Toronto Carrying-Place Trail
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The Toronto Carrying-Place Trail, also known as the Humber Portage and the Toronto Passage, was a major portage route in Ontario, linking the Lake Ontario with Lake Simcoe and the northern Great Lakes. The name comes from the Mohawk term toron-ten, meaning "the place where the trees grow over the water", an important landmark on Lake Simcoe through which the trail passed.
Starting with the Toronto end, the trail ran up the eastern bank of the Humber River. The trail splits at Woodbridge, with one fork crossing the east branch of the Humber and going up the west side of the river to the vicinity of Kleinberg where it re-crossed the river. This trail was probably used during the seasons when the water was low enough to ford. The other fork stayed on the east side of the river and angled cross-country to King Creek, joining the other fork before crossing the river near Nobelton, some 50km north of Lake Ontario. From there it runs north over the Oak Ridges Moraine to the Holland River, and from there north-east into Lake Simcoe some 80km north.
Once into Lake Simcoe, known as Ouentironk among the First Nations people living in the area, the trail continues north through straights on the north end of the lake into Lake Couchiching. These straights, an important fishing area, gives rise to the name Toronto, as this is "the place where the trees grow over the water". From there the trail follows the Severn River into Georgian Bay. Many of the major First Nations tribes lived in the area around and to the north of Lake Simcoe, which were easily reachable via the many rivers leading to the lake.
A second arm of the trail runs from the Holland River to the south-east, eventually into the Rouge River valley, and from there to Lake Ontario. This arm appears to have been favoured by the French explorers in the area, without ever having seen the Humber. The first European to see the Humber arm was Étienne Brûlé, who travelled it with a group of twelve Huron in 1615. Near the mouth of the Humber and along the Toronto Passage was a trading post called Teiaiagon. It was a place where Indians and Europeans (French and English) could meet and make trades. The site is marked with a plaque and is near the historic Old Mill.
Further French settlement used the Humber portion of the trail primarily, including the construction of three forts on, or near, the trail. The first of these, Magasin Royale, was built in 1688 about 2km north of Lake Ontario on the Humber near what is today Old Mill. The second, Fort Toronto, was built in 1750 only a few hundred metres north of the lake, right on the trail. The final one, Fort Rouillé, but known widely as Fort Toronto, was built about 2km to the east of the river during 1750 and 1751, and today lies under the bandstand at the Canadian National Exhibition.
The trail was widely used by both French and English fur traders until Toronto started to be permanently settled in the early 1800s, bringing to close its use for over a millennia.
External link
- The Coming of the French (http://www.trca.on.ca/water_protection/strategies/humber/pdf/Legacy-C2b.pdf) - part of a lengthy article on the Humber, this section contains a map of the southern portions of the trail