Beckles Willson

Crisis in the Company's Affairs—No Dividend Paid—Petition to Lords of the Treasury—Factors Allowed a Share in the Trade—Canada Jurisdiction Act—The Killing of MacDonnell—Mowat's Ill-treatment—Lord Selkirk—His Scheme laid before the Company—A Protest by Thwaytes and others—The Project Carried—Emigrants sent out to Red River—Northmen Stirred to Reprisal.

England was again at war with France. Napoleon had placed an embargo on English commerce, and to the uttermost corner of Europe was this measure felt. Tons of the most costly furs, for which there was no market, lay heaped in the Company's warehouse. The greatest difficulty was experienced in procuring servants, especially seamen, and when these were procured, they were often seized by a press-gang; shares began to decline in value; numerous partners were selling out their interests, and no strong man appeared at the head of affairs.

In 1808 no dividend was paid, chiefly the result of the non-exportation of the Company's furs to the Continent of Europe. There were the accumulations of furs imported during 1806, 1807 and 1808 lying in the warehouse without prospect of sale.

The pressure still continued and at last, in 1809, the Company was driven to petition the Chancellor of the Exchequer for transmission to Lords of the Treasury, setting forth the Company's position and its claims on the nation.

The Company in difficulties.

"Accumulated difficulties," it said, "have pressed hardly on the Company and we ask assistance to maintain a colony that till now has found within itself resources to withstand the pressure of all former wars and to continue those outfits on which six hundred Europeans and their families and some thousands of native Indians depend for their very existence.

"We assure your worships that it was not until all those resources were exhausted that we came to the resolution of making the present application."

The petition recited that after having received their charter the Company had colonized such parts of newly granted territories as appeared most convenient for carrying on their commerce with the natives. This commerce "consisted in the barter of British manufactures for the furs of animals killed by the different tribes of Indians who were within reach of factories and gradually extended itself till, as at the present moment, the manufactures of Great Britain are borne by the traders of Hudson's Bay over the face of the whole country from Lake Superior to the Athabasca.

"The trade is at present pursued by the export of furs, gunpowder, shot, woollens, hardware and other articles, which together with large supplies of provisions for the factories, constitute an annual outfit consisting wholly of British manufactures and British produce of from £40,000 to £50,000, in return for which we receive the furs of bears, wolves, foxes, otters, martens, beaver and other animals, together with some oil and articles of inferior value. The cargoes are sold at public sale. The beaver and some few inferior furs, together with the oil, are bought for home consumption and sell for about £30,000, but the fine furs were, till after the sale of 1806, bought by the fur merchants for the fairs of Frankfort and of Leipsic for Petersburg, and before the present war, for France. Since that year there has not been a fur sold for exportation, and as a proof to your worships that the deficiency of buyers did not arise from our holding back for a higher market, we sold in 1806 for seven shillings per skin furs that in the more quiet state of Europe in 1804 had brought us 20s. 3d., and which for years previous to that time had sold for a similar price; and other depreciation pervaded in about the same proportion the whole of those furs calculated only for the foreign market, and in some instances furs were sold for a less price than the duties we had paid for them.

"Since that period no orders have been received from abroad, and our warehouses are filled with the most valuable productions of three years' import that if sold at the prices of those years before the closing of the ports on the Continent would have produced us at least £150,000.

"It may be objected to us, that we were improvident in pursuing under such circumstances a trade which must so inevitably tend to ruin. But a certainty that a considerable quantity of furs found their way to New York, and an earnest zeal for the preservation of trade which by the conduct of the Hudson's Bay Company had been secured to this country for a century and a half, prompted us to every exertion to maintain the footing we had established, and the annually increasing amount of our trade gave us just grounds to look forward with confidence to the opening of the northern ports of Europe as the period when all our difficulties would cease; an event which, anterior to the battles of Austerlitz or of Jena, was looked for with the most sanguine expectation.

"Above all were we impelled by the strongest motives to continue these supplies which were necessary for the subsistence of six hundred European servants, their wives and children, dispersed over a vast and extended field of the North American Continent, and who would not be brought to Europe under a period of three years as well as those upon whom the many Indian nations now depend for their very existence.

"The nations of hunters taught for one hundred and fifty years the use of fire-arms could no more resort, with certainty, to the bow or the javelin for their daily subsistence. Accustomed to the hatchet of Great Britain, they could ill adopt the rude sharpened stone to the purposes of building, and until years of misery and of famine had extirpated the present race, they could not recur to the simple arts by which they supported themselves before the introduction of British manufactures. As the outfits of the Hudson's Bay Company consist principally of articles which long habit have taught them now to consider of first necessity, if we withhold these outfits, we leave them destitute of their only means of support. The truth of this observation had a melancholy proof in the year 1782, when from the attack made upon the settlements by La PÉrouse, and the consequent failure of our supplies, many of the Indians were found starved to death.

Petition of the Company.

"It was not only from the firm conviction that we felt of the necessity of European manufactures to the present existence of whole nations of North American Indians that we considered ourselves bound by the most powerful ties to exert every effort in their favour; but also that we might continue to them those advantages which would result to their religious as well as civil welfare from the progressive improvements, and a gradual system of civilisation and education which we have introduced throughout the country; improvements which are now diffusing the comforts of civilized life, as well as the blessings of the Christian faith to thousands of uninstructed Indians, and would in their completion, we can confidently assert, have tended to the future cultivation of lands, which from experiments we found capable of growing most of the grains of Northern Europe, and from their climate adapted to the culture of hemp and flax, and from the labour of those families who would have been induced to settle at our factories, might soon have brought to this country the produce of the boundless forests of pine that spread themselves over almost the southern parts of our possessions.

"To realize these not visionary schemes, but sure and certain plans, founded upon the progressive civilization of the natives, were objects not to be given up without the most urgent necessity, and the hope that the ruler of the French Empire could not forever shut out our trade from Europe, induced us to resort to every means within our power to preserve the advantages resulting to ourselves and to the Indians, and to the British nation.

"We have exhausted those funds which we set apart for their completion; we have pledged our credit till we feel, as honest men, that upon the present uncertainty we can pledge it no farther, and we throw ourselves upon your Worship's wisdom to afford us that temporary assistance which we cannot ask at any other hands.

"Were we to resort to the early history of our settlements, we might lay the foundations of just claims upon the public to assist our present wants. We could show instances of most destructive attacks by the French upon our factories. Our forts and military works, mounted with a numerous and expensive artillery for the defence of the colony against their future operations, were destroyed and the guns ruined. And particularly was a most grievous loss occasioned to us by the predatory attack of La PÉrouse about the conclusion of the American War, which caused the distress to which we have above alluded.

"Against these pressures when our trade flourished we were able to hold up, and we found within ourselves those resources which defeated the enemy's views and continued to Great Britain the trade we had established.

"And it is not until pressed to our last resort that we ask of your Lordships that assistance with which we may confidently hope to preserve our trade until the continent may be again opened, when we shall be delivered from those difficulties under which we are now sinking."

The petition was signed by Wm. Mainwaring, Governor; Joseph Berens, Deputy Governor; George Hyde Wollaston, Thomas Neave, Job Mathew Raikes, Thomas Langley, John Henry Pelly, Benjamin Harrison, John Webb.

In April the Adventurers petitioned the King in Council to reduce duties on furs to one-half, or trade must suffer extinction. No profit was derivable, it said, on marten, wolf, bear, wolverine and fisher-skins.

To this petition the Office of Committee of Privy Council for Trade, Whitehall, replied in the following February, that the memorial of the Hudson's Bay Company contained no proposition on which the Lords of this Council could "offer any opinion to the Lords of Treasury."

Small Government assistance.

As their petition was denied, the Company now boldly prepared a request and asked for a loan of £60,000, and that time be extended for paying the duties on furs imported until the continental market re-opened. To this request an answer was returned, allowing twelve months storage of furs free of duty and promising drawbacks as if storage had only been for one year, but stating that there were no funds out of which a loan could be made without special authority of Parliament.

It was clear that the Company was in very low water, and that some new salutary policy was demanded. By way of a beginning, barter was abolished as a basis of trade, and money payments ordered. At the same time the Adventurers stole a leaf out of the book of the North-West company, and new regulations, comprising thirty-five articles, were made in the early months of 1810, for carrying on the business in Hudson's Bay.

The principle of allowing to their chief officers a considerable participation in the profits of their trade was admitted. It was found absolutely necessary to adopt some step of this sort, as nothing of such a measure could be sufficient to stem the torrent of aggression with which they had been assailed by the North-West company; and their absolute ruin must have ensued if some effectual means had not been taken, not only to rectify some of the abuses which had crept in under the former system, but also to rouse their officers to a more effectual resistance of the lawless violence practised against them.

The total lack of jurisdiction in the Indian country, as the territory which was the scene of the operations of the fur-traders was called, permitted crime to go unpunished, and numerous representations were made in respect to the evils of this practical immunity from punishment. In Sir Alexander Mackenzie's letter of the 25th of October, 1802, he says that, in view of the improbability of the two companies amalgamating, a jurisdiction should be established as speedily as possible, to prevent the contending fur companies from abusing the power either might possess, so as to secure to each the fruits of fair, honest and industrious exertion; it would also, he believed, tend to put a stop to the increasing animosity between the two companies. Mr. Richardson, of the other company, also pressed for the establishment of a competent jurisdiction and instanced the case of one of the clerks in his company who had killed a clerk of the other in defending the property in his care. The young man had come to Montreal to be tried, but there being no jurisdiction there for such trial, "he remains in the deplorable predicament that neither his innocence nor his guilt can be legally ascertained." He also proposed that a military post should be established at Thunder Bay, on Lake Superior, as an additional means of securing peace.

Repeatedly had the Grand Juries of Quebec and Montreal called attention to this want of jurisdiction. In one report the number of people from the Canadas, chiefly from Lower Canada, was urged as one reason for establishing in the Indian country a court of competent jurisdiction for the trial of offences committed in these territories, including Hudson's Bay.

Plea for establishment of jurisdiction.

"The very heavy expense," observes the report, "incident to the conveyance of offenders from the Territory of Hudson's Bay to England, with the necessary witnesses on both sides, and the cost of prosecution and defence, must generally operate, either to prevent recourse to a tribunal across the ocean, and thereby stimulate to private retaliation and revenge, or where such course can or shall be had, the guilty may escape punishment, and the innocent be sacrificed from the distance of time and place of trial, the death or absence of witnesses, or other causes; and the mind cannot contemplate without horror the possible abuses to which such circumstances might give rise; as in the instance of a prosecutor coming from and at a remote day, when the accused may be destitute of pecuniary means, and the exculpatory evidence may either be dead, removed, or be otherwise beyond his reach, who at all events (however innocent he may finally be found) will have undergone a long and painful confinement, far removed from his family and connections, and perhaps ruinous to every prospect he had in life."

Sir Robert Milnes strongly supported the representation of the Grand Jury, and added that "Under such circumstances every species of offence is to be apprehended, from Trespasses to Murder," and also that "the national character of the English will be debased among the Indians, and the numerous tribes of those people will in consequence thereof be more easily wrought upon by foreign emissaries employed by the Enemies of Great Britain."[88]

In consequence of these representations Lord Hobart promised that immediate steps should be taken to remedy the existing state of affairs. But Milnes became impatient for a decision, and writing in September, 1803, to the Under-Secretary, he reminded him of the promise, the great increase and extent of the fur-trade rendering such an Act daily more necessary. The Act to give jurisdiction to the Courts of Upper and Lower Canada had, however, been assented to on the 11th of the preceding month.

Voyageurs Tracking Canoes up a Rapid.

Canada Jurisdiction Act.

The first case brought to trial under the Act became celebrated. In the autumn of 1809 William Corrigal was the trader at a Company's post near Eagle Lake. On the 15th of September a party of North-Westers established an encampment about forty yards from the Company's post, under one of their clerks, Aeneas MacDonnell. In the evening an Indian arrived in his canoe to trade with Corrigal and to pay a debt which he owed him. As he was not able to defray the whole amount, Corrigal accepted the canoe in part payment. The Indian requested that it might be lent to him for a few days, which was agreed to; and the Indian spent the night at the post with his canoe. In the morning he received in advance some more merchandise, such as clothing for his family and ammunition for his winter hunt. When he finally departed, three of the Company's servants were sent down to the wharf with the canoe and the goods. On their way they were observed by a number of Northmen, including MacDonnell, who went immediately down to the lake, armed with a sword and accompanied by a voyageur named Adhemer, armed with a brace of pistols. Upon pretence that the unhappy Red man was indebted to the North-West company, they proceeded to seize and drag away the canoe and the merchandise to their own wharf. Corrigal observing this, commanded two of his men, James Tate and John Corrigal, to go into the water and prevent the seizure, and as they approached on this mission MacDonnell drew his sword and struck two blows at Tate's head. The latter was unarmed, and warded the blows with his wrist, which was severely gashed. He then received another deep wound in the neck, which felled him to the ground. In the meantime Adhemer had seized John Corrigal (who was also unarmed) and presenting a cocked pistol at his head, swore that if he went near the canoe he would blow out his brains.

Several of the Company's servants who were near the spot, perceiving what was going on, and observing that the rest of MacDonnell's men were collecting with arms, ran up to their own house, which was only about forty or fifty yards from the lake, for weapons of defence. MacDonnell next attacked John Corrigal, who to escape him ran into the lake. Finding the water too deep, however, he was soon obliged to make a turn towards the shore. His pursuer wading after him, aimed a blow at him with his sword, cut his arm above the elbow and laid the bone bare. He followed this up with a tremendous blow at his head, which Robert Leask, one of the Company's servants, fortunately warded off with the paddle of his canoe, which was cut in two by the blow. The North-West leader in a fury now attacked another servant named Essen, aimed a blow at him with his sword, which, however, only struck his hat off. But in making his escape Essen fell into the water. Before he could recover himself another Canadian aimed a blow at his head with a heavy axe, which missed its aim, but dislocated his shoulder, so that he could make no use of his arm for over two months after this affray.

Killing of MacDonnell.

MacDonnell and Adhemer, the one with a drawn sword and the other with a cocked pistol, continued to pursue several other of the Company's servants towards the fort, when one of them, named John Mowat, whom MacDonnell had previously struck with his sword, and was preparing to strike again, shot MacDonnell on the spot.

Trial of Mowat.

MacDonnell's body was carried away, and the parties separated, Corrigal fearing a further attack. On the 24th, a partner of the North-West Company, named Haldane, arrived in a canoe with ten men, and on the following day another partner, McLellan, also arrived. They came to the gates of the stockades, behind which Corrigal and his men had barricaded themselves, and demanded the man who had shot MacDonnell. They declared that if the person was not immediately given up they would either shoot every one of the Company's men, or get the Indians to kill them, were it even to cost them a keg of brandy for each of their heads! Mowat now stepped forward and acknowledged that he was the man, and that he would shoot MacDonnell again in the same circumstances. Much to his surprise the North-Westers announced their intention of taking him and two witnesses down to Montreal for trial. Mowat was thereupon put in irons. From the 2nd of October, when they arrived at Rainy Lake, the unhappy man was generally kept in irons from six in the morning till eight in the evening, and during the night until the 14th of December. During the whole winter he was kept in close confinement, and the two witnesses, Tate and Leask, who had voluntarily accompanied him, were themselves subjected to much insult and indignity, and were obliged to submit to every species of drudgery and labour in order to obtain a bare subsistence. In June the whole party, including Corrigal, arrived at Fort William, the chief trading-post rendezvous of the North-Westers. Here Mowat was imprisoned in a close and miserable dungeon, about six feet square, without any window or light of any kind whatsoever, and when he finally reached Montreal he was in a most pitiable condition. The witnesses were seized on a charge of aiding and abetting the murder of MacDonnell, and this upon the oath of one of the North-West half-breeds. The Hudson's Bay Company had at this time no agent or correspondent at Montreal or any place in Canada, and it was not until the end of November that the Honourable Adventurers heard of the prosecution being carried on against their servants. Immediate steps were taken for their protection, and counsel engaged for the defence. Mowat and his witnesses were indicted for murder. The grand jury found a true bill against Mowat, but not against the others, and Tate and Leask were accordingly discharged.[89]

In spite of the evidence, the jury brought in a verdict of manslaughter. The judge, however, had charged them to find it murder. Mowat was sentenced to be imprisoned six months and branded on the hand with a hot iron. After his discharge, two years from the time he was first put in irons at Eagle Lake, Mowat proceeded from Canada to the United States in order to return to England, but was never heard of again. He is supposed to have been drowned by the breaking of the ice in one of the rivers he had to cross on his way.

The Earl of Selkirk.

Such was the situation in the early years of the century. At this time there rose a name destined to be of more than local fame, that of Thomas Douglas, fifth Earl of Selkirk, a young man of benevolent character, whose feelings had been deeply moved by the sufferings of his countrymen in the Scottish Highlands. Nor was the nobleman's compassion excited without cause. A compulsory exodus of the inhabitants of the mountainous regions in the county of Sutherland was in progress. The tale of expulsion of a vast number of poor tenantry from the estates of the Duchess of Sutherland, which they and their ancestors had looked upon as their own without the necessity of rent and taxes, may be heard to-day from some white-haired old grandfather, who had it from the lips of his sire, in the far north of Scotland. The system of rents and land-management as it prevails to-day all over the Highlands had only then been put in force, and the squatters were driven to seek their homes as best they might in the remote and sequestered places of the earth. Selkirk encouraged this emigration as the only remedy; and having endeavoured in vain to secure the active co-operation of the Government, resolved to settle a colony on waste lands granted him in Prince Edward Island. The better to ensure success, he went in person to oversee the whole enterprise. Gathering together about eight hundred of these poor people, who bade a melancholy farewell to their heather-robed hills, they arrived at their future home early in September, 1803.

Selkirk visited Montreal in this and also in the following year on matters connected with his philanthropic undertaking, and on both occasions evinced the heartiest interest in the great territory to the north-west which formed the theatre of action for the two rival fur-trading companies.

The Prince Edward Island colony continuing to prosper, Lord Selkirk now conceived the plan of forming a colony on the banks of the Red River, in Rupert's Land.[90] In order to execute his project with a greater assurance of success, he again, in 1805, addressed the British Government and nation, pointing out the successful issue of his colony as an example of the excellent results which would attend a further exodus of the superfluous population.

Time went on and the execution of the plan being still in abeyance, the great decline in Hudson's Bay stock suggested an idea to Selkirk. He submitted the charter to several of the highest legal authorities in England, and got from them the following:

"We are of the opinion that the grant of the said contained charter is good, and that it will include all the country, the waters of which run into Hudson's Bay, as ascertained by geographical observations.

Legal opinion on the Company's charter.

"We are of opinion that an individual holding from the Hudson's Bay Company a lease or grant in fee simple of any part of their territory, will be entitled to all the ordinary rights of landed property in England, and will be entitled to prevent other persons from occupying any part of the lands; from cutting down timber and fishing in the adjoining waters (being such as a private right of fishing may subsist in), and may (if he can peaceably or otherwise in due course of law) dispossess them of any buildings which they have recently erected within the limits of their property.

"We are of opinion that the grant of the civil and criminal jurisdiction is valid, though it is not granted to the Company, but to the Governor and Council at their respective establishments. We cannot recommend, however, it to be exercised so as to affect the lives or limbs of criminals. It is to be exercised by the Governor and Council as judges, who are to proceed according to the laws of England.

"The Company may appoint a sheriff to execute judgments and do his duty as in England.

"We are of opinion that the sheriff, in case of resistance to his authority, may collect the population to his assistance, and put arms into the hands of his servants for defence against attack, and to assist in enforcing the judgments of the courts; but such powers cannot be exercised with too much circumspection.

"We are of opinion that all persons will be subject to the jurisdiction of the court, who reside or are found within the territories over which it extends.

"We do not think the Canada Jurisdiction Act (43 George III.) gives jurisdiction within the territories of the Hudson's Bay Company, the same being within the jurisdiction of their own governors and council.[91]

"We are of opinion that the Governor (in Hudson's) might under the authority of the Company, appoint constables and other officers for the preservation of the peace and that the officers so appointed would have the same duties and privileges as the same officers in England, so far as these duties and privileges may be applicable to their situation in the territories of the Company." This was signed by Sir Samuel Ronully, Mr. Justice Holroyd, W.M. Cruise, J. Scarlett and John Bell. There could be thus no question of Selkirk's right. The Company's charter, amongst other provisions, expressly forbids all English subjects from entering, without license or authority, upon the territories of the Hudson's Bay Company. The Governor and Company only are empowered to grant such authority and on them also is conferred the right of establishing castles, fortifications, forts, garrisons, colonies, plantations, towns and villages, in any parts or places within the limits of their territory. They had also the right of sending ships of war, men or ammunition, to their colonies, fortifications or plantations, and of appointing governors, commanders and officers over them.

Selkirk began by purchasing several thousand pounds worth of shares in the Company.

Late in 1810 he made a formal proposition to the Company, a proposition previously made and rejected, for a settlement to be made within its territory. This time some of the Honourable Adventurers began to see that the scheme might be fraught with salvation for themselves.

Lord Selkirk was asked to lay before the committee the terms on which he would accept a grant of land within the Hudson's Bay territories, "specifying what restrictions he would be prepared to consent to be imposed on the settlers." Also what security he would offer to the Company against any injury to its trade or to its rights and privileges.

Lord Selkirk responded to this, and his proposals were agreed to, subject to final approbation of a general court of all the Adventurers.

Selkirk's project.

It now dawned upon the wiser spirits that here was being offered them the means for the Company's salvation. Nevertheless, the traditional opposition of the Company to any project of the kind still lingered, and was not easily disposed of. For weeks the meetings in committee resounded with appeals to "traditional policy," to "loyalty to the noble, the ancient founders," to "a spirit of reverence for the history of our Company," but all to no purpose. Selkirk was to carry the day. A general court was convened, by public notice, in May 1811, when the stockholders were informed that the Governor and Committee considered it beneficial to their general interests to grant Lord Selkirk 116,000 square miles of their territory, on condition that he should establish a colony and furnish, on certain terms, from amongst the settlers, such labourers as would be required by the Company in their trade.

In order to give the partners a further opportunity of making themselves fully informed of the nature of the proposed measure, an adjournment of the court took place. In the meanwhile notice was given to all the stockholders that the terms of the proposed grant were left at the secretary's office for their inspection.

This interval was the opportunity of McGillivray and his friends.

In certain quarters, no pains or misrepresentations were spared by persons associated with the North-West Company to prejudice the public mind against it. The newspapers teemed with falsehoods representing the country as cold or barren, as a dreary waste or interminable forest, unfit to be the abode of men and incapable of improvement. Selkirk was accosted in Pall Mall by a friend who remarked: "By God, sir, if you are bent on doing something futile, why do you not sow tares at home in order to reap wheat, or plough the desert of Sahara, which is nearer."

Old servants of the Company came forward to dispel these calumnies, and seeing their first falsehoods destroyed, Selkirk's enemies now proceeded to follow new tactics. They spoke with feigned alarm concerning the hostile disposition of the aborigines; they lamented with affected sympathy and humanity the injuries and slaughters to which the colonists would be exposed from the savages.

At the adjourned meeting the proposition was again discussed amidst the greatest excitement and tumult, and adopted. A memorial or protest was however entered against the measure, bearing the signature of six of the proprietors.

Opposition by agents of the North-West Company.

Of these six signing the protest, three were persons closely connected with and interested in the rival commercial concerns of the North-West Company of Montreal; and two of the three were, at the very moment, avowed London agents of that association. These had become proprietors of Hudson's Bay stock only eight and forty hours before the general meeting. They were not indeed possessed of it long enough to entitle them to vote at the meeting; but their names now being entered in the Company's books, though the ink was scarcely dry with which they were inserted, they felt themselves competent to formally raise their voices in condemnation of those measures which the committee of directors unanimously, and the general court by a great majority, had approved of.

Their design in acquiring the Company's stock was obvious. However circuitous the stratagem might be, it was clear that they had thus become proprietors of one commercial company for the purpose of advancing the fortunes of another, and a rival concern.[92] The stratagem did not altogether fail, for Lord Selkirk's agents were yet to encounter much friction in distant quarters supposed to be friendly, and required to be obedient to the orders of the Company.

When the vote was taken, it was found that for the question there appeared holders of stock valued at £29,937; against it, £14,823. The Earl, himself, voted "for"—£4,087; the principal opponent of the scheme being one William Thwaytes, whose interest was represented at £9,233.

At this meeting a memorial was read violently opposing the scheme, signed by Thwaytes and four or five others. According to them, the main objections were:—(a) Impolitic; (b) Consideration inadequate; (c) Grant asked for very large proportion of Company's holding, viz.: 70,000 square miles, or about 45,000,000 acres; (d) Should be a public sale, if any, not a private contract with a member of the Company; (e) No penalty for failure to find settlers; (f) Colonization unfavourable to the fur-trade; private traffic would be carried on with the United States of America.

The Earl proposed to find a number of effective men as servants to the Hudson's Bay Company in return for a grant of land, viz., two hundred men for ten years, from 1812, who would every year be ready to embark between May 1st and July 1st at an appointed place in Scotland.

The Company were to pay wages to each man not exceeding £20. Should the Earl fail, he agreed to forfeit £10 per man short of two hundred. As to proposed grants of land to settlers, two hundred acres were to be given to labourers or artificers; one thousand acres to a master of a trading-house. The Company were, of course, to have full rights of access to all the surrendered districts.

Earl Selkirk's proposal accepted.

The customs duties, exports and imports, payable by settlers were not to exceed five per cent, at Port Nelson, unless it happened that a higher duty was levied at Quebec. The duties so to be levied were to be applied to the expense of Government police, communication between Lake Winnipeg and Port Nelson, etc., and not to be taken as profits for the Company. The show of hands was in favour of the proposal; but a protest was handed in to the Governor by Thwaytes and others. In spite of this, on the 13th of June, the deed was signed, sealed and delivered by the secretary on behalf of the Company.

The lands were defined by deed as situate between 52° 30' north latitude and 102° 30' west longitude, a map being affixed to the deed.

In reading this protest, one who was ignorant of the true state of affairs would have been led to believe that the partners concerned had no object so dear to them as the welfare and prosperity of the Hudson's Bay Company. These gentlemen appeared to be animated by the most thorough devotion and zeal, as they stood together declaiming in loud, earnest tones against the errors into which their beloved Company was falling, and pouring out their sympathy to the emigrant settlers who might be lured to their destruction by establishing themselves on the lands so granted "out of reach," to employ their own phrase, "of all those aids and comforts which are derived from civil society;" and so it did truly appear to many then as it has done since. But let us examine those signatures, and lo, the wolf obtrudes himself basking in the skin of a lamb!

The grant was thus confirmed. The opposition had found itself powerless, and Selkirk was put into possession of a territory only 5,115 square miles less than the entire area of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.[93]

The grant secured, Selkirk at once despatched agents to Ireland and throughout the highlands of Scotland, to engage servants, some for the Company's service, others for general labourers in the colony. These last were known as "his lordship's servants," and were engaged for a term of years, at the expiration of which they became entitled to one hundred acres of land, free of cost. They were placed under the charge of Miles McDonnell, who received a joint appointment from Selkirk and the Company, as first Governor of the new colony.

Selkirk's immigrants arrive.

The first section of the immigrant party arrived at York Factory late in the autumn of 1811.[94] This post was then in charge of William Auld, who, as we have seen, occupied the position of Superintendent of the Northern Department of Rupert's Land. After a short residence at the fort, where they were treated in a somewhat tyrannical and high-handed fashion by the Governor, who had scant sympathy for the new rÉgime, the party were sent forward to Seal Creek, fifty miles up Nelson River. Governor McDonnell and one Hillier, in the character of justice of the peace, accompanied them thither, and preparations were at once made for the erection of a suitable shelter.

McDonnell experienced a great deal of trouble during the winter with the men under his charge, for a mutinous spirit broke out, and he was put to his wits' end to enforce discipline. He put it all down to the Glasgow servants. "These Glasgow rascals," he declared to Auld, the Governor of York Factory, "have caused us both much trouble and uneasiness. A more stubborn, litigious and cross-grained lot were never put under any person's care. I cannot think that any liberality of rum or rations could have availed to stop their dissatisfaction. Army and navy discipline is the only thing fit to manage such fierce spirits."

But the Irish of the party were hardly more tractable. On New Year's night, 1812, a violent and unprovoked attack was made by some of the Irish on a party of Orkneymen, who were celebrating the occasion. Three of the latter were so severely beaten that for a month the surgeon could not report their lives entirely out of danger. Four of the Irishmen concerned in this assault were sent back home. "Worthless blackguards," records the Governor; "the lash may make them serviceable to the Government in the army or navy, but they will never do for us."

On the subject of the Orkney servants of the Company all critics were not agreed. Governor McDonnell's opinion, for instance, was not flattering:—

"There cannot," he reported, "be much improvement made in the country while the Orkneymen form the majority of labourers; they are lazy, spiritless, and ill-disposed—wedded to old habits, strongly prejudiced against any change, however beneficial. It was with the utmost reluctance they could be prevailed on to drink the spruce juice to save themselves from the scurvy; they think nothing of the scurvy, as they are then idle, and their wages run on.... It is not uncommon for an Orkneyman to consume six pounds or eight pounds of meat in a day, and some have ate as much in a single meal. This gluttonous appetite, they say, is occasioned by the cold. I entirely discredit the assertion, as I think it rather to be natural to themselves. All the labour I have seen these men do would scarcely pay for the victuals they consume. With twenty-five men belonging to it, the factory was last winter distressed for firewood, and the people sent to tent in the woods."[95]

Opposition by the Nor'-Westers.

Meanwhile, leaving the shivering immigrants, distrustful of their officers and doubtful of what the future had in store for them, to encamp at Seal Creek, let us turn to the state of affairs amongst the parties concerned elsewhere, particularly amongst the Nor'-Westers. Simon McGillivray, who was agent in London for that Company, watched all Selkirk's acts with the utmost distrust, and kept the partners continually informed of the turn affairs were taking. He assured them that Selkirk's philanthropy was all a cloak, designed to cover up a scheme for the total extinction of the Hudson's Bay Company's rivals. The colony was to be planted to ruin their trade. It was an endeavour to check the physical superiority of the Nor'-Westers and by means of this settlement secure to the Hudson's Bay Company and to himself, not only the extensive and sole trade of the country within their own territories, but a "safe and convenient stepping-stone for monopolizing all the fur-trade of the Far West."

The partners in Montreal were stirred to action. Regarding Lord Selkirk's motives in this light, they warmly disputed the validity of the Hudson's Bay Company's Charter and of the grants of land made to him. It was decided to bring all the forces of opposition they possessed to bear on this "invasion of their hunting grounds."