Brigus: Past Glory, Present Splendour

By John Northway Leamon and Edward Roberts

This is a comprehensive history of Brigus, a small fishing community located in Conception Bay, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, which dates back to around 1612, when John Guy sold half of the harbour to the Spracklin family. Located in a sheltered bay, Brigus has been home to many fishermen and has been a strategic location in early times. It is located adjacent to Cupers Cove (modern-day Cupids), an English settlement established in 1610 by John Guy on behalf of Bristol’s Society of Merchant Venturers.

Seafaring, fishing, shipbuilding, sealing, and Arctic exploration were among the primary occupations of the residents of Brigus during the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries. The community's name is derived from Brickhouse, the name of an old town in England.

Brigus was home to the world-famous Captain Robert “Bob” Abram Bartlett and is the location of his residence, Hawthorne Cottage, now a National Historic Site of Canada. There were many other “Arctic Heroes” who came from this historic town, including Captain William Munden, who built the schooner Four Brothers, the first 100-ton schooner in Newfoundland, in 1819.

This book is the result of a deep personal commitment on the part of the author and the kindness of many who allowed insight into certain, often pertinent facts relating to their own family history. The author’s preferred style of recounting the town of Brigus’s history is that of a grandfather telling it to his grandchild.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Flanker Press
• Release date: Nov 13, 2019
• ISBN: 9781771177788

John Northway Leamon

John Northway Leamon was born in Brigus on March 10, 1921. He was educated at the old Brigus United Church Academy, Memorial University of Newfoundland, and at Trinity College, London, where he obtained a degree in Class Music Teaching. For some years he operated a grocery and ice cream parlour in Brigus, where he was also a day-school teacher and, for 17 years, the church organist. Leamon moved to Carbonear in 1957 to take a full-time position as a music teacher and church organist, remaining there until 1970. From then until his retirement in 1981 he lived in St. John’s and taught music in various city schools. After years of being a weekend and summer resident of Brigus, he returned to his birthplace year-round in 1988. John Leamon founded the Brigus Historical and Conservation Society in 1983, working to establish what became known as the Ye Olde Stone Barn Museum. He served as curator of the Museum until June 1997, when he was incapacitated by illness. His lifelong interest in the preservation of Brigus was recognized by the presentation of the Canada 125 Medal (1992) for community service and the Manning Award (1997) for the preservation of community heritage. This book, the culmination of a life’s work, was completed in June 1997. Unfortunately, Mr. Leamon passed away that August, but not before he had been assured of publication

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CHAPTER ONE

THE ORIGIN OF THE NAME BRIGUS

A vessel being careened at Brigus in the 1890s. Note the Norman house at top of Battery Hill, where Captain Nathan Norman entertained Lord Strathcona on several occasions. This is quite possibly the only photograph of Brigus that shows this historic home. (Photo courtesy of the Stone Barn Museum)

Let us make us a name.

— Genesis 11:4, KJV

Extensive research into the name Brigus has uncovered a number of interesting, rare, and sometimes baffling versions and opinions as to its origin and usage. Here are some:

1. Canon William Pilot says it is from the French for ship or brig.

2. Historian Michael F. Howley believed the name Brigus to be a corruption of Brig Harbour. He maintains, as well, that Brigue Bay, a harbour on the northwest coast of Newfoundland, near Flowers Cove, is called Brigue by the French in precisely the same manner as they call Brigus by the name Brigue.

3. The French priest Abbe Jean Boudoin, who came to Newfoundland as chaplain to d’lberville’s forces in the late 1600s, also calls it Brigue. English publications of the day use much the same version as the French, but with an added letter s, hence Brigus, a form determined by Seary, Story, and Kirwin to have first come into use as early as 1677, and which, except for the e, is identical to the spelling of today. Over the next decade or two, with the apparent dropping of the e, we have the evolution of the word Brigus, a term said to have existed since 1693.¹

So, Brigus it is! But why? What is the rationale for such a name? Why, for example, did Boudoin in his journal choose to call the place Brigue, the French meaning of which is intrigue, or a secret plot?

Consider this: in about 1910, a cache of cannonballs, each about the size of a cricket ball, was discovered in a beach on the South Side. Since the capture and burning of Brigus in 1697 was accomplished without resistance, and since the size of cannon required to use this size ball would be too heavy for a boat of the type used by the d’lberville landing party, how did these balls get there? Was there indeed a secret plot at Brigue, previous to this, in which an armed ship took part?

I have boyhood recollections of having played shot put with a heavy metal ball that my brother and I found in the old boat-building shed on a portion of the Brittoner quayside property at Harbour Pond, which our family purchased from the Wilcox estate in the late 1920s. The old homestead property of the Wilcox family was on the Brigus South Side at Frogmarsh. It might very well be that our heavy metal ball was one of those cannonballs.

4. The Reverend Charles Lench in his Souvenir of the Brigus Methodist Jubilee (1925) proposes several different spellings from ancient history for the word Brigus, the most uncommon of which is Breckhouse, a term borrowed no doubt from the Englishman Campbell who first made use of it in his account of the 1705 burning of Brigus by the French. Also from Lench, the following: On the occasion of celebrations marking the fiftieth anniversary of the Brigus Methodist (now United) Church in 1925, a memorial plaque was unveiled by W. A. Munn of St. John’s in honour of his ancestor, the Rev. John Percey, pioneer of Brigus Methodism in the late 1700s and early 1800s and pastor at Brigus from 1804 to 1820. Having passed from generation to generation, certain relics of the Reverend Mr. Percey came into the possession of Mr. Munn. The most valuable of these items is a Bible. This most ancient and priceless volume bears on its cover the name Brighouse. The date of the book is 1787. There is also an old hymn book bearing the same name in gilt letters on its cover.² What, you might ask, does all this have to do with the origin of the name Brigus? H. F. Shortis, noted historian, maintains that Brigus is a corruption of Brig House or Bridge House, a small village in the West Riding of Yorkshire, whence the first settlers of Brigus came. Shortis also maintains that since the Yorkshire and Lancashire people, like the Scotch, pronounce Bridge as Brig, and House as ’Ouse, then either Bridge House or Brig House would most certainly have been pronounced Brigus.

5. Others have connected the word Brigus with the old English town of Brickhouse, as this story from the Bartlett lecture to the Newfoundland Historical Society on January 16, 1940, confirms: Dr. Roy Clarke, Brigus, Newfoundland Rhodes Scholar, of 1928, and physician in London, England, told me he was spending an evening with some people who said ‘We are going to Brigus tomorrow.’ Roy said ‘Where? Why, I belong to Brigus!’ Upon enquiring, he found they were referring to Brickhouse. They had pronounced it exactly as we pronounce Brigus. Dr. Clarke was born in Brigus in 1905 and was killed in action in 1942 while serving as a member of the Royal Army Medical Corps.

6. The fact that some of today’s place names in certain parts of the province can be traced to the Basque influence (e.g. Traspas [Trepassey], Fortuna [Fortune], Santa Maria [St. Mary’s], etc.) is possibly what prompted the suggestion by some that Brigus may have been named after Bruge, a town in Spain, or after the Portuguese word Brega. Nevertheless, this seems unlikely, since Spanish Portuguese influence is said to be not known in the Conception Bay area of Newfoundland. Seary et al., however, claims a French origin of the word Brega, saying it is an old word from southwestern France. He conjectures that the word is more likely French than Portuguese because both Brigus, Conception Bay, and Brigus near Ferryland (known as Brigus South) are located in areas of French influence which contain other French names.³ Also worthy of mention here is the French meaning of the old word Brega, which, as with the word Brigue, is said to mean intrigue or a secret plot.

In view of the foregoing, one would have thought that all of the possibilities, at least with regard to the spelling of the name Brigus, would have been exhausted. However, such is not the case, for apart from those already discussed, the National Museums of Canada’s Bulletin 219 gives also the following:

Briggs (1669)

Brigass in the North (1677)

Brecast by North (1705)

Our discussion thus far has centred around the origin of the name Brigus, together with its various spellings since the late 1600s. There is, however, evidence of its use much earlier than that, in fact, almost a century earlier.

That Brigus was known as a place in the early 1600s is a certainty, otherwise, why would Henry Crout, a resident of John Guy’s colony at Cupids in February 1613, write, master Thomas Willoughby and my selfe at Breegas … This, then, is the first documented mention of the place we know today as Brigus, and only one of the surprising number of variants given to the spelling of the place over the next 100 years or so. Not even the enumerators at the time could agree on any particular spelling. Consequently, from these came the following:

Brigasse in the North (Census, 1674 and 1675)

Beregues (1677)

Bregus (1679 and 1715)

Brigges (1681)

Bregas by North (1692 and 1693)

Brigus (1698 and 1700)

Breakus (1699)

Breacus (1701 and 1702)

Baracass North (1708)

However, whether from the simple term Brig or from any of the wide variety of names that history gives as possible derivatives, the appellation Brigus, having first appeared almost three centuries ago, is today firmly entrenched as occupying an important place in the annals of Newfoundland history.

So, the place is Brigus! And since the history of a place is largely the history of its people, who, then, we might ask, were its first people? Now, while we here on Newfoundland’s east coast may not be in a position to claim visits from Norsemen 1,000 years ago, it is a distinct possibility that migratory fishermen were coming here for perhaps 500 years before the arrival of Sir Humphrey Gilbert in 1583.

We have already determined that the first visitors by land, of whom we have documentation, were Henry Crout and Thomas Willoughby in February 1613. There is nothing to suggest, however, that there was anybody living in the place at the time. The first indication that there were livyers here was not until the census of 1674, which shows two planters as inhabiting Brigasse in the North. Livyers were permanent settlers in Newfoundland, as opposed to migratory English fishermen. Unfortunately, no names are given. In 1675 there is listed in Brigus by North the following:

Apart from this record, there is also the following oral account, passed down from generation to generation, of the Spracklin family of Brigus, whose ancestors are said to have come with John Guy on his second voyage to Newfoundland in 1612. Later that year, John Guy reportedly sold half the harbour of Brigus to the Spracklin family for 100 pounds.

Worthy of mention also is the fact that listed among the earliest Brigus settlers with records dating back 300 years or more are the Perceys, the Robertses, and the Antles.

Endnotes

1. National Museum of Canada. Bulletin 219, The Avalon Peninsula of Newfoundland—An Ethnolinguistic Study by E. R. Seary, G. M. Story, W. J. Kirwin. Dept. of Secretary of State: Queen’s Printer, Ottawa 1968.

2. Archbishop M. F. Howley, Newfoundland Name Lore, The Newfoundland Quarterly, Spring 1951, page 27.

3. J. R. Smallwood, Encyclopedia of Newfoundland & Labrador, pages 259, 262.

CHAPTER TWO

BRIGUS: THE GREATNESS FADES, THE SPLENDOUR STILL REMAINS

Ships line Brigus harbour. (Photo courtesy of the Stone Barn Museum)

To watch the ships in the harbour.

To smell the salt sea air

As the seagulls war in the deep blue sky

Without a worry or care.

— Adapted from The Nostalgia of Brigus by Vera Sylvia

No matter how fascinating and bewitching the detailed versions and opinions offered with regard to the origin of the name Brigus may appear, one reality remains. They cannot hold a candle to the alluring and captivating qualities, the charm and enchantment, offered by the town itself, both in its essential physical characteristics and its fine old properties.

At this point, lest I be accused of partiality, it would be interesting to hear what others have said about Brigus, the place and its people. Regarding the Brigus of more than a century ago:

The Reverend Philip Toque, writing of the years between 1830 and 1880, a period referred to by the Reverend Charles Lench as the piping times of prosperity in Brigus, has this to say: The Mundens, Normans, Perceys, Whelans, Bartletts, Robertses, and Wilcoxes reside here, who are some of the richest planters in Newfoundland. Referring to the commissioned elegant, sometimes three-foot-high oil portraits that graced many Brigus parlour walls, Reverend Mr. Lench comments:

It was only a certain quality of people that sat for oil paintings! Some of these paintings, notably of Captain William Munden, his son Azariah, and daughter Naomi, hang today on the walls of the Conception Bay Museum at Harbour Grace.

— Adapted from Charles Lench, A Souvenir of the Brigus

Methodist Jubilee, 1925

As a youngster I can remember the long lines of vessels berthed along the wharves of Brigus, their masts towering, their yards and rigging a fine marine forest, the very salt smell of them a beckoning lure for any small boy living there right at the edge of the sea. In those fine days the shipping brought the far places of the world close to our little port …

— Captain Robert A. Bartlett, The Log of Bob Bartlett, 1928

Grave Hill (was) at one time the best residential part of Brigus and where the most business was carried on, from J. & G. Smith’s important premises down to Capt. Azariah Munden’s and over to the Battery to Capt. Nathan Norman’s. Both of these captains had homes like English castles, and they were a picture to see.

— Nicholas Smith, Fifty-two Years at the Labrador Fishery, 1936

Brigus of the 1900s:

"I have been looking at photographs of Brigus. The earliest is dated September 1927, when we first spent long enough in the little town to savour its character, appreciate its beauties, be accepted by its people, and fix it firmly in our affections. Of course, it wasn’t what it had been, as the older folk hastened to assure us; the glory had departed; and it is true that we could by no means cross the harbour, as once had been possible stepping from deck to deck of the moored schooners. The complete absence of fishing rooms by the road to Riverhead had made incredible the simple and practical explanation of the famous tunnel, a convenient way through to a fishing room. Yes, the glory had departed, gone, so we were told, with the advent of steam; departed, but not so far or so long but it left an afterglow which shone in certain survivors of an earlier age, men like Captain William Bartlett and Nicholas Smith who summed up in themselves the legendary era of sail, the era when Brigus was Brigus.

"Personal attachments came to figure in our affection for Brigus, but our attraction was first won by the place itself, by its character and beauty. Recall the view you get when coming from St. John’s. You stop halfway down the steeply curving descent into the valley. See the long line of bare rocky hill descending at its seaward end in great steps to the tip on which the lighthouse used to stand and where the light still is; see the inner harbour lying there in the midst like a lake. Better still, go up round the harbour, up Rattley Row, delightful name, and on to the rock ridge that guards Brigus on the north. Look down, and it is almost a bird’s-eye view look down on the town and you will see that the natural features of hills and harbour and rivers have compelled it into an unusually compact pattern or plan. Its streets seem to know where they are going, not merely following directions laid down by the highway or the edge of the sea. Indeed, when I first walked about them, I found myself recalling with satisfaction old Saxon towns which our forefathers laid out so efficiently and so beautifully in Wessex or Holderness, not with mechanical, gridiron precision, but adapted harmoniously to the contours of the surroundings.

"Brigus was an excellent centre for walks, and how we walked! On one of our first mornings, it may have been indeed our very first, we made our way up on the hill that separates Brigus from Cupids…. We got to know that promontory well, going straight over it to Cupids; diagonally to Greenland and the pretty church at Burnt Head; along its length to scramble down the ponderous steps to the lighthouse and its keepers, Walter Wilcox and his wife.

An equally favourite excursion was on the other side to Red Rocks via Riverhead and Frogmarsh, where you have to turn inland for a while until you strike a trail by a pretty pond that takes you to an inland cliff. You scramble down it amidst alders into a green valley, remote, quiet, lovely, and turning seawards go along it until you reach the Red Rocks, a sharp cape of red shale standing up out of the water almost vertical. A lovelier spot for an outing on a summer day couldn’t be found if you scoured the world.

— Dr. A. C. Hunter, excerpts from an address entitled Memories of Brigus, delivered on CBC’s Sunday Miscellany, November 24, 1963, and reproduced in the Newfoundland Quarterly, December 1972.

NOTE: Dr. A. C. Hunter, B.A., M.A., Docteur de L’Universite, Officier de L’Academie, D.Litt., was for many years Dean of Arts and Science at Memorial College and later at Memorial University of Newfoundland. He, along with Mrs. Hunter, sister of American writer Danielle W. Steele, visited Brigus on many occasions in the 1920s and 1930s.

Brigus is one of the most beautiful villages of the entire Avalon. It is the birthplace of men long known for their prowess at sea and was the port at which Peary shipped his crew for his northern dashes. It is the birthplace of Captain Bob Bartlett and is also famous for the Tea Rooms of which his sisters are the proprietors. No visit to the Avalon is complete without one of their famous meals and a pleasant stop with the mementos of Captain Bob’s northern journeys with his famous commander, Peary.

— Dr. S. T. Brooks, The Avalon—Rich in Historic Lore,

the Daily News, December 31, 1940

NOTE: Dr. Stanley Truman Brooks travelled extensively in Newfoundland. He visited Brigus in the 1940s in connection with his work as curator at the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Brigus is a blissful place to wander around. There is a beautiful picnic ground on the seashore with a tunnel through the cliff nearby. This tunnel, the disused warehouses, the buried wine vaults and the high quality of the houses and public buildings bespeak of Brigus as a flourishing mercantile centre based upon the sea and its resources. Industries such as coopering, shipbuilding, printing, agriculture and coastal trading were prominent as well as the fishery and seal hunt.

— Colin Karasek, Round the Bay … to Brigus,

Atlantic Guardian, (n.d.)

Brigus as it nears the twenty-first century:

A quiet and dignified outport … Brigus still looks like a transplanted English coastal town … the stirring seascapes are eternal. You could scarce find a more eye-catching waterfront. Red cliffs rise sheer from blue waters and a stirring assortment of rocky capes runs into the sea.

— Harold Horwood,

Brigus, Newfoundland, Atlantic Insight, March 1981

"Brigus, unlike other towns in Conception Bay, has managed to preserve its ancient character. Though the old captains have passed on, and fleets of sailing ships no longer seek refuge in its harbour, Brigus still has its winding roads, white picket fences and fine old houses to remind one of a glorious past.

"Brigus has escaped the supermarkets and shopping malls that have cropped up in many towns in its vicinity during this age of commercialization. Instead, its inhabitants commute to these centres to work but slip back into the tranquil surroundings of Brigus before nightfall.

The village is quiet, compact, charming, surrounded by stirring seascapes, and by old fields filled with flagstone foundations, the ruins of houses that vanished generations ago. Everywhere you walk there are stone retaining walls, built at a time so remote there is no longer a tradition of their origin, or any obvious reason for their being.

— Compass, reporting on the article entitled

Brigus, Newfoundland by Harold Horwood (above)

Brigus—A Glorious Town with a Glorious Past.

— Calvin Coish, Atlantic Advocate, April 1984

Even today visitors (to Brigus) marvel at the maze of narrow streets, the rock walls, the old homes, the beautiful gardens, all of which make it an ideal spot for an evening stroll which can occupy two hours or more, yet you are never more than a few minutes from where you started.

— Burnham Gill, Today in History,

Newfoundland Herald, July 9, 1966

Over the centuries, travellers have described Brigus as quaint, charming, beautiful and unique.

— Lana Hickey, BRIGUS ‘Polishing the Jewel,’

Newfoundland Lifestyle, Vol. 5, No. 3; June/July 1987

Brigus provides a sense of history and permanence.

— Sally Lou LeMessurier, Decks Awash,

Vol. 15. No. 2; March-April 1986

And we could go on and on. But why not walk with us now through the ancient streets and lanes of the town where almost every step brings one face to face with some particular aspect of local history?

The Brigus Flag logo represents the three historical occupations of the people of Brigus: a ship in full sail, exploration and seafaring; sealing industry, harpoons and seal; fishing, dried split salt fish. (Photo by Peter Hanes)

CHAPTER THREE

A WALK WITH HARRY

Start: Jackson’s Quay

Route: To Ox Cove via Grave Hill;

Rattley Row;

Battery Road to the Battery and beyond;

return to Rattley Row (upper portion)

to Chalker’s Road.

Jackson’s Quay as it appeared before the fire of 1935

(Photo courtesy of the Stone Barn Museum)

That the next generation might know …

and tell it to their children.

— Psalm 78, Vs. 6. NRSV

Harry is a bright, intelligent boy, of course. He is my grandson, full of questions, just right for my purpose here. Maybe he comes by his inquisitiveness naturally. Grandfathers are supposed to begin a story with That reminds me of the time …, I remember when …, It seems like only yesterday … or something like that. I’ll remain true to form and tell you that Harry’s inquisitiveness reminds me of the time when I was at school. I was told, Look, my son, we’d get a lot more work done in this class if you didn’t ask so many questions!

How else do you acquire knowledge? Harry asks questions, and that is one of the reasons why I enjoy my walks with him.

Come with us now, we’ll walk and talk, and I’ll tell you some of the things that I’ve found out about the places we’ll pass and the things we’ll see as we make our way along some of Newfoundland’s most time-worn smalltown thoroughfares, the streets and roads of historic Brigus, Newfoundland’s, Queen of Hamlets by the Sea.

(The italicized words that follow throughout the book are Harry’s part of our conversation.)

We’ll park our car on Jackson’s Quay. The waterfront here, now a slipway, or a docking and launching facility for small boats, was, in earlier times, a much-used landing place for capelin. It is here in the centre of this open space that A. E. Harris sat and sketched the outline for his etching entitled Chaplin Carts, now considered one of the most valued items in the Harris body of Newfoundland visual imagery of the early 1930s.

The Jackson family lived in a house on the corner of this open space and Grave Hill. They owned sheds and stores extending from the back of their house all the way to the forge, which was situated at the edge of the water. Philip Jackson and two of his sons were blacksmiths. Philip Jackson moved to Brigus from Harbour Grace in 1895. He was 31 at the time.

A tragic fire that occurred on September 25, 1935, destroyed the greater part of the Jackson property; the house and shop of Mrs. Martha Leamon, mother-in-law of Albert Harvey, whose family lived there at the time; Jerrett’s coal shed, plus a number of tons of coal; a cooperage; and the Pomeroy dwelling, shop, and stores, eleven buildings in all. This was indeed a tragedy, as not one of these structures, apart from a couple of coal sheds, was ever rebuilt. The place today is largely a cluster of old rock walls and crumbling stone foundations, all that remains of what was once a thriving business section, as well as a very picturesque part of the town. The unique grouping of the buildings here often provided the subject material for the sketchbook of many an artist.

The Jackson house, where the 1935 conflagration started, was situated directly across the road from the lane leading to Nellie Kavanagh’s Well. Nicholas Smith in his Fifty-two Years at the Labrador Fishery pinpoints the location as being halfway down Grave Hill. At that time Grave Hill was considered to be that portion of the street beginning opposite the old Edwards (now Smith) house and running east up the incline to just beyond the tip of the old Stone Steps. This road then led to the public wharf. The road that branches off from just opposite the tip of these same Stone Steps and leads uphill in a more northerly direction is the traditional starting point of the old street known as Rattley Row.

The three-storey mansard dwelling opposite Jackson’s Quay, enhanced in 1990 by the addition of a two-storey east wing, was originally the home of Captain Sam Edwards, schooner master with the mercantile establishment of J. & G. Smith. Built during the heyday of the large mercantile firm, this house was sold a few years after the folding of the firm in 1877 to Captain Sam Edwards, as shown by the following well-preserved document: Sold by J. J. Smith and William George Spear Smith, operating under the mercantile establishment known as J. & G. Smith, to Sam Edwards, fisherman. Date of sale August 31, 1883. Registered October 13 of that year. This was one of the earliest houses built by William A. Green, a prominent Brigus contractor and builder of many fine Brigus residences during the late 1800s. Vacant for a time following the demise of Captain Edwards, the dwelling later served as the home of the Scaplens. Gordon Scaplen was for a time an employee of the Hue Mattress Manufacturing Co., which existed on a site between North Brook and the Conception Bay Highway just west of the path known today as Quigley’s Lane. The Misses Louisa and Mary Charlotte Spracklin were also occupants here, as were the Harold Linthornes. Owned later by Victor Antle, the place was sold to the Harveys of St. John’s in the early 1970s.

Acquired by the LaFosses in October 1987, the Barrens in 1990, and the Smiths in 1993, the basic structure, mostly because of its unaltered exterior, still represents a fine example of the mansard style so evident here at the turn of the century. Harold Lafosse was for years a prominent St. John’s musician and orchestra leader. Harold Barrett was a former Minister of Development and Tourism in the Peckford administration and, for a short period, Minister of Finance under Tom Rideout. Harold Smith is a direct descendant of the original owners of the building. Could we not indeed call this place The House of Harolds?

The area that is now a lawn east of this Smith dwelling was once occupied by a small, quaint, saltbox-type house. This was the home of Billy Cole, who operated a shebeen on the site.

What’s a shebeen?

A shebeen is an unlicensed place where illicit liquor is sold. Billy Cole was a dispenser of alcoholic beverages, which he kept in a cellar under the kitchen floor of his house, in bottles suspended on strings by means of which he retrieved the cool liquid as required. Cole died about 1914, and his house was demolished shortly thereafter. James Fry, an elderly Brigus resident from whom information was sought regarding Billy Cole, spoke as follows: Being a mere boy at the time, I didn’t know exactly what went on at Billy Cole’s, but I do know that he had an awful lot of visitors.

The narrow lane between the Cole site and the Kevin Spracklin house leads to a public well, which, on our old Brigus map, is labelled Nellie Kavanagh’s Well. Nellie Kavanagh was a sort of recluse who lived in what has been described as a tilt, in this case a rough, rectangular, shack-like structure, which was situated in the garden just behind the wall on what is today part of the Kevin Spracklin holdings.

At the time of the second edition of this text, in 2019, some of the community elders report having first-hand knowledge of this well.

The Spracklin dwelling, constructed on land purchased from one William John Percey, was the last of the buildings to be erected in Brigus by contractor W. A. Green. It was built for his own use, but because Green’s daughter married into the Horwood family, it passed to the Horwoods after his death in 1913. Thomas Spracklin, father of Kevin, purchased the property from the Horwoods about 1926. Both W. F. and R. F. Horwood were, for years, prominent members of the Brigus Glee Club, forerunner of the Jubilee Club. They owned and operated a sawmill at Clarke’s Beach but moved to St. John’s in December 1892, and there, after a short period of operation as Horwood & Campbell, established the Horwood Lumber Company.

Let’s walk on now. It is just a few more steps to the top of Grave Hill.

Grave Hill! Why a name like that?

Well, there’s a very good reason. Until about 1966, an old walled-up graveyard existed on the corner where Grave Hill used to meet Rattley Row. According to today’s signage, this would be where Grave Hill meets Harbour Drive. It was a captivating spot, quite unusual in that it was built up from ground level and held in place by a curved dry rock wall about six feet high at its rounded outer end. It was completely occupied by old mounded graves, most of which were marked by vertical stone slabs at both head and foot. The few headstones that had survived, and the uniqueness of the site, were never-ending sources of curiosity to both townsfolk and tourists alike.

A kind of Indian burial ground, maybe?

No, not really! However, in connection with the graveyard that existed here, that question is not as far-fetched as it sounds. After all, there is evidence of the presence of certain Indians here as late as the early 1800s. Parson Percey in his Brigus Church Register, for the years between 1804 and 1820, records the burial of MARG, an Indian Woman, in Brigus on February 19, 1810. And since the various Brigus graveyards as we know them today had not come into use up to that time, there is every possibility that she was buried here at this Grave Hill site. As further proof of the Indian presence in Brigus, it is indeed interesting to note that these same Percey Church Records also give information regarding the baptism of this Indian woman on February 17, 1810, two days before her death, as well as the baptism of her son, named Thomas, on the day of her death, which leads us to speculate that she died in childbirth.

In any case, the really sad part of this story is that the whole thing was bulldozed away in the mid-1960s to make space for, would you believe, vehicles to turn. And there with one fell swoop went at least 200 or more years of one of the most important remnants of Brigus history. Even though the bones of those who were buried here were reinterred in a common box in one of the present-day cemeteries, the whole sad process is, even more so today than at the time of the operation, regarded as a most lamentable act.

How sad, for sure!

Yes, and I wish that was all, but it’s not! Here, just a few paces east of the top of the Old Stone Steps and directly under the road, are buried two fine brick and stone cellars. Colin Karasek in his article Round the Bay … to Brigus in the Atlantic Guardian (n.d.) refers to these underground arched structures as buried wine vaults, and buried they are, filled in, perhaps destroyed, but hopefully not!

The old Pomeroy house was a two-and-one-half-storey building that stood on this dry rock wall next to the old Stone Steps, and which had served not only as the living quarters of the William Pomeroy family, but the retail business known for years as Pomeroy Brothers. It was formerly the property of a family named Green and, earlier still, was considered to have been an integral part of the extensive Spracklin holdings. Purchased later by the Pomeroys, the building at the time of the 1935 fire was occupied temporarily by Mrs. Ida Whiteway, her son Everett, and daughter Margaret. Mrs. Whiteway was a sister of William Pomeroy. The old Pomeroy house was burnt in the Jackson fire of 1935. Two distinct openings were revealed in its high north basement wall. These were doorways to two splendid cellars, both of which were constructed of early masonry with red brick curved in rounded arch fashion at the top. These subterranean structures, one of which had a well in its floor, and the other a keg-sized recess in its end wall, extended out under the road to a point just below where we are standing now. I remember having been inside these structures in 1957 and thinking at the time how in miniature they somewhat resembled those I had seen in the old black and white movie films of earlier days. I was fascinated by them, as were many other people, most of whom climbed over the rocks and rubble and alongside an old open fireplace that for years still stood among the ruins, just to get a peek inside. One of my own very first literary efforts was a purely fictional and rather elementary tale about square-rigged ships, swashbuckling sailors, and rum-running captains. Written in 1969 and entitled The Finest Rum in Town, both the setting and the incentive for the story were provided by these captivating old structures.

For a short period during the early years of the first Brigus Town Council, mid-late 1960s, these cellars were utilized as storage places for dynamite and other explosives.

Does anybody have any idea about how old these cellars might be?

As with many ancient structures of this nature, the date of construction is difficult to determine. Any records that may have existed in this regard were probably destroyed when the building was burnt in the 1935 fire. However, as has been said of many of the old Brigus dry stone retaining walls similar to the one in which these vaults are set, they were no doubt built at a time so remote that there is no longer a tradition of their origin.¹ Nevertheless, we may speculate as follows: given an awareness of the fact that these structures were in existence before the period of the Pomeroy occupancy of the place, and conceivably may even date beyond ownership by the Greens, it is not unlikely that their construction may have taken place during the latter part of the long period of possession by the Spracklins. They are traditionally considered to have been the original owners of all the land and properties in this area, from the Drawbridge to the Battery Brook,² from about the year 1612.

One thing, however, is certain: with the act of the filling-in of these structures, Brigus has lost, for the present, at least, what was perhaps its most unique and very likely its most ancient piece of heritage property, perhaps older than the town’s oldest existing dwellings.

Do you think it might be possible, that someday, myself and others of my generation may be able to visit and see inside these structures as you did some years ago? Couldn’t the old cellars be dug out again?

Yes, I believe that someday someone will emerge who will have gumption and insight enough to do just that. You see, it may just be that those who made the decision to inundate these man-made underground caverns with tons of fill have, without realizing it, performed some sort of blessing in disguise. There is every likelihood now that the original brick and stone walls and partitions have, by that very act, been preserved from complete destruction. So, with the newly awakening sense of the value, and indeed the recovery, of many of our town’s fine homes, I feel more convinced than ever that restoration is not only possible, but quite inevitable.

The reference here is to such laudable examples as the reconstruction of the Old Stone Barn; restoration of the Old Stone Steps; the formation and beautification of the Wilcox Gardens and the Malcolm Bartlett Vindicator Park; the construction of the new Town Hall on Water Street in conformity with the surrounding heritage structures; the recently constructed United Church Hall on South Street built in the style and likeness of the former Old Brigus Academy; plus the recent restoration and enhancement of a number of the town’s most prestigious dwellings, as well as the attempt at the recapturing of old traditions, unfortunately short-lived, in operations such as the Tea Cozy on North Street and Bartlett’s Landing on Middle Ridge. Of special significance, however, is the opening of Hawthorne Cottage as a National Historic Site in 1995. It has already been determined that, with today’s engineering technology, well-placed reinforcements in the roadbed above the cellars could ensure the safe passage of even the heaviest of today’s vehicles without any damage whatsoever to the caverns below.

We can’t, however, remain at this spot much longer, so let’s move on down the road a little.

Yes. And may I say that all this is much more interesting than I would have believed. And sad, too, some of it!

Well, we’ve gone only about thirty feet or so, but we’ll stop here for a few minutes and look down on that fine new boat basin below, with its diversified collection of pleasure craft, a longliner or two, some small fishing skiffs, and a couple of beautiful, sleek, tall-masted sailboats, all protected now by a cleverly engineered breakwater.

If we had been standing on this same spot about 100 years ago, we would not have been able to see very far in the direction of the boat basin at all, except maybe between the densely erected houses and stores that once existed here.

About 20 feet east of the old Pomeroy dwelling was the attractive house of Captain John Norman, noted sealing master, while the space between the Norman house and today’s road leading down around the western end of the J. W. Hiscock Sons fish store was occupied for the most part by the home, business premises, and wharf of Robert (John Cozens) Leamon, my great-grandfather, your great-great-great-grandfather. His house here was described by Nicholas Smith as charming. It was a large two-and-one-half-storey structure with gabled roof and six dormer windows. The two upper floors were the living quarters. My grandfather John Norman Leamon, his brother Robert, and his sister Mary, who later became Captain Bob Bartlett’s mother, were born here. A retail business occupied the whole of the ground floor and led back to a large four-storey section larger than the house itself but built on a lower level because of the steep drop of the land toward the waterfront. A considerable portion of the finely constructed high north stone wall of the basement and second storey of the four-storey warehouse section still exists today.

This is the place of which the Frederick Hann Conservation and Community Study (1986) makes this suggestion: "The potential exists to develop this spot as an interpretive site for Effie M. Morrissey and Captain Bob Bartlett, by relocating the ‘sails’ presently at Bishop’s Beach. Relocating the sails to this place on the waterfront is appropriate in that it overlooks the wharf where the Morrissey docked semi-annually for years. This site has high visual profile and prominence given that important sight lines terminate at this point." All the more appropriate, we might add, since this was the site of the home and business premises of Robert J. C. Leamon, who was Captain Bob Bartlett’s maternal grandfather, and the spot where Mary J. Leamon was born. However, we would acknowledge also that the Bishop’s Beach site has its own particular points of merit, in that it was just a few yards from here that the earliest of the Bartletts arrived in Brigus, settled, and built their first place of residence at a site just below the hill where the United Church stands today.

Lovell’s Newfoundland Directory for 1871 lists Robert J. C. Leamon as general importer and dealer in British & foreign goods, provisions, etc. As such, the firm owned ships, two of which were the Joseph, built in 1827; and the Nimrod, a schooner of 72 tons built in 1833, but changed to a barquentine rig in 1847.

The Grave Hill area of Brigus has a history of tragic fires. Both the John Norman and the Robert J. C. Leamon properties were burnt to the ground about the year 1892.

I would like to have seen that place. But we do have pictures, don’t we?

Yes. One of the oldest pictures in our collection shows not only the buildings that were later destroyed, but others in the area, some of which have survived and are in good repair even today. A case in point is the Rose family dwelling on our left. This house was originally the home of Captain George Spracklin, who upon retirement from active seagoing duties served as the ship’s husband, a person responsible for the management of ship’s supplies, at the nearby public wharf. Later occupants were the Hamptons, followed by the Barretts. Israel Barrett lost his life in World War II when the SS Caribou was torpedoed in the Gulf of St. Lawrence on October 14, 1942. For a time in the 1970s and 1980s certain window alterations and the placing of the tall chimneys on the outside had considerably altered the appearance of the original structure. However, a more sensitive renovation carried out in the early 1990s has served to recapture much of the early character of the building, which dates from about 1870.

The concrete building next to the Rose house is a somewhat recent addition to the Hiscock fish processing complex, originally established a little farther out in the Gut in 1894. This business now occupies both sides of the road and much of the waterfront from here to the public wharf. The earliest of the Spracklins lived in a house whose front garden, once adorned with lilac and apple trees, is now occupied by this undoubtedly practical but rather unimaginative concrete structure.

The last occupants of the old Spracklin house were Mary Charlotte and her sister Louisa. Louisa, Miss Lou, was a teacher at the old Methodist Academy in Brigus for almost 50 years. Their brother George Gushue Spracklin, was a noted scholar, instructor of navigation, and traveller.

A most unique feature of the old Spracklin residence was the fact that the whole of the kitchen floor was paved with blue flagstones that extended right into the old-fashioned open fireplace. The house itself, a two-and-one-half-storey building with gables, occupied a commanding position overlooking not only the roofs of many of the then Spracklin-owned waterfront buildings, but much of the busy harbour as well. Like so many other homes of distinction that once graced the area, this building, too, fell into disrepair and was taken down in the early 1930s.

Just a few feet farther down the incline here, and close by the roadside on our left, there existed until shortly after the year 1900 a long, two-and-one-half-storey duplex. This building was approximately 70 feet in length and consisted of two complete dwellings sharing a massive central chimney. This was the estate of Robert Knight. It included not only the land on which the duplex stood but an additional 20 yards toward the Plowman property on the east. Given to him by his mother in 1800, it was, as W. A. Munn states, right in the Spracklin property, which prompts us to ask, Was Robert Knight’s mother a Spracklin? It seems very likely!

Are there any Knights in Brigus today?

It appears that Robert Knight left Brigus shortly before 1811. It is also apparent that he intended to return but died in the meantime. The following inscription written 184 years ago on his headstone in the Methodist graveyard at a site close by the south side of the church tells the story:

When Brigus I left, I thought of

soon returning,

Alas! My hopes are fled, and now

you are mourning.

Therefore prepare; make no delay

For I in my prime was called away.

From these lines we can only assume that Robert Knight anticipated his death while away from home and penned the lament himself. He died in 1811 at the age of 32, and with his passing, the surname Knight disappears from the Brigus scene.

For many years a winding lane ran from a point just past the Knight residence uphill toward Rattley Row. Our earliest map of Brigus designates this lane Forge Hill, probably the site of the ironworks of one James Guy, who is listed as blacksmith in People and Occupations in Brigus in 1867. Access from the lower portion of this lane no longer exists, as all of the roadside property along here is now occupied by buildings of the Hiscock complex.

Let’s go now to a spot directly opposite the public wharf. This was the site of the stately residence of Captain Azariah Munden. Nicholas Smith in his book Fifty-two Years at the Labrador Fishery described the house that stood here and the Norman house at the Battery as homes like English castles. Captain Azariah Munden, who had his house built here about the year 1855, was one of the third generation of Mundens in Brigus. His father was Captain William Munden. His grandfather, Azariah Munden, Sr., was a native of Bridgeport, England, and had first come to Newfoundland in 1756 as agent for ropes and twines for the firm of Messrs. Gundry of Bridgeport.

Captain William Munden was called the most progressive of the Brigus captains, not only by virtue of his expressed dissatisfaction with his 40-ton western boat, a schooner-rigged fishing vessel, which he soon enlarged to over 70 tons, but also because of his having built the Four Brothers, the first vessel of over 100 tons to prosecute the seal fishery.

There were those at the time who took a very dim view of Captain Munden’s initiative in building such a boat, emphatically declaring it to be a foolhardy venture and asserting that the captain would most certainly experience great difficulty in manipulating such a craft amid the ice floes, some going so far as to say that it would be impossible to turn the bloody thing around in heavy ice.

I can well imagine the deep-water language as salty old skippers of the day met one another on the streets of the old town, or gathered together in twos and threes in their homes at night talking, debating, and eventually wagging their heads about the whole thing, can’t you?

A portion of the old walled graveyard at the foot of Rattley Row, removed in the 1960s (Photo courtesy of the Stone Barn Museum)

Yes. It is interesting also to note that the Reverend Charles Lench, when writing on this particular topic more than a century later, declared that the Four Brothers was talked about as much at the time of her construction as was the Great Eastern in her early days. This comparison between the Four Brothers and the Great Eastern is a most interesting observation pointing out the significance placed on the value of the seal fishery to both the welfare of the town and to the economy of the country in general.

The history books tell us much about the Great Eastern. But are there any more facts available about the Four Brothers? And was she really, as some had said, a foolhardy venture?

The 104-ton Four Brothers was built at Brigus in 1819 by William Cole, presumably at the shipbuilding dock at Riverhead. The four brothers after whom the ship was named were the sons of Captain William Munden: Reuben, William, Azariah, and Robert. Notwithstanding those who had earlier termed the undertaking to be a foolhardy venture, she instead proved herself as time went by to be a sturdy and most worthy craft. Years later she came into the possession of Captain Azariah Munden, son of the original owner, and was rebuilt in Brigus by shipwright Michael Kearney in 1853. She was enlarged to 123 tons, renamed the Three Sisters, and was reported as still sailing in 1868, after almost 50 years of service. The three sisters were Elizabeth, Susie, and Julia, the daughters of Captain Azariah Munden.

The Four Brothers, however, was not the first of the Munden-owned fleet of ships. Earlier vessels included the 52-ton Active, built at Colliers in 1805 and owned by William Munden, Sr.; and the 49-ton Victory, built at Brigus in 1804 for Nathaniel Munden, one of the first vessels ever constructed here.

Entrances of the now-buried Wine Cellars as they looked in the 1940s

(Photo courtesy of the Stone Barn Museum)

When Captain Azariah Munden built his house here at a point opposite the public wharf in the mid-1800s, it was on land that came to him through his mother, Elizabeth, daughter of Robert Knight. Standing here on a high, solidly constructed dry rock wall, a part of which still exists today near the northeast corner of the most easterly of the stores of the Hiscock complex, it occupied a commanding position overlooking the wharf and the then crowded harbour. Stone steps led to a wide front deck, which was supported by a row of arches held in place by a series of pillars. The centrally located front door was set into a recessed arched opening, and the drawing room and parlour windows on either side of it were also arched and as tall as the door itself.

The house appeared very lofty in spite of its only two-and-a-half storeys, occasioned no doubt by the ten-foot ceilings inside and the high wall on which the structure stood. The steep hip roof fitted on all four sides with dormer windows, ten in total, added greatly to the building’s stately appearance. Inside, scarlet and gold wallpaper adorned the drawing-room walls, and elegant life-sized oil portraits of the captain, his wife, and other family members bespoke an air of gracious living. Such a refined and formal lifestyle was not surprising, especially in view of the fact that the family’s Old Country ancestors included such personalities as Sir Richard Munden and Admiral Sir John Munden, both of whom were famous British naval heroes.

I wish I could have seen Captain Munden’s house.

It may come as a surprise to you to know that you may still see it today, not in its original form, however, but nearly so. You see, the building was taken down and moved to Harbour Grace about 1910, where it became the property of the Munns. This came about because

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