Hamnett Pinhey named his estate and imposing residence Horaceville after his eldest son who would inherit following the English gentry tradition. The general custom of rural farmers was to give the home farm to the youngest son, who had the least time to wait until the parents retired.
Horace Pinhey was born in London in 1817 and immigrated with his parents in 1821. Remembering bouts of seasickness in coming to Canada, he refused to attend his father’s boarding school in England. Instead, he spent eighteen months at Upper Canada College in Toronto.
A rather shy homebody, he avoided holding any government position, apart from becoming an officer in the county militia and one appointment as a magistrate. In 1847 Horace married Catherine (Kate) Tydd Greene (1822-1899), one of three immigrant sisters from an Irish gentry family in General Arthur Lloyd’s social circle.
The young family took up residence in the original clapboarded-log wing along with the stone kitchen. Horace took over operation of the farm and started his own series of diaries and accounts in 1848, while his father devoted his time to work with the colony’s Legislative Council. A digitized version of this diary is available elsewhere on this website.
Following a five month illness, Horace died at the age of 58 in 1875 at the Ottawa residence of his sister Mary Anne and her husband Dr Hamnett Hill. His eldest son Hamnett Kirkes Pinhey II married and took over the farm in 1877. Horace’s widow Kate moved into Ottawa with her remaining children.