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Key Events in the History of Nova Scotia: 1791.
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[Backward In Time (1790)]
[Forward In Time (1792)]
§Thomas Paine answers Burke with his work, The Rights of Man. The first part appeared in February.
§The French Republic sets its constitution in 1791. It expressed a theory of liberty, the "Golden Rule of Liberty," where one is permitted to do anything which does not injure other people's like right.
§Louis XVI tries to flee France in June, but he is arrested, returned to Paris, and forced to accept the new constitution.
§The British Parliament passes the Constitution Act of 1791: The act set up new provinces in Canada, Upper and Lower Canada.
§The English Parliament approved a charter for Sierra Leone, its company pledged to oppose the slave trade in Africa. Sugar prices rise steeply.
§At Windsor, Bishop Inglis laid the corner stone for a new building for King's College which, in a rented house, had first opened in 1788.
§A census shows that the population at Halifax, stood at 4,897. It had not gone up much in forty years, when, in 1752, it stood at 4249.
§8 May: "The brig Minerva, Capt. Bradford, arrives in the harbour ... 23 days passage from St. Martins. All well on board. He has salt, rum, sugar, cotton & tobacco, for cargo." (Perkins' Diary.)
§17 May: A thief was tried at Liverpool. Found guilty, he was sentenced to be whipped thirty strips at ye post and pay costs. The convicted person could not pay the costs so he was jailed until he could? (See Perkins entry.)
§Aug 3rd-10th: During this period we can see from Perkins' diary that 18 vessels come into Liverpool within the week. They were mostly returning from Newfoundland having fished for salmon, one from Madeira which had wine aboard, and the rest from local waters fishing for mackerel.
§Captain John Clarkson of the Royal Navy arrived at Halifax on October 7th, 1791. Two weeks after that he sailed for Shelburne and brings up twelve hundred Negroes, who sailed from Halifax early in 1792 for Sierra Leone, Africa.
§31 Oct: "Two forty gun ships are arrived there [Halifax] with two regiments, to be exchanged for two regiments now at Halifax." (Perkins.)
§November 25th, 1791, Governor Parr dies at Halifax. Parr had been the Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia since 1783. Richard Bulkely, as senior councilor, then took over the administration of government. Perkins made the following entry into his diary at Liverpool, 2 Dec: "News that His Excellency Governor Parr is dead. He died last week of the gout in his stomach. He [the captain that just came in from Halifax] saw him buried under the church ..."
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[Backward In Time (1790)]