The Bath Academy
1811
Corner of Church and Academy across from the cemetery
Commemoration
On this site stood the Bath Academy, Lennox and Addington's earliest public school, founded in 1811 by means of local subscriptions. During the War of 1812, it was used for a time as a military barracks. Barnabus Bidwell, a radical political reformer and supporter of William Lyon Mackenzie, was its first teacher. His son, Marshall Spring Bidwell, who held similar views and became a leading member of the Legislative Assembly 1825-33, attended the academy. The institution was supported for many years by local settlers, but was merged into the common school system under the Public School Act of 1850.
Background
The school had to be rebuilt twice because of fires in the 19th century. The structure that exists now is from 1910. It is privately owned.
Barnabus Bidwell was born in Massachusetts in 1763. He was an elected state senator there from 1801 to 1804. He sat in the state House of Representatives from 1805 to 1807. At the same time, he was a member of the U. S. House of Representatives. He served as Attorney General for Massachusetts from 1807 to 1810. Throughout that period he was Treasurer of Berkshire county in Massachusetts. Irregularities in the books there led to his flight from the U. S. to Upper Canada. There he was elected to the provincial assembly but expelled because of his American citizenship amongst other things. He died in Bath in 1833.
Marshall Spring Bidwell was born in Massachusetts in 1799. He tried to stand for his father’s seat in the provincial legislature but was declared ineligible. Two years later he was elected in a by-election, winning by just 13 votes. He represented William Lyon MacKenzie in court in 1826 and was a supporter politically. This led to his having to leave the province in 1837 when the rebellion broke out. He settled in New York City and died there in 1872.