Robert Orchard was an early schoolteacher at Victoria (Stroud, Innisfil) School and the son of one of Innisfil's early Pioneers.  In this newsletter is presented Robert Orchard's account of the death of his father Joseph Orchard.


"Monday, April 3rd, 1865.  About one o'clock today, young James Clemens came to our house and told me that Father's house was on fire.  I and sister Elizabeth started for Father's and got as far as David Myer's when we met Charles Chantler, who informed us that the fire had been put out.
I came back but Elizabeth went on, saying she would go and see how it happened.  I had just commenced teaching when John Clements came to the school and told me to go to Father's as quickly as possible, for he had been hurt.  I left the school, and went to my house to get my boots and a warmer coat, and told Sarah, Father was hurt.  Just as I came out of my gate I saw John Hagman with William's horse and light wagon, which he told me to take.  I asked him if Father was much hurt; he said 'He is dead'.
I hastened to Father's and found Mother almost wild.  I never saw her grieve so violently.  After she became somewhat calmer, she told me the following account of the fire, and dear Father's death.  She had been cleaning the cellar, and Father had been fixing up fence, in the forenoon.  They were at dinner, and as a train was passing the whistle blew strongly.  Mother went out and one of the men on the train pointed to the roof, and Mother saw it was on fire, and shouted to Father.  He came hurriedly and ran to the barn, a distance of about 100 yards, and got a ladder.  Mother told him not to go up for fear of falling; he told her to give him a pail which had some water in, and go to the trough at the barn for more.  She hastened to the barn, got two pails of water, when she got half way back she saw Father, lying on the ground.  She called to him, asking if he were hurt, but got no answer; she ran to him, and found him lying with his head toward the house, partly on his face, and with his hands stretched out to one side.  She lifted him up, his eyes were closed, she called his name, tried to rouse him, but, alas, never more would those dear old lips speak to her.  He was dead.
Oh! what a position for dear old Mother, her dear old husband dead, deprived of life in a moment, the house on fire, and she a poor weak old woman, all alone there.  She says she shouted frantically, but it was fifteen or twenty minutes before any one came.  Mr. Shepherd was the first.  But the first who did anything toward putting out the fire was John Clements.  William and Thomas Hurst who were working at Craigvale, and James Fraser, merchant, were soon there, but William and Thomas Hurst were so greatly shocked to find Father dead, that they could do nothing to assist in putting out the fire.  About ten square feet of the roof was burned but the house was saved.  We supposed that Father had gone up the ladder, as far as to be about breast even with the roof, and perhaps becoming dizzy had fallen on his head, dislocating his neck; the vertebrae was dislocated at the process joint.  I feel so shocked that I can hardly realize that it is so. O Father you were taken from us in an appallingly sudden manner; it is indeed most wonderful to reflect that God protected you from the whistling bullets in your youth, and from many-dangers in your after life, and yet you were killed in your weak and feeble old age, just at your own door.  Yet I murmur not; I see mercy in it all.  I would have felt it a great satisfaction, if I could have received your parting blessing, and bade you farewell, but it could not be.  I bless God that I can trust Him where I cannot trace Him and firmly believe that He doeth all things well....

"William went to Barrie to tell the Coroner, and telegraph to sister Hannah.  John Clements went for Joseph; Joseph and Hannah came to-night; we were all there tonight except Sister Sarah (Mrs. William Daniel Warnica) who is very ill.  There were a great many of the neighbors there.  Wm.  Thompson, Thomas Webb, Sr. and John Quantz laid out Father's corpse."


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