--once hospitable yeomen of
the country--were addressing me in language which
almost murdered me as I heard it. 'Sir, we have served
all the war, your honour is witness how faithfully.
We were promised land; we expected you had obtained
it for us. We like the country--only let us have a
spot of our own, and give us such kind of regulations
as will hinder bad men from injuring us.'
Many of these men had ultimately to go up the river more
than fifty miles past what is now Fredericton.
A second difficulty was that food and building materials
supplied by government proved inadequate. At first the
settlers were given lumber and bricks and tools to build
their houses, but the later arrivals, who had as a rule
to go farthest up the river, were compelled to find their
building materials in the forest. Even the King's American
Dragoons, evicted from their lands on the harbour of St
John, were ordered to build their huts 'without any public
expence.' Many were compelled to spend the winter in
tents banked up with snow; others sheltered themselves
in huts of bark. The privations and sufferings which many
of the refugees suffered were piteous. Some, especially
among the women and children, died from cold and exposure
and insufficient food. In the third place there was
great inequality in the area of the lands allotted.
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