Hi, Joyce. Alexander Peers and Mary Bolding were my gggg-grandparents, and I've accumulated quite a bit of information about them which I'm always willing to share. I don't know for sure who Alexander's parents were but do have some info that Alexander was the son of a Richard Peers, born circa 1710, who married Sarah Williams and was a merchant in Helsby, Cheshire, England. Richard and
Sarah allegedly had seven sons and seven daughters, of which Alexander was the third-born. (We know from Nova Scotia records that Alexander had a brother Samuel, probably a brother Henry and perhaps also a brother Joseph.) My understanding is Alexander was born in either 1736 or 1745, emigrated around age 20 and married Mary Bolding at Long Island City, Queens Co., NY, in 1765. From his Dundas Commission testimony, we know he bought out the lease of his brother Samuel around 1772 to 123 acres of farmland at Phillip's Upper Mills (also called Phillipse's Upper Patent), near the mouth of the Croton River in then Dutchess Co., NY. Alexander improved the property and in November 1786 valued the improvements at 100 British pounds. Alexander and his family were driven from this home early in the war because of his support of the British, i.e., joining Delancey's Cowboys, also known as the Westchester Refugees. The family then lived for some years in a log hut community of Loyalists' families called Morrisinia or Morrisina, located behind the British lines at the southern tip of Westchester Co., NY, not far from Long Island Sound. This property consisted of seven acres and a log home, which Alexander purchased from another Loyalist. Toward the end of the war the Americans and French burned this community, and Alexander lost that property also. He and his family withdrew over Kings Bridge onto Manhattan Island, where a month or so later they were picked up by British sailing ships in June 1783 and taken to Fort Cumberland in Nova Scotia. After spending several years in the area of Fort Cumberland, Alexander and his four sons were finally granted land by the British government in the Remsheg Grant, their lands being located at Wallace Bay in Cumberland Co., and there they forged new lives.