Day Eighty Four
Staying close to home, we decided to start our local tour at the Signal Hill National Historic Park, and move out from there. The Signal Hill Park is located high on the cliffs, overlooking St. John’s harbor with a perfect view of the ocean. Any ships that want to enter the harbor through the narrows will be seen by Signal hill miles off the coast.
The Hill has a long history dating back to the mid 16th century. It is believed that pioneers and fishermen arrived in the area as early as 1600’s and began to establish what is now St. John’s. In 1665, The town was sacked by the Dutch causing the locals to petition the British government for protection, by 1680 Britain agreed to protecting St. John’s and built a fort on Signal Hill. In 1696 the French made an overland attempt on taking the fort and St. John’s. They succeeded in taking St. John’s but could not breach the fortification on the hill. After a thirty day siege, the French ran short of supplies and had to retreat, the town was destroyed by the French as they pulled out.
By the early 1700’s, both Britain and France were competing for the rich fishing along the coasts of eastern Canada, and the seven year war over the area had begun. From 1756 to 1763, they took turns sacking each other’s fishing villages along the coast. St. John’s was sacked twice more by the French and on the last attack, the French managed to take the fort forcing the British to retake the fort shortly after.
From there, the British continued to fortify the hill with stronger garrisons to ensure the towns safety from any further attacks by the French. In 1870 the garrison was withdrawn for more preferable living conditions off the hill as the elements on the hill were too hard on the troops stationed there.
In WWII, St. John’s became another major staging port for the war effort in Europe and it again played a pivotal roll to the defence of any German U-boat attacks. Several attempts were made on the harbor and even torpedo's were fired at the harbor, but missed any potential targets.
A long standing military tradition of the noonday gun was performed everyday on the hill for 150 years. The firing of the gun was performed over time by specific cannons that carried some significant history with it. The first cannon was a 32-pound cannon, then moved to a field gun that was used in the Boer war, around 1930 a Hotchkiss gun from the H.M.S Briton was used, until it was replaced with a WWII anti-tank gun. In 1906 the Church silenced the gun on Sundays as they felt it interfered with Sunday worship, this created an uproar from the townsfolk who pushed to have the gun continue the noonday firing, regardless of what the church wanted.
After the Signal hill, we drove to Quidi Vidi harbor for a brief walk along the pier, and then headed downtown for a walk along water street. Water Street is St. John’s version of eighth Ave in Calgary, or Kings Street in Toronto. There are lots of places to eat and shop, unfortunately we got the impression that Covid has hit the area hard, there was a fair number of boarded up stores along the walk. We found a great little place to enjoy a drink and a little lunch before we headed home for the day.
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