Article

Robert Nichol

Published Online January 22, 2008

Last Edited December 16, 2013

Robert Nichol, businessman, politician, militia officer (b at Dumfries, Scot c 1774; d near Queenston, UC 3 May 1824). A successful merchant in Norfolk County, UC, he was elected to the House of Assembly in 1812, 1816 and 1820. During the WAR OF 1812 he served as quartermaster general of militia.

Nichol, Robert

Robert Nichol, businessman, politician, militia officer (b at Dumfries, Scot c 1774; d near Queenston, UC 3 May 1824). A successful merchant in Norfolk County, UC, he was elected to the House of Assembly in 1812, 1816 and 1820. During the WAR OF 1812 he served as quartermaster general of militia. Mercurial and capricious, he led the opposition in the Assembly after 1817, though often working closely with the administration and criticizing unrelentingly "the base and wicked Executive." He was an early promoter of canals, and his Assembly report on the resources of the province defined for a generation a strategy for economic development. Nichol described himself with detachment as "more of the Epicurean than Stoic" with "not sufficient stability."