Heritage York Research Guide
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Early European Presence
in the Lower Humber River area
Within the 17th and 18th centuries, several travellers, explorers, and colonists came through the Humber River area, via the Toronto Carrying Place trail. Also known as "Kabechenong" in Anishinaabe, which means “leave the canoes and go back,” the path followed alongside the river on the east bank, stretching from Lake Ontario to Lake Simcoe. It is this path, as well as the river itself, which brought the individuals featured on this page into the area.
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For more information on the Kabechenong trail, please visit the Surveys & Settlement section of this research guide, or click here to visit a Heritage York exhibition on the natural geography of the area.
René Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle of France travelled through North America, including a visit to the Teiaiagon village on the Humber River in the 1680s. Below is a transcribed translation of his journeys. For more information on the Teiaiagon village, please visit the Taiaiako'n Historical Preservation Society
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Father Louis Hennepin travelled throughout the Great Lakes area and visited the village of Teiaiagon along the Humber River in the 1680s. You can find a transcribed version of his 1698 diary linked in the below citation. For more information on the Teiaiagon village, please visit the Taiaiako'n Historical Preservation Society
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John Collins was a surveyor in the USA and Canada. In 1788, he was tasked with surveying the Humber Bay, including the river, and part of the (future) city of York.
Jean-Baptiste Rousseau, dit Saint-Jean, a Québécois, was involved in commerce in the York area beginning in the late 18th century. Rousseau lived and traded fur at a home on the east bank of the Humber River, north of the present-day Gardiner, between 1791-95. His was one of the earliest documented non-indigenous settlements in York. The location of the home appears on various contemporary maps, however, its precise location was determined in 2018 using ground-penetrating radar.
John Graves Simcoe, a loyalist in the Revolutionary War, was responsible for prompting much of the first surveying, industry and roads near the Humber, including the first mill. Simcoe was an abolitionist, and his efforts to convince the British government to eradicate slavery resulted in the "Upper Canadian Act of 1793 Against Slavery" (linked below). It was not abolition, but it was the first step the empire had yet taken towards anti-slavery.
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Alexander MacDonell travelled with John Graves Simcoe's company along the Humber River in 1793, and wrote in his diary (linked below) of interactions with indigenous guides and inhabitants, traders, and the landscape. MacDonell’s account begins on page 128.
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Elizabeth Simcoe (née Posthuma Gwillim), wife of John Graves Simcoe, wrote diaries of her time in Upper and Lower Canada, of which the years 1791-1796 have been published. Mrs. Simcoe visited York in 1793-4 and wrote much about the landscape and daily activities, including the cutting of Dundas Rd., and meeting the above-mentioned Alexander Macdonell.
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Elizabeth Simcoe, "Mrs Simcoe's Diary," editor Mary Quayle Innis, Macmillan of Canada, 1965
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Travels with Elizabeth Simcoe: A Visual Journey Through Upper and Lower Canada
Étienne Brûlé, European explorer, has long been rumored to have travelled south along the Humber and the Toronto Carrying Place trail to Lake Ontario in the early 17th century. However, no evidence of such a journey exists. In fact, many believe it unlikely he would have chosen to take this path, due to the warring Iroquois in the area.