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| Memorial Plaque, Havelock, New Brunswick Used with permission Photo by Sheila L. (Graves) Bampton |
Given the recent media coverage of the sad events surrounding the Canadian Indian residential school gravesites I felt it necessary to document other sad events that the media does not cover. I do not condone either of these sad events from history, but I wish the media were more transparent and balanced with their coverage, but understand that some events are not politically correct regardless of their historicity. Still the events must be understood in their historical context.
I have been revisiting the descendants and genealogy of my Grandparents (Leland Dimock [Sept 22, 1905–Nov 7, 1975] and Mary Agnes (Thorne, 1908–2001) on my mothers (Hilda Luella Graves) side to publish my great aunt, Georgia Luella Dimock, memoirs. In the process, I have once again come across the account of the abduction of the two Keith girls (distant relatives) by Mi'kmaq Indians on May 16, 1816,[1] which I have heard from my relatives over the years.
Their names were Eliza Keith (b. 1808 ca. 5–7 years) and Mary Ann Keith (b. 1809/10–ca. 1824; ca. 7–9 years) and were the daughters of George Ezra Keith (born 1784 in Long Reach, Kings County, New Brunswick–died 1831 New Canaan, NB) and Abigail (Clark) Keith (1788–November 27, 1862), the oldest son of Daniel Keith (1761–1830) married to Elizabeth (Disbrow, 1765/1767–1838) of Havelock, New Brunswick.
I am related to the Keith girls through my Grandmother (Mary Agnes Thorne) and trace the connection back to Daniel Keith and his 9th son Josiah [2]. The two lost girls are descendants of Daniel Keith's first son.
An account of the incident is confirmed, documented and published in “The Story of the Two Little Lost Girls” [3] by Margaret Keith, (Margaret Disborough Keith,1837–1927) widow of Ezra Keith (James Ezra Keith (February 3, 1828–November 28, 1903), who was the youngest brother of the two little lost girls who also recounts the story. I also recall my mother (Hilda Luella Dimock), grandmother (Mary Agnes Price) and Aunt (Georgia Luella Dimock) telling me the story and who knew the family well.
The account I am reproducing here was compiled in 1905 by the pastor Rev. J. W. Brown the eighteenth pastor of the Baptist Church in Havelock, New Brunswick (May 1900–1903) and published in his An Historical Sketch of the Early Settlement of New Canaan [N.B.] and the Histories of the New Canaan, Havelock, and Albert Baptist Churches, 1905, 12. It is consistent with the account by the girls youngest brother's wife, Margaret Keith.
These early settlers as a rule had large families, it being not uncommon for a mother to have twelve children “to rise up and call her blessed.” Daniel Keith could rejoice in twelve sons grown to manhood, besides a few daughters. It is said on one occasion that these twelve sons were mowing in a large field with the father leading off. The father was moved with a pardonable pride on the occasion, and was afterwards accustomed to refer to it with considerable elation. The name of the oldest son was George. He settled afterwards on Butternut Ridge, on what is now known as the Ezra Keith Place. Shortly after he settled here, he met with a very sad and peculiarly distressing experience, an account of which is being handed down to successive generations. He had at the time two children — girls — Eliza and Mary Ann, aged respectively 9 and 7 years.[4] Just north of his house was a spring near a wood, where the children were accustomed to play.
One day while the children were out to this place, a neighbor’s child — May Price — came over to play with them, and their mother went to the door and called them. She received an answer to the call, and after waiting some time for them to come in, she called again; receiving no answer to this call she went in search of them, but a most careful search failed to discover their whereabouts. She then called her husband, who joined in the search, but with no better success. Appeal was made to the neighbors and a general search was instituted which continued through the days and nights for a considerable time without avail. The only trace found was the imprint of a child’s hand in the soft sand on the bank of a brook some considerable distance in the woods, as if a child had stooped to drink. It was at last surmised that the children had been carried off by Indians, of whom there were then a large number to the east of the New Canaan Settlement.
After a while, stray reports would reach the parents of white children being seen with [Mi’kmaq] Indians at different places, which would move Mr. Keith to make journeys to these places that he might ascertain whether the children thus reported were his.
[2] These journeys were all fruitless. The last journey made seemed to have satisfied Mr. Keith that it was useless to make any further attempts to recover them. His peculiar reticence concerning this particular journey aroused suspicion in some that he had received some tidings from them, but as they would then be grown to young womanhood he had found it impossible to induce them to return home; however this might have been only a suspicion.
Years afterwards a supposed Indian woman came into the place with some of her tribe, and it was at once surmised — although she had taken on almost the Indian hue — that she was one of the missing children. This surmise she gradually and reluctantly admitted was true. She at once recognized her grandmother when brought into her presence, whom she knew well before her abduction, and of whom she had been very fond, and in other ways removed all doubt as to her identity. In a moment of confidence she told the story of their capture by the Indians: She said they were suddenly seized, their cries stopped, and they were quickly carried away. For a time the horns and guns of the searching parties could be heard, but gradually died away. At one place the Indians halted and attempted to kindle a fire by igniting the powder in the pan of a musket; but by some miscalculation the gun went off which greatly alarmed the Indians; whereupon they hastily caught up the children and travelled a considerable distance further. She said they were kindly treated by the Indians, but that her sister never took kindly to them, but despite all their efforts to win her she persisted in pining for home.
This woman Eliza was at the time married to an Indian and had a family of children. She was very anxious to rejoin them but was hindered by her new-found folks from doing so. On one occasion she escaped and took a straight course through the woods to the place where her Indian friends were encamped, which she reached only to find that they had removed to an other place; guided as if by instinct she took a direct course to the place where they had gone. She was however, missed, tracked and found before reaching the place and brought back to the home of her parents. She told them that it was useless to detain her for that when spring opened and the snow disappeared they would be unable to track her and she would get away. Her father had long since passed away. It was generally believed that his death was caused by his long continued anxiety and grief for his lost children. Her mother was most anxious that she should remain with her, but when spring opened, yielding to her persistent entreaties, consent was given that she should visit her family and the Indians to whom she had become attached. These were then encamped in the vicinity of Shediac [New Brunswick]. She promised to return to the home of her youth after she had made this visit. She was taken a long way on her journey and then left to herself. She never returned. Whether she chose to stay, or was prevented from coming back it is not known. The other child Mary Ann also returned but in such a demented condition that she was unable to give any intelligent account of herself. She wandered at large and remained an oddity until her death.
Margaret Keith, widow of Ezra Keith, who was the youngest brother of the two girls recounts:
She [Eliza] answered so readily to the name “Eliza” that the mother was deeply impressed, although it was difficult to get her to say anything about her former life, or how she came to be with the Indians. One day she was sitting with her elbows on her knees and her resting on her hands, as that was the position she seemed most comfortable in, several old ladies came in, her mother drew attention to them and asked her if she knew them. She looked up and said “No, me don’t know them.” At last her grandmother came in, her mother said “Do you know this old lady, Eliza?” She looked up with such surprise, put her arms around the old lady and said, “Dat my dear old grandmother”, and burst out crying. That was proof enough that she was the same little girl who used to visit her grandmother and stay for weeks at a time . . . After that she did not seem so distant, and would sometimes enter into conversation with the family, and talk of what little she could remember of her being lost. At one time when talking with one of her uncles who had been telling her how they had searched for them, she joined right in and said, “Did you hear the gun go off”. [5]
Footnotes
[1] The date is May 10 in M. Frederick Amos, Myrtle K. Perry, and Gerald Keith, The Descendants of Daniel and Elizabeth (Disbrow) Keith: Loyalists to New Brunswick in 1783 (Burlington, Ont.: M.F. Amos, 1981), 18; and the Memorial Plaque in Havelock, NB (see photo).
[2] M. Frederick Amos, Myrtle K Perry, and Gerald Keith, The Descendants of Daniel and Elizabeth (Disbrow) Keith: Loyalists to New Brunswick in 1783 (Burlington, Ont.: M.F. Amos, 1981), 18.
[3] Mary Keith, Bernice Plume, Myrtle Perry, and Pauline Steeves. Butternut Ridge-Havelock Our Proud Heritage 1809-1988. Havelock Women’s Institute (Sackville, New Brunswick: The Tribune Press, 1990), 4-6
[4] Eliza Keith (b. 1808 ca. 5–7 years) and Mary Ann Keith (b. 1809/10 ca. 7–9 years) were abducted in May 10, 1816. J. W. Brown, An Historical Sketch of the Early Settlement of New Canaan [N.B.] and the Histories of the New Canaan, Havelock, and Albert Baptist Churches, 1905, 12.
[5] Mary Keith et al., Butternut Ridge-Havelock Our Proud Heritage 1809-1988, Havelock Women’s Institute (Sackville, New Brunswick: The Tribune Press, 1990), 5.
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Updated Dec 11, 2021.
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