Adeline Barclay (abt. 1853)

Ancestors

Biography

Adeline was born in about 1853 to Eli Barclay and Mary Harper.

"Few men were better known in the township during the first half of the nineteenth century than Elder George Barclay. He was a native of Cupar, Fifeshire, Scotland, and received his education at St. Andrew's University, after which he was ordained a minister of the Baptist Church. In 1801 he married Janet Tullis, and in 1816 came to Canada, being followed a year later by his wife and family. He purchased Lot 16 in the 6th Con. from Elizabeth Matthews and, building his log house, began the life of a pioneer. Much of his time was devoted to religious work. As early as 1821 he was laboring as the pastor of the first Baptist Church in Markham, and in that year a number of members seceded from the congregation because it favored a motion to pay him a stated salary. He traveled extensively through adjoining and even distant townships, ministering to the spiritual needs of the people. At a later period he was one of those who organized and helped forward the work of the Disciples Church on the Kingston Road. Mr. Barclay died in 1857, leaving a family of five sons and four daughters. Of his family the eldest son, George, took a somewhat active part in the political disturbances of 1837 and was as a consequence condemned to transportation, but was included in the amnesty afterwards proclaimed. He removed to the county of Middlesex, where he died in 1882. The second son, James, removed to Brooklin and afterwards to Oshawa, where he died in 1869, leaving ten children, one of whom, L. T. Barclay, is the well-known barrister and solicitor of Whitby. William, a third son, removed to Wisconsin, where one of his sons, David, became a County Judge. The two remaining sons, David L. and Eli G. Barclay, remained in Pickering. David died in 1903 and Eli, whose life was spent on the old homestead, in 1893. Of Eli's family four are still living, Elizabeth (Mrs. George Burton), whose son, E. F. Burton, B.A., is Demonstrator in Physics at Toronto University; Miss Adeline Barclay, of Brougham; John, of Owen Sound, and Charles A., who still lives on the homestead. Of Elder Barclay's daughters, Janet (Mrs. Randall Bentley) died in 1838. (One of her grandsons is the well-known writer, E. E. Sheppard). Betsy (Mrs, George Miller of Markham) died in 1871. Nancy (Mrs. Abraham Knowles, of Lot 20, B. F.), died in 1888, and Margaret (Mrs. Robert Barrie) died some years ago at Brougham." ^[1]

Sources

1. ↑ Past Years in Pickering: Sketches of the History of the Community, William R. Wood, 1911

• Canada Census, 1911: https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QV9Y-984C