John Kerby

Biography

John Kerby was the son of Thomas Kerby born in Belfast Ireland and Mary Walker who had married June 21,1757, at Albany N.Y. He was born about 1754 at Albany, New York. In 1759 his father was ordered to take part in the campaign to capture the town of Quebec, leaving wife and child behind. He did not return and is believed to have died, or been killed, and buried on the Plains Of Abraham.

Family has it that about the ages of 10 to 15 years, he became an apprentice to a silversmith. He was employed by North West Fur Co. to trade with the natives. His duties took him to Mackinac, Milwaukee, and Prairie du Chien on the Mississippi. He became an expert in the trade, and is said to speak 10 different native languages.[1]

In June 1781at Detroit, he married Alison Donaldson [2] She was the daughter of Sgt. James Donaldson (born 1744, Scotland) & Isabella (nee Maybor, Scotland) [alternatively Isobella McCallum, 1747-1814]. Alison was born in 1760 in Detroit. She died in 1839 at Kerby Mills and was buried at Rich Buttons Family Cemetery. They were both members of the Church of England and were said to be devout Christians in every sense of the word.

The Kerbys had 12 children:

Mary Kerby born in Detroit on July 26,1782; died 1868, Galveston; married 1) Elisa Whallen, 2 children. 2) Thomas Fream, 2 children 3) Joseph Wallen [?]
Col. James Kerby born in Windsor in 1785, died 1854, buried at St Paul's Cemetery, Fort Erie, married Jane Lambert, died 1839.
Ann Kerby born Dec.28,1786, died 1806, married 1804 to ? Tucker.
John Peter Kerby born in Detroit in 1788, married Mary Ann Moudreauy born 1795
Col.William Kerby born in Detroit on Apr.15,1791, died in Napanee on Mar. 01,1877 married Mary Smith.
Col. George Pigeon Kerby born in Prairie du Chein Wisconsin on Jan 10,1793, died Oct 20,1874 in Bayfield Ontario, married 1) Mary Merrill, 2) Mary Cornwall, 3) Helen Reid.
Margaret Kerby married June 14,1789 to Ensign Claude Guion.
Alice Kerby [?], abt 1792/1801?
Lt. Col Aaron Donaldson Kerby born in 1803 at Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin; died 1877 at Florence, Kent, Ontario; married Dianna ___
Elizabeth Kerby married Andrew Brice.
Andrew Todd Kerby born in Prairie du Chein WI, on Feb. 17,1797 died May 14,1868 in Goderich On. (see below)
Alexander Kerby [?], born abt 1806?, or 1809 Prairie du Chien
This story was told by Grandson Edwin Donaldson Kerby in 1883: [3]

When John got old enough to work as an apprentice to a silversmith and learned to trade, he was employed by the North West Fur Company as a trader to the Indians. He traveled to Detroit where he met and married his wife (about June 1781) which was about 22 years after his father's death.
In discharge of his duties he was stationed in the 'Great West', was for sometime in Mackinaw, Milwaukee and 'Prairie du Chien' on the Mississippi. He became an expert as an Indian Trader and learned to speak in ten different Indian languages, in a fluent manner.
While stationed in Prairie du Chien, three children were born and he was six years without seeing the face of another white person, except for his wife and children. Owing to an accident by which he was injured, he was obliged to five up his position as a trader and took up a farm of 200 acres @ Gross Point, near the city of Detroit and lived there many years and several of the children were born there. Subsequently he gave his farm to his son John and went back to Canada where he lived the remainder of his life.
For years before his death, John lived as a cripple, not able to walk without the aid of crutches after being burned in his dwelling. Both he and Ellison died at their son George Pigeon Kerby's home at the 'Kerbys Mills'. Both are buried in the burying ground -St. Matthews on Richard Button's Farm in the the Gore of Camden, county of Kent. They also were members of the 'Church of England' and most devout Christians in every sense of the word.

Sources

1 ancestry profile
2 Yates Publishing. U.S. and International Marriage Records, 1560-1900 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2004.
3 LSnowden1009 posted the story on Ancestry.ca citing Douglas W Heir - CA
4.Kerby history webpage[1]
5.https://vanantwerpfamily.wordpress.com/2022/04/12/john-kerby-1754-1...
https://www.ancestry.ca/family-tree/person/tree/30553454/person/127...