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Unpublished Letters of Governor

Simcoe

By W. R.

OR one who played as prominent

a part as did John Graves Sim-
coe in the life of his country, as sol-
dier, statesman and administrator, less
is known than either the situation or
the parts of the man demand. In
his very admirable book dealing with
the first Governor-General of Canada,
in the series ‘‘Makers of Canada,”’
Dunean Campbell Scott has given
some interesting details of the life,
sayings and doings of Governor Sim-
coe; but despite the book’s excellence
and fullness, one feels it were a pity
that more had not been said, if it were
possible. The fact is, however, that
for one of his force, character and
position, Governor Simcoe was singu-
larly retiring—whether as General in
the English army operating against
the United States, whether as member
of the Imperial Parliament, or
whether, coming nearer home, as the
first Governor of Upper Canada. It
is for the purpose, therefore, of shed-
ding such further light on his charac-
ter, as contradistinguished from his
exploits, that the present writer now
presents five heretofore unpublished
personal letters of Governor Simcoe.
The letters are the property of Mrs.
C. C. Secombe, of Minneapolis, the
mother of the author’s wife, having
come down to her as the direct des-
cendant (great granddaughter) of
Christopher Saur, to whom they were
addressed. Mr. Saur himself was the
son of the well-known Christopher

402

GIVENS

Saur (or Sower, as the family spelled
the name) who, graduating from one
of the German universities, settled in
America and, as a publisher, printed
the first Diamond Edition of the
Bible, the first or second ever printed
in English in America. The gon, to
whom the Simeoe letters are address-
ed, was one of the United Empire
Loyalists whose property in Phila-
delphia, valued at some $75,000, was
confiscated and who subsequently
moved to Nova Scotia, of which Pro-
vince he later became Postmaster-
General. He was active always in
seeking to secure compensation for
the loyal Englishmen who, because of
their loyalty, suffered the confisca-
tion of their property and presented,
under Governor (then General) Sim-
coe’s advice several petitions to the
Home Government on behalf of him-
self and many others.

‘The Simeoe letters are typical and
not only bear out strikingly the san-
guine, buoyant, Christian, kindly tem-
perament of Governor Simcoe, but
they show that his motto, “Non sibi
sed patriae,’’ was fully lived up to.
Yet it may be doubted whether it is ab-
solutely true, as Mr. Scott in his book
Says is the case, that Governor Sim-
coe “‘never wavered in his opinion
that the war of the Revolution was
forced on Great Britain, and he serv-
ed in the army from principle and not
alone because such service was his
duty.’”” Rather, certain paragraphs