Ortonville, New Brunswick

Ortonville
Community
Ortonville
Coordinates: 46°57′29″N 67°40′48″W / 46.95806°N 67.68000°W / 46.95806; -67.68000Coordinates: 46°57′29″N 67°40′48″W / 46.95806°N 67.68000°W / 46.95806; -67.68000
Country  Canada
Province  New Brunswick
County Victoria County
Time zone Atlantic (AST) (UTC−4)
 • Summer (DST) ADT (UTC−3)
Area code(s) 506

Ortonville is an unincorporated farming community located at a bend of the Saint John River seven miles south of Grand Falls, New Brunswick. It is on the west side of the river, 5.7km north, north east of Limestone, New Brunswick.[1] Geographical coordinates are 46°57'29" North and 67°40'48" West.[2]

History

Lt. Joseph Bouchette

The earliest[3] British, and probably the earliest European, settlement at or very near Ortonville was across the river at Salmon River Settlement. In May 1814 British North American surveyor-general Joseph Bouchette settled two military families here at the direction of Governor Sir George Prevost. Sensitive to the presence of the recently hostile United States nearby, Prevost wanted a communication route from Fredericton to Upper and Lower Canada to serve as an alternative if the St. Lawrence River were to freeze. The two settled families at the Salmon River had been disbanded from the Tenth or Fourth Royal Veteran's Battalion and together with other military settlers formed a series of widely dispersed stations along the Saint John River. Three families were here by 1817.[4]

Early families included Hitchcock, McLaughlin, and Gallagher[5] who settled here before Ortonville received a name separate from the Salmon River Settlement.[6] The Benjamin Hitchcock, Jr., family petitioned for land here in 1862,[7] and settled here by 1865.[8]

A post office was located in private homes of six different postmasters between 1883 and 1964, all members of the Gallagher, Hitchcock, and McLaughlin families.[9] "In 1898 Ortonville was a flag station on the Canadian Pacific Railway and a settlement with a population of 75."[10]

A cable ferry was located here in the first half of the twentieth century. Perley Hitchcock and then George Gallagher ran a small store at the foot of the ferry hill on the Albert Victor Hitchcock farm in the 1920s and 1930s.

There was a two room schoolhouse in the 1930s and 1940s. The Ortonville Baptist church[11] was organized in 1861[12]

Name

The name Ortonville was in use by June 1886 when "Ortenville" native John Renfrew Hitchcock's marriage was reported in the Saint John Daily Telegraph.[13]

There is only circumstantial evidence that this community was named after Canada's first olympian, George Orton, whose prominence as a middle-distance runner was established at approximately the same time as Ortonville was named. The unknown railway official who named it may not have known Orton was Canadian.[14] However neither Rayburn[15] nor Ganong[16] had an alternative explanation.

Notable people

See also

References

  1. ↑ Provincial Archives of New Brunswick, "Place Names of New Brunswick", "Ortonville" "Ortonville" accessed 31 March 2012
  2. ↑ "Ortonville, New Brunswick Maps" accessed 31 March 2012
  3. ↑ Joseph Bouchette, "1815 Map of the route from Halifax to Riviere du Loup", (W. Faden, London, August 1815) as found at C. Gagnon, www.upperstjohn.com, accessed 2 April 2012. Note the reference to "RVB Settlers - Salmon Rr" in the detail from the map
  4. ↑ Mori Hillman, "David Anderson" accessed 1 April 2012. The Tenth was renumbered as the Fourth shortly before disbanding.
  5. ↑ Provincial Archives of New Brunswick, Cadestral map,"Place Names of New Brunswick", "Ortonville" accessed 31 March 2012
  6. ↑ Provincial Archives of New Brunswick, "Hutchinson Directories" , accessed 1 April 2012
  7. ↑ Provincial Archives of New Brunswick, "RS108 :: Index to Land Petitions: Original Series, 1783-1918" Microfilm F6649, 1862 accessed 1 April 2012
  8. ↑ Provincial Archives of New Brunswick, "Hutchinson Directories" , accessed 1 April 2012
  9. ↑ Library and Archives Canada, "Post Offices and Post Masters - Ortonville" accessed 1 April 2012. The last postmistress, the late Mrs. Muriel Merritt, was daughter of Albert Victor Hitchcock and great granddaughter of Benjamin Hitchcock, Jr.
  10. ↑ Provincial Archives of New Brunswick, "Place Names of New Brunswick", "Ortonville" accessed 31 March 2012
  11. ↑ "Bruce C. Stark" In: "Memorials", JETS 35/1 (March 1992) 140-142, accessed 13 April 2012
  12. ↑ Ortonville Baptist Sign accessed 13 April 2012
  13. ↑ Provincial Archives of New Brunswick, "Daniel F Johnson's New Brunswick Newspaper Vital Statistics" accessed 6 April 2012.
  14. ↑ "George Orton" accessed 31 March 2012
  15. ↑ Alan Rayburn, Geographical Names of New Brunswick (Ottawa, 1972)
  16. ↑ W.F. Ganong, A Monograph on the Place - Nomenclature of the Province of New Brunswick, part of a series known as Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada (1896)
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