Person:Peter Brick (1)

It looks like Peter and Barbara came to Canada sometime after 1833. They arrived in NY on the ship Marengo on [11] Aug 1833. The entire family and their ages were listed on the passenger list and it states that they were from Prussia. Other Brick /Bruck families arrived in NY during the next few years. Some of them stayed in Buffalo, NY. It looks like Peter and Barbara left for Canada about 1835 and may have stayed a year or so in Rainham, in what is now Haldimand Co. Ontario. This is where some of Peter's supposed brothers settled. In an article sent to me by Donna Detzler Haid in Canada, Michael, Martin and Peter of Wilmot came from Sulzweiler. (Later we found out that this was Sotzweiler). The brother, Michael, that settled in Rainham, had sons named Peter, Nicholas and Michael. His son Peter married Mary Holdrid and moved to Bruce Co. and lived near the families of our Peter and Barbara. By 1838 Peter and Barbara had moved to Wilmot, Waterloo Co., Ontario. The baptism of Margaretha in 1838 is the earliest record in Waterloo Co., Ontario of the Peter and Barbara Brick family. The earliest land purchase by a Brick in Waterloo Co. was Peter Brick on 12 Mar 1840 in Wilmot B Concession 3 Lot 5. More land was purchased in June of 1841 in Concession 3. (Found on index of Land Records for Ontario.). The requirements for land purchase at that time were that you lived on and improved the land for 5 years before you could purchase it. So maybe our Peter came to Waterloo Co., in 1835 without the stop over in Rainham. The following is an excerpt from "The Catholic Church in Waterloo County, 1916" by Spetz, Theobald, C.R., D.D. "NEW PRUSSIA S.S. NO. 18 "Immigrants of Roman Catholic faith from Rhenish Prussia settled in the northwest corner of Wilmot Township, hence the name New Prussia. A mission of St. Agatha was organized and the Jesuit priests started a Separate School in the late 1840's. An outbreak of Saugeen Fever in the 1850's greatly diminished the population of the colony. As late as 1860 a three day mission was held by a Roman Catholic priest during the Easter season. About this time the building was dismantled and church services ceased. Family names were: Brick, Detzler, Schmidt, Lienhart, Fritz, Casper and Bucheidt." Just a note, Saugeen Fever was not a disease it was the moving on of the younger families to Bruce Co. Ontario. The next record that Peter appears in is the 1851-52 Census in Wilmot, Waterloo Co., Ontario, Canada. He is age 58 and Barbara is 56. Living with them at the time is Catherine age 16 listed as servant, Margaret age 13 listed as a servant and a three year old child Elizabeth (I was unable to make out the last name). They live next door to the Jacob and Anna Detzler. In 1861 in District 17, Township of Wilmot, in Waterloo Co ., there is Peter Brick age 66, born France and Barbara, age 60 born France. On a trip to Canada I found what looks like the death of Peter Brick in the records of St Agatha Church. If this is his death he died 2 April 1861. In 1871 Barbara Brick is living with son Michael and Mary in Bruce Co., Canada. There is a Barbara Brick buried at the Immaculate Conception Cemetery in Formosa, Bruce Co., Ontario, Canada. She has an iron cross. Any information that may have been in the tiny plate on that cross is long gone. According to some records that Tom Brick (a cousin from MN) found Barbara lived to be 105. That would place her death about 1899/1900. I did not find Barbara in the 1881 or 1891 census. But she could of lived with another child that I have not stumbled across yet. There is no index for the census for those years. The story of why they left the Saarland area in Germany is not known. There have been many accounts written about that time period and the reasons why families immigrated to North America. We can only assume that our family came because of the same reasons. Some of those reasons were war and famine.

1. ↑ St Agatha Church records Waterloo Co., Ontario, Canada.