Person Page - 678

They traveled to Edmonton after the deaths of their daughter and son-in-law. They probably took their three grandchildren back to Ontario at this time since they then raised them as their own.¹⁰

Arthur Johnston must have visited his brothers, John and Will, in Collingwood Township as it was there he met Lavina Shore. He also visited at his mother's sisters, the Dixon home in Listowel. He worked as hired help on farms near Clinton and Seaforth.

In the tall of 1879, he bought a 100 acre farm near Fordwich, Lot 24, Concession 5 (Fourth line) Howick Township from Jack Warren. He took possession in the spring of 1880 when he came with team and sleigh from Pickering Township. A short time later his sister, Min, came to keep house for him and remained until Arthur and Lavina were married, October 7, 1885. The family of four daughters and four sons were born there.⁹

BODY OF J. JOHNSON SENT TO THORNBURY
Deceased Was Former Resident of Moose Jaw
Leaves Four Daughters and One Son
(By Staff Correspondent.)
MOOSE JAW, Aug. 13.
The body of John Johnston, formerly of Kolapore, Ontario, but for some years a resident of Moose Jaw, has been sent to Ontario for burial. The funeral will take place at Thornbury. Ont., tomorrow. Mr. Johnston died August 9.

The body was accompanied by the only son of deceased, R. H. Johnston, of Kerrobert.

The late Mr. Johnston was born in Pickering township, Ontario, in 1848, and was of Irish parentage. The greater part of his life was spent in Ontario. For many years the deceased was a business partner of T. B. White, now of Parry Sound, Ont., in the firm of Johnston and White Hoop and Stave Co., at Kolapore, Ont. Mr. Johnston retired from active business life in 1913.

Besides a large number of friends and acquaintances, Mr. Johnston leaves to mourn him four daughters, one son, four brothers and two sisters. The daughters are: Mrs. A. W. Hamwood. Ermine, Sask; Mrs. T. E. Allcock, Moose Jaw; Mrs. Rev. A. E. Elliott, Milden, Sask; and Mrs. C. F. McClelland, Regina. The son is Mr. Robert Johnston, of Kerrobert, Sask.

The sisters are Mrs. David Russell, Clairemont, Ont., and Mrs. Hy. Russell, of Bodmure, N.D. The brothers are: Wm. F. and Arthur Johnston, of Thornbury, Ont; Thomas Johnston, Gorrie, Ont., and Lance Johnston, Brougham, Ont.¹³

John Johnston came to Collingwood Township as a young man in the early seventies and located on the south half of Lot 18, Concession 11. His sister Sarah Jane, kept house for him until he married Elizabeth White, who lived in the area. She was the assistant teacher at the nearby school. Here the family of four daughters and one son were born.

After farming for almost twenty years, John sold his farm and moved to Kolapore. He joined the firm, Johnston, White and Company, a partnership formed a few years earlier by his brother, Will, and brother--in-law, T. B. White. Will moved to Heathcote in 1895, John and T. B. White continued in business until 1913 when the partnership was dissolved and John retired.

At this time, Rhoda, the youngest daughter, and, her father followed the rest of the family to Saskatchewan where Rhoda entered Regina Hospital to train for a nurse and her father made his home in Moose Jaw with his daughter Ethel and. her husband, Thomas Allcock. John Johnston died Aug. 9, 1923. Elizabeth Johnston predeceased him Feb. 21, 1904.
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According to "An Illustrated History of Collingwood Township" Thomas McIlfaterick gave John Johnston a clay pot he found in a cave on his land. It is about 1,000 years old, one of the oldest found in Ontario. John later gave it to E. Frances White who passed it on to the new museum in Toronto (later the Royal Ontario Museum) in 1895.¹¹

Mrs. John Johnston
It becomes our painful duty this week to record the demise of Mrs. John Johnston of Kolapore, after an illness of only a few days. She was the daughter of the late T. B. White, whose sudden death a few years ago startled the whole community and filled it with regret.

Mrs. John Johnston was a woman of bright and cheerful disposition, tireless energy and complete forgetfulness of self when the sick were to be nursed or a friend needed her assistance. Many a sick room in the vicinity of her home will in the future ,miss her presence and ministering care. By her genial disposition she endeared herself to all who had the privilege of her acquaintance. Having had a great deal of sickness in her own family, it is no doubt greatly due to her own tireless nursing that she has been able, so far, to have kept the family circle complete.

There survive her, her mother, Mrs. T. B. White of Collingwood, three sisters-Miss Myrtle White of Collingwood, Mrs. Wm. Johnston of Thornbury, and Mrs. Clifford Sine of Cobden;also five brothers-Messrs. T. B. White of Kolapore, George P. White of Idaho, Jas. L. White of Duncan, E. F. White of Cincinnati, Ohio, Robert H. White of Napinka, Man. and Bert White of Rochester, N.Y. She leaves, besides her sorrowing husband, 5 children,-Misses Sophia, Ethel, Mabel and Rhoda and Master Rob.

To the bereaved ones, we, in common with the whole community, extend our most sincere sympathy.¹⁸

In July, 1919, my brother Arthur Harold Johnston visited Northern Ireland and with the aid of the number of the Orange Lodge No. 1709, obtained from a Certificate of Membership dated Feb. 4, 1836, that belonged to Oliver Johnston, was able to locate the lodge. This established the fact that Oliver Johnston, who came to Canada in 1837 and settled in Pickering Township, was the Oliver Johnston of Lankill near Enniskillen. This lodge, which originally met at Lankhill two miles from Enniskillen, now meets at Culky a short distance away.

On page 7 and 8 she continued:

Oliver Johnston, son of Arthur Johnston Was born in 1803 at Lankhill, about two miles from Enniskillen, County of Fermanah, Northern Ireland. Here he spent his boyhood.

In the spring of 1837, he was on the Atlantic on his way to Canada and his brother, Lancelot, was on his way to Australia. This voyage took sixteen weeks. On his arrival June 22, he made his way to Pickering Township. He located on the south half of Lot 16 Concession 6, 100 acres, a short distance east of Brougham. He met Elizabeth Smith of Lot 15 Concession 6 and in 1847 they were married.

A stone house and frame barn were built and here the family of five sons and five daughters were born. The youngest daughter, Alzina, died at the age of nine months, the others all attended the Greenwood school, 5.8. No. 9, Pickering, and the Methodist Church.

During the years that followed two sons, John and Will, and daughter, Sarah, established homes of their own in Collingwood Township, Grey County; two sons, Arthur and Thomas, located in Howick Township, Huron County; two daughters married Russell brothers from a nearby farm. A few years later, Sophia and Henry Russell moved to Bottineau, North Dakota, USA. Martha and David Russell made their home on Lot 15 Concession 7 Pickering Township.

Oliver Johnston died in March 1897. A daughter, Mary Ann, died, two months later on May 23rd. Lancelot, the youngest son, remained on the farm with his mother. She passed away Feb. 27, 1908.

Elisabeth Smith's parents, Elisabeth Bateman and Thomas Smith were born in Ireland 1797 and 1798 (Pickering Twp. census 1851). The Batemans and the Smiths may have brought their families to New Brunswick early in the 1800's or Elisabeth Bateman and Thomas Smith may have married in Ireland and, came to New Brunswick where all the family were born except William Henry, who was born in Upper Canada (Pickering Twp. census 1851).

A year or two before his death, father, Arthur Johnston wrote down the name of the place as he could recall it, where his mother, Elisabeth Smith, and her parents had come from in New Brunswick. He spelled it "Carshacton".

Some time in the early 1960's his grandson, Jim Johnston and family vacationed in New Brunswick. Jim tried to locate a place by this name. He could find no record of such a place or region. He then began to search for a place with a similar sounding name. He came up with Carleton County where some of the United Empire Loyalists had settled. There he found an old cemetery on the St. John River, about three miles south of Woodstock. One stone had the name Josiah Smith but he had no way of knowing if he were a relative. This cemetery was in the area that was to be flooded on the completion of the dam, which was under construction at that time.

I have no definite record of Elisabeth Bateman or Thomas Smith other than we know that they came from New Brunswick. They bought Lot 15, Concession 6, Pickering
Township in 1839. They were buried in Salem Cemetery near Greenwood.

The patent on the 200 acres in Lot 16, Concession 6 was taken out in 1828 by King's College. According to the deed of the south half of Lot 16, of which I have a copy, Oliver Johnston bought the south half consisting of 100 acres from the University of Toronto in 1854 for one hundred and fifty pounds, about $500 at that time.

In 1797, certain lands were set aside for the support of education. Other farms, Clergy Reserves, were set aside for the support of the Protestant Church. This system did not prove satisfactory. Lot 16 was one of these farms. This was the reason the University owned it. Many of these farms were bought by 1840 and all were bought by 1854.

When married, Elisabeth came from Lot 15 to Lot 16 so Oliver must have had it rented at that time. It is generally assumed he came to the farm much earlier perhaps shortly after his arrival from Ireland in 1837.⁴