Post-war
In his report of the battle, FitzGibbon omitted any mention of Secord, stating only that he "received information" about the threat. This may have been to protect the Secords at the time. Fitzgibbon first wrote of Laura in a certificate dated 26 February 1820, in support of a petition by James for a licence to operate a stone quarry in Queenston.
After the war ended, with James' Queenston store in ruins, the Secord family was impoverished. They were supported only by James' small war pension and the rent from 200 acres of land they had in Grantham Township.
The Secords' sixth child Laura Anne was born in October 1815, and their last child, Hannah, was born in 1817. The Secords' eldest daughter Mary wedded William Trumball, a doctor, on 18 April 1816. On 27 March 1817, Mary gave birth in Ireland to the first of Laura and James' grandchildren, Elizabeth Trumball. Mary had another daughter, Mary, in Jamaica, and brought her children back to Queenston with her in 1821 following her husband's death.
The struggling James petitioned the government in 1827 for some sort of employment. Lieutenant-Governor Peregrine Maitland did not offer him a position, but instead offered something to Laura. He asked her to be in charge of the yet-to-be-completed Brock's Monument. At first, she turned it down, but then reluctantly accepted it. While waiting for the monument's 1831 opening, the Secords' daughter, Appolonia, died at 18 in 1828 of typhus. When the monument finally opened, Laura learned the new Lieutenant-Governor, John Colborne, intended to hand the keys over to the widow of a member of the monument committee who had died in an accident. On 17 July 1831, Laura petitioned Colborne to honour Maitland's promise, including another certificate from Fitzgibbon attesting her contribution to the war. She wrote that Colonel Thomas Clarke had been told by Maitland, "it was too late to think of Mrs. Nichol as I have pledged my word to Mrs. Secord that as soon as possible she should have the key." In the end, Laura's pleas fell on deaf ears, and the widow got the keys to the monument.
James was appointed registrar of the Niagara Surrogate Court in 1828. He was promoted to judge in 1833, with son Charles Badeau taking over the registrar position. Charles Badeau's first son, Charles Forsyth Secord, was born 9 May 1833. His is the only surviving line of Secords to have survived into the 21st century.
James became a customs collector in 1835 at the Port of Chippawa. The position came with a home in Chippawa, into which the family moved, with Charles Badeau taking over the Queenston home. Following her husband's death, Daughter Laura Ann and her son moved into the home in 1837.
Read more about this topic: Laura Secord, Personal History
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