Pirate Bill and the "Patriots"

Another look back into the past    of our area      
 
An interesting account of Lake Ontario region history is available from Shaun McLaughlin who publishes on the Patriot War and the well known historical personage of Bill Johnston.
Shaun McLaughlin is a journalist and tech writer living in eastern Ontario. He has published several books on the Patriots War, Pirate Bill Johnston, and other upper St. Lawrence River and Thousand Islands history  raiders and rebels press 

 He calls his publishing endeavor Raiders and Rebels Press.
He has self published two historical novels "Counter Currents" and "Islands of Love and War" and a historical nonfiction work that the History Press picked up,“The Patriot War along the New York Canada Border”. The so-called Patriot War is an obscure and little understood episode in the history of U S-Canada relations. Yet it has interesting parallels to more modern times.

 In large part the trouble started when Canadians in both Ontario and Quebec got sick and tired of their corrupt unresponsive governments during the 1830s. Immigration and differential treatment of recent immigrants from the U.S. and economic hard times that resulted in a bank bail out that ignored indebted farmers contributed to the resentments. People took to the streets and shots were exchanged in 1837. Once trouble broke out, folks on the New York side of the border were more than willing to help out to keep the resentments bubbling. Among them was Bill Johnston.

Johnston was probably one of the best known pre-Prohibition era smugglers on Lake Ontario. Both before and after the 1812 war he was quite active in “free trade” of rum and tea. A Wikipedia entry says he made a little money on the side by passing information on to the U.S. revenue agents on Canadian smugglers. One of his claims to fame during the Patriots War was the burning of the steamer Robert Peel.

One reason for Johnston's fame was his ability to elude the enemy forces thanks to his skill and good seamanship. An old account of his time says The flagship of his fleet consisted of a 16-oared barge ( a long narrow rowboat similar to a 'gig' only larger) manned by his companions and mounting three-pound guns. The paper says the boat and crew were able to make a speed of from 12 to 14 miles an hour, and the small size of the craft gave it far greater mobility than a steamboat,as it could take advantage of all the “nooks and crannies that abound” in the Thousand Islands.



Learn more about him and the Patriots War at McLaughlin's blog or at .
http://www.piratebilljohnston.com/