| Annapolis Royal | |||
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| — Town — | |||
| Seaward view at Annapolis Royal | |||
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Annapolis Royal
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| Coordinates: | |||
| Country | Canada | ||
| Province | Nova Scotia | ||
| Municipality | Annapolis County | ||
| Founded | 1605 | ||
| Incorporated | November 29, 1892 | ||
| Electoral Districts Federal |
West Nova |
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| Provincial | Digby-Annapolis | ||
| Government | |||
| • Mayor | Phil Roberts | ||
| • Governing Body | Annapolis Royal Town Council | ||
| • MLA | Stephen McNeil (L) | ||
| • MP | Greg Kerr (C) | ||
| Area | |||
| • Total | 2.04 km2 (0.8 sq mi) | ||
| Elevation | 0-7 m (0-23 ft) | ||
| Population (2006) | |||
| • Total | 444 | ||
| • Density | 217.7/km2 (563.8/sq mi) | ||
| Demonym | Annapolitan | ||
| Time zone | AST (UTC-4) | ||
| Postal code | B0S | ||
| Area code(s) | 902 | ||
| Telephone Exchange | 526, 532 | ||
| Median Earnings* | $40,949 | ||
| NTS Map | 021A12 | ||
| GNBC Code | CAASF | ||
| Website | http://www.annapolisroyal.org/ | ||
| *Median household income, 2000 ($) (all households) | |||
Annapolis Royal (2006 population: 444) is a town located in the western part of Annapolis County, Nova Scotia. Known as Port Royal until the Conquest of Acadia in 1710 by Britain, the town is the oldest continuous European settlement in North America, north of St. Augustine, Florida.
The town was the capital of Acadia and later Nova Scotia for almost 150 years, until the founding of Halifax in 1749. It was attacked by the British six times before permanently changing hands after the Conquest of Acadia in 1710. Over the next fifty years, the French and their allies made six unsuccessful military attempts to regain the capital.
Including a raid during the American Revolution, Annapolis Royal faced a total of thirteen attacks, more than any other place in North America.[1]
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The original French settlement at Port Royal, known as the Habitation at Port-Royal, was settled in 1605 by François Gravé Du Pont, Samuel de Champlain, with and for Pierre Dugua, Sieur de Mons. This site is approximately 10 km (6.2 mi) west of present-day Annapolis Royal at the mouth of the Annapolis River on the Annapolis Basin. The first settlement was abandoned after being destroyed by English attackers in 1613.
Scottish settlers, under the auspices of Sir William Alexander, established their settlement, known as Charlesfort in 1629 at the mouth of the Annapolis River (present site of Annapolis Royal). The settlement was abandoned to the French under the terms of the Treaty of St. Germain-en-Laye in 1632. A second French settlement replaced the Scottish Charlesfort at present-day Annapolis Royal.[2] It was also called Port-Royal and it developed into the capital of the French colony of Acadia. Port-Royal under the French soon became self sufficient and grew modestly for nearly a century, though it was subject to frequent attacks and capture by British military forces or those of its New England colonists, only to be restored each time to French control by subsequent recapture or treaty stipulations. Acadia remained in French hands throughout most of the 17th century.
In 1710 Port Royal was captured a final time from the French at the 1710 Siege of Port Royal during Queen Anne's War, marking the British conquest of mainland Nova Scotia. The British renamed the town Annapolis Royal after Queen Anne (1665–1714), the reigning monarch. The name was formed by combining the queen's name 'Anne' with that of 'polis', the Greek word for city and taking part of the former French name Port-'Royal'. The Annapolis Basin, Annapolis River and the Annapolis Valley all take their name from the town. Under the French reign, Annapolis River had been known as Rivière Dauphin.
After success in the local Battle of Bloody Creek (1711), 600 Acadians and native warriors attempted to retake the Acadian capital. Under the leadership of Bernard-Anselme d'Abbadie de Saint-Castin they descended on Annapolis Royal and laid siege to Fort Anne. The garrison had fewer than 200 men, but the attackers had no artillery and were thus unable to make an impression on the fort.[3] They eventually dispersed, and Annapolis Royal remained in British hands for the remainder of the war.
Under the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, Acadia was granted to the British; however the vague boundary definitions saw only the peninsular part of Nova Scotia granted to Britain, and the next half century would be turbulent years as Britain and France acted out the final struggle for Acadia and North America.
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During Father Rale's War,[4] in July 1722 the Abenaki and Mi'kmaq attempted to create a blockade of Annapolis Royal, with the intent of starving the capital. The natives captured 18 fishing vessels and prisoners from present-day Yarmouth to Canso. They also seized prisoners and vessels from the Bay of Fundy.
In response to the New England attack on Father Rale at Norridgewock in March 1722, 165 Mi'kmaq and Maliseet troops gathered at Minas to lay siege to the Lt. Governor of Nova Scotia at Annapolis Royal.[5] Under potential siege, in May 1722, Lieutenant Governor John Doucett took 22 Mi'kmaq hostage at Annapolis Royal to prevent the capital from being attacked.[6] Massachuetts Governor Samuel Shute declared war on the Abenaki.
New Englanders retrieved some of the vessels and prisoners after the Battle at Winnepang (Jeddore Harbour), in which thirty-five natives were killed and five New Englanders. Other vessels and prisoners were retrieved at Malagash harbour after a ransom was paid.[7]
During Father Rale's War, the worst moment of the war for the capital came in early July 1724 when a group of sixty Mikmaq and Maliseets raided Annapolis Royal. They killed and scalped a sergeant and a private, wounded four more soldiers, and terrorized the village. They also burned houses and took prisoners.[8] The British responded by executed one of the Mi'kmaq hostages on the same spot the sergeant was killed. They also burned three Acadian houses in retaliation.[9]
As a result of the raid, three blockhouses were built to protect the town. The Acadian church was moved closer to the fort so that it could be more easily monitored.[10]
During King Georges War there were four attempts by the French, Acadians and Mi'kmaq to retake the capital of Acadia.[11]
Le Loutre gathered three hundred Mi'kmaq warriors together and began their assault on Annapolis Royal on July 12. This was the largest gathering of Mi'kmaw warriors to date to take arms against the British. The Mi'kmaq outnumbered the New Englanders regulars by three to one. Two New England regulars were captured and scalped.[12] The assault lasted for four days, when the fort was rescued on July 16 by seventy New England soldiers arriving on board the ship Prince of Orange.[13]
After spending the summer trying to recruit the assistance of Acadians, François du Pont Duvivier attacked Annapolis Royal on September 8. His force of 200 was up against 250 soldiers at the fort. The siege raged on for a week and then Duvivier demanded the surrender of the fort. Both sides waited for reinforcements by sea. The fighting continued for a week and then two ships did arrive - from Boston, not Louisbourg. On board the ship was New England Ranger John Gorham (military officer) and 70 natives. Duvivier retreated.[14]
In May 1745, Paul Marin de la Malgue led and 200 troops, hundreds of Mi'kmaq joined a siege against Annapolis Royal. This force was twice the size of Duvivier's expedition. During the siege the English pulled destroyed their own officers fences, houses and buildings that the attackers might be able to use.[15] The siege was ended quickly when Marin was recalled to assist with defending the French during the Siege of Louisbourg (1745).[16]
During the Siege, the Mi'kmaq and Maliseet took prisoner William Pote and some of Gorham's (Mohawk) Rangers. While at Cobequid, Pote reported that an Acadian said that the French soldiers should have "left their [the English] carcasses behind and brought their skins."[17] The following year, among other places, Pote was taken to the Maliseet village Aukpaque on the Saint John River. While at the village, Mi'kmaq from Nova Scotia arrived and, on July 6, 1745, tortured him and a Mohawk ranger from Gorham's company named Jacob, as retribution for the killing of their family members by Ranger John Gorham.[18] On July 10, Pote witnessed another act of revenge when the Mi'kmaq tortured a Mohawk ranger from Gorham's company at Meductic.[19]
Martin was not able to assist Louisbourg because he engaged in the Battle at Tatamagouche.
Led by Ramesay, the French land forces laid siege to Annapolis Royal for twenty-three days, awaiting naval reinforcements. They never received the assistance they required from the Duc d'Anville Expedition and were forced to retreat.[20]
During the Expulsion of the Acadians, on December 8, 1755, 32 Acadian families (225 prisoners) were deported from Annapolis Royal on the British ship Pembroke. The ship was headed for North Carolina. During the voyage, the Acadians took over the vessel. On February 8, 1756, the Acadians had sailed up the Saint John River as far as they could.[21] The Acadians disembarked and burned their ship. A group of Maliseet met them and directed them up stream, where they joined an expanding Acadian community.[22] The Maliseet took them to one of Charles Deschamps de Boishébert et de Raffetot's refugee camps for the fleeing Acadians, which was at Beaubears Island.[23]
In December 1757, while cutting firewood near Fort Anne, John Weatherspoon was captured by Indians (presumably Mi'kmaq) and carried away to the mouth of the Miramichi River. From there he was eventually sold or traded to the French and taken to Quebec, where he was held until late in 1759 and the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, when General Wolfe's forces prevailed.[24]
During the American Revolution, the 84th Regiment of Foot (Royal Highland Emigrants) were stationed at Annapolis Royal to guard Nova Scotia against American Privateers. On October 2, 1778, the 84th Regiment, was involved in the defeat of an American privateer at Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia. Captain MacDonald arrived at Annapolis in a ship, to find a large privateer ship raiding the port. He destroyed the privateer vessel, which mounted ten carriage guns.
Two months later, Captain Campbell of the 84th Regiment, in December 1778, took seven men with him to retrieve an American Privateer ship that was abandoned on Partridge Island, New Brunswick. They returned the ship safely to Annapolis Royal.[25]
However the 84th Regiment was transferred to the Carolinas in June 1780, leaving the town vulnerable to attack. On August 29, 1781, two large American privateer schooners attacked the undefended town. They imprisoned the men of the community in the fort and systematically looted houses in the town, even stealing window glass from the church. The privateers fled when reports arrived that the militia was assembling outside the town. The only death took place when the privateer's accidentally shot their own pilot. Two town residents were taken as hostages and later released on parole on promise of exchange for an American prisoner at Halifax.[26]
After the American Revolution, a flood of United Empire Loyalists arrived at Annapolis Royal. The Loyalist migration severely taxed the resources of the town for a time before many moved to found Loyalist settlements like nearby Digby and Clementsport while others stayed. Some such as Anglican minister Jacob Bailey remained in Annapolis Royal and became members of the town's elite. Many escaped slaves who fought for the British known as Black Loyalists were also part of the Loyalist migration, including Thomas Peters, an important Black Loyalist leader who first arrived in Annapolis Royal before taking land near Digby. Another notable Black Loyalist was Rose Fortune who founded a freight business and policed the Annapolis Royal waterfront.[27]
The town grew with the rise of wooden shipbuilding and boomed in 1869 when the Windsor and Annapolis Railway arrived and made Annapolis Royal an important steamship port. Incorporation as a town under the provincial municipalities act took place in 1893. However the completion of the railway to Digby in 1893, followed by the creation of the Dominion Atlantic Railway to Yarmouth shifted much of the steamship commerce to Digby and Yarmouth at the same time as the wooden shipbuilding industry declined. Annapolis Royal became a small country town, although the rising tourism industry of the 20th century stimulated some commercial growth.
Since the early 20th century, the outskirt of the town has been the site of a bridge connecting the south side of the Annapolis River to the north side at Granville Ferry; before the bridge, there was a ferry connection. In 1961, the bridge was replaced with a causeway or dam and in 1984, the causeway became a component of part of the Annapolis Royal Tidal Power Generating Station.
The construction of the tidal generating station by the then-provincially owned electrical utility Nova Scotia Power Inc. was part of a pilot project to investigate this alternative method of generating electricity. It is the only tidal power facility in operation in North America. The generating station has created tangible environmental changes in water and air temperatures in the area, siltation patterns in the river, and increased erosion of the river banks on both sides of the dam.
Annapolis Royal is situated at the western end of the fertile Annapolis Valley, nestled between the North and South mountains which define the valley. The town is on south bank of the Annapolis River facing the heavily tidal Annapolis Basin. The riverside forms the waterfront for this historic town. Directly opposite Annapolis Royal on the northern bank of the river is the community of Granville Ferry. Allains Creek joins the Annapolis River at the town, defining the western side of the community. The Bay of Fundy is just over the North Mountain, 10 kilometers north of the town.
| Climate data for Annapolis Royal | |||||||||||||
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| Month | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Year |
| Record high °C (°F) | 18.5 (65.3) |
17.5 (63.5) |
21.7 (71.1) |
26 (79) |
30 (86) |
34 (93) |
32.2 (90.0) |
32.8 (91.0) |
30 (86) |
25.6 (78.1) |
22.2 (72.0) |
19.4 (66.9) |
34 (93.2) |
| Average high °C (°F) | −0.3 (31.5) |
0 (32) |
3.7 (38.7) |
9 (48) |
16.1 (61.0) |
20.6 (69.1) |
23.6 (74.5) |
23.5 (74.3) |
18.7 (65.7) |
13 (55) |
7.6 (45.7) |
2 (36) |
11.5 (52.7) |
| Average low °C (°F) | −8.1 (17.4) |
−8 (18) |
−4.2 (24.4) |
0.8 (33.4) |
5.6 (42.1) |
10 (50) |
12.9 (55.2) |
12.8 (55.0) |
9.5 (49.1) |
4.9 (40.8) |
1.3 (34.3) |
−4.8 (23.4) |
2.8 (37.0) |
| Record low °C (°F) | −26 (−15) |
−27.2 (−17.0) |
−24.4 (−11.9) |
−13.3 (8.1) |
−6.1 (21.0) |
−3.3 (26.1) |
−1.1 (30.0) |
0 (32) |
−2.2 (28.0) |
−8.3 (17.1) |
−13.3 (8.1) |
−23.9 (−11.0) |
−27.2 (−17) |
| Precipitation mm (inches) | 131.4 (5.173) |
92.4 (3.638) |
101 (3.98) |
85.2 (3.354) |
90.8 (3.575) |
79.8 (3.142) |
85.5 (3.366) |
74.9 (2.949) |
113.8 (4.48) |
111 (4.37) |
119.6 (4.709) |
123.7 (4.87) |
1,209 (47.6) |
| Source: Environment Canada[28] | |||||||||||||
Tourism is a substantial industry for Annapolis Royal. Fort Anne, contained within the boundaries of the town, was designated as a National Historic Site in 1917 and is a natural tourist attraction. The French fort was renamed Fort Anne and established as a British garrison. The Fort, built originally around 1703, was designed to defend the capital of Acadia/ Nova Scotia from seaward attack. Today, much of the original earthen embankments are preserved for tours by the public, as well as some buildings original to the military facility and the Garrison Cemetery. It is the oldest formal cemetery in Canada, dating back to the French and later the British. The oldest English gravestone in Canada is among the graves, that of Bathiah Douglas who was buried in 1720.[29] (Rose Fortune, a Black Loyalist and the first female police officer in what is now Canada is buried here.)[30]
The trains of the Dominion Atlantic Railway ceased operations in 1990, bringing much industrial commerce within the confines of Nova Scotia's smallest town to a halt. Today, after many years of neglect, the old brick railway station is being privately renovated into professional office space.
The fleet of scallop boats moored in the Annapolis Basin continue to generate millions of dollars of economic activity each year, and support many businesses in the Annapolis Royal area.
The town also contains the largest Registered Historic District in Canada, as well as a waterfront boardwalk, a variety of unique shops, and many mature trees. Visitors can enjoy a fine selection of Bed & Breakfast accommodations, the Annapolis Royal Historic Gardens (established in 1986), many shops and galleries, including Westside Studio, featuring the art of Richard Zenkner.
There are also a number of historical walking tours. During the summer, late night, guided candlelight Garrison Cemetery tours are available and very popular. An added benefit is the scenery of the surrounding countryside, much of which is agricultural. The mild climate and scenic location make this a favourite destination in all seasons. Nova Scotia's largest amusement park, Upper Clements Park, was built several kilometres west of the town in nearby Upper Clements.
The town, along with most of Annapolis and Digby counties, experienced a severe economic decline during the mid-1990s after a nearby military training base, CFB Cornwallis, was closed as a result of defence budget cuts. The former base located on the shores of the Annapolis Basin in Cornwallis is now the site of an international peacekeeping training centre, and an innovative industrial park for small businesses.
| Historical populations | ||
|---|---|---|
| Year | Pop. | ±% |
| 1981 | 631 | — |
| 1991 | 633 | +0.3% |
| 1996 | 583 | −7.9% |
| 2001 | 550 | −5.7% |
| 2006 | 444 | −19.3% |
| [31] | ||
Secondary sources
Endnotes