Kaiser Families of York

PREFACE: This attempt at collecting the details of a family so widely scattered as that of the Canadian Branch of the Kaiser descendents must necessarily be brief and to some extent imperfect. As it is my intention to bring out at least a second issue at some date within the next few years, may I ask all those whose names appear in this effort, to send me a list of any errors or omissions found herein, and particularly to correct all dates given by me and add to the numbers additional dates and names as far as possible. By sending me the name and address of any person desiring a copy. I shall try and meet their request. T.E. Kaiser M.D. Oshawa, Ontario, Canada. This issue is dedicated to the Memory of my Father, John E. Kaiser, upon the centenary of his birth on July 2nd 1831.

Peter Erlin Kaiser, an army officer, came from Frankfurt-on-Maine, to Johnstown, shortly before the American Revolution, where he joined many of his Palatine relatives who imigrated from the Palatinate. First to England in the Great Exodus and from thence to the Valley of the Mohawk, in New York, and to the Susquehanna in Pennsylvania. During the revolution he sympathized with the British and paid the penalty of land confiscation after the war was over. In 1785 he left Johnstown and took up residence at Niagara along with the United Empire Loyalists of that date. Induced by promises of restoration of his lands he returned to Johnstown where in 1792 he married Mary Delabo, a descendant of one of the original Palatines from Alsace.
After three of his children were born, he was still denied not only the promised possession of his lands, but was also, like thousands of others, refused the common right of citizenship.