(c. 1791 or c. 1794-9 Nov. 1888), surveyor. Presumably born in GC, on his parents’ farm on the Front of Charlottenburgh Township. Parents: Donald McNaughton, a native of Scotland who served in the King's Royal Regiment of New York as a private and was granted land as a U E Loyalist on the Front of Charlottenburgh, and his wife Annie MacDonald (sp. McDonell also found), who came to Canada from Scotland. John McNaughton served in the militia in the War of 1812. After the war he studied surveying under Duncan Macdonell of Greenfield, who had probably also been his superior officer in the militia. Having completed his training, John McNaughton received his official qualifications, namely his appointment as a deputy provincial surveyor on 2 June 1821. A few months before, Alexander Macdonell (perhaps the bishop), writing from Glengarry in a letter on several topics to Thomas Ridout, 27 Feb. 1821, wrote that John McNaughton, the bearer of the letter, was going to York with a view to getting “a Licence of Deputy Surveyor. ” McNaughton surveyed the Townships of Ross, Westmeath and Pembroke in Renfrew County for the provincial government in the period Dec. 1834 to Dec. 1835. Surviving records of these surveys of these three townships include his survey diary and other papers in the Ontario Archives in Toronto and the Crown Land Surveys office at Peterborough. Also, he surveyed mining limits on the north shore of Lake Huron in 1846, and along the Ottawa River in 1847.

     He built a sawmill near Foresters Falls in Renfrew County, said to have been the first sawmill in the Township of Ross, and operated it for some years, eventually exchanging it with his brother Alexander for the family homestead in GC, where John then went to live. In GC, he farmed (though it appears not successfully) and did surveying on a local basis; after disposing of the farm, he spent part of his time in Ottawa. He appears to have been unmarried. A newspaper death notice, almost certainly from the Glengarrian (Alexandria) of 16 Nov. 1888, stated that “Mr. John McNaughton, the surveyor, so well known in all parts of Glengarry for many years, died in Glen Robertson last week and was buried at St. Finnan’s here, aged 97.” He had a nephew, Duncan A. McNaughton, who was described (1921) as being a resident of Cobden, Ont., in Renfrew County, but involved in lumbering in the New Liskeard area.

     The subject of the present sketch was presumably the John McNaughton, Civil Engineer, who attended the laying of the cornerstone of John A. (“Cariboo”) Cameron’s Fairfield House in 1865. (Cornwall Advertiser, 12 July 1865) W. P. Lett, in his eloquent Recollections of Bytown and Its Old Inhabitants (1874), wrote:

     Nor would I willingly forget

     While tracing recollections met

     Of other days, and from the past

     Collecting memories fading fast,

     Of lines our earliest purveyor,

     John MacNaughton the Surveyor,

     The only one who then was quite

     At home with the theodolite,

     And boxed the trembling compass well,

     Before the days of Robert Bell.*

*Robert Bell, the scientist cited here, attended high school at L’Orignal, not far north of Glengarry) His biog., OLS No. 36 (1921 )120-122, with photograph (portrait) dated 1852 * his death remembered: 20 Years Ago column, Cornwall Freeholder 13 Nov. 1908, and DTL Standard Freeholder 17 Nov. 1945, both based on CF 16 Nov. 1888 * death notice as quoted: ASC ii, 82 * Lovell 1857 388 * Dictionary of Canadian Biography, VII, 755 (mentioned) * Ladell 291, 293 * 1821 letter: Archives of Ontario-TP (Concession 3, N. S. River Raisin, Lots 1-47) * his father Donald: Pringle 388, 404; UE List 229 * Reid, L, 211-212; Cruikshank King's Royal Regiment of New York 241 * information from Archives of Ontario and Crown Land Surveys office