Belleville (Ontario)

Belleville is a city located at the mouth of the Moira River on the Bay of Quinte in Southern Ontario, Canada, along the Quebec City-Windsor Corridor. It is the seat of Hastings County, but politically independent of it, and is the centre of the Bay of Quinte Region.HistoryOriginally the site of an Anishinaabe (Mississaugas) village in the 18th century known as Asukhknosk, the future location of the city was settled by United Empire Loyalists. It was first called Singleton's Creek after an early settler, George Singleton, and then as Meyer's Creek after prominent settler and industrialist John Walden Meyers, one of the founders of Belleville who built a sawmill and grist mill. It was renamed Belleville in honour of Lady Arabella Gore in 1816, after a visit to the settlement by Sir Francis Gore and his wife.Another important family in the growth of Belleville was that of Henry Corby, the founder of H. Corby Distillery, who had arrived in 1832. He promoted the municipality and his son Henry Corby, Jr. (Harry) donated the public library, helped develop the park at Massassaga Point, established the Corby Charitable Fund, helped raise funds to build the first bridge across the Bay of Quinte and donated Corby Park.