uch a distance they
never can hope for any, and I should think myself highly culpable,
were I not to endeavor to settle nearer to the metropolis, or to some
place where I can attend to this necessary duty."

Major Thomas Menzies, of the Loyal American Legion, writes on March
2d, 1784: "I drew Block No 10 for the Corps under my command, which
commences 48 miles above St. Anns, so that whatever becomes of me, it
would be wildness to think of carrying my family there for the
present."

We get a glimpse of the distress and perplexity of the men of the
loyal regiments in one of Edward Winslow's letters to Ward Chipman. "I
saw all those Provincial Regiments, which we have so frequently
mustered, landing in this inhospitable climate, in the month of
October, without shelter and without knowing where to find a place to
reside. The chagrin of the officers was not to me so truly affecting
as the poignant distress of the men. Those respectable sergeants of
Robinson's, Ludlow's, Cruger's, Fanning's, etc.,--once hospitable
yeomen of the Country--were addressing me in language which almost
murdered me as I heard it. 'Sir, we have served all the war, your
honor is witness how faithfully. We were promised land; we expected
you had obtained it for us. We like the country--only let us have a
spot of our own, and give us such kind of regulations as will hinder
bad men from injuring us.'"

A great many of the disbanded soldiers drew lots at Parrtown in the
Lower Cove district. Some of them spent their first winter in canvas
tents on the Barrack square. They thatched their tents with spruce
boughs, brought in boats from Partridge Island, and banked them with
snow. Owing to the cold weather and the coarseness of the provisions,
salt meat, etc., the women and children suffered severely and numbers
died. They were buried in an old graveyard near the present deep water
terminus of the Intercolonial railway.

The last of the transports that sailed from New York to St. John, in
addition to her passengers--mostly women and children--carried an
assortment of clothing and provisions. The officer in charge was
Lieut. John Ward of the Loyal American Regiment, grandfather of
Clarence Ward, the well known secretary of the New Brunswick
Historical Society. There was not time to build even a hut, and
Mr. Ward was obliged to spend his first winter in the country under
canvas. His son, John Ward, jr., was born in a tent on the Barrack
square, Dec. 18,