Lake Ontario shore ca. 1793. Pen and paper sketch by Elizabeth Simcoe.
On May 6, 1796, Captain William Mayne, a member of the Queen’s Rangers, became the first official landowner in Scarborough.
Mayne was granted 500 acres of Crown land in Birch Cliff, on the east side of today’s Birchmount Rd., from Lake Ontario to St. Clair Avenue.
At the time, the land was identified as lots 29 and 30, concessions A and B of Scarborough Township.
Mayne, who was only 20 years old in 1796, was a former aide and companion to Elizabeth Simcoe, wife of John Graves Simcoe, the first Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada.
More significantly, despite his youth Mayne became the first commander of the garrison at Amherstberg, a strategic military defense post on the Detroit River.
According to the book “The People of Scarborough: A History”, Captain Mayne never actually lived in Scarborough and may have been something of a land speculator:
“In the years that following 1793 various shrewd government and army officers, citizens of York and others, obtained from the Crown generous grants of land in the Township of Scarborough, not with a view to their immediate settlement but to hold for future use or sale at profit.”
The book cites the newspaper The Upper Canada Gazette as reporting on Dec. 21, 1796 that Mayne had not picked up his grant and returned to England in the summer of 1797 having “neither lived on nor showed any interest in his Scarborough properties”.
Second patent holder killed in duel
The second official landowner in Scarborough was Upper Canada’s first Attorney-General, John White, who was awarded a land patent in August, 1796. White’s grant of 1,130 acres also included land in Birch Cliff, but it’s not known exactly where.
It appears that White was not enamored with life in the colony as he wrote letters home to England complaining about pretty much everything and describing himself as “Banished, solitary, hopeless, planted in the desert … disappointed – and without prospect….”
White was killed on Jan. 3, 1800 in a duel with John Small, clerk of the Executive Council of Upper Canada, over petty grievances involving their wives.
Below are photographs of what Capt. Mayne’s land looks like today – 220 years after the land patent was granted.
Harrison Estate Park, behind the Scarborough Arts building, overlooking Lake Ontario.
Birchmount Park, behind the collegiate.
This is article is part of a “Today in History” series commemorating the upcoming 100th anniversary celebration of Birch Cliff Public School, which is taking place on Sept. 23/24, 2016. To see other articles click here: 1927, 1929, 1935, 1935, 1951, 1993.
