From The Niagara Gazette:
Moving along to 1789 and a trip involving a Miss Ann Powell. Her journal is a graphic description of the difficulties and inconvenience of travel in her day. I found it interesting enough to select some her writings, as they were found to be of great value historically, not only for the light which it throws upon the general state of the country, about Niagara and for the description of the Falls, but for the information which it contains relative to the Indians whom Miss Powell was so fortunate as to see in council assembled on the present site of Buffalo and for evidence as to conditions on the Niagara frontier just after the Revolution.
She states: “The Fort Niagara is by no means pleasantly situated. It is built close upon the Lake, which gains upon its foundations so fast, that in a few years they may be overflowed … Several gentlemen offered to escort us to the landing, which is eight miles from Fort Erie. There the Niagara River becomes impassable, and all the luggage was drawn up a steep hill in a cradle, a machine I never saw before. We walked up the hill, and were conducted to a good garden with an arbor in it, where we found a cloth laid for dinner, which was provided for us by the officers of the post. “
“After dinner we went on for seven miles to Fort Schlosher. (Her spelling) .The road was good, the weather charming, and this was the only opportunity we should have of seeing the fall. All of our party collected half a mile above the Falls and walked down to them. I was in raptures all the way. The Falls I had heard of forever, but no one had mentioned the Rapids! For half a mile the river comes foaming down immense rocks, some of them forming cascades 30 or 40 feet high! The banks are covered with woods, as are a number of islands, some of them very high out of the water. One in the centre of the river, runs into a point and seems to divide the Falls, which would otherwise be quite across the river , into the form of a crescent.
“I believe no mind can form an idea of the immensity of the body of water, or the rapidity with which it hurries down. The height is 180 feet, and long before it reaches the bottom, it loses all appearance of a liquid. The spray rises like light summer clouds, and when the rays of the sun are reflected through it , they form innumerable rainbows, but the sun was not in a situation to show this effect when we were there.
“One thing I could find nobody to explain to me, which is, the stillness of the water at the bottom of the Falls; it is as smooth as a lake, for half a mile, deep and narrow, the banks very high and steep, with trees hanging over them. I was never before sensible of the power of scenery, nor did I suppose the eye could carry to the mind such strange emotions of pleasure, wonder and solemnity.” For a time every other impression was erased from my memory! Had I been left to myself, I am convinced I should not have thought of moving whilst there was light to distinguish objects.”
Link to the rest at The Niagara Gazette
PG doesn’t believe he has ever posted anything from The Niagara Gazette before and definitely not something written by its columnist, Norma Higgs.
Along with many others (he presumes), PG and Mrs. PG have been discussing the short and long-term impacts of the extraordinary Covid shutdown and some of the weirdness which has accompanied it.
PG has found distraction and some perspective in reading historical fiction and non-fiction.
He is not quite certain how he stumbled across Ms. Higgs’ article transcribing what appears to be a 1789 journal entry by an unmarried woman, Ann Powell, recording her firsts impressions of Niagara Falls during her travels through the area.
For historical context, Ann was traveling six years after the end of the Revolutionary War and two years after the Constitutional Convention.
Fort Niagara, which Ann mentions in her account, was originally built under the direction of the Governor of New France in 1687 on Lake Ontario beside the source of the Niagara River. The fort underwent a series of reconstructions and expansions over the years thereafter.
The Fort fell into British hands during the French and Indian War in 1759. At the time Ann visited the fort, in 1789, although the area where the fort was constructed was ceded to the United States under the Treaty of Paris which ended the Revolutionary War, the fort was still under British control.
During and after the Revolutionary War, this part of upstate New York was a stronghold and sanctuary for those who had been Loyalists, supporting the British during the Revolutionary War and a great many Loyalists fled the effective boundaries of the United States to settle in this area. Fort Niagara did not come under the control of the United States until after the signing of the Jay Treaty in 1796.
Following are a couple of illustrations of the fort.
