LE3 .A278 1979

1979

Moody, Barry

Acadia University

Bachelor of Arts

Honours

History

History & Classics

In 1759 Liverpool was just starting its rise as a frontier town on the wilderness of Nova Scotia's coastline. Its people came from the fishing communities of Cape Cod in Massachusetts. They attempted to build their town almost as an exact copy of the communities they had left. This meant, among other things, that they had brought New England Congregationalism as their religious denomination. They found immediately that the Colonial Government in Nova Scotia was determined to change the social and governmental system from that which they had had in New England. These changes did not stop their establishment of fisheries, shipbuilding and sawmills as the economic base of their economy. Liverpool inhabitants were tied economically to the southern colonies. The outbreak of the American Revolution left Liverpool's people in a dilemma. They were sympathetic to many of the American complaints against Britain. The Liverpool people found money in London to get their businesses started. The war was on their doorstep as American privateers disrupted Liverpool shipping and attacked the town. Although they had leaned toward the American position at the war's beginning, privateering assaults turned them into Nova Scotia patriots. Liverpool's sailors took to the sea as privateers after 1778 and they were very successful at finally beating off the threat of armed aggression against their town. This movement also helped develop Liverpool's shipbuilding. The trauma of the Revolution was in the end constructive since it developed their response to outside forces in an indigenous manner which would influence the town's growth for the future.

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