page_title: Laura Secord
section_title: Later life and death
hierarchical_section_title: Laura Secord / Personal history / Later life and death
caption_attribution_description: Laura Secord statue, Valiants Memorial, Ottawa
context_page_description: Laura Secord was a Canadian heroine of the War of 1812. She is known for having walked 20 miles out of American-occupied territory in 1813 to warn British forces of an impending American attack. Her contribution to the war was little known during her lifetime, but since her death she has been frequently honoured in Canada. Though Laura Secord had no relation to it, most Canadians associate her with the Laura Secord Chocolates company, named after her on the centennial of her walk.
  Laura Secord's father, Thomas Ingersoll, lived in Massachusetts and fought on the side of the Patriots during the Revolutionary War. In 1795 he moved his family to the Niagara region of Upper Canada after he had applied for and received a land grant. Shortly after, Laura married Loyalist James Secord, who was later seriously wounded at the Battle of Queenston Heights early in the War of 1812. While he was still recovering in 1813, the Americans invaded the Niagara Peninsula, including Queenston. During the occupation, Secord acquired information about a planned American attack, and stole away on the morning of 22 June to inform Lieutenant James FitzGibbon in the territory still controlled by the British.
context_section_description: James Secord died of a stroke on 22 February 1841.  He was buried, according to his wishes, at Drummond Hill (now in Niagara Falls).  James's death left Laura destitute.  When his war pension ended, she was unable to maintain her land as profitable and sold off much of it.  Governor-General Sydenham denied a 27 February 1841 petition which she sent, seeking to have her son to take over James's customs position.  Sydenham also denied a petition she sent that May for a pension for herself, as James had received a pension for decades.
  Possibly with help from better-off members of the family, Secord moved to a red brick cottage on Water Street in November 1841.  Daughter Harriet and her own two daughters joined her in May 1842, after Harriet's husband died of alcohol poisoning.  The three shared quarters with Secord for the rest of her life.  Youngest daughter Hannah also moved in when she was widowed in 1844, and brought two daughters with her.  Though she lacked training, for a short time Laura Secord ran a small school out of the home in an effort to support herself.  This venture came to an end when the public common school system was introduced in the 1840s.
  Over the years, the Secords unsuccessfully petitioned the government for some kind of acknowledgement. In 1860, when Secord was 85, the Prince of Wales heard of her story while travelling in Canada. At Chippawa, near Niagara Falls, he learned of Laura Secord's plight as an aging widow and sent an award of £100 (equivalent to $9,462 in 2019). It was the only official recognition that she received during her lifetime.
  Laura Secord died in 1868 at the age of 93.  She was interred next to her husband in the Drummond Hill Cemetery in Niagara Falls.  Her grave is marked by a monument with a bust on top, and is close to a monument marking the Battle of Lundy's Lane.
  The inscription on her grave marker reads:
  To perpetuate the name and fame of Laura Secord, who walked alone nearly 20 miles by a circuitous difficult and perilous route, through woods and swamps and over miry roads to warn a British outpost at DeCew's Falls of an intended attack and thereby enabled Lt. FitzGibbon on 24 June 1813, with fewer than 50 men of the H.M. 49th Regt., about 15 militiamen and a small force of Six Nations and other Indians under Capt. William Johnson Kerr and Dominique Ducharme to surprise and attack the enemy at Beechwoods (or Beaver Dams) and after a short engagement, to capture Col. Bosler of the U.S. Army and his entire force of 542 men with two field pieces.
caption: Statue of Laura Secord at the Valiants Memorial in Ottawa
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