War of 1812, Upper Canada War Loss Claims Numerical Index Compiled by Fred Blair, Published January 28, 2017, p. 2

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Most claims also indicated who was responsible for causing the loss. The more detailed claims may even record the name, rank, and regiment of the person involved. There was limited space in the indices below for a lot of detail and claims were only categorized here as caused by the allies or the enemy. Losses to Indians aiding either side were not indicated. Some claims lacked a detailed list of what was lost while others gave detailed itemized lists of the contents of a stolen trunk or a burnt house. Generally, losses to the enemy were for property taken or destroyed. For the allies, the list of losses also included lost pay or payment for rent or goods delivered. Things lost included buildings, bridges, boats, merchandise, crops, livestock, trees, building materials, tools, household goods, food, clothing, books, currency, and many other items. Rather than an exact date for a loss, there may have been no date given, just the year, or just the month or season in a particular year. This information is included in some of the indices below but where there were multiple losses on different dates only the years may have been recorded. Another problem was discovering where the loss occurred. Most claims were indexed with the place where the claimant was living during the war but some were indexed with the place where the claim was submitted, the place where the claimant was living after the event, or the place where the loss occurred. Claims for losses were sometimes registered in major towns like York and Niagara because the claimant had travelled there from another community to have his claim prepared and submitted. A number of families moved during or after their loss and the claimants sometimes gave their place of residence at that time rather than where they were living when the loss occurred. An effort was made to use the claimant's place of residence at the time of the event in the indices below. Why and how a loss occurred would have helped the commissioners determine the validity of the claim but this information was sometimes lacking as well. A number of interesting stories were reported by witnesses to some of the events. Rather than repeating the microfilm number for every claim the last two digits of that number were given with the first page of each claim. As an example, the claim starting on Microfilm t-1126, page 163 was abbreviated to 26-163. The last page of the claim was the page before the first page of the next claim. The claim after 26-163 was on 26-171, so the last page of 26-163 was page 170. Where claims papers were mixed with other claims, the first and last pages of each claim were recorded.

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