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Moses Henry Perley

Canadian lawyer

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionMay 5, 2024
Entity authorityQ6915815 ↗
Source-derived summary

Moses Henry Perley (31 December 1804 – 17 August 1862) was a lawyer and entrepreneur in colonial New Brunswick.

Biography

Born in Maugerville, Sunbury County, Perley received his primary school education in Saint John. In 1829, he married Jane, daughter of the United Empire Loyalist Isaac Ketchum. They had eight children. Perley studied law and was called to the Bar in 1830.

Perley played a dominant role in producing the New Brunswick Indian Act of 1844. He had an extensive knowledge of Indian affairs through his travels and communication throughout the province. He was appointed commissioner for Indian affairs and further influenced matters covered under the Indian Act.

Between 1849 and 1852 he wrote several studies on the prospects for the further development of the province's ocean and river fisheries, a task which saw him travel some 900 miles throughout New Brunswick (500 of them by canoe) collecting information and statistics. Perley's findings on these trips were detailed in his Report on the Fisheries of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence (1849), Report on the Sea and River Fisheries of New Brunswick, Within the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and Bay of Chaleur (1850), and Report upon the Fisheries of the Bay of Fundy (1851), all of which were compiled in a one-volume omnibus entitled Reports on the Sea and River Fisheries of New Brunswick (1852).

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Moses Henry Perley” as canadian lawyer. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewA productive starting point for separating a subject’s documented career from later reputation and commemoration. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1804, 1862, 1829, 1830—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1804-12-31. The account is most persuasive where Moses, Henry and Perley can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as canadian lawyer. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 5, 2024. The linked authority identifier is Q6915815. VIAF identifies the subject as 35940551. The Library of Congress control number is n86118643. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1804, 1862, 1829 and 1830.

Critical limits

Public reputation and documentary evidence do not always develop together; absence from a summary is not evidence of historical absence. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Moses Henry Perley”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Moses Henry Perley primary sources, Moses Henry Perley archive and Moses research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Moses Henry Perley”?
  2. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
  3. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Moses Henry Perley” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.