Susanna Moodie emigrated to Canada with her family in August of 1832, along with 52,000 other immigrants that year. They lived near Cobourg for two years, then went on to homestead in 1834 near Lakefield, Ontario. Emigration to Canada was encouraged, but what prospective newcomers were not told was the backbreaking work that was required to hack a homestead out of what was almost an entirely treed wilderness. The Moodie family lived near Lakefield for 6 years, after which they relocated to Belleville, Ontario. She wrote about her adventures in the book “Roughing in in the Bush”, which went on to become a Canadian classic. The image below is their homestead near Lakefield.
