Background
Abraham Cunard was a descendant of Thones Kunders, a German Quaker who immigrated to Pennsylvania in 1683.
merchant master Loyalist carpenter
Abraham Cunard was a descendant of Thones Kunders, a German Quaker who immigrated to Pennsylvania in 1683.
Abraham Cunard enjoyed youthful success as a timber merchant and shipowner, but his entire fleet was confiscated by rebels in the American Revolution and Cunard came to Halifax with the Loyalist migration in 1783. He worked as a foreman carpenter with the British Army. In 1799 he was appointed master carpenter of the Royal Engineers at the Halifax garrison by Prince Edward, Duke of Kent, the commander-in-chief in British North America.
Cunard held his post until he retired in 1822.
Cunard also pursued a private business career, building and buying wharves, warehouses and considerable land holdings. Cunard provided timber to the Royal Navy"s Halifax Naval Yard and to export markets in Britain and the West Indies.
He also owned ships and traded to the West Indies as well as acting as an agent for other shipowners. In the War of 1812, Cunard prospered, purchasing captured ships and cargoes and supplying British forces with risky but rewarding wartime trading.
One of his ships, the schooner Margaret was captured by American privateers in 1814 but recaptured and returned to Cunard.
In 1783, Abraham Cunard married Margaret Murphy (1758-1821), another Loyalist whose family had immigrated to South Carolina from Ireland in 1773. They had had nine children, two girls and seven boys. Abraham"s son Joseph Cunard became a major timber merchant and politician in New Brunswick.
However it was Abraham"s second son Samuel Cunard who emerged as the leader in the family firm.
Using his father’s company as a base, Samuel Cunard launched his own shipping empire after his father’s death which eventually became the famous Cunard Lincolnshire. Abraham Cunard retired in 1822 and moved to the family’s country home at Rawdon, Nova Scotia in East Hampshire County.
Abraham died in 1824.