Jesse Tarzwell - Land Grant Petition (1829)

Please note that the copyright for this material remains with Library and Archives Canada. I have obtained a worldwide permission to display this material on my flickr website.

 

This Land Grant Petition does seem to confirm what has been passed down in the family – that Jesse Tarzwell was an English soldier who was wounded at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. In the application Jesse states that he was a private soldier of the 1st Foot Regiment. It is recorded here, www.britishbattles.com/waterloo/waterloo-casualties.htm that the 1st Foot Regiment fought at the Battle of Waterloo and had fifteen officers and one hundred and twenty-eight men killed and wounded. My understanding is that there were only about 23,000 British troops at the Battle of Waterloo. From what I have read the 1st Foot Regiment was also known as the Royal Scots. Jesse’s association with Chelsea Hospital would confirm that he was wounded. The Royal Hospital Chelsea, located in the Chelsea region of central London, England, is described here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Hospital_Chelsea.

 

There is a bit of a mystery in the Petition. According to the Petition, Jesse emigrated to the Colony six years before he made his land petition (i.e. in 1823) and it states that during that six years he married. I had always previously assumed that he had married in England before he emigrated. I have a feeling that he had a woman follow him here from England which would sort of be the same thing but the possibility is certainly raised that he met a woman here in Canada that he married. This would not be in keeping with the family’s oral history however which states that Jesse Tarzwell was the first of our ancestors to emigrate to Canada. At present I do not know either the given or maiden name of Jesse Tarzwell's wife or where she may have come from.

 

The Petition appears to have been prepared by a lawyer or perhaps some other learned person and affixed with Jesse’s signature. I have found it somewhat hard to understand in places and have done my best to transcribe it below. York is the former name of Toronto, Ontario.

 

 

To His Excellency

Sir John Colbourne (H,C,B,?) Lieutenant-Governor of the Province of Upper Canada and Major General commanding His Majesty’s Forces

 

Therein ? ? ?

 

Incouncil

 

The Petition of Jesse Tarzwell of the Township of Erin, in the County of Halton, in the District of ________, Pensioner,

 

Humbly ___________,

 

That your petitioner is a discharged private soldier from the 1st Rgt. of Foot and an out pensioner of Chelsea Hospital. ___________ which he receives from the proper office at this ____________ the directions of the Lords and Commissioners of said hospital.

 

That your petitioner emigrated at his own expense from England about six years ago to this colony with a view of settling therein since which period of time he got married and has a young family to support by his honest industry in addition to his small allowance of pension.

 

That your petitioner has not heretofor made application for land in this colony and being desirous of applying himself to the improvement and culture of wild land such as may be set apart for the location of claimants of his description. Therefore most humbly beseacheth your Excellency to make him a gratuitous grant of the usual allowance heretofore bestowed on disbanded soldiers of his description.

 

And as in duty bound with war pray (That's what it looks like to me anyway.)

Jesse Tarzwell

 

York, 25th March 1829

 

I have also found the following information from the National Archives of England:

 

Royal Hospital Chelsea: Soldiers Service Documents WO 97/237/60

JESSE TARGWELL Born MARK, Somerset Served in 1st Foot Regiment Discharged aged 25 . JESSE TARGWELL Born MARK, Somerset Served in 1st Foot Regiment Discharged aged 25 1st Foot: Sta - Twi

Date: 1813 - 1818

Source: The Catalogue of The National Archives

 

 

Royal Hospital, Chelsea: Discharge Documents of Pe... WO 121/220/109

JESSE TARGWELL. Born [Not Known]. Served in 1st Foot Regiment . Discharged aged [Not Known]. Original certificate of discharge missing. See film image 107. . JESSE TARGWELL. Born [Not Known]. Served in 1st Foot Regiment . Discharged aged [Not Known]. Original

Date: 1830

Source: The Catalogue of The National Archives

 

Jesse has signed his name Targwell on the Land Petition document as well. Somehow over the years the name has changed to Tarzwell. More information may become available since it is presently in the process of being digitized.

 

Jesse would have been thirty-seven years old when he applied for land in the then colony of Upper Canada.

 

I came across this on the Internet:

 

"During the Napoleonic Wars the (Royal Scots) Regiment was increased to a strength of four battalions. The 1st Battalion spent the entire period of the war in the Americas and the 2nd Battalion took part in the capture of Egypt (1801), then moved to the West Indies (1803-05), before travelling to India, the first time that any part of the Regiment had been there. They were to stay until 1831. In contrast the 3rd and 4th Battalions remained in Europe, with the 4th Battalion on home service until 1812 supplying drafts for the other three battalions. The 3rd Battalion first saw action at Corunna in 1808 and then took part in the Peninsular War. There followed the Battles of Quatre Bras and Waterloo which cost the battalion 363 casualties out of a strength of 624. Two years later it was disbanded; the 4th Battalion having suffered a similar fate the previous year."

 

It follows that Jesse Tarzwell was in the 3rd Battalion of the 1st Regiment of Foot or the Royal Scots and that he also likely saw action at the Battle of Quatre Bras which was fought just two days before the Battle of Waterloo. Three hundred and sixty-three casulaties out of a strength of six hundred and twenty-four (fifty-eight per cent) would appear to be a rather high casualty rate

 

And another snippet from the Internet:

 

"The following year, the 3rd Battalion the Royal Scots participated in the historic battle of Quatre-Bras and they were also engaged at Waterloo, where they recaptured from the French one of the key positions on the battlefield, the farmhouse of La Haye Sainte."

 

Postscript (September 2017)

 

Some months ago I was contacted by a chap whose surname was Tarzwell and whose grandfather had come from Hillsburgh. He stated that he could not say for sure that Jesse Tarzwell was one of his forebears but given that his grandfather came from Hillsburgh my feeling is that he is almost certainly descended from Jesse Tarzwell.

 

Regardless he stated that he had done a paper on Jesse Tarzwell some twenty years previously while he was attending university and he gave me some information he had uncovered while researching the paper. He stated that the information came from the Archives of Canada and from a lady in Ann Arbour, Michigan. He encouraged me to contact this lady in Ann Arbour and I did make some attempts to find a phone number but to no avail. He, himself, had not spoken to this woman for twenty years, so I assumed in the meantime she had moved, or had obtained an unlisted number or perhaps passed on.

 

Regardless he gave me information that I found interesting and I very much thank him for providing this information. The information is as follows:

 

•Jesse married a lady called Mary Mariah Ried in Kingston On in the late 1820's.

 

•She appears on the Censuses in 1850 from Hillsborough (sic), ON, which is just outside of Erin, ON.

 

•Mary was born in Ireland, as indicated on the census picture. They met in Kingston.

 

•Jesse looked for land around Perth - Perth Military Settlement, and Kingston, before settling in Erin.

 

•Jesse was an out pensioner from Chelsea, which means he had a monthly pension. What happened is it didn't follow him to Canada, and the records mostly relate to his years of pleading to have it started, and then after it was reinstated, more pleading for his back pay, which was never granted.

 

Some two hundred years later I have to admit to some pangs of sympathy for my ancestor given that it seems he never received his back pay.

 

I was rather glad to get the information regarding Mary Mariah Ried as I previously knew nothing of her. She may have been born in Ireland but Ried (or as it is more commonly spelled, Reid) is a Scottish surname and was common around Aberdeen in Scotland according to the limited research I have done.

 

Once again I thank my Tarzwell benefactor for taking the time to send me this information.

 

 

 

Done