John Galt’s dream: The building of the Huron Road

John Galt, who initiated the construction of the Huron Road. Contributed photo

By Paul Knowles

Anyone who looks at a present-day map of Wilmot Township will begin to understand the dual history of this municipality. The names of the communities in the northern part of the township denote direct connections with Germany – Hamburg, Baden, Mannheim and others. In the south, the German influence disappears and names appear that clearly have English language origins – New Dundee, Rosebank, Haysville, Pinehill and more.

The reason is rooted in history – most of the northern part of Wilmot was designated “The German Block,” and was settled by Amish and Mennonite newcomers led by Christian Nafziger, beginning in 1822. The German Block stretched the length of the present-day township, from east to west, and included everything from one lot of land north of Erb Street to one lot of land south of Bleams Road.

Meanwhile the extreme northern part of present-day Wilmot and everything south of the German Block was controlled by a group called The Canada Company, which was formed in London, England, in 1824, headed by John Galt, whose name is memorialized in the city of that name, now part of Cambridge.

Galt and his contemporaries were committed to expanding the British presence in southwestern Ontario, at least partly because the company was founded only a decade after the War of 1812-1814, and the British wanted to make their holdings more secure against any possible American incursions. So in 1827, a surveying party spent a month travelling from Guelph through Wilmot, exploring a possible new route for an important road intended to open up the land unoccupied by European settlers – but with typical disregard of Native Canadian land rights.

The initial groundwork done, in June, 1828, construction was begun on the 12-foot-wide road – called then and now the Huron Road – which was to run from Guelph to Goderich, and passing through the entire length of Wilmot, with the village of Haysville an important way station on the route.

Building a road involved hard, manual labour. Galt himself kept a journal, which includes this description of the project.

“All the woodmen that could be assembled from the settlers were directed to be employed, an explorer of the line to go at their head, then two surveyors with compasses, after that a gang of blazers or men to mark the trees in the line, then went the woodmen with their hatchets to fell the trees; and the rear was brought up by the wagons with provisions and necessaries. In this way, they proceeded simultaneously, cutting their way through the forest.”

This was clearly not easy work, though at times, oxen were used to haul the heaviest loads. But if no oxen were available, teams of men were the only option. The Huron Road was being built through what Galt describes as “the forests of the Huron tract.” And not only were the trees being felled to create an open route, many of them were being used in the roadway. Much of the Huron Road, especially when the route went through swampy areas, was built as a corduroy road, which guaranteed both a dryer passage and a much bumpier one.

Records show that the summer of 1828 was very rainy, which prevented any construction work about half the time, and which undoubtedly contributed to unhealthy working conditions, so much so that many workers came down with a type of malaria.

Galt, a Scottish entrepreneur and novelist, was the leader of The Canada Company, but the Huron Road project was more the responsibility of an intriguing character – Dr. William “Tiger” Dunlop, who was Galt’s right-hand man and officially “warden of the forests” for The Canada Company. Dunlop led the construction project.

Dunlop was also a writer, and a medical doctor, a politician, and a man with a fondness for practical jokes and alcohol. His personality is revealed in some of the bequests he made in his will.

For example, “I leave my silver tankard to the eldest son of old John, as the representative of the family. I would have left it to old John himself, but he would melt it down to make temperance medals, and that would be a sacrilege.”

He also bequeathed an item to his brother-in-law: “I leave Parson Chevasse the snuffbox I got from the Sarnia Militia, as a small token of my gratitude for the service he has done the family in taking a sister no man of taste would have taken.”

Eccentric, perhaps, but Dunlop – whose nickname, “Tiger,” related to his involvement in hunting expeditions during time spent in India – was also effective; the Huron Road was completed in short order, running 95 miles from Guelph to Goderich (where Dunlop lived for the rest of his days). Within about a decade of its completion, almost 6,000 newcomers from Europe – mostly, the United Kingdom – had settled in the Huron Tract.

The British presence is underlined by the fact that there were once three Anglican churches in close proximity – Christ Church Haysville (no longer a consecrated church); St. James, further west on the Huron Road (now a “chapel of ease” with a cemetery and occasional church services); and the still-functioning St. George’s in New Hamburg.

With the Huron Tract now open, initial settlers could receive a land grant of 50 acres on the condition they build a home and clear their land.

The construction of the Huron Road instantly made the community of Haysville an important centre. The new road became a major stagecoach route through southwestern Ontario; in the Castle Kilbride archives, there is an official stamp marked “Haysville U.C.” (Upper Canada) which would have been used by the stagecoach manager. It was identified in a Haysville home by this author and donated by the owner to Kilbride.

Today, it is not difficult to deduce that some of the larger family homes along the Huron Road in Haysville were, once upon a time, hotels and shops built to provide food and accommodation for stagecoach passengers and others travelling the Huron Road.

Records show that less than a decade after the Huron Road was completed, Haysville businesses included a post office, three mills, harness shops, a tannery, general stores, a shoe business, blacksmiths, carriage shops, a drug store, furniture factories, a cooper’s shop (for making barrels) and a tin shop.

Many years ago, a longtime resident of Haysville shared her personal scrapbook with this writer. It included a letter to the editor (date, publication and author unknown, except by the initials J.P.) that shared a vision of Haysville in its heyday:

“In 1835, the village had the promise of a satisfactory future. It was the chief stagecoach depot on the highway from Hamilton to Goderich. Here, the drivers changed their horses and put up for the day or night. The Huron Road was alive with traffic, for the upper districts were yearly receiving thousands of newcomers with their covered wagons, or houses on wheels. Its (Haysville’s) population grew to 500, with the stimulus of a flour mill and a woollen mill, supplied with power from the River Nith, provided work for a number of families.”

But that all changed less than 30 years after the Huron Road was completed. In 1856, a technological revolution hit Wilmot Township – the coming of the railroad. The new Grand Trunk Railway line, running from Guelph to Sarnia – which came through Wilmot, passing through Petersburg, Baden and New Hamburg – rendered stagecoach travel almost instantly redundant.

Growth of Haysville stopped almost completely and New Hamburg began to thrive. As the anonymous writer quoted above noted, “Then from the Haysville point of view, a catastrophy (sic) occurred. The Grand Trunk Railway surveyors elected to pass through New Hamburg. Haysville was side-tracked. Floods and fires destroyed the industries. One flood rising in its wrath swept away the bridge and even wrecked the famous Plum Tavern, as well as other properties.”

With the coming of the railway, Haysville was immediately eclipsed by New Hamburg and, in terms of significant travel routes, the Huron Road was replaced by the Grand Trunk Railway.

But both of those historic routes remain today – the original GTR tracks run through New Hamburg and the other communities of Wilmot, though the trains no longer stop in any of the towns or villages. And the Huron Road exists, though its original route has at times been superseded by more modern highways to the east and west of Wilmot.

But in the township itself, the route of Galt’s highway remains consistent with the road cut through the thick forests of south Wilmot two centuries ago.