POWELL, Grant M. D.: 1779 - 1838
Grant was the third son of William Dummer Powell (Tile # 25) and Anne Murray. He was born in Norwich, England where his parents had taken refuge near his mother’s family after William, fearing for his life because of his overt Loyalist sympathies, had fled Boston in 1775. Grant’s father moved to Canada the year he was born and began practising law in Montreal. William Powell was eventually to become Chief Justice of Upper Canada. Although William’s family soon joined him in Montreal, Grant was educated in England and, following in the footsteps of his maternal grandfather, studied medicine.
Grant moved to America in 1803 and set up a medical practice in New York State. He married Elizabeth Staats Bleeker in Albany in 1805. They had ten children together, four sons and six daughters.
In 1810, the family moved to Montreal where Grant again began to practise medicine and was appointed a medical examiner for the district of Montreal. When the War of 1812 broke out in June 1812, he was appointed acting surgeon to the Provincial Marine at York on the recommendation of Major-General Isaac Brock. He had a lifelong interest in politics and although he maintained links with the medical profession, serving both on the Medical Board of Upper Canada and as Health Officer for York and vicinity, his primary activities were as Judge of the Court of Probate, Justice of the Peace, Home District Court Judge and eventually Clerk of the Legislative Council.(1)
Dr. Grant Powell died in Toronto in 1838.
1. “Powell, Grant,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online, Vol. VII.