Thomas Tennant

Thomas Tennant migrated from Aghade in Carlow with his family of 10 in June 1820. His wife was Anne Hill. They settled in Lanark Township in Lanark County in Ontario Canada. He died in February 1821 and is buried in the Tennant Cemewtery in Lanark Township - now part of Lanark Highlands near Middleville.

It was Thomas who chose, at the age of 66, to leave everything he knew, to gather his wife, their ten children and two servants, to take up pioneering in Canada’s Ottawa Valley.

Until then, Thomas had been an administrator at Ballintemple, the estate of the Butler family near Aghade parish, a few miles outside the town of Tullow in County Carlow, Ireland.

Thomas, family & servants were among the 402 settlers who sailed on the vessel Commerce from Greenock, Scotland on Wednesday, June 21st, 1820, and arrived in Quebec on Saturday, August 5th.

There were no railways. The Lanark settlers had to haul their possessions overland by wagon, and by barge for weeks before arriving at the Prescott Military settlement. From there, Thomas and sons took a stage to Perth. From Perth, Thomas and sons would hike north some 20 miles to find the land they wished to claim as part of the settler’s program. Then, given a starter kit of supplies, they had to quickly build a log shelter on their new property before winter set in.

Robert Dawson Tennant’s original history suggests that Thomas was heartbroken over his decision to move his family to “this wilderness”. On February 7th, 1821, barely six months after first setting foot in Canada, Thomas died following a short illness.
 

He’s buried in a spot at 943 Concession 10B Lanark Township that he had chosen himself, in what would become the Tennant Family Burying Ground, at a small, sandy clearing in the woods within view of his homestead.