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Preface

Surprisingly little has been written in our generation about the United Empire Loyalists. One gap which has particularly struck me is the lack of any single narrative account attempting to cover in detail both the wartime experiences and the postwar settlement of those United Empire Loyalists who came to Ontario. This book is a modest attempt to rectify that lack by combining some original research with a synthesis of existing sources. I hope that its many illustrations will help the reader to catch the flavour of the period and that the book will be of interest both to the general reader and to the scholar.

I have entailed many debts in the preparation of this work. I should like to thank the Ontario Ministry of Culture and Recreation who commissioned an earlier report on this subject as a background paper. In particular I owe a debt to Mr. Lorne Ste. Croix of the Ministry who has been a great aid to me in all stages of the production of the work. I wish to thank the Ontario Heritage Foundation who have given a substantial grant towards the publication of this book and my own institution, the Public Archives of Canada, for a short leave period to research my manuscript. The following institutions and their staffs have been most helpful to me in my research: the Public Archives of Canada; the Archives of Ontario; the Sigmund Samuel Collection of the Royal Ontario Museum; the Baldwin Room of the Metropolitan Toronto Library; the National War Museum; the Niagara Historical Society; the National Gallery of Canada; the State Historical Society of Wisconsin; the John Carter Brown Library, Brown University; the Connecticut Historical Society; the National Gallery of Art, Washington; the St. Catharines Historical Museum; and the William L. Clements Library.

I wish to thank Kirk Howard, my publisher, who has put a great deal of effort into this book and Ron Rochon who has been responsible for its design. Diane Mew, my editor, has made a number of suggestions that have greatly improved the work. P. J. Lloyd prepared the maps. I owe a special thanks to my mother-in-law, Edna Mellor, and my wife, Mary sue Wilson, who have typed the manuscript. Finally, my thanks to my wife and children who have patiently endured the cuts into our limited leisure time that this book has made.

Bruce Wilson

London, England,

December 1981.