The Remarkable History of the Hudson's Bay Company

"Having decided to establish a fort, we all set to work; four men to build, one to square boards for the doors, timber for the floors, and shelves for the shops, the two others to attend the rest… There are now eight Indians here, all drunk and very troublesome to my neighbour, who, I believe, is as drunk as themselves; they are all very civil to me, and so they may, for I am giving them plenty to drink, without getting anything from them as yet."

"This man (an Indian from Red Lake) tells me that the English (H. B. Co.), the X Y, and Mr. Adhemar (a free trader) were striving who would squander the most and thereby please the Indians best, but the consequence will be that the Indians will get all they want for half the value and laugh at them all, in the end. He told me that an Indian, who I know very well to have no influence on anyone but himself, got five kegs of mixed high wines to himself alone between the three houses and took 200 skins credit; that all the Indians were fifteen days without getting sober. I leave it to any rational being to judge what that Indian's skins will cost."

"Another circumstance which will tend to injure the trade very much, so long as we have the Hudson's Bay Company against us, is the premium they allow every factor or master on whatever number of skins they obtain. Those people do not care at what price they buy or whether their employés gain by them, so long as they have their premium, which sets them in opposition to one another almost as much as they are to us. The honourable Hudson's Bay Company proprietors very little knew their own interest when they first allowed this interest to their 'officers,' as they call them, as it certainly had not the desired effect, for, if it added some to their exertions, it led in a great degree to the squandering of their goods, as they are in general both needy and selfish."

PETER GRANT, THE HISTORIOGRAPHER

While many journals and sketches were forwarded to Mr. Roderick McKenzie, none of them were of so high a character in completeness and style as that of Mr. Peter Grant on the Saulteaux Indians. Peter Grant, as quite a young man at the age of twenty, joined the North-West Company in 1784. Seven years afterward he had become a partner, had charge of Rainy Lake district, and afterward that of the Red River department. His sketch of the Indians marks him as a keen observer and a facile writer. Some of his descriptions are excellent: —

"The fruits found in this country are the wild plum, a small sort of wild cherry, wild currants of different kinds, gooseberries, strawberries, raspberries, brambleberries, blackberries, choke cherries, wild grapes, sand cherries, a delicious fruit which grows on a small shrub near sandy shores, and another blueberry, a fine fruit not larger than a currant, tasting much like a pear and growing on a small tree about the size of a willow. (No doubt the Saskatoon berry. – Ed.) In the swamp you find two kinds of cranberries. Hazel nuts, but of very inferior quality, grow near the banks of the rivers and lakes. A kind of wild rice grows spontaneously in the small muddy creeks and bays."

"The North-West Company's canoes, manned with five men, carry about 3,000 lbs.; they seldom draw more than eighteen inches of water and go generally at the rate of six miles an hour in calm weather. When arrived at a portage, the bowman instantly jumps in the water to prevent the canoe from touching the bottom, while the others tie their slings to the packages in the canoe and swing them on their backs to carry over the portage. The bowman and the steersman carry their canoe, a duty from which the middle men are exempt. The whole is conducted with astonishing expedition, a necessary consequence of the enthusiasm which always attends their long and perilous voyages. It is pleasing to see them, when the weather is calm and serene, paddling in their canoes, singing in chorus their simple, melodious strains, and keeping exact time with their paddles, which effectually beguiles their labours. When they arrive at a rapid, the guide or foreman's business is to explore the waters previous to their running down with their canoes, and, according to the height of the water, they either lighten the canoe by taking out part of the cargo and carry it overland, or run down the whole load."

Speaking of the Saulteaux, Grant says, "The Saulteaux are, in general, of the common stature, well proportioned, though inclining to a slender make, which would indicate more agility than strength. Their complexion is a whitish cast of the copper colour, their hair black, long, straight, and of a very strong texture, the point of the nose rather flat, and a certain fulness in the lips, but not sufficient to spoil the appearance of the mouth. The teeth, of a beautiful ivory white, are regular, well set, and seldom fail them even in the most advanced period of life; their cheeks are high and rather prominent, their eyes black and lively, their countenance is generally pleasant, and the symmetry of their features is such as to constitute what can be called handsome faces.

"Their passions, whether of a benevolent or mischievous tendency, are always more violent than ours. I believe this has been found to be the case with all barbarous nations who never cultivate the mind; hence the cruelties imputed to savages, in general, towards their enemies. Though these people cannot be acquitted from some degree of that ferocious barbarity which characterizes the savages, they are, however, free from that deliberate cruelty which has been so often imputed to other barbarous natives. They are content to kill and scalp their enemy, and never reserve a prisoner for the refined tortures of a lingering and cruel death.

"The Saulteaux have, properly speaking, no regular system of government and but a very imperfect idea of the different ranks of society so absolutely necessary in all civilized countries. Their leading men or chief magistrates are petty chiefs, whose dignity is hereditary, but whose authority is confined within the narrow circle of their own particular tribe or relatives. There are no established laws to enforce obedience; all is voluntary, and yet, such is their confidence and respect for their chiefs, that instances of mutiny or disobedience to orders are very rare among them.

"As to religion, Gitche Manitou, or the 'Master of Life,' claims the first rank in their devotion. To him they attribute the creation of the heavens, of the waters, and of that portion of the earth beyond the sea from which white people come. He is also the author of life and death, taking pleasure in promoting the happiness of the virtuous, and having, likewise, the power of punishing the wicked. Wiskendjac is next in power. He is said to be the creator of all the Indian tribes, the country they inhabit and all it contains. The last of their deities is called Matchi-Manitou, or the 'Bad Spirit,' He is the author of evil, but subject to the control of the Gitche Manitou. Though he is justly held in great detestation, it is thought good policy to smooth his anger by singing and beating the drum.

"When life is gone, the body of the dead is addressed by some friend of the deceased in a long speech, in which he begs of him to take courage, and pursue his journey to the Great Meadow, observing that all his departed friends and relations are anxiously waiting to receive him, and that his surviving friends will soon follow.

"The body is then decently dressed and wrapped in a new blanket, with new shoes, garnished and painted with vermilion, on the feet. It is kept one night in the lodge, and is next day buried in the earth. After burial they either raise a pole of wood over the grave, or enclose it with a fence. At the head of the grave a small post is erected, on which they carve the particular mark of the tribe to whom the deceased belonged. The bodies of some of their most celebrated chiefs are raised upon a high scaffold, with flags flying, and the scalps of their enemies. It is customary with their warriors, at the funeral of their great men, to strike the post and relate all their martial achievements, as they do in the war dance, and their funeral ceremonies generally conclude by a feast round the grave."

Grant, in 1794, built the post on the Assiniboine at the mouth of Shell River, and five years afterward was in charge of the fort on the Rainy Lake. About the same time he erected a post, probably the first on the Red River, in the neighbourhood of the present village of St. Vincent, near 49° N. Lat., opposite Pembina. He seems to have been in the Indian country in 1804, and, settling in Lower Canada, died at Lachine in 1848, at the grand old age of eighty-four.

Thus have we sought to sketch, from their own writings, pictures of the lords of the fur trade. They were a remarkable body of men. Great as financiers, marvellous as explorers, facile as traders, brave in their spirits, firm and yet tactful in their management of the Indians, and, except during the short period from 1800-1804, anxious for the welfare of the Red men. Looking back, we wonder at their daring and loyalty, and can well say with Washington Irving, "The feudal state of Fort William is at an end; its council chamber is silent and desolate; its banquet-hall no longer echoes to the auld world ditty; the lords of the lakes and forests have passed away."

CHAPTER XXI

THE IMPULSE OF UNION

North-West and X Y Companies unite – Recalls the Homeric period – Feuds forgotten – Men perform prodigies – The new fort re-christened – Vessel from Michilimackinac – The old canal – Wills builds Fort Gibraltar – A lordly sway – The "Beaver Club" – Sumptuous table – Exclusive society – "Fortitude in Distress" – Political leaders in Lower Canada.

To the termination of the great conflict between the North-West and the X Y Companies we have already referred. The death of Simon McTavish removed a difficulty and served to unite the traders. The experience and standing of the old Company and the zeal and vigour of the new combined to inspire new hope.

Great plans were matured for meeting the opposition of the Hudson's Bay Company and extending the trade of the Company. The explorations of David Thompson and Simon Fraser, which, as we have seen, produced such great results in New Caledonia, while planned before, were now carried forward with renewed vigour, the enterprise of the Nor'-Westers being the direct result of the union. The heroic deeds of these explorers recall to us the adventurous times of the Homeric period, when men performed prodigies and risked their lives for glory. The explanation of this hearty co-operation was that the old and new Companies were very closely allied. Brothers and cousins had been in opposite camps, not because they disliked each other, but because their leaders could not agree. Now the feuds were forgotten, and, with the enthusiasm of their Celtic natures, they would attempt great things.

The "New Fort," as it had been called, at the mouth of the Kaministiquia, was now re-christened, and the honoured name of the chieftain McGillivray was given to this great depôt – Fort William.

It became a great trading centre, and the additions required to accommodate the increased volume of business and the greater number of employés, were cheerfully made by the united Company.

Standing within the great solitudes of Thunder Bay, Fort William became as celebrated in the annals of the North-West Company, as York or Albany had been in the history of the Hudson's Bay Company.

A vessel came up from Lake Erie, bringing supplies, and, calling at Michilimackinac, reached the Sault Ste. Marie. Boats which had come down the canal, built to avoid the St. Mary Rapids, here met this vessel. From the St. Mary River up to Fort William a schooner carried cargoes, and increased the profits of the trade, while it protected many from the dangers of the route. The whole trade was systematized, and the trading houses, duplicated as they had been at many points, were combined, and the expenses thus greatly reduced.

As soon as the Company could fully lay its plans, it determined to take hold in earnest of the Red River district. Accordingly we see that, under instructions from John McDonald, of Garth, a bourgeois named John Wills, who, we find, had been one of the partners of the X Y Company, erected at the junction of the Red and Assiniboine Rivers, on the point of land, a fort called Fort Gibraltar. Wills was a year in building it, having under him twenty men. The stockade of this fort was made of "oak trees split in two." The wooden picketing was from twelve to fifteen feet high. The following is a list of buildings enclosed in it, with some of their dimensions. There were eight houses in all; the residence of the bourgeois, sixty-four feet in length; two houses for the servants, respectively thirty-six and twenty-eight feet long; one store thirty-two feet long; a blacksmith's shop, stable, kitchen, and an ice-house. On the top of the ice-house a watch-tower (guérite) was built. John Wills continued to live in this fort up to the time of his death a few years later. Such was the first building, so far as we know, erected on the site of the City of the Plains, and which was followed first by Fort Douglas and then by Fort Garry, the chief fort in the interior of Rupert's Land.

It was to this period in the history of the United Company that Washington Irving referred when he said: "The partners held a lordly sway over the wintry lakes and boundless forests of the Canadas almost equal to that of the East India Company over the voluptuous climes and magnificent realms of the Orient."

Some years before this, a very select organization had been formed among the fur traders in Montreal. It was known as the "Beaver Club." The conditions of the membership were very strict. They were that the candidate should have spent a period of service in the "upper country," and have obtained the unanimous vote of the members. The gatherings of the Club were very notable. At their meetings they assembled to recall the prowess of the old days, the dangers of the rapids, the miraculous deliverances accomplished by their canoe men, the disastrous accidents they had witnessed.

Their days of feasting were long remembered by the inhabitants of Montreal after the club had passed away. The sumptuous table of the Club was always open to those of rank or distinction who might visit Montreal, and the approval of the Club gave the entry to the most exclusive society of Montreal.

Still may be met with in Montreal pieces of silverware and glassware which were formerly the property of the "Beaver Club," and even large gold medals bearing the motto, "Fortitude in Distress," used by the members of the Club on their days of celebration.

It was at this period that the power of the fur trading magnates seemed to culminate, and their natural leadership of the French Canadians being recognized in the fur trade, many of the partners became political leaders in the affairs of Lower Canada. The very success of the new Company, however, stirred up, as we shall see, opposition movements of a much more serious kind than they had ever had to meet before. Sir Alexander Mackenzie's book in 1801 had awakened much interest in Britain and now stimulated the movement by Lord Selkirk which led to the absorption of the North-West Company. The social and commercial standing of the partners started a movement in the United States which aimed at wresting from British hands the territory of New Caledonia, which the energy of the North-West Company of explorers had taken possession of for the British crown.

It will, however, be to the glory of the North-West Company that these powerful opposition movements were mostly rendered efficient by the employment of men whom the Nor'-Westers had trained; and the methods of trade, borrowed from them by these opponents, were those continued in the after conduct of the fur trade that grew up in Rupert's Land and the Indian territories beyond.

CHAPTER XXII

THE ASTOR FUR COMPANY

Old John Jacob Astor – American Fur Company – The Missouri Company – A line of posts – Approaches the Russians – Negotiates with Nor'-Westers – Fails – Four North-West officials join Astor – Songs of the voyageurs – True Britishers – Voyage of the Tonquin– Rollicking Nor'-Westers in Sandwich Islands – Astoria built – David Thompson appears – Terrible end of the Tonquin– Astor's overland expedition – Washington Irving's "Astoria, a romance" – The Beaverrounds the Cape – McDougall and his smallpox phial – The Beaversails for Canton.

Among those who came to Montreal to trade with the Nor'-Westers and to receive their hospitality was a German merchant of New York, named John Jacob Astor. This man, who is the ancestor of the distinguished family of Astors at the present time in New York, came over from London to the New World and immediately began to trade in furs. For several years Astor traded in Montreal, and shipped the furs purchased to London, as there was a law against exporting from British possessions. After Jay's treaty of amity and commerce (1794) this restriction was removed, and Astor took Canadian furs to the United States, and even exported them to China, where high prices ruled.

While Astor's ambition led him to aim at controlling the fur trade in the United States, the fact that the western posts, such as Detroit and Michilimackinac, had not been surrendered to the United States till after Jay's treaty, had allowed the British traders of these and other posts of the West to strengthen themselves. Such daring traders as Murdoch Cameron, Dickson, Fraser, and Rolette could not be easily beaten on the ground where they were so familiar, and where they had gained such an ascendancy over the Indians. The Mackinaw traders were too strong for Astor, and the hope of overcoming them through the agency of the "American Fur Company," which he had founded in 1809, had to be given up by him. What could not be accomplished by force could, however, be gained by negotiation, and so two years afterward, with the help of certain partners from among the Nor'-Westers in Montreal, Astor bought out the Mackinaw traders (1811), and established what was called the "South-West Company."

During these same years, the St. Louis merchants organized a company to trade upon the Missouri and Nebraska Rivers. This was known as the Missouri Company, and with its 250 men it pushed its trade, until in 1808, one of its chief traders crossed the Rocky Mountains, and built a fort on the western slope. This was, however, two years afterward given up on account of the hostility of the natives. A short time after this, the Company passed out of existence, leaving the field to the enterprising merchant of New York, who, in 1810, organized his well-known "Pacific Fur Company."

During these eventful years, the resourceful Astor was, with the full knowledge of the American Government, steadily advancing toward gaining a monopoly of the fur trade of the United States. Jonathan Carver, a British officer, had, more than thirty years before this, in company with a British Member of Parliament named Whitworth, planned a route across the continent. Had not the American Revolution commenced they would have built a fort at Lake Pepin in Minnesota, gone up a tributary of the Mississippi to the West, till they could cross, as they thought would be possible, to the Missouri, and ascending it have reached the Rocky Mountain summit. At this point they expected to come upon a river, which they called the Oregon, that would take them to the Pacific Ocean.

The plan projected by Carver was actually carried out by the well-known explorers Lewis and Clark in 1804-6. Astor's penetrating mind now saw the situation clearly. He would erect a line of trading posts up the Missouri River and across the Rockies to the Columbia River on the Pacific Coast and while those on the east of the Rockies would be supplied from St. Louis, he would send ships to the mouth of the Columbia, and provide for the posts on the Pacific slope from the West. With great skill Astor made approaches to the Russian Fur Company on the Pacific Coast, offering his ships to supply their forts with all needed articles, and he thus established a good feeling between himself and the Russians.

The only other element of danger to the mind of Astor was the opposition of the North-West Company on the Pacific Coast. He knew that for years the Montreal merchants had had their eye on the region that their partner Sir Alexander Mackenzie, had discovered. Moreover, their agents, Thompson, Fraser, Stuart, and Finlay the younger, were trading beyond the summit of the Rockies in New Caledonia, but the fact that they were farther north held out some hope to Astor that an arrangement might be made with them. He accordingly broached the subject to the North-West Company and proposed a combination with them similar to that in force in the co-operation in the South-West Company, viz. that they should take a one-third interest in the Pacific Fur Company. After certain correspondence, the North-West Company declined the offer, no doubt hoping to forestall Astor in his occupation of the Columbia. They then gave orders to David Thompson to descend the Columbia, whose upper waters he had already occupied, and he would have done this had not a mutiny taken place among his men, which made his arrival at the mouth of the Columbia a few months too late.

Astor's thorough acquaintance with the North-West Company and its numerous employés stood him in good stead in his project of forming a company. After full negotiations he secured the adhesion to his scheme of a number of well-known Nor'-Westers. Prominent among these was Alexander McKay, who was Sir Alexander Mackenzie's most trusted associate in the great journey of 1793 to the Pacific Ocean. McKay had become a partner of the North-West Company, and left it to join the Pacific Fur Company. Most celebrated as being in charge of the Astor enterprise on the coast was Duncan McDougall, who also left the North-West Company to embark in Astor's undertaking. Two others, David Stuart and his nephew Robert Stuart, made the four partners of the new Company who were to embark from New York with the purpose of doubling the Cape and reaching the mouth of the Columbia.

A company of clerks and engagés had been obtained in Montreal, and the party leaving Canada went in their great canoe up Lake Champlain, took it over the portage to the Hudson, and descended that river to New York. They transferred the picturesque scene so often witnessed on the Ottawa to the sleepy banks of the Hudson River, and with emblems flying, and singing songs of the voyageurs, surprised the spectators along the banks. Arrived at New York the men with bravado expressed themselves as ready to endure hardships. As Irving puts it, they declared "they could live hard, lie hard, sleep hard, eat dogs – in short, endure anything."

But these partners and men had much love for their own country and little regard to the new service into which desire for gain had led them to embark. It was found out afterwards that two of the partners had called upon the British Ambassador in New York, had revealed to him the whole scheme of Mr. Astor, and enquired whether, as British subjects, they might embark in the enterprise. The reply of the diplomat assured them of their full liberty in the matter. Astor also required of the employés that they should become naturalized citizens of the United States. They professed to have gone through the ceremony required, but it is contended that they never really did so.

The ship in which the party was to sail was the Tonquin, commanded by a Captain Thorn, a somewhat stern officer, with whom the fur traders had many conflicts on their outbound journey. The report having gone abroad that a British cruiser from Halifax would come down upon the Tonquin and arrest the Canadians on board her, led to the application being made to the United States frigate Constitution to give the vessel protection. On September 10th, 1810, the Tonquin with her convoy put out and sailed for the Southern Main.

Notwithstanding the constant irritation between the captain and his fur trading passengers, the vessel went bravely on her way. After doubling Cape Horn on Christmas Day, they reached the Sandwich Islands in February, and after paying visits of ceremony to the king, obtained the necessary supplies of hogs, fruits, vegetables, and water from the inhabitants, and also engaged some twenty-four of the islanders, or Kanakas, as they are called, to go as employés to the Columbia.