St Paul’s is one of the oldest Presbyterian congregations in Ontario. In 1816, Reverend Mr William Jenkins made visits from Scarborough and conducted services in the barn of Hugh McLaren and the house of Gilbert Bastedo, who had settled in Nelson in 1807, acquiring Lot 12 of Concession 1 SDS from George Calvert. In 1822 Bastedo gave part of his 200-acre lot for the construction of a frame church.
Bastedo was one of the first elders of St Paul’s, along with Neil Johnson, Hugh Green, and William McKerlie. The McKerlie family, like the Bastedo family, were early settlers in Nelson. William & Nancy McKerlie owned Lot 8 of Concession 1 SDS in 1804; in 1870 George McKerlie purchased Lot 9, which remained in the family until 1924; it is the site of the oldest house still standing in Burlington, built in 1820, now 4134 Dundas Street.
The pioneer cemetery beside the church, established in 1817, has been studied and recorded by the Halton Peel Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society. The first known burial was that of an infant daughter of Gilbert and Marion Bastedo. Many veterans of the War of 1812 are buried here. The cemetery is under the care of the City of Burlington.
The congregation of St Paul’s have recently built a new church on land to the east of the cemetery, and the historic church is now rented to another congregation.
