Parliamentary Committee of Enquiry Appointed—Aim of the Malcontents—Lord Strange's Report—Testimony of Witnesses—French Competition—Lords of Plantations desire to Ascertain Limits of Company's Territory—Defeat of the Labrador Company—Wolfe's Victory—"Locked up in the Strong Box"—Company's Forts—Clandestine Trade—Case of Captain Coats.

Parliamentary enquiry.

"Mr. Sharpe, the Company's solicitor," we read in the Company's minute-books, under date of March 10th, 1748, "attending the Committee acquainted them that a motion was yesterday made and carried in the House of Commons to enquire into the state and condition of the countries and trade of Hudson's Bay, and also the right the Company pretend to have by charter to the property of the land, and exclusive trade to those countries, and that a committee was appointed accordingly."

The Adventurers were not caught entirely unawares. They had expected some such move on the part of their opponents, and now determined that since they could not ward off the enquiry, they would take the best means to present the most favourable statement of the Company's case to the nation. A ransacking of books and records ensued; and a rigorous search after facts bearing on the beneficent character of the Company's rule and policy; and these proofs being at length ready, were placed by the following December in the form of a memorial in the hands of every member of the House of Commons.

The enquiry aroused the greatest national interest. It began soon after Christmas, 1748, and lasted for two months.

Plea of the malcontents.

What the malcontents desired is, perhaps, best explained in the words of their prime mover: "By opening," said he, "the trade in the Bay, many thousands more would be employed in trade, and a much greater vent would be opened for our manufactures. Whereas all the gain we have at present, whilst the trade is confined to the Company, is the employment of one hundred and twenty men in all their factories, and two or three ships in that trade, manned with perhaps one hundred and twenty men in time of war, to enrich nine or ten[62] merchants at their country's expense; at the same time betraying the nation, by allowing the French to encroach upon us at the bottom of the Bay, having given up by that means the greatest part of their trade there to the French. It is, therefore, humbly submitted to the Government, whether it is not just, as well as prudent, to open that trade to all the British merchants, and resume at the same time the charter, so far as to take from them all those lands they have not reclaimed or occupied after seventy years possession, leaving them only their factories, and such lands as they have reclaimed adjoining to them; and to give grants as usual in other colonies to all who shall go over to trade and make settlements in the country; for no grants were ever intended to be made to them, to enable them to prevent other subjects of Britain from planting colonies in those countries, which they themselves would not plant or occupy; for such a power, instead of being beneficial, would be the greatest prejudice to Britain, and is become a general law in the colonies, that those who take grants of land and don't plant them in a reasonable, limited time, forfeit their rights to those lands, and a new grant is made out to such others as shall plant and improve them; and if this grant be not immediately resumed so far and the trade laid open, and some force be not sent to secure our southern possessions in the Bay by the Government in case there should be a French war, we shall see the French immediately dispossess the Company of all their factories but Churchill, and all these countries and that trade will be in the possession of the French." So ran the argument of the Company's enemies.

On the 24th of April, 1749, Lord Strange presented, on behalf of the Select Committee, the report to Parliament.

"The Committee," said he, "appointed to enquire into the state and condition of the countries adjoining to Hudson's Bay and the trade carried on there; and to consider how those countries may be settled and improved, and the trade and fisheries there extended and increased; and also to enquire into the right the Company of Adventurers trading into Hudson's Bay pretend to have, by charter, to the property of lands and exclusive trade to those countries; have pursuant to the order of the House, examined into the several matters to them referred.

"Your Committee thought proper, in the first place, to enquire into the nature and extent of the charter granted by King Charles the Second, to the Company of Adventurers trading into Hudson's Bay; under which charter the present Company claim as right to lands and an exclusive trade to those countries; which charter being laid before your Committee, they thought it necessary for the information of the House to annex a copy thereof to this report."

The charter, published now for the first time, was deemed to be valid.

Witnesses called by the committee.

The Committee had examined the witnesses in the case. These witnesses were: Joseph Robson, who had been employed in the Bay for six years as a stonemason; Richard White, who had been a clerk at Albany Fort and elsewhere; Matthew Sargeant, who had been employed in the Company's service and "understood the Indian language"; John Hayter, who had been house carpenter to the Company for six years at Moose River; Matthew Gwynne, who had been twice at Hudson's Bay; Edward Thompson, who had been three years at Moose River as surgeon; Enoch Alsop, who had been armourer to the Company at Moose River; Christopher Bannister, who had been armourer and gunsmith, and had resided in the Bay for twenty-two years; Robert Griffin, silversmith, who had been five years in the Company's service; Thomas Barnet Smith, who went over to Albany in 1741; Alexander Brown, who had been six years at Hudson's Bay as surgeon; Captain Thomas Mitchell, who had commanded a sloop of the Company.

Besides the above witnesses there was, of course, Dobbs himself, who was "examined as to the information he had received from a French-Canadese Indian (since deceased) who was maintained at the expense of the Admiralty, on the prospect of his being of service on the discovery of a north-west passage." Dobbs "informed your Committee that the whole of that discourse is contained in part of a book printed for the witness in 1744, to which he desired leave to refer."[63] There also appeared Captain William Moor, who had been employed in Hudson's Bay from a boy; Henry Spurling, merchant, who had traded in furs for twenty-eight years past, during which time he had dealt with the Hudson's Bay Company; Captain Carruthers, who had been in the Company's service thirty-five years ago; and Arthur Slater, who had been employed by the Company on the East Main.

The opposition endeavoured to show that one object aimed at in granting a charter to the Hudson's Bay Company was to further the discovery of the north-west passage. This of course was absurd. It was charged that they had done almost nothing in this direction, which the Adventurers on their part rebutted by furnishing Parliament with a list of the ships they had fitted out for such a discovery.

In the evidence before the Committee, it became clear that the witnesses were not unanimous, especially concerning the probability of finding a north-west passage.

Evidence as to a north-west passage.

The evidence of Edward Thompson, the ship surgeon on the Furnace, for example, states that he has the "greatest reason to believe there is one, from the winds, tides and black whales; and he thinks the place to be at Chesterfield Inlet; that the reason of their coming back was they met the other boat which had been five leagues farther, and the crew told them the water was much fresher and shallower there, but where he was the water was fifty fathoms deep, and the tide very strong; the ebb six hours and the flood two, to the best of his remembrance; that it is not common for the tide to flow only two hours." He imagined it to be obstructed by another tide from the westward. The rapidity of the tide upwards was so great that the spray of the water flew over the bow of the schooner, and was "so salt that it candied on the men's shoes, but the tide did not run in so rapid a manner the other way." Captain William Moor, being asked if he believed there was a north-west passage to the South Seas, said he believed there was a communication, but "whether navigable or not he cannot say; that if there is any such communication, 'tis farther northward than he expected; that if it is but short, as 'tis but probable to conclude from the height of the tides, 'tis possible it might be navigable. It was the opinion of all the persons sent on that discovery that a north-west wind made the highest tides." According to Captain Carruthers, "he don't apprehend there is any such passage; but if there is, he thinks it impracticable to navigate it on account of the ice; that he would rather choose to go round by Cape Horn; and that it will be impossible to go and return through such passage in one year; and he thinks 'tis the general opinion of seamen, that there is no such passage." In which opinion the seamen were in the right, although Dobbs and his friends were long to hold the contrary.

John Tomlinson, a London merchant, testified that he was a subscriber to "the undertaking for finding a north-west passage, which undertaking was dropped for want of money; that he should not choose to subscribe again on the same terms; that he can not pretend to say whether there is such a passage or not, or whether, if found, it could ever be rendered useful to navigation."

It was only to be expected that the merchants, having no share in the Company's profits, should be, to a man, in favour of throwing open the trade of Hudson's Bay. Tomlinson, for example, gave it out as his opinion that if the charter were revoked more ships would be sent and more Indians brought down to trade. "This is confirmed," said he, "by the experience of the Guinea trade, which, when confined to a company, employed not above ten ships, and now employs one hundred and fifty." He moreover asserted that "the case of the Guinea trade was exactly similar, where the ships are near one another, and each endeavours to get the trade; and the more ships lie there the higher the prices of negroes."

The Company's profits.

The Company was obliged, in the course of this enquiry, to divulge a number of facts relating to its trade, which had until then remained secret. Parliament was informed that the trade between London and Hudson's Bay was carried on in 1748, and for some years previous, by means of four ships; that the cost of the exports was in that year £5,012 12s. 3d.; that the value of the sales of furs and other imports amounted to £30,160 5s. 11d. As for the "charge attending the carrying on of the Hudson's Bay trade, and maintaining their factories," it was, in 1748, £17,352 4s. 10d. Thus a trade which involved only £5,000 a year in exports brought back a return of £30,000. Even when the outlay for working and maintenance of forts and establishments was considered, there was, in dull times, a profit of forty per cent on actual paid-up capital.

With regard to French competition, many of the witnesses were most emphatic. Robson, for instance, "thought that the beavers which are brought down to the Company are refused by the French from their being a heavy commodity; for the natives who come to trade with the Company dispose of their small, valuable furs to the French, and bring down their heavy goods to the Company in summer when the rivers are open, which they sell, and supply the French with European goods purchased from the Company."

"The French," said Richard White, another witness, "intercept the Indians coming down with their trade," he having seen them with guns and clothing of French manufacture; and further an Indian had told him that there was a French settlement up Moose River, something to the southward of the west, at the distance, as the witness apprehended, of about fifty miles. "The French deal in light furs, and take all of that sort they can get, and the Indians bring the heavy to us. Sometimes the Indians bring down martens' skins, but that is when they don't meet with the French; but never knew any Indians who had met the French bring down light furs. The French settlement on Moose River is at Abbitibi Lake. The trade," concluded the witness, "might be further extended by sending up Europeans to winter amongst the natives, which, though the Company have not lately attempted, the French actually do."

"The French," said another, "intercept the trade; to prevent which the Company some time ago built Henley House,[64] which did, in some measure, answer the purpose: but if they would build farther in the country it would have a better effect. The French went there first, and are better beloved; but if we would go up into the country the French Indians would trade with us."

French encroachment on trade.

Another of the witnesses testified that he "has been informed by the Indians that the French-Canadese Indians come within six score miles of the English factories. The French Indians come to Albany to trade for their heavy goods." He said he had heard Governor Norton say that the "French ran away with our trade." "If," continued this witness, Alexander Brown, "the trade was opened, the French would not intercept the Indians, since in that case the separate traders must have out-factories in the same manner the French have, which the Company have not." Upon being asked by Lord Strange if "in case those out-settlements were erected, whether the same trade could be carried on at the present settlements?" the witness replied that "it would be impossible, but that the trade would be extended, and by that means they would take it from the French. That if these settlements were near the French, they must have garrisons to secure them against the French, and the Indians who trade with and are in friendship with them (whom he distinguished by the name of French Indians)."

Brown quoted Norton as saying, in the year 1739, "that the French had a settlement at about the distance of one hundred or six score miles from Churchill, which had been built about a year, and contained sixty men with small arms."

The result of the deliberations of the Committee of Enquiry was, on the whole, favourable to the Company. The charter was pronounced unassailable, and the Company had made out a good case against its enemies. It had certainly permitted the encroachments of the French. But the English Government of the day foresaw that French possession of Canada was doomed, and the Company could make ample amends when the British flag was unfurled at Quebec and at Montreal.

The Company having come out of the ordeal unharmed,[65] the Lords of Trade and Plantations thought it might as well settle in its own mind the precise territory claimed by the Company under its charter. The Company, on its part, was not forgetful that the French Government had not yet paid its little bill, which having been running for over sixty years, had now assumed comparatively gigantic proportions.

The Government asks the Company to define its territory.

Accordingly the Lords of Trade and Plantations, on the 25th of July, 1750, addressed a letter to the Company, representing that "as it was for the benefit of the plantations that the limits or boundaries of the British Colonies on the Continent of America should be distinctly known, more particularly as they border on the settlements made by the French, or any foreign nation in America, their Lordships desired as exact an account as possible of the limits and boundaries of the territory granted to the Company, together with a chart or map thereof, and all the best accounts and vouchers they can obtain to support the same, and particularly, if any, or what settlements have been made by the English on the frontiers towards the lakes, and if any, or what encroachments have been made, and at what period, and to be exact in stating every particular in the history of whatever encroachments have been made, which may serve to place the proceedings in a true light, and confute any right which may at any time be founded upon them."

Company's reply.

The Company replied, among other things, that the said Straits and Bays "are now so well known, that it is apprehended they stand in no need of any particular description than by the chart or map herewith delivered; and the limits or boundaries of the lands and countries lying round the same, comprised, as your memorialists conceive, in the same grant, are as follows, that is to say: all the lands lying on the east side or coast of the said Bay, and extending from the Bay eastward to the Atlantic Ocean and Davis' Strait, and the line hereafter mentioned as the east and south-eastern boundaries of the said Company's territories; and towards the north, all the lands that lie at the north end, or on the north side or coast of the said Bay, and extending from the Bay northwards to the utmost limits of the lands; then towards the North Pole; but where or how these lands terminate is hitherto unknown. And towards the west, all the lands that lie on the west side or coast of the said Bay, and extending from the said Bay westward to the utmost limits of those lands; but where or how these lands terminate to the westward is also unknown, though probably it will be found they terminate on the Great South Sea, and towards the south," they propose the line already set out by them, before and soon after the Treaty of Utrecht, stating that the Commissioners under that treaty were never able to bring the settlement of the said limits to a final conclusion; but they urged that the limits of the territories granted to them, and of the places appertaining to the French, should be settled upon the footing above mentioned.

The Treaty of Utrecht stipulated that the French King should restore to Great Britain in full right forever, Hudson's Bay, the Straits, and all lands, rivers, coasts, etc., there situate. Further, that the Hudson's Bay Company be repaid their losses by French hostile incursions and depredations in time of peace.

The Hudson's Bay Company now went farther and asked the Government to insist that no French vessel should be allowed to pass to the north or north-west of a line drawn from Grimington's Island and Cape Perdrix.

One of the most feasible plans of the Company's foes seemed to be to get hold of some adjacent territory, and from that vantage ground gradually encroach on the chartered preserves. Such seems to have been the scheme in July, 1752, when a petition was presented to the Lords of Trade and Plantations, from "several London Merchants," who sought a grant of "all that part of America lying on the Atlantic Ocean on the east part, extending south and north from 52° north latitude from the equinoctial line to 60° of the same north latitude, called Labradore or New Britain, not at this time possessed by any of his Majesty's subjects or the subjects of any Christian prince or state."

On the receipt of this petition by the Government, the Hudson's Bay Company was called upon to say whether it laid claim to this tract. In their reply the Honourable Adventurers referred to the grant of Charles II. of all rights to trade and commerce of those seas, etc., within entrance of Hudson's Straits, and of all lands on the coasts and confines thereof; Labrador throughout its whole extent, from 60° north latitude to 52°, was therefore alleged to be within their limits.

The Company was already settled there, and had spent £10,000 on it. Moreover, declared the Company, it was a barren land, with few beavers or other furs of value.

The Company suggested that the "London Merchants'" aim was to gain a footing and draw off the Hudson's Bay Company's trade, which it hoped would not be permitted. This hope of the Adventurers was realized, for the petition of the London Merchants was not allowed.[66]

France's fatal hour with respect to her sovereignty over Canada rapidly approached. In December, 1759, the Company wrote as follows to the Lords of Plantations:—

Halifax and Soame Jenyns thereupon wrote to Pitt in these words:

Conquest of Canada.

While England went mad with joy over Wolfe's victory at Quebec, the Company thought the time had, at last, come when the indemnity it claimed so long should be exacted in the treaty of peace which could not be long delayed. But its sanguine expectations were not destined to be realized. In vain did the Governor wait at the door of Mr. Secretary Pitts; in vain did Lord Halifax assure the Company's secretary that he would make it his own personal business to have the affair attended to. It was too late in the day.[67] With reason might the Company's zealous secretary trace in the minutes: "Locked up this day (November 22nd, 1759), in the Great Iron Chest, a Book containing estimates of the Company's losses sustained from the French, from 1682 to 1688."

The "Great Iron Chest" was to hold the book for many a day, and though the Company evinced a never-failing alacrity to produce it, yet never was there to be inscribed the words "settled with thanks," at the foot of this "little bill against the French."

We have already been made familiar with the character of the Company's forts in the Bay so late as the reign of Queen Anne. There had been almost from the beginning a party amongst the Honourable Adventurers favourable to the erection of strong forts, not built of logs with bastions of stone, but of stone throughout, from the designs of competent engineers.

A few years after the Company had regained possession of York Factory, it built (1718) a wooden fort at Churchill River, to which was given the name of Prince of Wales. In 1730 it constructed another at Moose River; and about the same time a small post, capable of containing eight or ten men at Slude River, on the East Main. In 1720 Henley House, one hundred and fifty miles up Albany River, was built to contain a garrison of eight men, as a check to the Indians who carried on a trade with the French.

Building of stone forts.

But the wooden fort Prince of Wales did not remain long. The remembrance of their former posts destroyed by fire, and Iberville's cannon, caused the Company at length to undertake the fortification on a splendid scale of its best harbour, to safeguard what it designed to be its principal entrepÔt from the French, as well as from the Indians. Opposition was cried down, and the "fortification party," as it was called, carried the day. A massive thirty-feet wide foundation was begun at Churchill, from the plans of military engineers who had served under Marlborough, and, after many vicissitudes, in 1734 Fort Prince of Wales, one of the strongest forts on the continent, was reared at the mouth of Churchill River.

It was the original intention to have the walls forty-two feet thick at their foundation, but on account of the Governor's interference the dimensions were reduced to twenty-five. It was afterwards found, however, that there was a tendency to sink when cannon were fired frequently from the walls, so one section was forthwith pulled down and rebuilt according to original plans. Three of the bastions had arches for storehouses, forty feet three inches by ten feet, and in the fourth was built a stone magazine twenty-four feet long and ten feet wide in the clear, with a passage to it through the gorge of the bastion twenty-four feet long and four feet wide.

The parapets were originally constructed of wood, supplied by denuding the old fort, situated five miles up the Churchill River, the site of which was first occupied in 1688; but in 1746 the Company began erecting a stone parapet. Robson's plan shows that two houses, a dwelling and office building, were erected inside the fort, and incidentally he describes one of the two as being one hundred and eighty-one feet six inches by thirty-three feet, with side walls seventeen feet high and the roof covered with lead.

In 1730 Moose, a new fort, was erected on the site of Moose Factory. About the same time Richmond Fort was built on Whale River, but it did not continue a great many years. I find, under date of 21st December, 1758, that "the Governor represented to the Committee that Richmond Fort did not give a sufficient return to pay the most moderate charge of supporting it," and it was "resolved that the Company's servants and effects be withdrawn from there as soon as conveniently may be and replaced at such of the Company's other factories as shall be found needful." Further, it was "resolved that a factory with accommodation for twelve men, with all convenience for trading goods stores, and provisions, be built as early as possible in the year 1760, in the most convenient place for that purpose on the north side of Severn River and as high up as may be."

At the same time it was ordered that the number of men for York Fort and the new settlement to be made on the Severn River should be forty-eight men.

Clandestine trade.

Clandestine trade was a constantly recurring feature of eighteenth century life in the Bay. Charges were repeatedly preferred against the Company's servants, and altogether scores were dismissed as a punishment for this offence. It must be confessed that there was often a temptation difficult to resist. Nothing seemed more natural for the poor apprentice to trade his jack-knife, Jew's-harp or silk kerchief with an Indian or Esquimau for a peltry; and the only reason, perhaps, why private bartering was not indulged in more generally was the certainty of detection. But with the Governors and traders and ship captains, risk was reduced to a minimum.

One of the most unfortunate examples was the case of Captain Coats. This able mariner had been in the employ of the Company for a period of many years. None was superior to him in knowledge of the Bay and straits. Captain Coats had been twice shipwrecked, once in 1727, "when near the meridian of Cape Farewell, when running through the ice with a small sail, when two pieces of ice shutt upon us and sank our ship"; and again in 1736, when he was entangled in the ice off Cape Resolution, when his ship had her sides crushed in and sank in twenty minutes. Coats drew up a journal for the use of his sons, containing an elaborate description of the Bay and its approaches, together with a great deal of relative matter; and this journal, which has received the honour of publication by the Hakluyt Society, concludes by saying that if these sons are neglected by the Hudson's Bay Company they are at liberty, and "it is his will and command that every part be made publick, for the use and benefit of mankind."

There is herein, it is almost needless to say, no mention of the captain's clandestine trading operations, which extended over a long series of years, and which might never have been made known to the Company had it not been for the sudden death of Pilgrim, who was formerly governor at Prince of Wales and Moose Fort. A number of private letters and papers reached England, incriminating Coats, but they never reached the public; nor in 1752, were the Hakluyt Society cognisant of the fate which overtook their author. "Of the writer," remarks Sir John Barrow, who edited the volume, "the editor can learn but little; nothing, in fact, is now known of Captain Coats, except that he was in the Company's service as commander of one or other of their ships from 1727 to 1751." He added that the memorial was believed to exist in the Company's archives.

Under date of November 28th, 1751, I find the following: "The Governor having acquainted the Committee of this affair, and laid the letters and papers before them, they were fully examined and the contents thereof considered." Coats was then called in and told of the information they had received, and the cause they had to suspect that he had defrauded the Company by carrying on a clandestine trade greatly to their prejudice and contrary to the fidelity he owed the Company.

Case of Capt. Coats.

Coats at first endeavoured to excuse himself, but finding the proofs contained in the letter papers (many of which were in his own handwriting and signature) so strong in evidence against him, at last owned he was guilty of the offence he was accused of and submitted himself to the Company, and he was ordered to withdraw while his case was considered. At the expiration of two hours the culprit was called in and acquainted with his sentence, which was dismissal from the service. He was ordered to deliver up the keys of the King George, of which he was commander, together with the stores and the keys of such stores in the warehouse in his custody belonging to the Company.

The disgraced captain went home, and after a miserable existence of some weeks, ended his life by his own hand. On the 20th of February, there is a letter to the Company from his widow, Mary Coats, which was read out to the Adventurers assembled. It prayed that the Committee would "indulge her so far as to order the balance that shall appear upon her late husband's account to be paid, and to permit her to have the stores brought home, still remaining in the King George; the profit of these, urged the widow, had always been enjoyed by every master in the Company's services." Moved by the appeal, Widow Coats was called in and informed that provided she delivered up to the Company all the books, papers, charts or drafts belonging to her late husband and now in her custody, she might expect to meet with the favour of the Company. "For which she returned thanks and promised to comply therewith." But the Hakluyt Society's publication of Coats' journal is sufficient to show that his widow did not keep to the strict letter of her word.