"Richard
Carman, like some of his descendants (including my uncle
Odber Carman and his
son, Charles R. Carman) was a lover of horses, witness the following
advertisement under date May 29, 1782; - The noted bay horse, Young Figure,
stands at Richard Carmans, Hempstead, at $8.00 the season. He is a colt of Old
Figure, completely made for shape, strength, action and equal to any horse
within the British lines.
When Richard Carman was coming to New Brunswick in 1783,
tradition says that he attempted to bring with him a very valuable horse, said
to have been worth 1,000 guineas - probably the horse Young Figure mentioned
above. On the voyage the weather became so tempestuous that a lot of the cargo
was cast overboard, the poor horse included. He followed, swimming in the
vessels wake, it is said, for more than 48 hours, and the passengers had hopes
of rescuing him, but the gale increased and he finally disappeared, to the great
regret of all on board.
That Richard Carmans interest in horses continued is
evident from the following advertisement printed in a
St. John paper; - Wildair.
The subscriber wishes to inform the Public that the celebrated Horse Wildair,
will be at Grimross as soon as the freshet will permit, and to be there three or
four times in the season - one week there and the next at Fredericton - Any
person wishing to have the breed must come forward this season, as he expects it
will be the last he will cover here."
Richard Carman -
Maugerville, April 29, 1799. t.f.
Richard Carman settled at
Maugerville soon after his
arrival in New Brunswick He purchased there, about 1784, the improvements on a
certain half lot of land, No. 77 in the Maugerville grant. The lot at first was
granted to William Harris, who in 1766 sold one half of it to John Hall of
Philadelphia, who soon after left the country and did not return to take
possession. The abandoned acres were afterwards settled and cultivated by one
Joseph Bubier for about 15 years, previous to their purchase by Richard Carman.
The Governor in Council, in response to Mr. Carmans petition, on July 29, 1785,
confirmed him in possession of the land, the improvements of which had been
purchased of Bubier by him. The farm was situated about eight miles below
Fredericton, and Richard Carman lived there from 1783 to 1815, when he removed
to Manawagonish (or Mahogany) near West St. John, where he died about two years
later. He sold the farm at Maugerville to John Brown, father of Dr. F Clowes
Brown of Fredericton. Mrs. Richard Carman lived at Manawagonish for seven or
eight years, when her children, all being married, she sold the farm and went to
live with her son Samuel (my grandfather) in Lower Saint Marys, about three
miles below the Nashwaak. She died there on November 3rd, 1835 and
was buried, at first, in her son-in-law, Col. Thos. Odber Miles private burial
ground in Maugerville, whence her body was removed twenty years later to the
Lower St. Marys churchyard.
Richard Carman was a vestryman of the parish of Maugerville
as early at least as 1788. He was later a Church Warden, for the parish
records tell us (under date July 5, 1803) This day, the Reverend James Bisset
was inducted into the Church at Maugerville, namely Christ Church, by the
ecclesiastical Commissary, Rev. George Pidgeon, and Wardens Richard Carman, and
John Simonson, as Rector of said Church and Glebe.
The old willows on the Carman homestead at Musquac [sp?
Unclear but definitely not Maugerville - probably Musquash] and probably those
on the old Samuel Carman homestead in Lower St. Marys, grew from scions brought
by Richard Carman from New York, or Long Island, in 1783. On the arrival of the
Loyalists in Saint John in 1783, Richard Carman drew lot No. 82 on the West side
of Germain Street, near the residence of the late Sir Leonard Tilley.
Richard Carman, the Loyalist, by his will (the original of which is now (1920)
in the old mahogany desk at 92 Madison Avenue, Toronto), left all his property
to his wife Sarah Horsfield Carman, and named her, with his sons William Carman
of the City of St. John, and Samuel Carman of St. Marys as his executors. The
will is dated February 10, 1814. Most of the property inherited by Richard
Carmans descendants came from his wife Sarah, who received it as a legacy from
her well-to-do uncle, Thos. Horsfield.
The widow, Sarah, passed her declining years with her
son Samuel. My mother, who was ten years old at the time of her grandmothers
death in 1835, remembered her very well. "
