Although the official name of this lock station has always been Davis Lock, most local people until this generation referred to it as Foster’s Locks. In the early 20th century, the area around here was also referred to as Fosterville. Around 1820, Walter Davis Junior, the son of an American settler took advantage of the waterpower at the future location of the locks and erected a sawmill. Unfortunately, the mill didn’t last very long. When the site was decided upon for a single lock, the mill was destroyed. Davis himself died in 1830 leaving a widow and five children.
Davis Lock c1910The construction of the station was fairly uneventful after the first contractor Donald MacLever went bankrupt. The contract was taken over by Robert Drummond, the contractor at Kingston Mills, and John Haggart, the contractor at Chaffeys Lock. The lock station was completed in a prompt fashion and the first lockmaster John Purcell took charge in 1832. Although there is some confusion about Purcell’s connection to the canal, it appears he was a stonemason with connections in Kingston, possibly through Robert Drummond. Purcell, in 1842, built a defensible lockmaster’s house which replaced the frame building his family had been living in.
Before 1850, the main settler in the area was Patrick Murphy, an Irishman who had married Samantha Halladay. The couple had a large family and many of their descendants live in the area today. Another early settler was Robert Dennison, a son-in-law of Purcell’s. Dennison operated a lumber business on the other side of the locks.
By the early 1850s, the area started to develop into small farm holdings. Captain William (Billy) Fleming, the son of the first lockmaster at Chaffeys married a neighbour, Margaret Doyle, and erected a log cabin where the couple raised eight children. Fleming, a legendary Rideau Canal captain, eventually owned the Rideau Lakes Navigation Company with his son-in-law Daniel Noonan of Kingston. The company maintained the luxury steamers, the Rideau King and Queen, and were active in developing the tourist industry on the Rideau. Ned Fleming, another son, captained the Rideau Queen and his oldest son was the third lockmaster at Chaffeys.
Other families such as the Murrays, Jordans and Freemans arrived from Ireland in the years before and after the terrible famine there. Most maintained small farming operations often supplemented by work on the locks or on the boats. As with the Murphys, many of their descendants remain in the area today.
Dennis Mahoney , his wife Ellen and members of the Alford and Mahoney families c1910When Purcell retired to a farm near Elgin in 1857, John Johnson took over as lockmaster. However, without a doubt, the most famous lockmaster was Alfred Forster (also called Foster). Alfred had been born in 1849 into a canal family and assumed charge of the lock station at the tender age of 22 (1871) shortly after his marriage to Margaret Clark. Forster was a strong personality who controlled his lock station with a fist of iron. Foster (Forster) remained lockmaster here until the turn of the century and during those years the lock and area around it began to adopt his name. He fired staff regularly, was accused of using government facilities for profit, and became heavily involved fighting vigilante groups of farmers trying to dismantle government dams. He was even accused by a neighbor of poisoning his cattle. One of his canal men, Dennis Mahoney, set up a farm on the opposite side of the locks and raised a large family there. The only access the family had to their home was across the lock gates or by boat.
Elah Alford and wife Martha c1910After Forster was sent to Jones Falls just before his retirement in 1897, Philander Alford was appointed lockmaster. When he died suddenly four years later, his son Elah was appointed lockmaster. His mother Martha kept the books until he reached the age of majority. Most of the Alford family relocated to Chaffeys Lock. Elah remained the lockmaster until 1947. Jim Pyne and John Watters were other mid-twentieth century lockmasters. The house was abandoned finally in 1959 and was rented as a cottage for many years. In 1983, after a fire, it was renovated.
Two notable early cottages at the lock station include a small cottage fixed up by Elgin doctor Gus Coon around the turn of the 20th century. It has remained in the same family for more than a century. Juniper Lodge was another notable cottage.
Today, Davis Lock remains one of the quietest and most remote stations on the canal, but 100 years ago it was an active little community called “Fosterville” in the local papers. The one-room school was closed in the 1940s.
By Sue Warren
Municipal Heritage Advisory Committee, Township of Rideau Lakes
