Lieutenant-Colonel John Askin (1739 – 1815) was an Irish-born merchant and militia officer who was instrumental in the establishment of British rule in Upper Canada.
John Askin was born in Aughnacloy, County Tyrone in 1739; his ancestors are believed to have originally lived in Scotland with the surname Erskine.
Askin's post was among the first to establish Grand Portage as a major redistribution point on the fur trade to the Canadian Prairies and Athabaska country.
Askin was connected to the Family Compact through a number of business and social ties, particularly associating with James McGill, who underwrote much of his debt.
[4] In 1795, Askin was part of a partnership with Ebenezer Allen and Charles Whitney of Vermont, Robert Randall of Philadelphia and several other British subjects in Detroit including William Robertson, which planned to buy the entire lower Michigan peninsula from the United States government.
Concession 2 lot 14, Barton Township; where present day Hamilton, Ontario is, was part of the original Crown Grant to Askin on July 10, 1801.
In a May 18, 1778 letter to a trader contact at the French trading post in Michilimackinac, he writes "I shall need two pretty panis girls from 9 to 16 years of age.