Avening
The following sketch of Avening was written by Mr. George Carruthers of Toronto and a son of one of the early pioneers of Avening.
My grandfather, George Carruthers, a native of Dumfrieshire, Scotland, came to America in 1848 by way of New York. He lived for a time in Albany, later in Buffalo, and took up land in what is now Avening, about 1850. Some clearing was done by my grandfather’s brother, John, and his son, John, and the family moved on to that property about 1851.
Frederick C. Thornbury came from West Gwillimbury where he kept a tavern about 1845, and later built the grist mill and saw mill and woollen or carding mill about 1860. The Thornburys named the place ‘Avening’ after the Avening in Gloucester, England. My grandfather and his son, George Carruthers, established the saw and shingle mill in Avening about the same year. F. C. Thornbury died January 16, 1872, age 63 years and was succeeded by his son, W.H. Thornbury.
The latter became the first postmaster on the establishment of Avening Post Office on February 1, 1864. He was also Reeve of Nottawasaga 1868-69. W. H. Thornbury died in September, 1908.
George Carruthers, Junior, (my father) carried on the saw and shingle mill for many years, and for a time about 1875, the mill was operated by Alex Rounday, and later by Miller Feltis. His brother, John, went to New Zealand to sell property in the city of Aukland, which had been taken up by his father while in New Zealand. He later returned to Canada and established a grist mill in Dunedin and named the village after Dunedin, New Zealand. He later sold the Dunedin mill and bought a grist mill in Creemore. He, however, returned to New Zealand.
When the Carruthers family settled in Avening in the early 1850s there was only one other settler on the second line northward, near Cashtown.”
Information taken from Nottawasaga: The Outburst of the Iroquois, published in 1934.
(to be continued…)
Helen Blackburn is a retired teacher, avid gardener and a long-time contributor to The Creemore Echo. She writes about local history.
