In Northern Ontario, the unusually hot and dry conditions that had prevailed throughout the summer of 1922 continued unabated into the autumn. Concerned about the approaching ‘burning’ season, local fire rangers asked for their contracts to be extended beyond mid-September, but the government denied their request and the rangers left the Temiskaming area on 12 September as scheduled. Homesteaders in the area, no longer requiring permits to set the small fires they routinely used to help clear their small holdings, began to set controlled burns to remove brush and scrub from their properties. Used to the smell of smoke in the area in the fall, townspeople in Haileybury, Charlton and other rural communities went on about their daily business, unconcerned.

Then at noon on Wednesday 4 October, the autumn breezes began to intensify and by late afternoon strong gale force winds began whipping the small clearing fires onwards, merging them into raging infernos that raced to devour everything in their path. From Englehart and Charlton in the north to Haileybury and Cobalt in the south, smoke began to fill the skies, obscuring the sun and residents began to sound the alarm. Men rushed from their work places, children were let out of school and frantic mothers stood on their porches searching for their loved ones through the swirling smoke.

In Charlton, 37-year-old mother Annie Brown – my maternal grandmother – watched the suffocating smoke rolling into town in utter disbelief. Little more than two months earlier a fire had razed the family’s homestead in Leeville in Tudhope Township. Thankfully she and her six young children had been away camping in the Hills Lake district where her husband George was fire ranging, but their home, their furniture and all their belongings were destroyed in the blaze.

It was only four years since they had arrived in Northern Ontario. They emigrated from England in 1913 and then went north in 1918 to pioneer, buying 160 acres of land for fifty cents an acre. The purchase agreement stipulated that they had to build a house at least 16x20 feet in size and put at least 16 acres under cultivation within three years.

In those four years, the Brown family had struggled hard to meet these objectives – within the space of an afternoon, it had all been taken away. And now fire was threatening her family again.

As the flames grew nearer to the town, the Brown family along with other residents of Charlton ran for their lives, some plunging into the river while others crowded into the concrete power house building. As night fell, the refugees inside the power house covered the windows with blankets and doused them with water while blazing cinders and sparks showered the building. The men took turns going out to look for survivors and bringing them through the acrid smoke to the comparative safety of the makeshift shelter.

At some point during the darkest hours that night in the midst of the fire’s siege, a baby was born to Mrs Reginald Thompson, one of the sheltering women.

By morning, the winds had subsided, the temperatures began to plummet and a cold rain mixed with snow extinguished the remaining flames. George Brown left the power house with a bucket. Finding a cow, he milked it and brought the milk back for the children in the power house. On his return, he reported that the power house, the station house and one farm were all that remained of Charlton.

Refugees shivering in sudden cold began to survey the overwhelming damage meted out by the devastating conflagration. As rescue efforts got underway and aid began to flow into the area, stories of heroism, bravery and close escapes began to emerge. Billie Weeks, a road foreman from Englehart, made ten trips between Englehart and Charlton through the choking smoke and blistering flames, rescuing about 150 people in his Gray Dort roadster until his tires melted away from the intense heat. Gervais Sutherland, firefighter in Haileybury, lost his life when he gave up his seat in a packed automobile to two small children so they could be carried to the safety of the lakeshore. A 14-year-old girl saved her young brother and sister by taking refuge in a culvert alongside a bear also trying to escape the flames. In Haileybury, the nurses from the hospital took to the river with their patients, holding wet blankets over their heads as the fire raged around them.

As news of the devastation spread, relief efforts were organised. Warm clothing, blankets, tar felt paper, doors, window glass and lumber were collected by the Red Cross to be sent north by train. Food including 21,000 loaves of bread, 170,000 pounds of flour, meat and almost 14,000 tins of evaporated and condensed milk were dispatched along with fodder for the surviving livestock. At the innovative suggestion of the Toronto Transit Commission, the City of Toronto sent a total of 87 retired streetcars north, to be used as temporary business offices or living quarters for the homeless.

In total, the Great Fire of 1922 consumed 650 square miles in 18 townships in Northern Ontario. The towns of Haileybury, Charlton, North Cobalt, Thornloe, Heaslip and many other small settlements were completely destroyed. Englehart and New Liskeard were partially burnt but ultimately saved as the winds shifted direction at the last moment. Remarkably, only 43 people lost their lives, but over 6,000 lost their homes and property damages were estimated in excess of $8 million dollars.

In the print edition
Read Barbara’s article about the opium trade in Canada in Issue 4 of Discover Your Ancestors, available online at discoveryourancestors.co.uk