James Bonfield (1825–1883)

James Bonfield was born at Gortmore, Youghalarra, near Nenagh, Co. Tipperary in 1825. he was one of seven children, five boys and two girls. After schooling in the area through Irish and English, he went to either Louvain or Douay to study for the priesthood for four years. Deciding that he was not suited to the life of a priest, he returned to his homeplace where he became a Hedge School Master and, with his brothers Patrick, George and Martin, he became an active Fenian.

With the Fenian Uprising of 1848 James was sent as a fund-raiser to the United States. From there he went to Canada, where he settled. He became a clerk and then secretary/manager to John Egan the owner of a thriving lumber business in the Ottawa Valley. Egan had given his name to the town of Eganville on the Bonchere River.

As the lumber business flourished, James Bonfield had need of a postal address and so he named his main lumber area Killaloe after his home area in Ireland.

James married Catherine Tracy who was from Co. Wicklow in Ireland in Ottawa in 18XX. They settled for the rest of their married life in Eganville, Ontario approximately 100 miles northwest of Ottawa.

In 1868, aged 43, he bought the Egan lumbering business. In 1875 he was elected as a Member of Parliament for Renfrew in the Ontario State Legislature as a Reform/Liberal.

In 1879 he was re-elected. He died in 1883 at the age of 58 having been pre-deceased by Catherine who died in childbirth (when Margaret 'Mug' was six), she had suffered from arthritis. They were survived by their ten children, three boys and seven girls.

An interesting point to note is that James, who had left Ireland to study in France as an educated 23 year old, educated his three sons, two of whom became Doctors, but not his seven daughters.

James travelled from Ireland to Canada with his brother, John, and his widowed sister, Mrs. Harty, who may have died at sea.

James Bonfield (1825–1883) was an Ontario merchant and political figure. He represented Renfrew South in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario from 1875 to 1883 as a Liberal member.

He was born in Gortmore, County Tipperary, Ireland in 1825, the son of John Bonfield, and came to Canada in 1848. He worked as a clerk for lumber merchant John Egan, later opened his own general store and afterwards became a lumber merchant in Eganville. He served as reeve for Grattan Township. In 1854, he married Catherine Tracy.

His daughter Elizabeth married John Francis Dowling who also represented Renfrew South in the provincial assembly.

The Township of Bonfield, Ontario was named in his honour.

Bonfield (1881) is a township in the province of Ontario. It was named after James Bonfield, an MPP and lumber merchant from Eganville, Ontario who built a mill on Brennan’s Creek. In 2001, it had a population of 2,064.

There is a profile of James Bonfield in The Canadian Biographical Dictionary and Portrait Gallery of Eminent and Self-made Men: Ontario Volume.

http://eco.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.08545/5?r=0&s=1

OBITUARY NOTES

The Hon. James Bonfield, member of the Provincial Parliament, died in Eganville, Ontario, on Monday night, of apoplexy

THE TORONTO GLOBE says of him:

“The death of Mr. Bonfield removes a well known form from the chamber of the Legislative Assembly, of which body he had been a Member for the past eight years.

He was a native of Ireland, having been born in 1825 at Gortmore, in Tipperary. Coming to this country to push his fortune, he went into the lumbering business in the Ottawa Valley, and was always regarded as a deservedly successful operator in a calling which, more than most others, requires the exercise of intelligence and discretion.
Few men were better known or more popular in the great lumber district than the “King of the Bonnechere”. Mr Bonfield’s adherence to Liberal principles in politics, coupled with his local popularity, won for him the Reform nomination for South Renfrew in the Ontario general election of 1875, and he was returned by acclamation. In 1879, he was re-elected by a fair majority after a keen contest, and had his life and health been spared he would no doubt have once more carried the Liberal banner to victory in the approaching election.”

In the 1871 census of Ontario, James Bonfield is listed as aged 50, (i.e. born 1821) Roman Catholic, Irish, Lumberman/Milkman. In 1881, he was listed as a lumber merchant and Member of the Provincial Parliament (MPP) for Renfrew South Riding. He was noted as the owner of 1,000 acres of land in Grattan Township and it was stated that he was born in Ireland in 1826 and that he came to Renfrew County in the year 1849. His post office address was noted as “Egansville”.

Bonfield, James M.P.P.

The following data is extracted from The Canadian Biographical Dictionary and Portrait Gallery of Eminent and Self-Made Men, Ontario Volume, 1880.

James Bonfield, the representative for South Renfrew in the Ontario Legislature, descends from an old agricultural family in Ireland, and was born in Gortmore, county of Tipperary, in 1825, his parents being John and Elizabeth O’Meara Bonfield. A maternal uncle of James, Father Morgan O’Meara, was a Catholic priest.

Mr. Bonfield received a good English education, including the higher mathematics, attending school most of the time until 1848, in the spring of which year he came to Canada, and settled at Eganville, township of Grattan, where he has resided for thirty-two years. He commenced work in this Province as a clerk for John Egan, from whom the village of Eganville was named; in 1863 opened a general store for himself, and not long afterwards commenced lumbering and discontinued merchandising.

Mr. Bonfield was at one period reeve of the township of Grattan; in 1875 was elected to the local Parliament for the riding of South Renfrew, by acclamation, and at the expiration of his term, after an animated contest, was re-elected by a handsome majority. His political affiliations are with the Reform party.

Mr. Bonfield was reared in the Roman Catholic church, and earnestly adheres to the faith of his parents, and a long ancestral line. His marriage is dated November 20, 1854, his wife being Miss Catharine Tracy

• Reference: Find A Grave Memorial - SmartCopy: Sep 21 2024, 17:25:36 UTC