Historical Research

At the time of initial European contact, in the mid-17th Century, there was a prosperous population of First Nations communities, with an agricultural economy. However, the ensuing warfare, famine and epidemics scattered the population of these so-called Neutral First Nations. In the late 17th and early 18th Centuries, the abandoned territory was occupied by the Mississaugas, an Algonquian people who practiced garden framing as well as hunting and fishing. It was these people with whom the British crown negotiated agreements for the settlement of Loyalists and Six Nations allies after the American Revolution.

The ravine and the landing area at the river’s edge remained an important transfer point in the early period of European settlement. The link to Chippawa and Lake Erie became known as the Niagara Portage Road, and was vital throughout the fur trade of the 17th, 18th and early 19th Centuries. 

In the late 18th Century, settlement of the area became important as a counterbalance to the threat posed by the newly independent United States of America. United Empire Loyalists and disbanded military units were granted land in six settlement centres in the Niagara-on-the-Lake area, including present-day Queenston. Robert Hamilton arrived in 1788 and was able to establish a mercantile wharf on the landing area at the foot of the ravine. He built up a significant commercial enterprise involving the transfer of goods and provisions for the military encampments. The name ‘Hamilton’s Wharf’ figures prominently on early maps (see 1826 example above). In 1799 he secured the patents for Lot 6 in the newly registered Queenston land division. One of the first distributing post offices in Ontario was established in 1802 on Hamilton’s property, and by 1811 the community of Queenston had a population of about 300, an active trading and portage economy, and a number of stores, hotels, warehouses and wharf buildings. 

The War of 1812 damaged many of the properties in the village and disrupted the economy and the flow of immigrants. Queenston was a centre of hostilities with military control passing back and forth between the Americans and the British, and the Robert Hamilton house saw a number of attacks and counterattacks. It was in ruins by 1814. However, the post-war period saw renewed activity and the population of Queenston crested at 500 or so in the early 1820s. William Lyon Mackenzie’s newspaper, The Colonial Advocate, became a leading voice of political reform in Upper Canada. Robert Hamilton erected a mansion at Deep Hollow, the landing area at the base of the ravine, and operated a successful shipping business, including the ferry to Lewiston. He was aided in his business ventures by his political connections with Governor Simcoe and others. 

By the time Robert Hamilton’s sons, Alexander and John, were entering business, the economy of Queenston was beginning to decline. The construction of the Erie and Welland canals, in the late 1820s, made overland passage optional. Brisk ferry traffic continued between Queenston and Lewiston, and the sons built and operated steamboats with some success. But their business ventures were to be short-lived. Alexander Hamilton eventually moved from business to government office, successfully lobbying for various appointments as Postmaster, Deputy Collector of Customs, Surrogate Court Judge, and Sherriff. He married Hannah Owen Jarvis, herself a member of a prominent Upper Canada family, in 1816.

Alexander and John obtained a railway charter in 1835, and established Deep Hollow, the landing at the base of the ravine, as the eastern terminus of the first railway in Upper Canada, the Erie & Ontario Railway Company. The line, connecting Queenston and Chippawa on iron-strapped timber rails, opened in 1841, after Alexander’s death. It provided an alternative route to the canal. The steep grade of the ravines was too much for early steam engines and required horses to haul the cars, until a regraded line and more powerful steam engines allowed mechanization of the line in 1854. By the 1860s, however, Queenston was no longer part of the key transportation network. 

The Hamilton Period:

It was during the 1830s that Alexander and Hannah Hamilton built their opulent Classical Revival mansion on the height of land overlooking the village and the ravine. Construction began in 1834 and was substantially complete in 1836. The house was designed and built by John Latshaw, master builder, with input from Alexander Hamilton. John Latshaw had moved to the Niagara area from Pennsylvania in 1827, at a time when architects such as Strickland and Latrobe had made Philadelphia the centre of American Greek Revival architecture. It was seen to reflect the republican and egalitarian interests of the new country. Interest in the Classical Revival style also spread to Upper Canada, however, where it became part of a more sophisticated interest in the combination of this architectural style with the Picturesque tradition in landscape design. Latshaw declared himself a carpenter and joiner when applying for Canadian citizenship in the 1830s, but at the end of his career had the word ‘architect’ inscribed on his tomb. He had a significant influence as a master builder in the Niagara area, and among his notable contributions besides Willowbank are Glencairn (1832) and Ruthven (1845), both Classical Revival mansions, as well as the Methodist church on Lundy’s Lane (1847), the Welland County courthouse (1856), an addition to the Lincoln County Courthouse (1865) and Stamford Township Hall (1874). 

In letters to Latshaw, Alexander Hamilton showed a keen interest in the design of the house, and may have helped create the classic lines of the house by suggesting cost-effective ways of integrating the various components. It was his suggestion to have the gallery on the front façade ‘embrace both stories’, as he put it, and to continue the cornice of the house around the top of the gallery, thus avoiding expensive paneled work. It was also Alexander who asked that the columns be of the Tuscan order, ‘as neater and plainer than the Grecian, but fluted, as the pillars of Mr. Jarvis’ portico at York’ (Mr. Jarvis being his wife’s father). He suggested reducing the slope of the hip roof to minimize its impact, further refining the lines of the house. He also was the one who insisted on wood stoves rather than fireplaces – ‘Franklin or other stoves to stand clear of the wall with a short pipe entering into the flue behind’ – at a time when this was a relatively new technology. 

The interior of the house was marked by an impressive centre hall plan, with the staircase to the side. The raised basement level created both a more dominant presence for the house on its promontory, and a well-lit kitchen and service area. The main floor featured a parlour and office flanking the main entrance, and a dining room and service area to the west. The third level contained the family bedrooms. From surviving evidence, it appears that the colours of the interior were rich and dark – deep green in the northeast office, deep red in the southeast parlour and the south dining room, stained and varnished trim, painted and richly carpeted floors. There is evidence of marbling in the centre hall. The large windows would have provided essential ambient and task lighting, and influenced many of the patterns of inhabitation. 

The landscape setting included a curved drive up the hill to the main entrance, with plantings and a delicate picket fence framing the façade and the central stair. It is possible that the original drive approached the house from Deep Hollow, to the northeast (see sketch above) and that is was only after construction of the railway that the drive shifted to the southeast. 

The completed estate, called Willowbank for the willows at the base of the east hill, had immediate landmark status. It was visible not only from Queenston but from the River Road, and even from across the river in Lewiston. It reflected the commercial and political importance of the Hamilton family. The father, Robert, was recognized as the founder of Queenston and the most important entrepreneur in its early history. The son, Alexander, had a less favourable business climate to operate in but was able to establish himself as a key political and administrative figure in the area. His wife Hannah also came from a well-known family.

With Alexander’s death in early 1839, Hannah was left a widow with ten children and a large estate to care for. For almost fifty years, until her death in 1888, she did a remarkable job of sustaining the Willowbank legacy. Working tirelessly as a seamstress, housekeeper, market gardener, and caregiver, she also kept up an active social presence with frequent guests at the estate and admonitions to her children to maintain an appropriate demeanor reflective of their social position. The estate was a working landscape, with vegetable gardens and fruit orchards, and although it was not easy to maintain the formal qualities of the estate, the dramatic picturesque setting was in some ways emphasized by the lush if untended vegetation. Finances were managed through an intricate array of loans, reverse mortgages, and other instruments, with the help of friends and relatives, and Hannah was fiercely proud of her home and unwilling to let it slip away from family ownership. 

In a significant foretelling of later uses, the idea of using Willowbank as a school was raised as early as the 1840s, within ten years of the house being completed. Hannah had correspondence about establishing a school for young women, teaching sewing and other womanly arts. 

Many of the children were successfully married off, while the spinster daughters lived with their mother. Eventually son Cyrus Jarvis Hamilton and his family moved back in, and this next generation continued to manage the estate after her death. It remained a relatively marginal farm operation. It was in 1912, when Hamilton descendant Alfred Boultbee bought the home, that there was finally some money to spend on improvements. He did not make any significant exterior changes, but did do interior alterations including creating family space in the lower level. 

When Alfred died in the 1920s, his brother Horatio acquired the property and eventually disposed of it in the 1930s. There were two transactions – the first in 1934 to John Mowat Bright, and the second in 1936 to John McIntosh Duff, who was married to Alexander Hamiton’s great-granddaughter. John Bright acquired John Duff’s interest in the property in 1938.

Many of the Hamiltons are buried in the Hamilton family cemetery, which sits adjacent to the Willowbank property at the top of the ravine. The first burials at this site date back to 1802, and the cemetery remains under the ownership of a Hamilton family trust.