Pierre Desjardins was born in 1775 in Nesle, Picary in France before the eve of the French Revolution.
As a Royalist, he fled to England in the spring of 1792 before leaving for Upper Canada in the fall of the same year. Pierre would then serve as a clerk to both John MacKay and later to James Durand in Newark (Niagara-on-the-Lake) before moving to the Head of the Lake in the village of Cootes Paradise, which would later be named Dundas. It is here that he entered a partnership with Richard Hatt, a prominent entrepreneur of the area, to invest in a canal to link Hamilton Harbour with Burlington Bay in an attempt develop Dundas. He applied to the Crown for the land grant, and while denied to him initially, the second application was pushed through and he was granted Lots 19-24 at the edge of the township to construct the canal.
The Canal’s development was plagued with issues such as a shortage of funding, disgruntled employees, conflicts between investors such as Mr. MacNab and Mr. Notman, both high profile and wealthy investors, and possibly most importantly, by natural erosion collecting sediment making the canal too shallow for most ships.
By August 1826, Desjardin was deeply indebted to his investors, including Hatt, and his house with two acres was up for sale to pay off the debt. In addition, his stockholders were forced to pay up on the failing investment bringing him out as far as Grimsby. It is here in early September 1827 that he died while attempting to catch and saddle his horse. The coroner ruled he had “died by the visitation of God,” possibly being a heart attack for there is no mention of injury. The failure of his investment and the financial pressures from some of the most prominent and wealthy figures of Upper Canada was undeniably stressful while chasing a horse in the late summers heat may well have triggered the heart attack. The canal still remains carrying his name “Desjardins Canal” but Hamilton quickly overtook Dundas as the industrial superpower.
Pierre Desjardin is buried in St. Andrew’s Anglican Church in Grimsby.
Pierre Desjardins’s life serves as a prime example of the risks of investment and industry during the turn of the century in Upper Canada. Desjardins dealt with some of the area’s most powerful men in building the Desjardins Canal.
Unfortunately the Canal was redundant and obsolete before it was even completed leaving Desjardins in relative obscurity.
Adam Elsebroek, Flamborough Archives Intern
This article was originally published in the Flamborough Review, 13 March 2014.
