Description Historic Landmark Lost to Pictou

A view of the battery hill that “was”

By Roland H Sherwood.

PICTOU, Oct 8—Pictou’s famous Battery Hill is no more. With relentless energy three large steam shovels are tearing away the Hill that has been a prominent landmark overlooking the harbor; a hill that has served much as a park for sightseers and a rendezvous for lovers. It was on this hill that the townfolk gathered in 1833 to watch and wave “Gad-Speed” to the Royal William as she steamed out of Pictou harbor to win fame as the first ship ever to cross the atlantic wholly under steam.

Signal Tower Site

It was on this vantage spot that

There was erected a signal tower for

Ships that stood in and out of the

Harbor. And here too, were the

Battery of large cannon with the

Royal Coat of Arms, that ringed the

Hill. Only the oldest citizens of

Pictou remember that these cannon

Were placed there at the time of the

Feinian raid, and for many years

Afterwards were always fired in a

Royal Salute on the 24^th of May.

With the coming of shipbuilding

To Pictou the face of the waterfront

began to change. Old Buildings

gave way to new. Wharves and

seawalls began to rise. The shallow

edge of the harbor began to be

pushed back to deep water. Inlet

and cove were filled and new build-

ings are going up on the earth that

is coming from battery hill.

Cannon First to Go

 The First to go from the historic hill were the old cannon that faced seaward from the promontory. They went into the salvage mill and finally came back to Pictou in the form of steel bending slaps for the shipyards. Next the steam shovels went to work at the foot of the hill, widening the narrow circling roadway to make room for a railway spur that runs between the new sea wall and the steep slopes of the look off. Then the residence of Archie MacNeill that occupied a commanding spot on the Northumberland strait side of the hill was moved to a new location. This was the biggest house moving project ever attempted in Pictou.

  When the hill was cleared steam shovels and trucks moved in, and from this spot 40,000 cubic yards of earth is being scooped and dumped into a steady string of trucks which transport the earth to new fill beyond the shipyards. The grassy slopes where hundreds of citizens gathered to watch the water sports by day, and the fireworks by night, in the days of the lobster carnivals, and where they packed it full as they watched Canadian warship race up the harbor bearing his majesty, King George Sixth, and Queen Elizabeth, in 1939, is no more.

 

 In the past one looked from the hill far out to the misty Northumberland Strait, or watched the ferry “Ashagola” ply her solitary way across the harbor. There was little shipping in those days. Today, Pictou is relieving the days of the past with the activity of her waterfront, and now, from Welsford Street, where one used to enter the fence enclosed spot that was known as battery hill, one looks down the steep incline to new scenes that came with shipbuilding and to activity such as Pictou has never known before.