At the time the first Loyalist settlers arrived, the area was known as Mohagadecek by the Miꞌkmaq, though the meaning of the name does not seem to have been recorded. In the 1820s Englishtown received its present name, translated from the name Scottish settlers in the area had given it: "Bhal no Ghaul" or "the Town of the English". This was a reference to the fact that the English language had become the town's common tongue, and not a reference to all the settlers originating from England.
Though magistrate Capt. Jonathan Jones is widely regarded as the first permanent settler in Victoria County, local legend had some six or seven families settling at present-day Englishtown a few years prior to his arrival. An elderly Englishtown resident, well acquainted with the early history of the area, in the late 1880s told historian G.G. Patterson that the earliest settlers had arrived there between 1770 and 1780. Though Patterson believed these families had indeed settled there, he regarded the timeline as impossible, believing they could not have come before 1782 and that they most likely did not arrive until at least five years later. Patterson’s research indicated that these six or seven families reached St. Anne’s in fishing vessels at different times and via different routes. They were chiefly English, but records show one family from Ireland and a bachelor from Virginia who, a few years later, went insane and hung himself. Eight years later a German family named Willhausen arrived, and records show no further settlers arriving until an influx of Scots some 40 years later. Little attention was given to farming and the small community survived on the fishery. Little is known about these earliest settlers due to the fact that their immediate descendants subsequently emigrated to other areas in search of better conditions.
The town's first school was kept by a man named Alex Munro, though he did not remain in the area for long. A Rev. MacLeod later built a schoolhouse near his dwelling on Munro’s Point. Many children from outside the district attended this school, many of whom saw the need and later took it upon themselves to become teachers in Victoria County’s many small settlements. A relative named John Munro was the town’s earliest merchant, opening a large timber business as well as engaging in shipbuilding.
"Giant" McAskill
The town's most well known resident was a man named Angus McAskill, a celebrity of some renown in the 1800s. McAskill was born in the highlands of Scotland and came to Englishtown as a child with his family. Though his exact height cannot be confirmed, his brother gave his height as 7 ft 9 in and his weight as approximately 400 pounds. In 1850, the captain of a fishing schooner from Yarmouth observed McAskill in Englishtown and tried to convince him to come to the United States to give exhibitions of his unusual size and strength. MacAskill consented and became one of the "wonders" of Barnum's American Museum. He did this for approximately four years, amassing enough money to live quite comfortably upon returning home to Englishtown. During his time in the United States, however, McAskill suffered a serious injury which would indirectly lead to his death many years later. One of his boots was preserved at the Nova Scotia Provincial Museum, displayed alongside the thigh bone of a mammoth.
