Biography
She was born Elizabeth Posthuma Gwillim in the village of Whitchurch, Herefordshire, England, daughter of Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Gwillim and Elizabeth Spinckes. Her father died before her birth, and her mother died shortly afterwards. After her baptism, which was on the same day as her mother's burial, she was taken into the care of her mother's younger sister, Margaret. In commemoration of her mother, Elizabeth was given the middle name Posthuma. Margaret married Admiral Samuel Graves on June 14, 1769 and she grew up at Graves's estate, Hembury Fort near Honiton in Devon.
On December 30, 1782, Elizabeth married John Graves Simcoe, Admiral Graves' godson. They had four daughters and one son, Francis Simcoe, for whom they named Castle Frank. Katherine Simcoe, their only daughter to be born in Upper Canada, died in childhood of unknown causes; she is buried at Fort York Garrison.
In 1791 her husband was appointed lieutenant governor of the new province of Upper Canada, and on September 26 the Simcoes with their two youngest children sailed from Weymouth, leaving their four older daughters at Wolford. They arrived at Quebec on November 11 where they stayed for seven months before departing for the temporary capital Newark (since renamed Niagara-on-the-Lake). They moved to York (Toronto) on July 30, 1793. After a summer at Newark, she took her children to Quebec because of the possibility of war with the United States. She returned to Upper Canada in the spring of 1795, but the following year her husband was granted leave of absence, and on September 10 they sailed from Quebec, never to return to the Canadas.
While her husband was at council meetings in Newark, Elizabeth Simcoe spent much of her time in the company of Guy Carleton (Lord Dorchester) and his wife, Lady Dorchester. In her diary, Simcoe states that, in a span of fifteen days, she attended to four parties at the home of Lord and Lady Dorchester. Elizabeth wrote of another occasion when, in the course of a week, she played cards three times and had tea and biscuits twice with the Lord and Lady Dorchester.
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