Fraser, Richard Duncan

  • DICTIONARY OF CANADIAN BIOGRAPHY ARTICLE: C. J. Shepard, “FRASER, RICHARD DUNCAN,” in Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 8, University of Toronto/Université Laval, 2003–. https://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/fraser_richard_duncan_8E.html
  • DCB profile notes:
    • Fur trader, merchant, militia officer, farmer, justice of the peace, politician, and office holder; b. c.1784 in the province of Quebec, probably in Montreal, third son of Thomas Fraser and Mary MacBean; m. by January 1812 Mary McDonell, and they had at least two sons and three daughters; d. 1 April 1857 in Fraserfield, Grenville County, Upper Canada.
    • Richard Duncan Fraser’s father, a captain in Edward Jessup’s Loyal Rangers during the American revolution, settled in Township No.6 (Edwardsburgh) after the war and became a prominent landowner in eastern Upper Canada. Richard Duncan spent his early years in Edwardsburgh Township and was said to have been educated by John Strachan. From 1802 to 1806 he worked for the North West Company as a clerk under Duncan Cameron at Lake Nipigon. On his return to Edwardsburgh in 1807 he received a 200-acre land grant as the son of a loyalist and settled in the village of Johnstown. There he operated as a merchant until the outbreak of the War of 1812.
    • After the war Fraser did not return to his mercantile pursuits, but was “oblidged to have recourse to farming” to support himself and his family. In addition he made several unsuccessful attempts during the next 15 years to obtain a government position. The only appointment he received, however, was in 1816 as a justice of the peace for the Johnstown District. Fraser’s difficulty in obtaining office despite support from his influential father may have been a result of his hot-tempered, violent behaviour.
    • Retaining only his position as militia colonel, Fraser retired to Fraserfield in Edwardsburgh Township, the farm fronting on the St Lawrence which he had inherited in the early 1820s from his father and his brother John. Although Fraser seems to have left active politics after the 1830s, he reappeared briefly during 1849 as a delegate to the convention of the British American League in Kingston.
  • Son of Proven United Empire Loyalist listed in Loyalist Directory: https://uelac.ca/loyalist-directory/detail/?wpda_search_column_id=2956
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