Silvanus Cobb

Silvanus Cobb Monument, Liverpool, Nova Scotia

Silvanus Cobb (Sylvanus Cobb) (b. Plymouth, New England in 1709 - d. Havana, 1762 ) . During King William's War, Cobb was chosen captain of the company of Col. John Gorham's regt. of provincial troops, which was raised in Plymouth in 1745, for the Expedition against Louisbourg, where he served with credit. He commanded a small armed vessel, employed by the government to cruise in the Bay of Fundy, in 1747 and 8.

During Father Le Loutre's War, after the establishment of the Government in Chebucto in 1749. Thus Cobb’s vessel became part of Captain John Rous’s sea militia which helped keep open communications along the coast of Nova Scotia and with New England. Cornwallis described Cobb as a settler who “knows every Harbour and every Creek in the Bay [of Fundy], a man fit for any bold enterprise.”

During the French and Indian War, Cobb served at the second siege of Louisburgh under Boscowen and Amherst in 1758, and was chosen by Gen. Monckton to conduct Gen. Wolfe to a reconnoisance of the fortress previous to its capture. Afterward he participated in the St. John River Campaign and the Petitcodiac River Campaign.

Capt Cobb returned to Plymouth after the campaign, and removed, with his family, to Liverpool, Nova Scotia, where he is said to have built a house. Previous to the year 1755, he had a house at Chignecto, where he occasionally resided in winter. Silvanus Cobb was an original proprietor of the town. In 1759 Capt. Cobb became a proprietor of the new township of Liverpool. Liverpool township was to run from Cape Sable Island to Port Medway and continuing 14 miles inland from the shore. Sylvanus transported many of the other original residents to the new settlement. On July 1, 1760, at the first meeting of the proprietors, Capt. Cobb made a petition to be granted a piece of land to build a house and a wharf. The land was granted and the house was built at the foot of present day Wolf street. There is a park and monument to Cobb at the site of his original home which was built from materials he transported from New England.

He was afterwards employed in the Expedition against Havana in 1762, where he died of the epidemic which there prevailed, expressing his regret that he had not met a soldier's death at the cannon's mouth. He left an only daughter, who married Col. William Freeman, of Liverpool, N. S. The descendants of Mrs. Freeman are numerous in Queen's County. His younger brother, Jabez Cobb, also settled at Liverpool and left descendants.

Legacy

• Silvanus Cobb Park, Liverpool, Nova Scotia

References

Texts

• Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online
• John Leefe."The Bounty Hunter: [The Life of Sylvanus Cobb]"; Nova Scotia Historical Quarterly, #3:4 (1973):

Endnotes