Biography for William Hood and Martha Park

Received from: Jan Darbhamulla - [email protected]

William Hood was born July 6, 1799 at Barony Parish, Lanarkshire, Scotland.  He was the oldest (and only surviving) son of James Hood.  His mother, Elizabeth Jones, died when William was a young child, and so his father eventually remarried.  William left from Greenock, Scotland with his family on July 4, 1820 and sailed on the Prompt for Canada.  It has been said that he met his future wife, Martha Park, on board this ship and that theirs was a shipboard romance, but there is no documentation to support that Martha came to Canada at that same time.  Martha was born Dec. 31, 1799 in Cambuslang, Lanarkshire, Scotland, the daughter of James Park and Marion Allen.  Martha's father did come to Dalhousie Township, Lanark County early on, but so did several other people with the same name.

That first winter at Dalhousie Township, the school teacher hired and brought over by the name of George Richmond, died when a tree fell on him.  His was the first death in the Dalhousie settlement ("The Lanark Society Settlers" by Carol Bennett p. 16).  I believe that this is the teaching position that William Hood took over.  William had had two years of college before emigrating to Scotland.  The school house was located at an intersection called Hood's Corner.  The school is still standing today, but is a private residence.  The Common School Report for 1827 (From the Journal of Assembly of Upper Canada - 1828) shows WIlliam Hood as one of six teachers in Dalhousie Township.  William had 12 boys and 10 girls in his classroom.

William and Martha had a large family of ten children, although many of their children moved to western Ontario where the land was better for farming.  The soil in Dalhousie Township was quite rocky, and making a living as a farmer proved to be difficult.  Their oldest child was Marion who was born in 1826.  Marion married John Baird and is buried at Hopetown Cemetery, Lanark County.  James came next, born in February 1828.  James moved to western Ontario and lived in several counties, but is buried at Harriston Cemetery, Minto Township, Wellington County.  Elizabeth, born May 1, 1830, married Robert Ferguson and moved to Hay Township, Huron County.  Martha married William Rodger on Apr. 22, 1856.  She died on Feb. 20, 1917.  William, born Aug. 5, 1834, was the first son to move to western Ontario.  Per his diary, on his way west he stopped at Simcoe County to visit his grandfather James Hood.  He also stopped at his aunt's to visit Isabella who was not expected to live, plus other relatives in the area, before settling in Howick Township, Huron County.  William died Apr. 1, 1922 and is buried at Clifford Cemetery, Huron County.  Margaret, born in 1836, married Archibald Penman, and is buried at St. Andrew's Cemetery at Watson's Corner, Lanark County.  Andrew, born in November 1837, also moved to Howick Township, Huron County, and lived and worked there as a farmer until 1902.  Several of Andrew's children had moved to North Dakota, so Andrew, his wife, and two youngest children also relocated to North Dakota, where Andrew and his wife, Ann Scott, ran a boarding house in Devil's Lake.  Even though he died in North Dakota, Andrew and his wife are buried, per their request, at Harriston Cemetery, Minto Township, Wellington County.  John, born in 1841, lived in many Ontario counties, but is buried at Huntsville, Chaffey Township, Muskoka District.  Gemmill, born two years after John, died when he was only twenty.  He had moved to Howick Township, Huron County, and died when a tree fell on him.  David, the youngest child, born in 1846, also moved to western Ontario, but eventually settled in Duluth, Minnesota, where he was a successful builder.

William and Martha lived their remaining lives in Dalhousie Township, and are buried at St. Andrew's Cemetery, Watson's Corner, plot 187, Lanark County, Ontario.

Posted: 08 October, 2005.