Last November, the Archives was fortunate to receive an extensive collection of letters, donated by Bill Henry. The collection includes a variety of authors and recipients, but the bulk are circa 1850s correspondence to George Snider. Snider assumed a number of roles in the formative years of the County, including Grey County Sheriff, Owen Sound Mayor, and Member of Parliament for Grey North. However, the feature correspondence for this blog, in honour of February being Black History Month, stems from George Snider’s role in the 1850s as Crown Land Agent. Grey County was provisionally established in 1852. Looking back, the mid-1850s in this region can be considered to be both a time of opportunity and turbulence. Land was opened for settlement, but at the same time there was an influx of people and jockeying for property. It is important to note that this particular petition is being featured primarily because it provides names of Black settlers in Artemesia, but that other circumstances of conflict in other townships and between other settlers also existed. A transcript of the letter is included for ease of reading along with the original below.
A letter written to Mr. George Snider, Government Agent:
27 February 1851
Sir
Mr. George Snider Government agent
Sir we as a body of colourd (sic) people we Pettion (sic) to your honour in order that you will prevent a man of colour by the Name of charles maloney from having agrant (sic) of land in the town ship of artemesia the reason that we Pettion to your honour is that this man is a bad man in the Neighbourhood this man is known by us in the Queens bush the agent Mr. Jackson on the account of this refused to let this Man have agrant of Land/ Sir your pettioners’ll ever pray
John W Levi
Dorsey ambush
James (?) Handay
Larken Mark alverson
John Brown
David mason
Lewis howard
James Jackson
Philloman workman
Lemuel brown
John Johnson
Levi Johnson
Chancey Simons
Gabriel Black
franklin crawford
James handy
When folded, the back of the letter reads:
Letter and Petition of John W. Levi and others – wishing me not to give a grant to Charles Maloney
July 27th 1851
Letter front and back PF502S1F3I4
By Karin Noble, Archives Transcription by Mollie Wilson
Grey Roots Museum & Archives Blog 
Does it say whether a grant was ever issued to Charles Maloney??
W. W. Smith’s Gazetteer & Directory of the County of Grey, 1865-1866, p. 26, mentions in its Artemesia Township section, that in 1848, the Toronto and Sydenham Road was run out (surveyed), as well as the Durham Road. In the next year, “Grant Lots” of 50 acres were laid out and apportioned to “actual settlers” (likely didn’t want land speculators). Smith mentions that “George Snider, Esquire, of Owen Sound, late the Sheriff of Grey, acted as Agent in the settlement of these roads”. After the lots belonging to the two road systems “were taken up, the rest of the township soon followed”. W. W. Smith does not list a Charles Maloney in his directory, but James Handy (Con. 1, Lot 31, South of the Durham Road), Gabriel Black (Con. 1, Lot 21, S.D.R.) and Charles Simons (Con. 1, Lot 7) are listed in 1865.
Mr. Snider was the Sheriff of Grey County between 1853-1863. He later served as a Reformer Member of Parliament 1867-1878, and Grey Roots has his Confederation Medal, as well as a couple of other artifacts that pertain to him. The Grey County Archives also has an image of him.
I could see no mention of a Charles Maloney in a transcript of the 1851 census (the Simons family, and Philimon Workman’s family are there), nor is he seen in the 1861 census of Artemesia.