Charles Shirreff (26 July 1768 – 5 May 1847) was an early

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

businessman and public official. He was born in

Leith Leith (; gd, Lìte) is a port area in the north of the city of Edinburgh, Scotland, founded at the mouth of the Water of Leith. In 2021, it was ranked by '' Time Out'' as one of the top five neighbourhoods to live in the world. The earliest ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

in 1768. In 1817, he migrated to Smith's Creek, later Port Hope, in

Upper Canada The Province of Upper Canada (french: link=no, province du Haut-Canada) was a part of British Canada established in 1791 by the Kingdom of Great Britain, to govern the central third of the lands in British North America, formerly part of the ...

. He obtained a grant of land in

Fitzroy Township Fitzroy is a former incorporated and present day geographic township (Canada)#Ontario, township originally part of Carleton County, Ontario, Carleton County in eastern Ontario, Canada. Fitzroy was located in the western part of the county, bordere ...

in the upper

Ottawa Valley The Ottawa Valley is the valley of the Ottawa River, along the boundary between Eastern Ontario and the Outaouais, Quebec, Canada. The valley is the transition between the Saint Lawrence Lowlands and the Canadian Shield. Because of the surroundi ...

and moved there in 1818. He founded the town of

Fitzroy Harbour, Ontario Fitzroy Harbour is a small village within the city of Ottawa in eastern Ontario, Canada. It is located on the Ottawa River at the mouth of the Carp River (Ottawa), Carp River. A branch of the Mississippi River (Ontario), Mississippi River, known a ...

on the

Ottawa River The Ottawa River (french: Rivière des Outaouais, Algonquin: ''Kichi-Sìbì/Kitchissippi'') is a river in the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. It is named after the Algonquin word 'to trade', as it was the major trade route of Eastern ...

in 1831 and built a

grist mill A gristmill (also: grist mill, corn mill, flour mill, feed mill or feedmill) grinds cereal grain into flour and Wheat middlings, middlings. The term can refer to either the Mill (grinding), grinding mechanism or the building that holds it. Grist i ...

there. His son, Robert, took the post of deputy surveyor general of woods, which regulated tree cutting on public lands in Upper and

Lower Canada The Province of Lower Canada (french: province du Bas-Canada) was a British colony on the lower Saint Lawrence River and the shores of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence (1791–1841). It covered the southern portion of the current Province of Quebec an ...

by collecting dues. Shirreff set up an informal arrangement where he measured the timber at

Bytown Bytown is the former name of Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It was founded on September 26, 1826, incorporated as a town on January 1, 1850, and superseded by the incorporation of the City of Ottawa on January 1, 1855. The founding was marked by a Grou ...

and Robert collected the dues at

Quebec City Quebec City ( or ; french: Ville de Québec), officially Québec (), is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Quebec. As of July 2021, the city had a population of 549,459, and the Communauté métrop ...

where the rafts of timber were sold. Shirreff proposed a new system, which was accepted in 1832, where a system of timber limits was used to control the cutting of trees on crown lands. A down payment was paid by the lumber company and then the fees were paid in full when the timber was sold. This system was challenged in 1832 on the

Gatineau River The Gatineau River (french: Rivière Gatineau, ) is a river in western Quebec, Canada, which rises in lakes north of the Baskatong Reservoir and flows south to join the Ottawa River at the city of Gatineau, Quebec. The river is long and drains ...

due to illegal cutting along the river; this area was exempted from public sale of timber limits. Although Shirreff protested, the "

Gatineau Privilege {{other uses, Gatineau (disambiguation) The Gatineau Privilege referred to a monopoly introduced to limit the cutting of timber along the Gatineau River in Lower Canada from 1832 to 1843. Quotas were established for each participant and no other t ...

" remained in place. A scandal surfaced when the company managing affairs at Quebec went bankrupt; it was discovered that they had been accepting promissory notes rather than bonds, resulting in lost revenue to the provinces. The Shirreffs were replaced in the Bytown office in 1836. Charles continued to expand his business interests at Fitzroy Harbour, adding a

sawmill A sawmill (saw mill, saw-mill) or lumber mill is a facility where logs are cut into lumber. Modern sawmills use a motorized saw to cut logs lengthwise to make long pieces, and crosswise to length depending on standard or custom sizes (dimensi ...

and a store. During the 1830s, Shirreff promoted a plan to connect the Ottawa River to

Georgian Bay Georgian Bay (french: Baie Georgienne) is a large bay of Lake Huron, in the Laurentia bioregion. It is located entirely within the borders of Ontario, Canada. The main body of the bay lies east of the Bruce Peninsula and Manitoulin Island. To ...

via a

canal Canals or artificial waterways are waterways or engineered channels built for drainage management (e.g. flood control and irrigation) or for conveyancing water transport vehicles (e.g. water taxi). They carry free, calm surface flow un ...

. Shirreff died in Bytown in 1847.

External links

Biography at the ''Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Shirreff, Charles 1768 births 1847 deaths Pre-Confederation Canadian businesspeople People from Leith