Newsletter reader Russ McGillivray reports that Library and Archives Canada recently announced a major update to its online database “Upper Canada Land Petitions (1763–1865).” This online resource is valuable for genealogists.
Before the arrival of the Loyalists and British military settlers, the present-day Province of Ontario was an extension of the Province of Quebec. Following the Constitutional Act of 1791, the colony of Quebec was divided to create Upper Canada (today Ontario) and Lower Canada (today Quebec). Many early settlers, both military and civilian, submitted petitions to the Governor to obtain Crown land. Sons and daughters of Loyalists were also entitled to free lands.
The Upper Canada Land Petitions contain petitions for grants or leases of land and other administrative records. The new online database provides access to more than 82,000 references to individuals who lived in present-day Ontario between 1783 and 1865.
While the database has been online for a while, the new update contains two major additions:
- More than 5,000 references to land petitions occurring in the Upper Canada Sundries have been added to the database.
- All suggestions for corrections received from users since the original launch in September 2010 have been integrated into the database.
In short, if you already looked earlier at this database and didn't find what you want, you might want to check again to see if the records you seek have been added in the new updates.
The database is available at:
www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/databases/upper-canada-land/index-e.html
Quoting from the website:
Furthermore, Library and Archives Canada is pleased to announce the addition of the digitized images of the Upper Canada land petitions from 326 microfilm reels, representing 357,831 new images to its website. Through the “microform digitization” research tool, users can browse the microfilm reels page by page.
The tool is available at:
www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/microform-digitization/index-e.html
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