Voices of the People

Nova Scotia House of Assembly Petitions and Correspondence

13 June 1803

Petition of Thomas Thomson, and other inhabitants of Chester, stating the inconveniences they suffer through having to travel to Lunenburg, over extremely bad roads or fifteen miles by water, to the County Court, and praying that the Court may sit once a year in Chester, where "there is a sufficient number of Houses of Entertainment…to accommodate the Court and Suitors etc." and offering to build a Courthouse. They "farther beg that they may be granted the Privilege of having a weekly Market, Established in the Town of Chester, on such a day as may be thought most Convenient, they want of which in any Town is the Cause of many Growing evils – in the first place it makes the People under a kind of Necessity of Making bargains (as they seldom meet but) on the Sabath day, notwithstanding the existing Laws, they find Means to avoid Detection, Such habits must produce nothing but Dissoluteness in Young people and Children, who think there Can be no evil in Such practices, when they see their Parents Resort to Shops and Taverns, as Soon as they Come out to the places of Public Worship, and often Drunkennes and Quarreling ends the day. Your Memorialists are Convinced that a weekly Market would in Great Measure prevent many of the evils stated in the above, and be a means to Promote Good Order, and prove Convenient both for Town and Country." Signed with 7 names. Consideration deferred to a future day.

Reference: Nova Scotia House of Assembly Nova Scotia Archives RG 5 Series A volume 10 number 33