1893 Booklet "Souvenir of Quoddy"; scenes around Passamaquoddy Bay in Maine and New Brunswick

Reprinted, with permission, from the Heirlooms Reunited blog.

"Souvenir of Quoddy", a booklet of scenes from around Passamaquoddy Bay in Maine and New Brunswick, published in 1893 by Charles E. Brown at the Loring Studio in Eastport, Maine. The booklet was printed in Boston, Massachusetts, by John Andrew & Son.

The Loring studio was founded by Davis Franklin Loring (1819-1891), father-in-law of Charles E. Brown.

The photographs depict scenes from:

• Eastport, Maine
• Lubec, Maine
• Robbinston, Maine
• Pembroke, Maine
• Perry, Maine
• St. George, New Brunswick
• Islands in Passamaquoddy Bay
• Eastport, Maine, on Moose Island
• Cherry Island, New Brunswick
• Campobello Island, New Brunswick
• Allan's Island (now Treat Island), Maine
• Grand Manan, New Brunswick   

Images of all of the pages appear at the end of this post.

Scenes include:

• a page with two photographs of the Eastport, Maine, waterfront, taken from the Bay
• a page with three photographs Eastport, Maine: the Toll Bridge, Goudy's Point and Carrying Place
• a page with four photographs of Eastport, Maine: Frontier National Bank, the Savings Bank; Boynton High School and the Custom House
• a page with ten photographs, entitled "Eastport of Former Days"
• a page with three photographs: of fishing boats; Estes Head in Eastport, Maine; Cherry Island, New Brunswick
• a page with a photograph of Pulpit Rock in Robbinston, Maine
• a page with a photograph of "Old Friar" on Campobello Island, New Brunswick
• a page with 4 photographs of Campobello Island, New Brunswick: Head Harbor; Herring Cove; Lake Glensevern; Meadow Brook
• a page with 5 photographs of Campobello Island, New Brunswick, including Friar's Bay, Harbor DeLute, Echo Lake
• a page with two photographs of the Lubec, Maine, waterfront, taken from the Bay or from Campobello Island, New Brunswick
• a page with 3 photographs of Lubec, Maine: the Landing; Looking South; Hotel Ne-Mat-Ta-No
• a page with a photograph of Sail Rock, just off West Quoddy in Lubec, Maine; easternmost point in the lower 48
• a page with a photograph of West Quoddy Light in Lubec, Maine; from the rocky shore with the lighthouse in the distance
• a page with a photograph taken on Allan's Island looking south toward Lubec, Maine, and Grand Manan, New Brunswick - now Treat Island in Eastport, Main. The photographs shows numerous buildings no longer there
• a page with two photographs, of Pembroke, Maine, and of Perry, Maine
• a page with a photograph of the Indian Village at Pleasant Point in Perry, Maine
• a page with a photograph of Dark Harbor, Grand Manan, New Brunswick
• a page with a photograph of Southern Head Light, Grand Manan, New Brunswick
• a page with three photographs of St. George, New Brunswick: the Landing, the Village and the Falls
• a page with five photographs of Grand Manan Island, New Brunswick: Swallow Tail Light; Southern Head; Flagg's Cove; Dark Harbor Bar; Southern Cross

 

Newspaper clipping about Fort Sullivan, Eastport, Moose Island, Maine, probably from the late 1870s.

Passing of a Fort
Eastport's Old Fort Sullivan to Be Divided Up Into Building Lots and Sold

Eastport, Me.  May 19 -- One of Eastport's oldest and most prominent landmarks narrowly escaped going up in smoke recently during a storm, and while a heavy wind was blowing.

Fire was discovered coming through the roof of the old-time building on Fort Sullivan, where several families live, and a large crowd soon collected, including members of the fire department, who rendered valuable aid in getting the fire under control and saving the building.  The damage was small, and the former Government building that was at one time occupied by the English soldiers is yet prominent on the high ground.

Fort Sullivan, on which the above building stands, was built by the United States Government in 1808, the result of the embargo act passed by Congress in 1807, and it is supposed that the old fort was named in honor of Gov. Sullivan.  It was during his administration that the Batterman act was passed, which gave settlers at that time, who had no title, a fair compensation for improvements or betterments.  The Government turned its attention to the fortifying of Eastport, or Moose Island, as it was called, in the spring of 1807, and in April of the following year instructions came from the Government for Col. Lemuel Trescott, then Collector of Customs at Machias, to build the proposed fort here.  It is known that he purchased for $180 three acres of land on Clark's hill and the earth works were soon begun, to be followed by the necessary buildings.  A crescent battery of stone mason work was completed which was laid in lime 11 feet thick, and sods six and one-half feet thick laid on top, making the platform for the cannon.  A block-house was built near of pine timber, two stories high and having walls 14 inches thick.

They also constructed a magazine 10 feet square, the walls two feet thick and the roof arched.  A company of United States Artillery arrived in Passamaquoddy Bay on the warship Wasp, and the garrison was first commended [commanded?] by Capt. Moses Swett, four 18-pounders being mounted.

During the War of 1812, the place was occupied and some time later a fleet of English men-of-war arrived in the harbor and soon took possession of Fort Sullivan, which they held up to the close of the troubles.  It is said that most of the buildings on the fort, of which the above-mentioned is one, were built by the British at that time, who improved the fortifications began by the American Government and many buried timbers are yet to be seen on the fort and near the building now standing.  American soldiers were stationed at Fort Sullivan at intervals up to 1875, when they were ordered away by the Government and since that time the houses have been occupied mostly by the poorer residents of the city.

Last year a careful survey of the fort property was made and it was divided into lots that will probably be sold at public auction at an early date, when the present buildings will be hauled away and the frontier fortifications of 100 years ago will disappear.

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James Monroe's 1817 SOTU: Mentioning the Islands in Passamaquoddy Bay

In his State of the Union address on December 12, 1817, President James Monroe mentioned the Treaty of Ghent and the islands in Passamaquoddy Bay.

Excerpt from his address: 

The Commissioners under the fourth article of the treaty of Ghent, to whom it was referred to decide to which party the several islands in the bay of Passamaquoddy belonged under the treaty of 1783, have agreed in a report, by which all the islands in the possession of each party before the late war have been decreed to it.  

The Treaty of Ghent ended the hostilities of the War of 1812 in 1815, but a few thorny issues remained for further negotiation, including the issue of the islands in Passamaquoddy Bay.    

In July of 1814 the British had captured Fort Sullivan on Moose Island and renamed it Fort Sherbrooke, in honor of the Governor General of British North America, Sir John Coape Sherbrooke.  Unlike as in the case of Castine, Maine, however, the British did not leave Moose Island at the war's end, feeling that it had rightfully been part of British North America all along, since the American Revolution.

In the end, however, the negotiators agreed that the islands would be governed as they were before the War of 1812, and, thus, Moose Island and its fort would return to the United States, whereupon the fort resumed its name of Fort Sullivan. 

Although this decision was reached in late 1817, the British did not leave until June 30, 1818, because of slow communications, the enormity of the task and because the British were having a hard time finding transport for the large force.

A different outcome from those negotiations, not difficult to imagine, would have placed Moose Island in British North America, and thus a part of modern day Canada, or would have placed what are now the West Isles of New Brunswick in the United States.

Read Monroe's State of the Union address of December 12, 1817 in its entirety here.