FIRST FOOT ON RED RIVER BANKS.
The weary winter passing at Nelson Encampment had its bright spots. Miles Macdonell in the building erected for himself, on the south side of the Nelson River, kept up his mess, having with him Mr. Hillier, Priest Bourke, Doctor Edwards, and Messrs. John McLeod, Whitford and Michael Macdonell, officers and clerks. Those Immigrants who took no part in the rebellion fared well. True, the scurvy seized several of them, but proved harmless to those who obeyed the orders and took plentiful potations of spruce beer. With the opening year a fair supply of fresh and dried venison was supplied by the Indians. In April upwards of thirty deer were snared or shot by the settlers. Some three thousand deer of several different kinds crossed the Nelson River within a month. "Fresh venison," writes Macdonell, "was so plenty that our men would not taste salt meat. We have all got better since we came to Hudson Bay."
But as in all far northern climates the heatwas great in the months of May and June, and Governor and Colonists became alike restless to start on the inland journey.
The passing out of the ice in north-flowing rivers is always wearisome for those who are waiting to ascend. Beginning to melt farther south, the ice at the mouth is always last to move. Besides, the arrival was anxiously awaited of Bird, Sinclair and House. By continuous urging of the dull and inefficient workmen to greater effort, Miles Macdonell had succeeded in securing four boats—none too well built—but commodious enough to carry his boat-crews, workmen, and Colonists.
Though Macdonell sought for the selection of the workmen who were to accompany him to Red River, he was not able to move the Hudson's Bay Company officials. Two days, however, after arrival of the Company magnates from the interior his men were secured to him, and he was fully occupied in transporting his stores up the river as far as the "Rock"—the rapids of the Hill River which here falls into Hayes River. For a long distance up the river there is a broad stream, one-quarter of a mile wide, running at the rate of two miles an hour through low banks. The boatmen have a good steady pull up the river for some sixty miles, and here where the Steel River enters the Hayes is seen a wide, deep, rapid stream running about three miles an hour. The banks of this river are of clay and rising from fifty to one hundred feet, the clay of the banks is so smooth and white that a traveller has compared them in color to the white, chalk cliffs of Dover. Thus far though it has required exertion on the part of the boatmen, a good stretch of a hundred miles from the Factory has been passed without any obstruction or delay. Now the serious work of the journey begins. The Hill River, as this part of the river is called, is a series of rapids and portages—where the cargo and boat have both to be carried around a rapid; of decharges where the cargo has thus to be carried, and of semi-decharges—where a portion of the cargo only needs to be removed.
At times waterfalls require to be circuited with great effort. A high mountain or elevated table-land seen from this river shows the rough country of which these cascades and rapids are the proof. Here are the White-Mud Falls and other smaller cataracts. To the expert voyageur such a river has no terrors, but to the raw-hand the management of such boats is a most toilsome work. The birch-bark canoe is a mere trifle on the portage, but the heavy York boat capable of carrying three or four tons is a clumsy lugger. The cargo must be moved, the non-effectives such as the women and children and the old men must trudge the wearypath, varying from a few hundred yards to several miles along a rocky, steep and rugged way. When the portage is made the whole force of boatmen and able-bodied passengers are required to stand by each boat, pull it out of the water, and then skid or drag or cajole it along till it is thrust into its native element again. To the willing crofter or Orkney boatmen this was not a great task, but to the Glasgow immigrant, or the lazy waiter-on-fortune this was hard work. Many were the oaths of the officers and the complaints and objections of the men when they were required to grapple with the foaming cascades, the fearful rapids and the difficult portages of Hill River. Mossy Portage being now past the landing on a rocky island at the head of the river showed that the first "Hill Difficulty" had been overcome.
Swampy lake for ten miles gives a comparative rest to the toiling crews, but at the end of it a short portage passed takes the beleagured party into the mouth of the Jack Tent River. Day after day with sound sleep when the mosquitoes would permit, the unwilling voyageurs continued their journey. Ten portages have to be faced and overcome as the brigade ascends the rapid Jack Tent River, covering a stretch of seventy miles. The party now find themselves on the surface of Knee Lake, a considerable sheet of water, but a comparative rest afterthe trials of Jack Tent River. The lake is fifty-six miles long and at times widens to ten miles across.
But there is trouble just ahead.
The travellers have now come to the celebrated Fall Portage. It is short but deterrent. The height and ruggedness of the rocks over which cargo and boats have to be dragged are unusually forbidding. The only consolation to the contemplative soul, who does not have to portage, is that "The stream is turbulent and unfriendly in the extreme, but in romantic variety, and in natural beauty nothing can exceed this picture." High rocks are seen, beetling over the rapids like towers, and are rent into the most diversified forms, gay with various colored masses, or shaded by overhanging hills—now there is a tranquil pool lying like a sheet of silver—now the dash and foam of a cataract—these are but parts of this picturesque and striking scene.
But Fall Portage was only a culmination, in this fiercely rushing Trout River, for above it a dozen rapids are to be passed with toilsome energy. After this the party is rewarded with beautiful islets, and the lake for a length of thirty-five miles lies in a fertile tract of country. It was formerly appropriately called Holy Lake, and as a summit lake suggests to the traveller abiding restfulness. To the traders on theirroute whether passing up or down the water courses, it was always so. After the long and tedious voyaging it was their Elysium. Not only are the sweet surroundings of the lake most charming, but the Indians of the neighborhood have always been noted for their good character, their docility and their industry.
ANDREW McDERMOTT, ESQ.ANDREW McDERMOTT, ESQ.Greatest Merchant of the Red River Settlement.Came to Red River Settlement in 1812.Died in Winnipeg in 1881.
A short delay at Oxford House led to the continuation of the journey over what was now the roughest, most desolate, and most trying part of the voyage. On this rough passage, perhaps the most distressing spot was "Windy Lake," a small but tempestuous sheet. The voyageurs declare that they never cross "Lac de Vent" without encountering high winds and very often dangerous storms. Again "the Real Hill Difficulty" is encountered above the lake at the "Big Hill" portage and rapids—one of the sudden descents of this alarming stream. Those coming toward Oxford Lake run it at the very risk of their lives, but the painful portages impress themselves on all going up the "Height of Land," which is reached after passing through a narrow gorge between hills and mountains of rocks, the stream dashing headlong down from the mile-long Robinson Portage.
This region is an elevated, rugged waste, with no signs of animal life about it. It is the terror of the voyageurs. This eerie tract culminates in the ascending "Haute de Terre," as the French call it—the dividing ridge between the waters running eastward to Hudson Bay and those running westward and descending to meet the Nelson River, on its headlong way to Hudson Bay as well. The obstacle known as the "Painted Stone" being passed the Colonists' brigade was now on its way to the inland plain of the Continent.
The portage led from this string of five small lakes to the head waters of a trifling, but very interesting stream called the "Echimamish River." A doubtful but curious explanation has been given of the name. On the stream are ten beaver dams; which ever of these filled first gave the voyageur the opportunity to launch in his canoe or boat and go down the little runway to Black Water Creek. It was said that in consequence it was called "Each-a-Man's" brook, according as each voyageur took the water with his craft first. The way was now clear, down stream until shortly was seen the dashing Nelson River, or as it is here called, "The Sea River." When this was accomplished the Immigrants had only to pull stoutly up stream for forty miles or more until Norway House, the great Hudson's Bay Fort at the north end of Lake Winnipeg was reached.
The weary journey—430 miles from York Factory—was thus over and the worn out, weather beaten, ragged, and foot-sore travellers had come to the lake, whose name, other than that of Red River, was the only inland word they had ever heard of before starting on their journey.
It was the first standing place in the country, which was now to have them as its pioneers.
There is no turning back now. The Rubicon is crossed. Thirty-seven portages lie betweenthem and the dissociable sea. For better or for worse they will now complete their journey, going on to found the Settlement which has become so famous.
The appearance of Norway House with its fine site and evidences of trade cheered the Colonists, and the sight of a body of water like Lake Winnipeg, which can be as boisterous as the ocean, brought back the loud resounding sea by whose swishing waves most of the settlers, for all their lives, had been lulled to sleep. It is a great stormy and dangerous lake—Lake Winnipeg. But for boats to creep along its shore with the liberty of landing on its sloping banks in case of need it is safe enough. The season was well past, and haste was needed, but in due time the mouth of the river—the delta of Red River—was reached. Now they were within forty or forty-five miles of their destination. At this time the banks of the Red River were well wooded, though there was open grassy plains lying behind these belts of forest. There was only one obstruction on their way up the river. This was the "Deer," now St. Andrew's Rapids, but after their experiences this was nothing, for these rapids were easily overcome by tracking, that is, by dragging the boats by a line up the bank.
Up the river they came and rounded whatwe now call Point Douglas, in the City of Winnipeg, a name afterwards given to mark Lord Selkirk's family name. They had completed a journey of seven hundred and twenty-eight miles, from York Factory to the site of Winnipeg—and they had done this in fifty-five days. Now they landed.
THE RED LETTER DAY OF THEIR LANDING WAS AUGUST 30TH, 1812.
At York Factory the Colonists had met a Hudson's Bay Company officer—Peter Fidler—on his way to England. He was the surveyor of the Company and a map of the Colony of which a copy is given by us marks the Colony Gardens, where Governor Miles Macdonell lived. This spot they chose, and the locality at the foot of Rupert Street is marked in the City of Winnipeg. A stone's throw further north along the bank of Red River, Fort Douglas was afterwards built, around which circles much of this Romantic Settlement Story.
This spot was the centre of the First Settlement of Rupert's Land and to this first party peculiar interest attaches.
There can only be one Columbus among all the navigators who crossed from Europe to America; there can only be one Watt among all the inventors and improvers of the steam engine; only one Newton among those who discuss the great discovery of the basal law of gravitation.
There can be only one first party of those who laid the foundation of collective family life in what is now the Province of Manitoba—and what is wider—in the great Western Canada of to-day. There may have been not many wise men, not many mighty, not many noble among them, but the long and stormy voyage which they made, the dangers they endured on the sea, the marvellous land journey they accomplished, and their taking "seisin of the land," to use William the Conqueror's phrase, entitles them to recognition and to respectful memory.
"THREE DESPERATE YEARS."
Pioneering to-day is not so serious a matter as it once was. To the frontiers' man now it involves little risk, and little thought, to dispose of his holding, and make a dash further West for two or three hundreds of miles across the plains. When he wishes more land for his growing sons, he "sells out," fits up his commodious covered wagon, called "the prairie schooner," and with implements, supplies, cattle and horses, starts on the Western "trail." His wife and children are in high spirits. When a running stream or spring is reached on the way he stops and camps. His journey taken when the weather is fine and when the mosquitoes are gone is a diversion. The writer has seen a family which went through this gypsy-like "moving" no less than four times. At length the settler finds his location, has it registered in the nearest Land Office and calls it his. With ready axes, the farmer and his sons cut down the logs which are to make their dwelling. The children explore the new farm lyingcovered with its velvet sod, as it has done for centuries; they gather its flowers, pluck its wild fruits, chase its wild ducks or grouse or gophers. Health and homely fare make life enjoyable. Subject to the incidents and interruptions of every day, which follow humanity, it seems to them a continual picnic.
But how different was the fate of the worn-out Selkirk Colonists. The memory of a wretched sea voyage, of a long and dreary winter at Nelson Encampment, and of a fifty-five days' journey of constant hardship along the fur traders' route were impressed upon their minds. The thought of fierce rivers and the dangers of portage and cascade still haunted them, and now everything on the banks of Red River was strange. On their arrival the flowers were blooming, but they were prairie flowers, and unknown to them. The small Colony houses which they were to occupy would be uncomfortable. The very sun in the sky seemed alien to them, for the Highland drizzle was seen no more. The days were bright, the weather warm, the nights cool, and there was an occasional August thunderstorm, or hailstorm which alarmed them. The traders, the Indians, the half-breed trappers, and runners were all new to them. Their Gaelic language, which they claimed as that of Eden, was of little value to them except where an occasional company-servant chanced to be a countryman of their own. They were without money, they were dependent upon Lord Selkirk's agents for shelter and rations. The land which they hoped to possess was there awaiting them, but they had no means for purchasing implements, nor were the farming requisites to be found in the country. Horses there were, but there were only two or three individual cattle within five hundred miles of them.
If they had sung on their sorrowful leaving, "Lochaber no more," the words were now turned by their depressed Highland natures into a wail, and they sang in the words of their old Psalms of "Rouse's" version:
By Babel's streams we sat and wept,When Zion we thought on.
By Babel's streams we sat and wept,When Zion we thought on.
They thought of their crofts and clachans, where if the land was stingy, the gift of the sea was at hand to supply abundant food.
But this was no time for sighs or regrets.
The Hudson's Bay traders from Brandon House were waiting for expected goods, and Messrs. Hillier and Heney, who were the Hudson's Bay Company officers for the East Winnipeg District, had arduous duties ahead of them. But though the orders to prepare for the Colonists had been sent on in good time,there was not a single bag of pemmican or any other article of provision awaiting the hapless settlers. The few French people who were freemen, lived in what is now the St. Boniface side of the river, were only living from hand to mouth, and the Company's people were little better provided. The river was the only resource, and from the scarceness of hooks the supply of fish obtainable was rather scanty.
As the Colonists and their leader were strangers they desired leisure to select a suitable location for their buildings. For the time being their camp was at the Forks, on the east side of the river, a little north of the mouth of the Assiniboine.
The Governor, Miles Macdonell, on the 4th of September, summoned three of the North-West Company gentlemen, the free Canadians beside whom they were encamped, and a number of the Indians to a spectacle similar to that enacted by St. Lawson, at Sault Ste. Marie, nearly a hundred and fifty years before. The Nor'-Westers had not permitted their employees to cross the river. Facing, as he did, Fort Gibraltar, across the river, the Governor directed the patent of Lord Selkirk to his vast concession to be read, "delivering and seizin were formally taken," and Mr. Heney translated some part of the Patent into French forthe information of the French Canadians. There was an officers' guard under arms; colors were flying and after the reading of the Patent all the artillery belonging to Lord Selkirk, as well as that of the Hudson's Bay Company, under Mr. Hillier, consisting of six swivel guns, were discharged in a grand salute.
At the close of the ceremony the gentlemen were invited to the Governor's tent, and a keg of spirits was turned out for the people.
Having made such disposition as we shall see of the people, Governor Macdonell went with a boat's crew down the river to make a choice of a place of settlement for the Colonists. A bull and cow and winter wheat had been brought with the party, and these were taken to a spot selected after a three days' thorough investigation of both banks of the river for some miles below the Forks. The place found most eligible was "an extensive point of land through which fire had run and destroyed the wood, there being only burnt wood and weeds left." This was afterwards called Point Douglas.
He had, as we shall see, dispatched the settlers to their wintering place up the Red River on the 6th of September, and set some half-dozen men, who were to stay at the Forks, to work clearing the ground for sowing winterwheat. An officer was left with the men to trade with Indians for fish and meat for the support of the workers.
The winter, which is sharp, crisp and decided in all of Rupert's Land, was approaching, so that their situation began to be desperate.
Governor Macdonell's chief care was for the safety and comfort during the winter of his helpless Colonists.
Sixty miles up the Red River from the Forks was a settlement of native people—chiefly French half-breeds—and to this place called Pembina came in the buffaloes, or if not they were easily reached from this settlement. But the poor Scottish settlers had no means of transport, and the way seemed long and desolate to them to venture upon, unaccompanied and unhelped. Governor Macdonell did his best for them, and succeeded in inducing the Saulteaux Indians, who seemed friendly, to guide and protect them as they sought Pembina for winter quarters.
The Indians had a few ponies and mounted on these they undertook to conduct the settlers to their destination. The caravan was grotesquely comical as it departed southward. The Indians upon their "Shaganappi ponies," as they are called, like mounted guards protecting the men, women and children of the Colony who trudged wearily on foot. The Indians were kindto their charge, but the Redman loves a joke, and often indulges in "horse-play." The demure Highlander looked unmoved upon the Indian pranks. The Indians also hold everything they possess on a loose tenure. The Highlander who was forced to surrender the gun, which his father had carried at the battle of Culloden, failed to see the humour of the affair, and the Highland woman who was compelled to give up her gold marriage ring, because some prairie brave wanted it, was unable to see the ethics of the Saulteaux guide who robbed her. The women became very weary of their journey, but their mounted guardians only laughed, because they were in the habit on their long marches of treating their own squaws in the same manner.
To Pembina at length they came—worn out, dusty and despondent. Here they erected tents or built huts. The settlers reached Pembina on the 11th of September, and Macdonell and an escort of three men, all on horseback, arrived on the 12th. Arrived at Pembina Macdonell examined the ground carefully, and selected the point on the south side of the Pembina River at its juncture with the Red River as a site for a fort. His men immediately camped here. Great quantities of buffalo meat were brought in by the French Canadians and Indians. Some of this was sent down to the Forks to the party which had remained to built a hut at that pointfor stores. At Pembina a storehouse was built immediately, and having given directions to erect several other buildings, the Governor returned by boat to the Forks. On the 27th of October Owen Keveny, in charge of the second detachment of Colonists, arrived with his party, largely of Irishmen. These men were taken on to Pembina. After great activity the buildings were ready by the 21st of November to house the whole of the two parties now united in one band of Colonists. The Governor and officers' quarters were finished on December 27th. Macdonell reports to Lord Selkirk that "as soon as the place at Pembina took some form and a decent flagstaff was erected on it, it was called Fort Daer." It is said that in most years the buffaloes were very numerous and so tame that they came to the Trader's Fort and rubbed their backs upon its stockaded enclosure. There was this year plenty of buffalo meat and the Scotch women soon learned to cook it into "Rubaboo," or "Rowschow," after the manner of the French half-breeds. Toward spring food was scarcer.
HON. DONALD GUNNHON. DONALD GUNNSchoolmaster, Naturalist and Legislator.York Factory, 1813; Red River, 1823; Died at Little Britain, 1878.
In May the winterers of Pembina returned to their settlement at the Colony. They sought to begin the cultivation of their farms, but they were helpless. The tough prairie sod had to be broken up and worked over, but the only implement which the Colonist had to use was asimple hoe, the one harrow being incomplete. The crofters were poor farmers, for they were rather fishermen. But the fish in Red River were scarce in this year, so that even the fisher's art which they knew was of little avail to them. The summer of 1813 was thus what the old settlers would call an "Off-Year," for even the small fruits on the plainswere far from abundant. These being scarce, the chief food of the settlers for all that summer through was the "Prairie turnip." This is a variety of the pea family, known as the Astragalus esculenta, which with its large taproot grows quite abundantly on the dry plains. An old-time trader, who was lost for forty days and only able to get the Prairie turnip, practically subsisted in this way. Along with this the settlers gathered quantities of a very succulent weed known as "fat-hen," and so were kept alive. The Colonists knowing now what the soil could produce obtained small quantities of grain and even with their defective means of cultivation, in the next year demonstrated the fertility of the soil of the country.
It was somewhat distressing to the Colonists again in 1813 to make the journey of sixty miles to Pembina, trudging along the prairie trail, but there was no other resource. The treatment of the Colonists by the "Nor'-Westers" had not thus far been unfriendly and the Canadian traders had even imported a few cattle, pigs, and poultry for the use of the settlers, and for these favors Governor Macdonell expressed his hearty thanks to the Montreal Company. The fatigues and mishaps of the journey to Pembina were, however, only the beginning of trouble for the winter. The reception by the French half-breed residents of Pembina wasnot now so friendly as that of the previous winter. At first the Nor'-Wester feeling had been one of contempt for the Colonists and pity for them in their hunger and miseries. The building of Fort Daer was an evidence of occupation that caused the jealous Canadian pioneers to pause. The reception of the second season was thus decidedly cool. The struggling settlers found before the winter was over that troubles come in troops. Very heavy snows fell in the winter of 1813-14. This brought two difficulties. It prevented the buffaloes coming freely from the open plains into the rivers and sheltered spots. The buffalo being a heavy animal is helpless in the snow. The other difficulty was that the settlers could not go on the chase with freedom. Unfortunately the Colonists were not able to use the snowshoe as could the lively Metis. The settlers well nigh perished in seeking the camp whither the native hunters had gone to follow the buffalo. Indeed the Colonists had the conviction that a plot to murder two of their most active leaders was laid by the French half-breeds whose sympathies were all with the "Nor'-Westers."
The climax of feeling was reached when Governor Macdonell, who was with the Colonists at Pembina, issued a most unwise proclamation, which to the Nor'-Westers seemed an illegality if not an impertinence. Dependent as the settlers were on the older Company for supplies and assistance this was nothing less than an act of madness.
By proclamation, on the 8th of January, 1814, Macdonell forbade any traders of "The Honorable Hudson's Bay Company, the North-West Company, or any individual or unconnected trader whatever to take out any provisions, either of flesh, grain or vegetables, from the country.
The embargo was complete.
In Governor Macdonell's defence it should be said that he offered to pay by British bills for all the provisions taken, at customary rates.
This assertion of sovereignty set on fire the Nor'-Westers and their sympathizers.
Not only was this extreme step taken, but John Spencer, a subordinate of Macdonell was sent west to Brandon House, found an entrance into the North-West Fort at the mouth of the Souris River and seizing some twenty-five tons of dry buffalo meat took it into his own fort.
It is quite true that Governor Macdonell expected new bands of Colonists and thus justified himself in his seizure. It is to the credit of the Nor'-Westers that they restrained themselves and avoided a general conflict, but evidently they only bided their time.
No breach of the peace occurred however,before the return of the Colonists from Pembina to the Colony Houses. The settlers occupied their homes in the best of spirits, and began to sow their wheat, but they were still greatly checked by the absence of the commonest implements of farm culture. Had Lord Selkirk known the true state of things on Red River, he would never have continued to send new bands of Colonists so imperfectly fitted for dealing with the cultivation of the soil.
The founder's mind had been fired, both by the opposition of Sir Alexander Mackenzie and by the successful arrival of his two bands of Colonists at the Red River, to make greater efforts than ever.
This he did by sending out a third party in all nearly a hundred strong, under the leadership of a very capable man—Archibald Macdonald. This band of settlers in 1813 were bound on the ship Prince of Wales for York Factory. A very serious attack of ship fever filled the whole ship's crew with alarm. Several well-known Colonists died. The Captain, alarmed, refused to go on to his destination, but ran the ship into Fort Churchill and there disembarked them. Further deaths took place at this point. In the spring there was no resource but to trudge over the rocky ledges and forbidding desolation of more than a hundred miles between the Fort Churchill andYork Factory. Only the stronger men and women were selected for the journey. On the 6th of April, 1814, a party of twenty-one males and twenty females started on this now celebrated tramp. At first the party began to march in single file, but finding this inconvenient changed to six abreast. Unaccustomed to snowshoes and sleds the Colonists found the snowy walk very distressing. Three fell by the way and were carried on by the stronger men. The weather was very cold. A supply of partridges was given them on starting, and the party was met by hunters sent from York Factory to meet them, who brought two hundred partridges, killed by the way. York Factory was reached on the 13th of April. This band of Colonists were superior to any who had come in the former parties. Many of them, as we shall see, did not remain in the Colony. A list of this party may be found in the Appendix. After remaining a month at York Factory, on the 27th of May, this heroic band went on their way to Red River, and reached their destination in time to plant potatoes for themselves and others. Comrades left behind at Churchill found their way to Red River. Lots along Red River were now being taken up by the settlers, and here they sought to found homes under a northern sky. Old and new settlers were now hopeful, but their hopes of peaceand happiness were soon to be dashed to pieces.
The arrival of the third year's Colonists provoked still greater opposition. Feeling had been gradually rising against the new settlers at every new arrival. The excellence of the later immigrants but led their opponents to be irritated.
FIGHT AND FLIGHT.
The year 1815 was a year of world-wide disaster. Napoleon's Europe-shadowing wings had for years been over that continent and he like a ravenous bird had left marks of his ravages among the most prominent European nations. The world had a breathing spell for a short time with Napoleon a virtual prisoner in Elba, but now in March of this year he broke from the perch where he had been tethered and all Europe was again in terror. The nations were thunderstruck; the alarm was deepened by the appearance of Olber's great comet, and in their superstition the ignorant were panic-stricken, while the more religious and informed saw in these terrible events the scenes pictured in the Apocalypse and maintained that the battle of Armageddon was at hand. The epoch-marking battle of Waterloo in June of this year was sufficiently near the picture of blood painted in the Revelation to satisfy the credulous.
But in a remote corner of Rupert's Land,where the number of the combatants was small and the conditions exceedingly primitive the comet was alarming enough. The action of Governor Miles Macdonell in the beginning of 1814, in forbidding the export of food from Rupert's Land and in interfering with the liberty of the traders, Indians and half-breeds, who had regarded themselves as outside of law, and as free as the wind of their wild prairies, produced an open and out-spoken dissent from every class.
The Nor'-Westers took time to consider the grave step of interrupting trade which Governor Miles Macdonell had taken. Immediate action was impossible. It was four hundred miles and more from the Colony to the great emporium of the fur trade on Lake Superior. The annual gathering of the Nor'-Westers was held at Grand Portage, the terminus of a road nine miles long, built to avoid the rapids of the Pigeon River which flows into Lake Superior some thirty or forty miles southwest of where Fort William now stands. This concourse was a notable affair. From distant Athabasca, from the Saskatchewan, from the Red River and from Lake Winnipeg, the traders gathered in their gaily decked canoes, to meet the gentlemen from Montreal, who came to count the gains of the year, and lay out plans for the future. Indians gathered outsideof Grand Portage Fort. The Highland Chieftains were now transformed into factors and traders, and for days they met in counsel together. Their evenings were spent in the great dining room of the Fort in revelry. Songs of the voyage were sung and as the excitement grew more intense the partners would take seats on the floor of the room and each armed with a sword or poker or pair of tongs unite in the paddle song of "A la Claire Fontaine," and make merry till far on in the morning. The days were laboriously given to business and accounts. When the great MacTavish—the head of the Nor'-Westers—was there he was often opposed by the younger men, yet he ended the strife with his tyrannical will and silenced all opposition.
The Nor'-Westers at their meeting, July, 1814, under Honorable William McGillivray, after whom Fort William was named, decided to oppose the Colony and sent two of their most aggressive men to meet force with force, and to give Miles Macdonell, the new Dictator, either by arms or by craft, the reward for his tyranny, as they regarded it.
The whole body of the traders were incensed against Lord Selkirk, for had not one of the chief Nor'-Wester partners written two years before from London saying, "Lord Selkirk must be driven to abandon his project,for his success would strike at the very existence of our trade."
The two men chosen at the gathering in Grand Portage were well fitted for their work. Most forward was Alexander Macdonell. On his journey writing to a friend he said: "Much is expected of us.... So here is at them with all my heart and energy." But the master-mind was his companion Duncan Cameron who, as a leader, stands out in the conflicts of the times as a determined man, of great executive ability, but of fierce and over-bearing disposition. The Nor'-Westers, having planned bloodshed, all agreed that Duncan Cameron was well chosen. He had been a leading explorer and trader in the Lake Superior district and knew the fur traders' route as few others did. His well-nigh thirty years of service made him a man of outstanding influence in the Company. Moreover, he could be bland and jovial. He had the Celtic adroitness. He knew how to ingratiate himself with every class and possessed all the devices of an envoy. His appearance and dress at Red River were notable. Having had some rank as a U.E. Loyalist leader in the war of 1812, he came to the Forks dressed in a scarlet military coat with all the accoutrements of a Captain in the Army. He even made display of his Captain's Commission by posting it at the gate of Fort Gibraltar. Of the Fort itself he took possession as Bourgeois or master and laid his plans in August, 1814, for the destruction of the Selkirk Colony. Cameron then began a systematic course of ingratiating himself with the Colonists. Speaking, as he did the Gaelic language, he appealed with much success to his countrymen. He represented himself as their friend and stirred up the people of Red River against Selkirk tyranny. He pictured to them their wrongs, the broken promises of the founder, and the undesirability of remaining in the Colony. He brought the settlers freely to his table, treating them openly to the beverage of their native country, and completely captured the hearts of a number of them. Those, friends of his, he made use of to carry out his deep plans. On the very day of the issue of the rations, he induced some of the Colonists to demand the nine small cannon in the Colony store houses. The request was refused by Archibald Macdonald, the acting Governor. The settlers then went forward, broke open the store houses and removed the cannon. Macdonald now arrested the leading settler, who had taken the field pieces, whereupon Cameron, like a small Napoleon, incited his clerks and men, to invade the Governor's house and release the prisoner. This was done, and now it may be said that war between the rival Companies was declared. On the return of Miles Macdonald, Cameron ordered his arrest. Macdonell refused to acknowledge the lawfulness of this action. The oily Nor'-Wester Highlander then threatened the people that if the Governor would not submit to the law, the whole body of settlers would be dispossessed of their farms and driven away from the banks of Red River. As if to make this threat seem more real, several loyal settlers were fired at by unseen marksmen.
Once having begun, Cameron was not the man to hesitate. Another Nor'-Wester plan was put into effect.
Cameron's comrade, Alexander Macdonell, now arrived from the Western plains leading it was said, a band of Cree Indians. The Crees are stubborn and determined warriors, but they are also crafty. The proposal by Alexander Macdonell ("Yellow Head as he was called" to distinguish him), was gravely considered by the Indians. The Indians respect authority and in this case they were not very sure who had the authority. The Indians declined the offer, and the report proved untrue.
The Nor'-Westers were, however, strong in their influence over the Chippewas of Red Lake in Minnesota. Similar propositions were made to the Sand Lake band of this tribe. Though offered a large reward to go on this expeditionagainst the Selkirk settlers, the chief refused the bribe, and the tribe declined to undertake the enterprise.
Cameron however, knew the importance of keeping up the war-like spirit of his following, and early in June himself took part in an attack upon the Colony houses. The affray took place on the edge of the wood near the Governor's residence. Surgeon White and Burke the store-keeper, narrowly escaped being killed by the shots fired and four of the servants were actually wounded. Cameron like a real operator effusively thanked his followers for their grand attack. This state of constant hostility, ostensibly on account of the refusal of Governor Macdonell to respect the legal summons served upon him, was ended by the surrender of Miles Macdonell, who was taken as a prisoner to Montreal, though he was never brought up for trial.
Thus far Cameron had succeeded in his plans. He was an artful plotter. His capture of Miles Macdonell gave him great prestige. Besides, he had roused feelings of serious discontent in the minds of nearly all of the Selkirk Colonists. His apparent sincerity and kindness to them had also won their hearts. He was now to make the greatest move in the game. This was nothing less than a tempting offer to transfer the whole of them to the fertile townshipsof Upper Canada. He provided all the means of transport, he promised them free lands in the neighborhood of market towns—two hundred acres to each family. Any wages due to them by Lord Selkirk he would pay and should three-quarters of the Colony accept his offer they would have provisions provided for a year free of cost. When the poor Colonists thought of the bleak, uncultivated country in which they were, of the inevitable hardships which lay before them, and saw the dangerous, unsettled state of the Selkirk settlement, they could not well resist the offer. Furthermore, the schemer did not stop here. As was afterward found out, George Campbell, the arch-agitator and leader among the disaffected settlers received a promise of £100, and others of £20 and the like. Further to allay their fears it was urged that they were going where the British flag was flying and where the truest loyalty prevailed. It was pointed out that it had been to prevent any obstacles being raised against their going, that the nine guns had been seized and were in the custody of the Nor'-Westers. Accordingly full arrangements were made. A supply of canoes was obtained and on the 15th of June, 1815, no less than one hundred and forty of the two hundred Colonists on Red River embarked and drifted down the river on their long canoe voyageof more than a thousand miles. By the end of July they had gone over the dangerous Fur traders' route and passing over four or five hundred miles reached Fort William, near Lake Superior. But their journey was not one-half over. Along the base of the rugged shores of Lake Superior, through the St. Mary's River, down the foaming Sault and then along the shores of Georgian Bay, they paddled their way to Penetanguishene. From this point they crossed southward to Holland Landing, which is forty miles north of Toronto, and arrived at their destination on the 5th of September.
It is hard to find a parallel for such a journey. They were a large body, made up of men, women, and children, continuously journeying for eighty-two days, through an unsettled and barren country, running dangerous rapids, and exposed to storms with a poorly organized commissariat, and under fear of pursuit by the agents of Lord Selkirk, to whom many of them were personally bound. In the township of West Gwillinbury, north of Toronto, near London, and in the Talbot settlement, near St. Thomas—all in Upper Canada—they received their lands. Half a century later, in one of the townships north of Toronto, the writer had pointed out to him a man named MacBeth weighing two hundred and fifty pounds, of whom it was humourously told that he hadbeen carried all the way from Red River. The explanation of course was, that he had been brought as an infant on this famous Hegira of the Selkirk Colonists.
The finishing of Cameron's work on the Red River, was handed over to Alexander Macdonell. The plan was nothing less than that the settlers remaining should be driven by force from the banks of Red River. The party led by Macdonell was made up of Bois-Brulés, under dashing young Cuthbert Grant. On their agile ponies they appeared like scourging Huns, to drive out the discouraged remnant of Colonists.
Each remaining settler was on the 25th of June served with a notice signed by four Nor'-Westers, thus:
"All settlers to retire immediately from Red River, and no trace of a settlement to remain." (Signed) Cuthbert Grant, etc.
Two days after the notice was served the beleaguered settlers, made up of some thirteen families—in all from forty to sixty persons, who had remained true to Lord Selkirk and the Colony—went forth from their homes as sadly as the Acadian refugees from Grand Pré. They were allowed to take with them such belongings as they had, and in boats and other craft went pensively down Red River with Lake Winnipeg and Jack Riverin view as their destination. The house of the Governor, the mill, and the buildings which the settlers had begun to build upon their lots were all set on fire and destroyed.
The U.E. Loyalists of Upper Canada and Nova Scotia draw upon our sympathies in their sufferings of hunger and hardship, but they afford no parallel to the discouragement, dangers, and dismay of the Selkirk Colonists.
Alexander Macdonell's party of seventy or eighty mounted men easily carried out this work of destruction. There was one fly in the ointment for them. The small Hudson's Bay House built by Fidler still remained. Here a daring Celt, John McLeod, was in charge. Seeing the temper of Macdonell's levy McLeod determined to fortify his rude castle. Beside the trading house of the Hudson's Bay Company stood the blacksmith's shop. Hurriedly McLeod, with a cart, carried thither the three-pounder cannon in his possession, then cut up lengths of chain to be his shot and shell, used with care his small supply of powder and with three or four men, his only garrison, stood to his gun and awaited the attack of the Bois-Brulés. Being on horseback his assailants could not long face his one piece of artillery. It is not known to what extent the assailants suffered in the skirmish, but John Warren, a gentleman of the Hudson's Bay Company, waskilled in the encounter. The siege of McLeod's improvised fort continued for several days, but the defence was successful, and McLeod saved for the Company £1,000 worth of goods.