Philip VanKoughnet

Colonel The Hon. Philip VanKoughnet M.L.C., M.L.A. (April 2 1790 – May 7 1873) Businessman and political figure in Upper Canada.

This family originated during the Middle Ages in Switzerland, when their name was spelt von Gachnang. Soon after being enobled they entrusted their considerable land holdings to Sigismund, Archduke of Austria who prompty lost them, though the family maintained their noble name. They moved from Gachnang to the surrounding villages of Zurich and Zurich itself, where they were well-known citizens. During the Thirty Years War (1618-1648) they emigrated to Colmar, Alsace, where three successive generations of the family were surgeons and members of the Grand Jury, spelling their name von Gochnat. Having again lost their land after the French regained possession of Alsace, in 1751 the family emigrated to North America where the name changed again to VanKoughnet, as it is now known.

Philip VanKoughnet was born in New Johnstown (Cornwall) in 1790 and was educated at John Strachan's school. He fought at the Battle of Crysler's Farm during the War of 1812. In 1816, he was elected to the 7th Parliament of Upper Canada representing Stormont & Russell. In 1833, he was part of a commission to establish a canal at Cornwall to improve transportation along the Saint Lawrence River. In gratitude, VanKoughnet Island, off the canal, was named after him.

In 1836, he was appointed to the Legislative Council of Upper Canada by Lieutenant Governor Sir Francis Bond Head. In 1838, he commanded a battalion of militia at the Battle of the Windmill. In 1870, he was appointed chairman of the Canadian Board of Government Arbitrators.

Philip VanKoughnet had inherited his United Empire Loyalist father's extensive lands in Upper Canada (which he bought in 1783 after the Americans had put a price on his head for his loyalty to the Crown) adding to them over time until at his death in 1873 he owned the entirety of the district. His father had named the original settlement 'New Johnstown', after Johnstown (New York) which was named after the Colonel's grandfather, John (Johann Eberhardt) von Gochnat (1712-1770), who had founded that town in 1751 after arriving from Colmar, Alsace.

It was said of the Colonel that he had, ‘all the stubbornness of a German, with the patriotism of a Briton’. He had ‘earned the respect of his contemporaries for his sterling qualities and honest patriotism’.

On 1st April, 1819, he married Harriet Sophia (1795-1854), daughter of Matthew Scott (d.1812) of Ormond Mills, Kilkenny, a well known protestant merchant of Carrick-on-Suir, by his wife Lady Anna Glancy of Kurley, Co. Kilkenny. Scott spent some time in America, but returned to Tipperary where he was later publicly flogged for apparently aiding the catholics during the troubles of 1798. Humiliated, though probably not the only reason, Scott later took his own life. [http://www.ulsterancestry.com/ShowFreePage.php?id=186] Matthew, a descendent of the notable Purcell family, Barons of Loughmoe, was a nephew of Lord Chief Justice The Rt. Hon. John Scott (1739-1798), 1st Earl and Viscount of Clonmel, Co. Tipperary, more popularly known as 'Copper-faced Jack'. Harriet Scott's sister, Catherine (1785-1863), married William Percy Pack of Kilkenny, the maternal great grandparents of the author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Philip and Harriet left thirteen children, who after his death divided Cornwall (which New Johnstown is now known as) between themselves. The eldest son, The Hon. Philip Michael Matthew Scott VanKoughnet, became the Chancellor of Upper Canada (now known as Ontario).

External links

* [http://www.biographi.ca/009004-119.01-e.php?&id_nbr=5307 Biography at the "Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online"]