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A wonderful new view of Fort York in the 1840s has been discovered by chance in a school boy’s sketchbook. In an article entitled “Art Education in a Manly Environment: Educating the Sons of the Establishment in a 19th Century Boys’ School,” (Studies in Art Education, vol. 42, no. 2, Winter 2001), Prof. F. Graeme Chalmers tells how pupils at Toronto’s elite Upper Canada College (UCC) learned to draw as part of their gentlemanly education. Listed as an example are the contents of a sketchbook produced by thirdFort York from the east, 1840, by Thomas Williamson (Courtesy of Upper Canada College Archives, Toronto) form pupil, Thomas Williamson, aged 17, which is now found in the UCC Archives. On page 24 are drawings in pen and wash of a child, houses in a landscape, and the Toronto Garrison from the east.
Williamson’s sketch adds much to what is known of how the fort looked after it had been strengthened following the 1838 rebellion, says Dr. Carl Benn, chief curator for City of Toronto museums and an authority on the fort’s history.
In the sketch the fort appears as a low-lying group of buildings surrounded by ramparts and log palisades. Outside its walls in the Garrison Creek ravine (right foreground) is seen the so-called artillery square composed of horse stables, straw stores and a gun shed. Inside the garrison’s gates most buildings in the view are still easily identified even though only their roofs are visible. The guardhouse, commandant’s house and new ‘D’ barracks are all there. However, one flat-roofed structure near the east blockhouse (extreme left) is still a mystery. Williamson’s work brings new life to what had previously just been outlines on a map and provides a better understanding of what the east side of the fort looked like. For example, the palisading and stockading are more extensive and impressive than previously thought.
Thomas Williamson, the son of a prominent Stoney Creek merchant and farmer, entered UCC as a boarder in September 1839. He signed and dated the sketchbook’s title page Dec. 10, 1840. In schoolboy fashion he described his hometown there as “the Capital of Canada,” likely a sly poke at a matter then under discussion: where the seat of government would be following the Act of Union that joined Upper and Lower Canada. Shortly the honour would come to rest on Kingston. The title page also includes a specimen of his handwriting: “Let us not expect too much pleasure in this life: no situation is exempt from trouble. The best persons are no doubt the happiest but they have their trials and afflictions.” In some ways Williamson was one of the latter people. Recognized at the end of the Fall term, 1840, for both his good conduct and proficiency, he secured firsts in Greek, Latin,
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