Tufts Cove, Nova Scotia

Last updated
Tufts Cove
Turtle Grove
Neighbourhood
Tufts Cove Station.jpg
Tufts Cove Generating Station
Tufts Cove, Nova Scotia
Location within Dartmouth
Canada Nova Scotia location map 2.svg
Red pog.svg
Location within Nova Scotia
Coordinates: 44°40′56″N63°35′49″W / 44.6822°N 63.5969°W / 44.6822; -63.5969
CountryFlag of Canada (Pantone).svg  Canada
Province Flag of Nova Scotia.svg  Nova Scotia
Municipality Halifax Regional Municipality
Community Dartmouth
Community council Harbour East - Marine Drive Community Council
District6 - Harbourview - Burnside - Dartmouth East
Area
[1]
  Total76 ha (188 acres)
Postal code
B3A
Area code 902, 782
GNBC codeCBMLN

Tufts Cove is an urban neighbourhood in the community of Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada. It is situated on the eastern shore of Halifax Harbour in the North End of Dartmouth. The neighbourhood boundaries of Tufts Cove are approximately from Albro Lake Road in the south to Highway 111 in the north, and from Victoria Road in the east with the harbour to the west.

Contents

History

The cove was the site of a Mi'kmaq community called Turtle Grove, first recorded in the 18th century and likely inhabited for generations. A painting from the 1790s shows a Mi'kmaq family at the cove, while an oil painting from around 1837 by William Eager shows a Mi'kmaq encampment. A notable resident in later years was the Mi'kmaw leader and ethnologist Jerry Lonecloud. [2]

The cove was named for Gersham Tufts, who was living in Halifax by 1752. [3] He later received a Crown land grant for a large tract of land in Dartmouth. [4] The farms of the early settler community grew in the early 19th century as industry spread north from the town of Dartmouth. The entrance to the cove was crossed by a railway trestle in the 1880s connecting to the short-lived railway bridge across the Narrows. The tracks were relocated to the head of the cove in the 1890s when the bridge collapsed. The arrival of industry put pressure on the Turtle Grove Mi'kmaw community as settlers sought to remove them from the cove. [5]

The village was close to ground zero of the Halifax Explosion on December 6, 1917, and was severely impacted by the blast and tsunami. The Halifax Remembrance Book lists 16 members of the Tufts Cove Community as dead; although this does not include all the Mi'kmaw dead. [6] The settler community was badly damaged and the Mi'kmaw community of Turtle Grove was completely destroyed. Nine bodies were recovered from Turtle Grove and there were eleven known survivors but the records of those living in Turtle Grove were incomplete. [7] Jerry Lonecloud lost two daughters and one of his eyes. The survivors were recorded in Lonecloud's journal. The Turtle Grove settlement was never rebuilt after the explosion. The survivors were settled in other Nova Scotian reserves. [8]

Eventually, Tufts Cove became known for its working class community, who were mostly employed at the ropeworks on Wyse Road, local shipyards, and other factories in the area. During the 1950s, Tufts Cove experienced rapid residential development, including the development of Shannon Park, a large military housing complex built beside the cove. [9]

Present day

The dominant feature of Tufts Cove is the Tufts Cove Generating Station, whose smokestacks tower over the area. The construction of the plant required the purchase and subsequent destruction of a large number of the neighbourhood's homes by Nova Scotia Light and Power Company, Limited in 1964. The plant is now operated by Nova Scotia Power Inc., a subsidiary of Emera Inc.

Shannon Park eventually closed in 2004. Disposal of the land is being planned by the Government of Canada's Canada Lands Company. Mi'kmaq from the Millbrook Reserve near Truro have applied for a portion of the former Shannon Park military housing development beside the cove. [10]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Colchester County</span> County in Nova Scotia, Canada

Colchester County is a county in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia. With a population of 51,476 the county is the fourth largest in Nova Scotia. Colchester County is located in north central Nova Scotia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Halifax Explosion</span> 1917 maritime disaster in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada

On the morning of December 6, 1917 the French cargo ship SS Mont-Blanc collided with the Norwegian vessel SS Imo in the harbour of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. The Mont-Blanc, laden with high explosives, caught fire and exploded, devastating the Richmond district of Halifax. At least 1,782 people were killed, largely in Halifax and Dartmouth, by the blast, debris, fires, or collapsed buildings, and an estimated 9,000 others were injured. The blast was the largest human-made explosion at the time. It released the equivalent energy of roughly 2.9 kilotons of TNT (12 TJ).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mi'kmaq</span> Indigenous ethnic group of eastern North America

The Mi'kmaq are a First Nations people of the Northeastern Woodlands, indigenous to the areas of Canada's Atlantic Provinces, primarily Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Newfoundland, and the Gaspé Peninsula of Quebec as well as Native Americans in the northeastern region of Maine. The traditional national territory of the Mi'kmaq is named Miꞌkmaꞌki.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia</span> Place in Nova Scotia, Canada

Peggy's Cove is a small rural community located on the eastern shore of St. Margarets Bay in the Halifax Regional Municipality, which is the site of Peggys Cove Lighthouse.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Miꞌkmaw hieroglyphic writing</span> Defunct writing system of Canadas Mikmaq First Nation

Miꞌkmaw hieroglyphic writing or Suckerfish script was a writing system for the Miꞌkmaw language, later superseded by various Latin scripts which are currently in use. Mi'kmaw are a Canadian First Nation whose homeland, called Mi'kma'ki, overlaps much of the Maritime provinces, specifically all of Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and parts of New Brunswick and Newfoundland and Labrador.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eastern Passage, Nova Scotia</span> Community in Nova Scotia, Canada

Eastern Passage is an unincorporated suburban community in Halifax Regional Municipality Nova Scotia, Canada.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Edward Cornwallis</span> 18th-century British Army general

Edward Cornwallis was a British career military officer and was a member of the aristocratic Cornwallis family, who reached the rank of Lieutenant General. After Cornwallis fought in Scotland, putting down the Jacobite rebellion of 1745, he was appointed Groom of the Chamber for King George II. He was then made Governor of Nova Scotia (1749–1752), one of the colonies in North America, and assigned to establish the new town of Halifax, Nova Scotia. Later Cornwallis returned to London, where he was elected as MP for Westminster and married the niece of Robert Walpole, Great Britain's first Prime Minister. Cornwallis was next appointed as Governor of Gibraltar.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Halifax Harbour</span> Harbour in Nova Scotia, Canada

Halifax Harbour is a large natural harbour on the Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia, Canada, located in the Halifax Regional Municipality. Halifax largely owes its existence to the harbour, being one of the largest and deepest ice-free natural harbours in the world. Before Confederation it was one of the most important commercial ports on the Atlantic seaboard. In 1917, it was the site of the world's largest man-made accidental explosion, when the SS Mont-Blanc blew up in the Halifax Explosion of December 6.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of Halifax, Nova Scotia</span> Aspect of history

The community of Halifax, Nova Scotia was created on 1 April 1996, when the City of Dartmouth, the City of Halifax, the Town of Bedford, and the County of Halifax amalgamated and formed the Halifax Regional Municipality. The former City of Halifax was dissolved, and transformed into the Community of Halifax within the municipality.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shannon Park, Nova Scotia</span> Neighbourhood in Halifax Regional Municipality, Nova Scotia, Canada

Shannon Park is an urban neighbourhood and former national defence site in the north end of Dartmouth on the eastern shore of Halifax Harbour in the Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM) in Nova Scotia, Canada. It is immediately south of the A. Murray MacKay Bridge in the community of Dartmouth. It straddles Highway 111, a CN Rail freight line, and Halifax Harbour. It is bordered on the south by Tuft's Cove.

Dartmouth founded in 1750, is a Metropolitan Area and former city in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia.

SS <i>Mont-Blanc</i> French cargo ship

SSMont-Blanc was a cargo steamship that was built in Middlesbrough, England in 1899 for a French shipping company. On Thursday morning, December 6, 1917, she entered Halifax Harbour in Nova Scotia, Canada laden with a full cargo of highly volatile explosives. As she made her way through the Narrows towards Bedford Basin, she was involved in a collision with Imo, a Norwegian ship. A fire aboard the French ship ignited her cargo of wet and dry 2,300 tons of picric acid, 500 tons of TNT, and 10 tons of guncotton. The resultant Halifax Explosion killed approximately 2,000 people and injured about 9,000.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Raid on Dartmouth (1751)</span> Killing of British villagers and soldiers during Father Le Loutres War

The Raid on Dartmouth occurred during Father Le Loutre's War on May 13, 1751, when a Miꞌkmaq and Acadian militia from Chignecto, under the command of Acadian Joseph Broussard, raided Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, destroying the town and killing twenty British villagers and wounding British regulars. The town was protected by a blockhouse on Blockhouse Hill with William Clapham's Rangers and British regulars from the 45th Regiment of Foot. This raid was one of seven the Natives and Acadians would conduct against the town during the war.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Father Le Loutre's War</span> Colonial war between Britain and France

Father Le Loutre's War (1749–1755), also known as the Indian War, the Mi'kmaq War and the Anglo-Mi'kmaq War, took place between King George's War and the French and Indian War in Acadia and Nova Scotia. On one side of the conflict, the British and New England colonists were led by British officer Charles Lawrence and New England Ranger John Gorham. On the other side, Father Jean-Louis Le Loutre led the Mi'kmaq and the Acadia militia in guerrilla warfare against settlers and British forces. At the outbreak of the war there were an estimated 2500 Mi'kmaq and 12,000 Acadians in the region.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Raid on Dartmouth (1749)</span> 1749 raid of a sawmill in Nova Scotia

The Raid on Dartmouth (1749) occurred during Father Le Loutre's War on September 30, 1749 when a Mi'kmaw militia from Chignecto raided Major Ezekiel Gilman's sawmill at present-day Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, killing four workers and wounding two. This raid was one of seven the Wabanaki Confederacy and Acadians would conduct against the settlement during the war.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Attack at Mocodome</span> 1753 Battle in Nova Scotia

occurred during Father Le Loutre's War in present-day Country Harbour, Nova Scotia on February 21, 1753 which saw two British mariners and six Mi'kmaq killed. The battle ended any hope for the survival of the Treaty of 1752 signed by Governor Peregrine Hopson and Mi'kmaq chief Jean-Baptiste Cope.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jerry Lonecloud</span>

Jerry Lonecloud served as an entertainer, ethnographer, and medicine man among the Mi'kmaq people in Nova Scotia. His oral memoirs, comprising Mi'kmaw oral histories and legends, were documented from 1923 to 1929. These memoirs were later compiled into a book—Tracking Dr. Lonecloud: Showman to Legend Keeper—by ethnographer and historian Ruth Holmes Whitehead at the Nova Scotia Museum in Halifax in 2002. These recordings laid the foundation for the 2002 biography, the first known Mi'kmaq memoir. According to Whitehead, Lonecloud could "rightly" be called the "ethnographer of the Micmac nation."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Military history of the Mi'kmaq</span> Militias of Mikmaq

The military history of the Mi'kmaq consisted primarily of Mi'kmaq warriors (smáknisk) who participated in wars against the English independently as well as in coordination with the Acadian militia and French royal forces. The Mi'kmaq militias remained an effective force for over 75 years before the Halifax Treaties were signed (1760–1761). In the nineteenth century, the Mi'kmaq "boasted" that, in their contest with the British, the Mi'kmaq "killed more men than they lost". In 1753, Charles Morris stated that the Mi'kmaq have the advantage of "no settlement or place of abode, but wandering from place to place in unknown and, therefore, inaccessible woods, is so great that it has hitherto rendered all attempts to surprise them ineffectual". Leadership on both sides of the conflict employed standard colonial warfare, which included scalping non-combatants. After some engagements against the British during the American Revolutionary War, the militias were dormant throughout the nineteenth century, while the Mi'kmaq people used diplomatic efforts to have the local authorities honour the treaties. After confederation, Mi'kmaq warriors eventually joined Canada's war efforts in World War I and World War II. The most well-known colonial leaders of these militias were Chief (Sakamaw) Jean-Baptiste Cope and Chief Étienne Bâtard.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Connor (mariner)</span>

John Connor (1728–1757) was a mariner who ran the first ferry in Halifax Harbour, Nova Scotia, and was involved in the Attack at Mocodome during Father Le Loutre’s War, which effectively ended the Treaty of 1752.

Sister Dorothy Moore is a Mi’kmaw educator, Indigenous Elder, Residential School survivor, and social justice activist. Moore was born in the Mi'kmaw community Membertou, Nova Scotia. She was the first Mi’kmaw person in a Roman Catholic order, entering the Sisters of St. Martha in 1954 and taking vows in 1956. Moore was an educator in the public elementary school system in Nova Scotia. She also taught at the University College of Cape Breton (UCCCB) and is noted as instrumental in the formation of their Mi'kmaw Studies program. Moore later became the Director of Mi'kmaq Services at the Nova Scotia Department of Education where she was instrumental in the development of the Mi'kmaw language program. She was awarded the Order of Canada on June 29, 2005 and has received numerous other awards including the Order of Nova Scotia, (2003) and three honorary degrees, including an honorary Doctor of Laws from St. Mary's University in Halifax. A collection of her talks, prayers, presentation, and ceremonies, entitled: A Journey of Love and Hope, was published by Nimbus Press in 2022. In 2022 a documentary film entitled Sister Dorothy Moore: A Life of Courage, Determination and Love was premiered at the Atlantic Film Festival in September, 2022.

References

  1. "Halifax Regional Municipality Urban Forest Master Plan" (PDF). halifax.ca. Government of the Municipality of Halifax. Retrieved 13 July 2021.
  2. Jennifer Burke, “Turtle Grove: Dartmouth’s Lost Mi’kmaq Community”, Ground Zero: A Reassessment of the 1917 Explosion in Halifax Harbour, Nimbus Publishing (1994), pp. 46-47.
  3. Thomas B Akins, History of Halifax City, Halifax, Nova Scotia, 1895. History of Halifax City, Appendices F, page 245.
  4. Nova Scotia Crown Land Grant Map. Index Sheet No. 66 Halifax County. https://novascotia.ca/natr/land/indexmaps/066.pdf.
  5. Jennifer Burke, “Turtle Grove: Dartmouth’s Lost Mi’kmaq Community”, Ground Zero: A Reassessment of the 1917 Explosion in Halifax Harbour, Nimbus Publishing (1994), pp. 48.
  6. "Tufts Cove", Halifax Explosion: A List of those that Died, Nova Scotia Archives
  7. Burke, Jennifer (1994). "Turtle Grove: Dartmouth's Lost Mi'kmaq Community". Ground Zero: A Reassessment of the 1917 Explosion in Halifax Harbour. Nimbus Publishing. pp. 50–51.
  8. Remes, Jacob (2014). "Mi'kmaq in the Halifax Explosion of 1917: Leadership, Transience, and the Struggle for Land Rights". Ethnohistory. 61 (3): 445–466. doi:10.1215/00141801-2681732 . Retrieved July 12, 2016.
  9. Chapman, Harry (2001). In the wake of the Alderney : Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, 1750-2000. Dartmouth Historical Association (2nd ed.). [Dartmouth, N.S.]: Dartmouth Historical Association. p. 379. ISBN   1-55109-374-X. OCLC   48398897.
  10. The Canadian Press (February 15, 2016). "Millbrook First Nation aims to redevelop Turtle Grove site in Shannon Park". CBC. Retrieved October 4, 2017.