The Old Quaker Meeting House

The old Meeting House was located on the third concession of Adolphustown, just north of Dorland.

The building is long gone, but the old stones from the surrounding cemetery have been preserved in a memorial wall

and the site marked as an Ontario Historic Site.

“In Tenth Month, 1798, it was proposed to erect a meeting house at Adolphustown. The committee entrusted with this duty reported, that having taken the matter into consideration, unite in proposing to commence building a house thirty feet by twenty-five feet, with eighteen foot posts. After solemn consideration, this was agreed upon and James Noxon, Aaron Brewer and John Dorland were appointed to consider a suitable spot of ground. A site was found on a corner of the farm of John Dorland, on the south shore of Hay Bay, which was also to serve as a burying ground. James Noxon and John Dorland were appointed to have oversight of the burying ground and to admit such persons to inter their dead there as are willing to conform to the good order used among Friends. This implied restriction referred to the plain headstones of a more or less uniform shape and height, upon which Friends insisted as being consistent with their simplicity in other matters. On a corner of the old burying ground stood the meeting house which was probably the third oldest place of public worship in Upper Canada. In 1868, the meeting house was pulled down and replaced by another building on the same site. After Adolphustown Meeting was laid down in 1871, the meeting house fell into disrepair and was finally disposed of in 1897.”

A History of the Society of Friends (Quakers) in Canada, Arthur Garratt Dorland, 1927

“I felt a strong inclination one Sabbath morning to visit the old Quaker Meeting House about three miles away. After making my toilette and breakfasting, I sallied forth on foot and alone, through the fields and woods. At length I arrived at the old meeting-house where I had often gone, when a lad with father and mother.

It was a wooden building standing at a corner of the road and was among the first places of worship erected in the Province. The effects of the beating storms of nearly half a century were stamped on the unpainted clapboards and the shingles which projected just far enough over the plate to carry off the water, were worn and partially covered with moss. One would look in vain for anything that could by any possibility be claimed as an ornament. Two small doors gave access to the interior, which was as plain and ugly as the exterior. A partition, with doors, that were let down during the time of worship, divided the room into equal parts and separated the men and women. It was furnished with strong pine benches, with backs; and at the far side were two rows of elevated benches, which were occupied on both sides by leading members of the society. I have often watched the row of broad-brims on one hand and the scoop bonnets on the other, with boyish interest and wondered what particular thing in the room they gazed at so steadily and why some of them twirled one thumb round the other with such regularity. On this occasion I entered quietly and took a seat near the door. There were a number of familiar faces in the audience. Some whom I had known when young were growing grey, but many of the well-remembered faces were gone. The gravity of the audience and the solemn silence were very impressive; but still recollections of the past crowded from my mind the sacred object which had brought the people together. Now I looked at the old bayonet marks in the posts, made by the soldiers who had used it as a barrack immediately after the war of 1812. Next, the letters of all shapes and sizes cut by mischievous boys with their jackknives in the backs of the seats years ago arrested by attention and brought to mind how weary I used to get; but as I always sat with my father, I dared not try my hand at carving. Then, the thought came: where are those boys now? Some of them were sober, sedate men, sitting before me with their broad-brimmed hats shadowing their faces; others were sleeping in the yard outside; and others had left the neighbourhood years ago.”

Country Life in Canada Fifty Years Ago, Canniff Haight, 1885

The Meeting House shown in Meacham’s Atlas 1878

October 1962

Quaker Monument and Burying Ground as it Appears Today

Further Information:

The Early Quakers

There Were Many Quakers