THE QUAKERS IN PELHAM

[Mute words,Living voices-The Letters of Henry Giles

by Pelham Historical Society September 1992]

As mentioned earlier, Henry Giles was a member of the Quakers(Society of Friends) who played a very significant role in the development of Pelham. It is very likely that it was his knowledge of a well established Quaker community in Pelham that influenced his decision to settle here in 1840. When Quakers first started migrating to America from Britain during the 17^th century, the form of the organization was fixed, and therefore, Quakerism experienced very little change in the  New World.

Early Quaker settlers did not involve themselves in mainstream economics or politics. They preferred to live in rural areas where they could earn a living by farming or by running a small business. However, the idea of community was a very important one to most Quaker settlers. “Nearly all of them chose to settle in a compact Quaker rural neighbourhood; only a few selected lands in isolation from other Friends.” (Richard K. MacMaster, “Friends in the Niagara Peninsula”. In Canadian Quaker Newsletter. Summer, 1989.) The development of the town of Pelham and the village of Fonthill relied a great deal on this Quaker sense of community.

Most of the early Quaker settlers in Pelham were from Bucks County or Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Many friends migrated to Canada from the American colonies after they had refused to take part n the American Revolution. These people were not loyalists. But they were, nevertheless, affected by restrictions placed on their civil rights.

By 1799, Pelham had enough Quaker settler (79) to establish its own Monthly Meeting. This was the first Monthly Meeting of the Society of Friends to be established in Canada. These meetings gave the Friends the opportunity to worship and to discuss any matters dealing with their organization. A Quaker meeting house had already been built in 1784, but it was too small and cramped to suit the needs of the growing community. Another meeting house was built in Effingham (Beckett’s Mills), which was, for a long time, the centre of Quaker influence in Pelham. Then in 1807, the original meeting house of 1784 was rebuilt. The cemetery that was situated beside this first meeting house still exists today at the corner of Welland Avenue and Effingham Road.

The year 1828 marked a separation among Quakers in both England and in North America. Differences of opinion over interpretation and practice led to the creation of the Orthodox and Hicksite branches of Quakerism. The Evangelical views of the Orthodox branch stressed the importance of the Holy Scriptures, along with the belief that the Message must be spread, while the Hicksites, who seceded from the Society of Friends, followed the Quietistic principles of Elias Hicks.

At the time of the separation, the Hicksites made up the majority of the Quaker community in Pelham. As a result, the Orthodox branch of Quakerism was forced to withdraw from the original meeting house and meet at the home of Robert Spencer.

Then in 1829, they erected a new meeting house on property secured from Samuel Taylor. In 1865, this was replaced by a brick edifice, the  meeting house at Pelham Corners as it stands today. Since Henry Giles was a member of the Orthodox branch, he most likely attended Quaker Monthly Meetings at this site.

Although local Monthly Meetings were an integral part of the Quaker community, the Quarterly, Half, and Yearly Meetings were also highly regarded. The Pelham Quarterly Meeting was first established in 1814 under the authority of the New York Yearly Meeting. This meeting took  in all the meetings of the Orthodox Branch in Canada West, including Norwich and Pelham.

The Quaker communities in this area experienced slow but steady growth. Throughout the 19^th century, the towns of Pelham and Thorold received a substantial number of Quaker settlers from the British Isles. Quakers migrating to Pelham in the 19^th century were guaranteed to find prosperous rural neighbourhood with a well established community of Friends. When news of such a community reached fellow Quakers in England, men like Henry Giles were naturally attracted to the possibilities of a new life in Canada.

Quakerism played an important role not only in the development of Pelham, but in the development of the Giles family as well. Henry Giles was a very active member of the Orthodox Branch. Most friends migrating from the British Isles during the 19^th century tended to join the Orthodox Quakers because they were being recognized by the meetings in Dublin and London. Giles was an assistant to the clerk at the Pelham Monthly Meeting at Pelham Corners, and he made a number of visits to meetings of Friends in other areas. In fact, Henry Giles passed away in 1871, at the age of 68, while preparing to attend a morning meeting at the Pelham Meeting House. His wife, Hannah, died at “Brook Farm” nine years later and was buried in the Friends Cemetery at Pelham Corners.