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Saint Croix Courier, St. Stephen, NB
June 29, 1893

GLIMPSES OF THE PAST

Contributions to the History of Charlotte County and the Border Towns.

LXXIII – DR. WILLIAM PAINE.

Among the first of the Loyalists who sought grants of land at Passamaquoddy was Dr. William Paine, afterwards the first clerk of the house of assembly of New Brunswick.

Dr. Paine was born at Worcester, Mass., in 1750.  One of his teachers, before entering Harvard, was John Adams, afterwards president of the United States.  John Adams was at the time referred to a student in the office of Attorney General Putnam, of Massachusetts, a Loyalist who settled in St. John at the close of the war, and became a judge of the supreme court of New Brunswick.

In 1774, Wm. Paine was in Scotland, where he secured from Marischal College, Aberdeen, an honorary M. D.  He was soon after appointed apothecary to the British troops.  In 1782 he was admitted a Licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians of London; and, on his return to America, Sir Guy Carleton appointed him to a position in the army.

At the peace he went with the Loyalists to Halifax, and was retired on half pay.  While there he obtained a grant of LeTete Island,¹ in Passamaquoddy bay, and went there to live.  Writing from there in August, 1784, he says:-

My situation I like very much.  My lands are certainly well located, and if Mrs. Paine could content herself I should be well pleased.  Her objection is that the children cannot be properly educated.  The island will soon be a place of consequence, and ultimately the principal Port in British North America.  But to make my situation desirable requires capital.  My island must be stocked, boats must be employed in procuring lumber for the American and West India markets.

In 1785 Dr. Paine removed to St. John, and at the incorporation of that city was appointed by Governor Carleton alderman for Sidney Ward.  In the fall of that year he wrote that he was busy canvassing for a friend for a seat in the house of assembly for St. John, and expected himself to be elected one of the members for Charlotte.  His hopes were fulfilled in both instances.

At the opening of the legislature, Jan. 7, 1786, in St. John, Dr. Paine was appointed by the Governor Clerk of the House.

Dr. Paine was an active and useful citizen.  His interest in education is indicated by his presenting, in December, 1783, a memorial to the governor-in-council praying that a charter of incorporation be granted for the institution of a Provincial Academy of Arts and Sciences.  The memorial was duly considered Dec. 13th; and it was ordered that the attorney-general and the solicitor-general be directed with all convenient speed to prepare the draft charter for the establishment of the said institution.  The member for Charlotte was thus the one to initiate the movement to which we are indebted for our provincial university.

Dr. Paine was appointed, June 14, 1786, one of the commissioners of the New England Company (so called) for the education and Christianizing of the Indians.

In 1785, Sir John Wentworth, Surveyor General of Woods and Forests in the Province of Nova Scotia, and other his Majesty’s Territories in America, appointed Dr. Paine principal deputy for New Brunswick, ‘to survey, inspect, and examine the lands and timber growing, and carefully to register such white pine trees as may be now or hereafter fit for the use of the Royal Navy.’

In the summer of 1883 Mrs. Sturgis, a grand daughter of Dr. Paine, visited St. John.  Standing with her alongside the Putnam tomb, in the old burial ground, the late J. W. Lawrence heard her relate an incident in the history of her great-grandmother, the mother of Dr. Paine:-

At a dinner party at Worcester, about the time of the commencement of the Revolution, the host (Dr. Paine’s father) proposed the health of ‘The King,’ some of the Whigs declined to honor it, but Mr. Adams requested them to comply, saying we shall have an opportunity to return the compliment.  When asked to propose a toast he gave ‘The Devil,’ which Mr. Paine was about to resent, when his wife quietly remarked, ‘My dear as the gentleman has been so kind as to drink the health of the King, let us by no means refuse to drink to his friend.’

After the repeal of the banishment act, Dr. William Paine returned to Worcester, where he resided in the old homestead till his death, in 1833, at the age of 84 years.

Mr. Lawrence records that at the commencement of the war of 1812, Dr. Paine was called on by the British government to report for service; but, as he did not wish to fight against friends among whom he had resided for twenty-five years, he resigned his commission, losing his half-pay, and was afterwards naturalized a citizen of the United States.

In the rooms of the N. B. Historical Society, at St. John, is a fine engraving of Dr. Paine, taken in early manhood.²  It was presented to the society May 1st, 1884, by a grandson of the old Loyalist, George Sturgis Paine.

Mr. Lawrence, in a MS., says that a descendant of Dr. John Califf, with others, purchased from Dr. Paine the Island of LeTete in 1822.

¹ Now Fry’s Island.

² Our illustration, taken from this engraving, first appeared in the St. John Globe of March 7, 1889, to accompany an article on the Clerks of the House of Assembly by the late J. W. Lawrence.  We are indebted to the publishers of the Globe for its use.

Correction: Article LXXX contains the following correction to this one: "The date of the petition for the establishment of a 'School of liberal arts and science' should be 1785, (not 1783.) The original draft, in Dr. Paine's writing, was in the possession of a descendant, Nathaniel Paine, of Worcester, Mass., a few years since; and is probably still in existence. It pleads 'the situation in which the Loyalist Adventurers here find themselves. Many of them upon removing here had sons whose time of life and former hopes call for an immediate attention to their education.'"