First Welland Canal points on the Lake Erie shore, and also offered a natural harbour for the ships waiting to enter the canal. The new part of the canal was to run in a fairly straight line, except for a stretch where it followed a local ravine and a creek to minimise required excavation of hard rock in the area. The Welland Canal Company obtained a loan of 50,000 pounds from the Province of Upper Canada. Construction started soon after, but it was delayed by rain, difficulty in clearing land, and a cholera outbreak in 1832. Neither the Wainfleet Marsh nor the rock
First Welland Canal of the Welland Canal. In 1818, William Hamilton Merritt borrowed an instrument called a water level from Samuel Beckett, a mill owner in St. Johns. Along with George Keefer, John DeCew, and a couple of other neighbours he set out to survey a potential route for a water canal. From the headwaters of the Twelve Mile Creek near present-day Allanburg, they planned a line three kilometers south to meet with the Welland River. A ridge was encountered along the way, and using the instrument, the surveyors calculated it to be 10 meters high. It was actually double that height; the