ANNAPOLIS ROYAL & REVEREND BAILEY

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After arriving in Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia, in his first letter dated October 14, 1782 the Reverend Jacob Bailey, a United Empire Loyalist preacher who had been forced to flee from Maine,  noted to William Morice, Secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel (S.P.G.), that  the Town contained a population of 160 persons,  all except four belonging to the Church of England.  At nearby Granville, he estimated there were about 50 church families. 

'View of gut of Annapolis Royal', by Joseph F.W. Des Barres

Later in October, between five and six hundred refugees, United Empire Loyalists, arrived from New York.   More came, and by November 1783, Annapolis County, which had about 1500 persons when he arrived,  only a year later, counted more than double that amount.

As described in the book by James S. Lemon entitled The Reverend Jacob Bailey - Maine Loyalist,  "When possible, local residents, including the Baileys, took refugees into their own homes, others were stowed in the church, in the courthouse, commercial buildings,  and the fort barracks,  while the less fortunate huddled together in hastily built sod huts."

Reverend Bailey wrote to the S.P.G. that "most of these distressed people left large possessions in the rebellious colonies, and their suffering on account of their loyalty, and their precarious and destitute situation,  renders them very affecting objects of compassion. "

An informative book

Using unpublished journals and correspondence, Lemon's book about Reverend Bailey describes the situation of the United Empire Loyalists who arrived in Annapolis Royal.  In doing this he includes a reference to an experience Reverend Bailey had with slavery.  The preacher took in the son of Captain Henry Mowat to tutor and the boy arrived with his slave whose unfree condition Reverend Bailey found "most disturbing".  Black Loyalists also arrived from New York and, as noted in the Book of Negroes, four ships came in 1783.  One was captained by Captain Jacob Getcheus whose wife Mary Getcheus was buried at Digby in 1785 and has the oldest gravestone in Trinity Anglican Church cemetery.

Reverend Bailey died on 26 July 1808 in Annapolis Royal and was buried in the  Garrison Cemetery  where his grave has a headstone for himself and his wife Sarah (Weeks).  He was proven as a United Empire Loyalist by members of the Edmonton Branch of the United Empire Loyalists' Association of Canada in 2013.


Bailey Headstone 



Further Reading:

Lemon, James S. , The Reverend Jacob Bailey - Maine Loyalist - For God, King, Country, and Self, published by University of Massachusetts Press, 2012

Jacob Bailey. listed in the Loyalist Directory, accessed on 17 January 2026.

Captain Jacob Getcheus , Master of ships supporting American Patriots, British and Black Loyalists, by Brian McConnell, UE, published online with Historic Nova Scotia

Historian & Author; Member of United Empire Loyalists ' Association of Canada, Genealogical Association of Nova Scotia, Ulster Historical & Genealogical Guild (Life)

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