Sherwood, Samuel Sheffield

  • From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: See full biography at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Sherwood_(high_constable)
  • Wiki Biography:
    • Samuel Sherwood (1819-1867) was High Constable of the Toronto Police Department from 1852 to 1859. He was the son of Levius Peters Sherwood. A tavern owner with ties to the Tory Family Compact, his brother, Henry Sherwood was Mayor of Toronto and then co-premier of the Province of Canada in the 1840s. Another brother, George Sherwood, was a member of the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Canada and eventually a judge.
    • According to Conyngham Crawford Taylor, Samuel Sherwood was “a quiet, good-natured man, who did not insist on any strict regulations as to the dress or discipline of the men. They wore a uniform, but without uniformity, except in one respect—they were universally slovenly.” His stewardship of the police force was accordingly lax. Most officers were Orangemen, at a time when Toronto was riven by religious sectarianism between the more affluent Protestant majority and the poorer Catholic minority, and showed favouritism to other members of the Orange Order, even to the point of joining them in brawling with Catholics in the six major instances of sectarian rioting between 1852 and 1858. In March 1858, Sherwood himself refused to testify against a fellow Orangeman implicated in rioting at the St Patrick’s Day parade.
  • Grandson of Proven Loyalist in Loyalist Directory –https://uelac.ca/loyalist-directory/detail/?wpda_search_column_id=7571
  • Find a GRAVE: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/288908741/samuel-sheffield-sherwood