Delhi (; ) refers to both a former township and unincorporated community located off of the junction of Ontario Highways 59 and 3. Delhi is known as the "Heart of Tobacco Country." Prior to 1880, this community was known for its lumber industry. One of the Communities in Norfolk County, Ontario, Delhi, had a population of 4,240 at the time of the 2016 Census.
Founded by Frederick Sovereign (spelled Sovereign by a few sources), the settlement was called Sovereign's Corners or Sovereign's Corners and was located in Middleton Township. Later, the community was renamed Fredericksburg and, in 1856, to its present-day name of Delhi. The name is usually attributed locally to a postmaster honouring the major city of Delhi, India.
History
Frederick Sovereign (or Sovereign) settled here in about 1812. According to some genealogy records, his father, originally from Germany, was called Frederick Zavering, Zafrin, or Safrein. The records suggest that the family initially emigrated to New Jersey but moved to Norfolk County in Upper Canada because of the Revolutionary War in the U.S. Joseph Lawson bought land at about the same time as Frederick Sovereign (or Sovereign) Jr. but did not actually build a home in the area for some time. The village was named Fredericksburg after Sovereign until the post office opened under the name of Delhi. Sovereign was a tavern keeper for more than 30 years. He also manufactured plug tobacco, growing his own leaves, curing them, and pressing them. He donated the land for the Baptist church and served as the deacon for "many, many years".
The population in 1869 was 300, and the village had some manufacturing as well as a lumber mill thanks to the abundant water power. The post office was receiving mail daily. The railway that arrived in the 1870s was a definite benefit to locals who opened businesses such as the Delhi Canning Company, established in 1878; the company shipped canned local produce across Canada.
The village initially had a log schoolhouse, but a new school was built in 1892. By around 1900, the village had an opera house, two tanneries, a railroad station, an Orange Hall, and a Mechanics’ Institute as well as a flour mill, the Quance Mills or Sovereign-Quance Mills. At the time, the primary crops in the area were still fruit and vegetables.
Delhi Cemetery was first established sometime in the 19th century. While it was originally a cemetery exclusively for residents who were members of the Roman Catholic Church, changes in cemetery policy made it possible to have anyone buried on their property. At least 4,372 individuals or families have been buried there. Fifteen people from the Delhi area who were killed in the First World War are buried in this cemetery. The last names of the graves belong to different ethnic groups ranging from English, French, Canadian, Eastern European, and those of Belgian descent. There are even a few Chinese families buried within the cemetery, and a large number of tombstones are written in languages other than English.
In the 1960s, Delhi had its own police station, complete with its own jail. Until the 1970s, most non-essential services and businesses closed earlier on Wednesday afternoons. Other economic factors, including the abolition of Canada's blue laws in 1985, eventually forced most businesses to operate seven days a week.
In 1974, the Town of Delhi was amalgamated with the Township of Charlotteville and the Township of Windham to form the Township of Delhi as part of the municipal restructuring that created the Regional Municipality of Haldimand-Norfolk. The Township's administrative centre was located in the community of Delhi. In 2001, Haldimand-Norfolk was dissolved into two separate single-tier counties. Delhi became part of the newly formed Norfolk County.
Delhi experienced a state of economic stagnation with the early-2000s decline in the tobacco industry; this problem has also affected the rest of the Ontario tobacco belt, including the nearby community of Tillsonburg. People who live in the Delhi area say that farming in the area started becoming highly unprofitable.