FRASER, JAMES (17?? LIVING 1791)
FRASER, JAMES, Presbyterian missionary to the Micmac Indians; b. Scotland; m. Mary - ; living in 1791.
James Fraser was educated in Edinburgh, Scotland, and served as a chaplain in the 71st Regiment during the Revolutionary War. Afterwards, he was stationed at Shelburne, N.S., where his ministry was unpopular and of short duration. He arrived in Saint John in 1786 and is thought to have been the first Presbyterian minister to officiate there.
In 1788 Fraser was appointed by the New England Company as missionary to the Micmac Indians of the Miramichi. When he arrived he was disappointed to discover that the Micmacs, who had been converted to Catholicism several generations previously, were suspicious and unco-operative, having been led to believe that the Protestant missionaries would be attempting to lure their sons into the armed forces. He applied successfully for grants of land at Douglastown and Northwest Meadows, but his proselytizing efforts were singularly unproductive, and complaints concerning his character led to his termination in 1791.
Sources
Betts (FF); Hoddinott; Royal Gazette 24 Oct 1786, 5 Jun 1787; Spray (ENC); Wood-Holt; World 10 Oct 1917, 9 Feb 1918
Notes
Fraser's wife may have been Mary Edwards, a native of Exeter, England, whose family settled in Saint John in the 1780's. Her first husband was a Rev. James Fraser. After his death, she married Neil McGraw of the 42nd Highland Regiment and lived with him at Black River, where they raised a family. He died in 1834, but she was still head of the McGraw household at Black River when the census of 1861 was taken, at which time the enumerator recorded her age as ninety-three.