Cornwall History

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History

Coat Of Arms Of The City Of CornwallAboriginal peoples have lived in and around the area of present day Cornwall for millennia. The first serious non-aboriginal settlement was established in 1784, by disbanded Loyalist soldiers, their families and other United Empire Loyalists-- primarily from New York -- following the 1776 American Revolution. They founded a settlement on the site formerly called Pointe Maligne, and named it New Johnstown. It was later renamed Cornwall for the Duke of Cornwall, Prince George, and became one of the first incorporated municipalities in the British colony of Upper Canada in 1834.



West of Cornwall, along the St. Lawrence River, there existed several smaller communities now known as The Lost Villages. These communities were permanently flooded in 1958 by the construction of the St. Lawrence Seaway to make way for the massive Moses-Saunders hydroelectric dam at the western end of the city and were covered by the hydroelectric reservoir.