On Tuesday, May 28, I attended a dinner in the Great Hall of Hart House, University of Toronto to commemorate the Fenian Raid, Battle of Ridgeway, June 2, 1866. The head table was a blue ribbon collection of dignitaries with connections to Ireland.
Peter Vronsky, author and filmaker, was also in attendance and his new book, “RIDGEWAY, The American Fenian Invasion and the 1866 Battle That Made Canada” is a must read for any serious student of Canadian history.
My attendance was driven by the fact that my ancestor Thomas Kennedy and his wife Eve Wintermute were driven from their farm in the Ridgeway, Ontario area by the Fenian invaders.
Their son, Edward Kennedy, is the fine Victorian gentleman with the handlebar moustache standing to the rear in this family portrait. He was born just months following the Raid and could relate boyhood remininsces of its tales he had heard from family and neighbours while growing up in the Ridgeway area. (The little nipper sitting to the right on the front step is me!!). Edward Kennedy was my great grandfather. His grandfather, William Wintermute, was only 17 when he fought with the Niagara Light Dragoons at Queenston Heights on 13 October, 1812 in the repulse of a prior invasion.