Pierpoint, Richard

  • DICTIONARY OF CANADIAN BIOGRAPHY ARTICLE: Robert L. Fraser, “PIERPOINT (Parepoint, Pawpine), RICHARD (Captain Dick, Black Dick),” in Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 7, University of Toronto/Université Laval, 2003–. https://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/pierpoint_richard_7E.html
  • DCB profile notes:
    • Soldier, militiaman, labourer, and farmer; b. c. 1744 in Bondu (Senegal); d. before 27 Sept. 1838 near Fergus, Upper Canada.
    • Pierpoint’s fascinating odyssey began in West Africa, where about 1760 he “was made a Prisoner and Sold as a Slave.” Shipped to the American colonies, he became the slave of a British officer. During the American revolution he took the opportunity offered to slaves of enlisting in the British forces and gaining their freedom. Although by 1779 it was rare for blacks to serve in the northern British armies, much less the loyalist provincial corps, Pierpoint was a pioneer in John Butler’s rangers. By 1780 he was stationed with them in the Niagara region of Quebec. On 20 July 1784 his name appeared among those of disbanded rangers on a list of persons intending to settle in that area. Blacks were entitled to the same proportion of land as their fellow loyalists and about 1788 Pierpoint, under his more common name of Captain Dick or Black Dick, was granted 200 acres of land on Twelve Mile Creek, in what later became Grantham Township.
    • On 28 Jan. 1828 Captain Dick made out his will, witnessed by sons of two former officers in Butler’s Rangers. The lone black in a settlement of whites, he had “no heirs nor relations.” He left his farm and a claim to one of his former lots in Grantham to a resident of Halton County, Lemuel Brown. Unfortunately Pierpoint had given the wrong concession number for the Grantham property and the Surveyor General’s Office reported the claim unsubstantiated.
  • United Empire Loyalist listed in Loyalist Directory: https://uelac.ca/loyalist-directory/detail/?wpda_search_column_id=6388
  • Find a GRAVE: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/156820166/richard-pierpoint