The War In The North Part 2


The original settlers in the St. John Valley were Acadians, Brayons, who were nominally British subjects, but considered themselves, at least in their hearts, to be citizens of the Republique du Madawaska, which comprised the northwestern corner of New Brunswick within the disputed region. The more recent settlers to the Aroostook Valley were Americans coming up from the south.
In 1825, one such settler, John Baker, petitioned to have the area annexed to the State of Maine. To this end, he and his wife raised a homemade American flag at the junction of Baker Brook (named later for him) and the St. John River, which is now in the town of Ft. Kent. On August 10 he and a few others announced their intention to establish a formal Republic of Madawaska. Acting swiftly, the local British magistrate had Baker arrested on charges of conspiracy and sedition and jailed for two months until his fine of £25 was paid. And so passed the attempt at creating a separate republic. However in 1938 a flag was designed, which hangs in the city hall of Edmundston, NB, and the mayor assumes the honorary title of President of the Republic of Madawaska.
Meanwhile, in New Hampshire a similar situation developed on that state’s northern border, where the boundary was also in dispute. With both Canada and the United States sending in tax and debt collectors, the citizens formed the Republic of Indian Stream to stop it. In 1835, in response to a request from the Republic’s congress, the New Hampshire militia moved in and occupied the area. This request had followed an incident in which some of the Indian Streamers had “invaded” Canada to rescue a fellow citizen arrested for unpaid debt at a local hardware store. In the process, the “invaders” shot up the local judge’s home. Horrified, the British ambassador in Washington negotiated a settlement, and in 1840, the Republic of Indian Stream entered the U.S. as the town of Pittsburg, NH.
Back in Maine, as winter closed in, farmhands, freed from that work entered the woods as lumberjacks, becoming a source of contention as both Maine and Massachusetts moved to protect their resources.
In 1830, in an attempt to ease the growing tensions, the U.S. and British governments asked William, the King of Holland to arbitrate the dispute and develop a border suitable to both sides. His solution, which ironically, was very similar to the current border was accepted by the British, but rejected by Maine and Massachusetts because it gave away territory inhabited by tax paying Americans. As an incentive, to offset the loss, the Federal government offered one million acres from the territory that was to become Michigan. What Maine would have done with that if accepted can only be left to conjecture. And so the dispute remained unresolved.

The War In The North Part 1

If you journey to the roof of Maine, The County, as the residents proudly call it, the traveler is greeted by endless forest or rolling farmland reaching to the horizon. Across the rivers and valleys to the north and east nestle the farms and villages of New Brunswick. The people, be they Franco speakers or English tinge their accent with a Canadian lilt. The broad “A” and dropped “R” of what stereotypes Maine speech are absent. In this friendly and peaceful place it is hard to think that approximately 170 years ago the military might of Great Britain and the United States was in readiness to turn Aroostook County into a war zone.
The 1783 Treaty of Paris ending the Revolutionary War left the northern border between Maine, New Hampshire and Canada in doubt. Some interpretations brought the Maine border close to the St. Lawrence River Valley, which would have made land communication between the Maritime Provinces and the rest of Canada difficult. Others brought the border south of the St. John River into what is now Northern Maine. In 1815, after the British withdrawal from eastern Maine at the end of the War of 1812, a collaborative survey was accomplished to determine the eastern border of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts’ District of Maine and Canada along the St. Croix River. (See July-October 2010 Harpswell Anchor)
After the separation of Maine from Massachusetts in 1820, the latter still had claim to 50% of the public land in the disputed northern territory. In 1825 both states had agents in the area issuing timber permits, taking censuses and recording births, deaths and marriages in the St. John Valley.
Then in October of that year tragedy of epic proportions struck the region in the form of the Miramichi Fire, one of the three largest ever recorded in North America. 1825 had been a particularly dry year, and a Massachusetts timber agent traveling through the area recorded that it was initially sparked by lightning. A firestorm swept through New Brunswick destroying one third of the homes in Fredericton, and on October 7 the town of Newcastle (now Miramichi) was almost totally destroyed with only 12 out of 260 buildings left standing. Many residents took refuge, along with their livestock in the Miramichi River, but when the flames subsided 160 people were dead including the prisoners in the local jail. Estimates of casualties, including lumberjacks caught in its path were set at 3,000 souls, and 20% of New Brunswick’s forest was destroyed. The Provincial Governor’s journal noted that the damage was so extensive, the province’s very survival would come from timber in the disputed area to the west.
To be continued