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Home , Francisco de Eliza, Greater Victoria, Maquinna, Margaret (1791 ship), Nootka Convention, Nootka Island

Volume 34, No. 4 Fall 2001 $5.00 HISTORICAL NEWS ISSN 1195-8294 Journal of the British Columbia Historical Federation

Our Spanish Heritage

Mexican Base A Unique Friendship Sailing in Northern Waters

Deception at Mud Bay Uncovering Malaspina Museo de América, . Courtesy Robin Inglis Madrid. América, Museo de Detail from a 1791 drawing by José Cardero— artist on the Malaspina Expedition— of Special Issue the battery of San Miguel built in 1789 at the entry to Friendly Cove. At that time some 75 soldiers were stationed at Yuquot . Not all went well: “... it seems that Spanish Spanish presence officials struggled to control their troops. ’s five-year sojourn at on BC’s coast was peppered with incidents of violence. Spanish troops chased Native women for sex and took house boards from Native villages.” (Quotation from p 106 of David W. Clayton’s ISLANDS OF TRUTH., reviewed in this issue by Phyllis Reeve.) British Columbia Historical News British Columbia Historical Federation Journal of the PO Box 5254, Station B., Victoria BC V8R 6N4 British Columbia Historical Federation a charitable society under the income tax act Published Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall. Editor: Honorary Patron: His Honour, the Honorable Garde B. Gardom, Q.C. Fred Braches Honorary President: Alice Glanville, Box 746, Grand Forks, BC V0M 1H0 PO Box 130 Whonnock BC, V2W 1V9 Officers Phone 604.462.8942 President: Wayne Desrochers [email protected] 13346 57th Avenue, Surrey BC V3X 2W8 Phone 604. 599.4206 Fax. 604.507.4202 [email protected] Book Review Editor: First Vice President: Roy J.V. Pallant Anne Yandle 1541 Merlynn Crescent, North BC V7J 2X9 3450 West 20th Avenue Phone 604.986.8969 [email protected] Vancouver BC, V6S 1E4 Second Vice President: Jacqueline Gresko Phone 604.733.6484 5931 Sandpiper Court, Richmond BC V7E 3P8 [email protected] Phone 604.274.4383 [email protected] Subscription Secretary: Secretary: Arnold Ranneris Joel Vinge 1898 Quamichan Street, Victoria BC V8S 2B9 561 Woodland Drive Phone 250. 598.3035 [email protected] Cranbrook BC V1C 6V2 Recording Secretary: Elizabeth (Betty) Brown Phone/Fax 250.489.2490 473 Transit Road, Victoria BC V8S 4Z4 [email protected] Phone 250.598.1171 Treasurer: Ron Greene Publishing Committee: PO Box 1351, Victoria BC V8W 2W7 To n y F a r r Phone 250. 598.1835 Fax 250.598.5539 [email protected] 125 Castle Cross Road, Past President: Ron Welwood BC V8K 2G1 R.R. # 1, S-22 C-1, Nelson BC V1L 5P4 Phone 250.537.1123 Phone 250.825.4743 [email protected] Copy editing: Helmi Braches Editor: Fred Braches Proof reading: Tony Farr PO Box 130, Whonnock BC V2W 1V9 Layout and Production: Fred Braches Phone 604.462.8942 [email protected] Member at Large: Melva Dwyer Subscriptions 2976 McBride Ave., Surrey BC V4A 3G6 Individual $15.00 per year Phone 604.535.3041 Institutional $20.00 per year Member at Large: Ron Hyde For addresses outside add $6.00 #20 12880 Railway Ave., Richmond BC V7E 6G2 Please send correspondence regarding Phone: 604.277.2627 Fax 604.277.2675 [email protected] subscriptions to the subscription secretary in Committees Cranbrook. Some back issues of the journal Archivist: Stoneberg are available—ask the editor in Whonnock. Box 687, Princeton BC V0X 1W0, Phone 250.295.3362 Single copies of recent issues are for sale at Membership Secretary: Terry Simpson Books and Company, Prince George BC 193 Bird Sanctuary, BC V9R 6G8 Gibson Coast Books, BC Phone 250.754.5697 [email protected] Galiano Museum Historical Trails and Markers: John Spittle Gray Creek Store, Gray Creek BC 1241 Mount Crown Road, BC V7R 1R9 Royal Museum Shop, Victoria BC Phone 604.988.4565 [email protected] This publication is indexed in the CBCA, published by W. Kaye Lamb Essay Scholarships Committee: Frances Gundry Micromedia. 255 Niagara Street, Victoria BC V8V 1G4 ISSN 1195-8294 Phone 250.385.6353 [email protected] Production Mail Registration Number 1245716 Publications Assistance: Nancy Stuart-Stubbs Publications Mail Registration No. 09835 2651 York Avenue, Vancouver BC V6K 1E6 Phone 604.738.5132 [email protected] The British Columbia Heritage Trust has pro- Writing Competition—Lieutenant-Governor’s Award: vided financial assistance to this project to support Shirley Cuthbertson conservation of our heritage resources, gain further #306 - 225 Belleville Street, Victoria BC V8V 4T9 knowledge and increase public understanding of the Phone 250.382.0288 complete history of British Columbia. Publishing Committee British Columbia Historical News: see column on the left BCHF Web site: Eileen Mak 779 East 31st Ave., Vancouver BC V5V 2W9 Phone 604.875.8023 [email protected]

Our Web site, HTTP://BCHF.BC.CA, is hosted by Selkirk College in Castlegar, BC Volume 34, No. 4 BRITISH COLUMBIA Fall 2001 $5.00 HISTORICAL NEWS ISSN 1195-8294 Journal of the British Columbia Historical Federation

2 A Spanish Heritage for British Columbia A Precious Spanish Heritage. by Robin Inglis In her book On Stormy Seas, B. Guild 4 British Columbia’s Mexican Connection: The Naval Gillespie recalls the mysterious disappearance Base at San Blas 1768-1810 of the words “It was Dawn for Britain, but by Nick Doe Twighlight for Spain” from a plaque on the Spanish Banks hill in Vancouver. The plaque 8 Chief and Bodega y Quadra commemorates the first friendly meeting of by Freeman M. Tovell the captains Vancouver, Galiano, and Valdés 15 Jacinto Caamaño: A Spaniard in BC’s Northern Waters on the waters off Point Grey. That “correc- tion” of the plaque happened just before the by John Crosse Spanish Monarchs visited Vancouver in 21 Translating Malaspina March 1984. The removal of the wording by Andrew David was an act of courtesy and diplomacy. In this issue we like to think about the 23 Fraudulent Bay: Spanish Explorations of friendly encounter on the waters off Span- by Nick Doe ish Banks, not in the context of an interna- tional European confrontation but with an 29 Reports: A Narrative From Friendly Cove emphasis on the spirit of co-operation of by Robert Eberle those mariners as well as awareness of this 45 Archives and Archivists briefly shared past of British Columbians, British Columbia’s Moving Past, Preserved Native and non-Native, and Spain. Our precious Spanish heritage is remem- by Dennis J. Duffy bered mostly by a multitude of geographi- 44 Token History: Two Diaries cal names; names respected by contempo- by Ronald Greene rary and later explorers, mariners, British, and British Columbian. Those names give proof of the pioneering work done by these peo- 20 THE A LEXANDRO MALASPINA RESEARCH CENTRE ple in exploring and describing our coastal by John Black regions and those who lived here. Yes, there 32 BOOK REVIEWS is much history to be told about the Spanish 40 FAMILY HISTORY by Brenda L. Smith voyages and presence and fortunately there 38 WEB-SITE FORAYS by Gwen Szychter are now an increasing number of British Columbians and historians elsewhere actively 45 INNOVATION & IMAGINATION by Patrick A. Dunae involved in the research of that part of BC’s 46 NEWS AND NOTEs history. 48 FEDERATION NEWS In 1971, in the fourth year of BC Histori- REVELSTOKE 2002 cal News, founder of the journal and editor Philip Yandle published a 10-page article by Tomàs Bartroli, then at UBC, on the Span- ish presence on the Northwest Coast. Near nothing else was published on the subject in “Any country worthy of a future should be interested in its past.” the following thirty years. This issue should W. Kaye Lamb, 1937 correct that omission…somewhat. A warm gracias to the authors. THE EDITOR

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 1 A Spanish Heritage for British Columbia by Robin Inglis

Robin Inglis is director T THE end of the fifteenth century, a pa- Following Spanish involvement in the Ameri- of the North Vancouver pal division of the world encouraged and can War of Independence, the arrival of traders Museum and Archives sanctioned the expansion of Europe by in the North Pacific and the threatening visit of and president of A dividing the world between Spain and . La Pérouse’s French expedition to the North- Vancouver’s Spanish Spanish conquests in the Americas were thus le- west Coast in 1786 led to renewed Spanish ac- Pacific Historical Society. In 1991, as gitimized, and Spain claimed the entire Pacific tivity. Esteban José Martínez explored the Alaskan director of the Vancou- coast of North and South America. Vast distances coast north and west to Unalaska Island in 1788, ver Maritime Museum, and adverse sailing conditions, however, combined returning to Mexico with information that sug- he and author and with the demands of Spain’s Central and South gested a Russian plan to occupy Nootka. The historian John American empire, to thwart Spanish exploration Spanish decided to move first and in 1789 Kendrick, developed of the coast beyond southern , with Martínez led an expedition to the major exhibition, the result that the Northwest Coast (Oregon, where they established themselves on the site of “Enlightened Voyages,” , British Columbia and ) was the Mowachaht village of Yuquot in Friendly and an international the last temperate region to be confirmed on the Cove. Here Martínez seized British fur trading symposium to cel- world map. vessels, which had arrived to set up a trading post ebrate the bicentennial of the visit of the Spanish exploration in the late eighteenth cen- in the wake of the Cook expedition’s discovery Malaspina Expedition tury was motivated by concern over a Russian of the high value of sea furs in China. This to the Northwest Coast approach to (Mexico), and later by a action touched off the Nootka Sound Crisis that of America. Robin search for the . As early as the nearly led to a war in Europe. Inglis edited the 1740s Russian traders were advancing northeast The Spanish withdrew from Nootka in the papers given at this along the Aleutian Islands and Vitus Bering Fall of 1789 but in 1790, just as the authorities in symposium, which reached the Alaskan coast at about 60° North. In Madrid were preparing to cede to Britain the were published by the 1774 Juan Pérez left the naval base of San Blas in right to trade on the coast, Francisco Eliza re- Vancouver Maritime command of the Santiago. On 18 July he sighted turned to occupy the site more permanently, Museum in the follow- the northern end of the Queen Charlotte Islands along with a garrison of soldiers under the com- ing year under the title Spain and the North and encountered a number of Haida who came mand of Pedro Alberni. While construction of a Pacific Coast. He has offshore Langara Island in canoes and engaged in fort and settlement proceeded, the Spanish em- lectured widely on the trade. But Pérez did not land. Later he anchored barked upon three years of feverish exploration subject of early off Nootka Sound on the west coast of Vancou- in the region and explored into exploration, with ver Island—Surgidero de San Lorenzo—and there the Strait of . The Spanish wintered particular reference to was more trade with local natives. But again he at Nootka and in the summer of 1791 Eliza con- the Spanish, and has neither landed nor officially took possession of tinued this exploration with José Maria Narváez, published a number of the area for Spain. Nevertheless, these first con- in command of the tiny schooner Santa Saturnina, articles from papers tacts between Europeans and peo- becoming the first European to enter the Strait delivered internation- ple on the coast resulted in the first descriptions of Georgia—Canal de Nuestra Señora del Rosario— ally. He contributed a number of entries in of native culture. In 1775 Juan Francisco de la off present-day Vancouver. That summer, also, the recently published Bodega y Quadra in the Sonora reached 58°30' Nootka Sound was visited, explored and de- Encyclopaedia of British and explored Bucareli Bay off Prince of Wales scribed by scientists attached to the major expe- Columbia Island in Alaska. At the end of the 1770s, learning dition commanded by who of ’s plan to search for the Pacific had earlier searched, without success, with his opening of the long-dreamed-about Northwest for the Northwest Passage—a navigable waterway between the At- Passage along the Alaskan coast. lantic and Pacific—Spanish authorities launched When Spain and Great Britain reached a dip- a third expedition, which, although a year late to lomatic settlement over Nootka Sound, Bodega intercept the English explorer, sailed again under y Quadra was sent to negotiate the details of a the command of Bodega y Quadra in 1779 as far handover of the site of the Spanish establishment as , also in Alaska. with , the great English navi-

2 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Left: The and under the command of Dionisio Alcalá Galiano and Cayetano Valdés passing through the in the summer of 1792, enroute into the Gulf of Georgia and a historic meeting with George Vancouver’s expedition off Point Grey. is in the background of this drawing by José Cardero, who made two trips to the Northwest Coast in 1791 and 1792 Cardero left us with more drawings of the area and its people than any other artist of the exploration

Museo Naval, Madrid. Courtesy of Robin Inglis Madrid. Museo Naval, period. gator who meticulously explored the Northwest affair was ultimately resolved in Europe. In 1795 Coast during three summers, 1792-1794. Spain ended her occupation of Yuquot and, fol- Bodega’s Expedición de Límites during the sum- lowing one final expedition in 1796, withdrew mer of 1792 also involved a search in northern from further maritime activity north of Califor- British Columbia waters by Jacinto Caamaño for nia. the Strait of Fonte, another suspected but wholly The charts, drawings, journals, and collections mythical passage to the Atlantic. of botanical specimens and artifacts from these When Malaspina returned to Mexico in the early Spanish voyages are today housed princi- fall of 1791 he learned the details of the explora- pally in the Museo de América, the Museo Na- tions into and beyond the val and the archives of the Real Jardín Botánico and persuaded Revilla Gigedo to dispatch in Madrid. They are a treasured legacy of the “first two of his officers, Dionisio Alcalá Galiano and contact” period between the vibrant native cul- Cayetano Valdés, in the Sutil and Mexicana to con- tures of the Northwest Coast and European ex- tinue the search for a passage to the Atlantic dur- plorers and traders. Recent scholarship, publica- ing the summer of 1792. After visiting Bodega y tions, conferences, and exhibitions, precipitated Quadra at Nootka, they entered the strait and, primarily by the bicentennial of the Malaspina off Point Grey in late June, encountered Vancou- Expedition in 1991, have served to rescue the ver, himself exploring in the waters behind Van- story of British Columbia’s Spanish history from couver Island en route to Nootka for his meet- the shadow of the nineteenth-century emergence ings with Bodega. For two weeks the Spanish of an English-speaking and the and British explorers sailed together sharing in- evolution of and British Co- formation as they worked their way into the is- lumbia into the British Empire. Those who live lands that we now know separate Vancouver Is- in this part of the world today are the beneficiar- land from the mainland. After parting from the ies of an increased understanding and apprecia- British, Galiano and Valdés took a route into tion of the fact that, in addition to an English and, via Goletas Chan- and American past, they also have an important nel, entered the Pacific and proceeded to Nootka, link with Spain and a precious Spanish Information on the completing the first circumnavigation of Vancou- heritage. ver Island by Europeans. That fall Bodega y Vancouver Spanish Pacific Historical Quadra and Vancouver failed to settle the com- Society can be found peting Spanish and British claims and the Nootka on page 47.

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 3 British Columbia’s Mexican Connection The Naval Base at San Blas 1768–1810 by Nick Doe

Nick Doe, a former ANY of the Spanish water marshes and lakes, and resident of White Rock, ships that visited the then the alluvial plain. From now lives on Gabriola coast of British Co- the air, the land to the north Island. His interest is in M lumbia in the late eighteenth looks as though it has been the history of coastal century sailed from the port of furrowed by the fingers of a BC. San Blas. Nowadays, asked to de- giant’s hand, leaving long, scribe exactly where San Blas is, narrow lagoons running par- one would probably have to allel to the sea. reach for an atlas.1 Yet, this small Two rivers emerge from 1 San Blas is in the state of and congenial Mexican town, the mangrove swamps on ei- Nayarit, Mexico at which is as far south of Victoria ther side of the town: the San 21º32’N, 105º17’W, as Toronto is east, was for forty Cristóbal to the east, and El 3394 km from Victoria BC. years the headquarters of the Pozo (formerly El Arsenal) to 2 The task of a visitador- general in Spanish in the north Pa- the west. Over the years, sur- dominions was to cific. Here, in a belated effort to rounding jungle has been implement royal policies. maintain their claim to all the cleared to make way for pa- They reported directly to lands of the Pacific Rim, the paya, mango, and banana or- the viceroy and were given wide-ranging powers to Spanish established shipbuilding chards, and near-by lagoons appoint officials, proclaim yards, warehouses, and a fortified are used as shrimp ponds. But new regulations, manage harbour. In what the historian development is not rampant. financial matters, etc. They regularly visited provinces Warren Cook has called the Today’s population, although to confer with local flood tide of empire, Spanish growing, is not much greater authorities, inspect, and ships sailed from San Blas to es- than what it was at the height report on conditions, tablish Franciscan missions in of the Spanish activities. The resolve problems, and direct the activities of the Upper California, naval bases at only buildings at the edges of provincial administrators. San Diego and Monterey, and the long, sandy beaches are 3 Spanish cedar was an naval outposts at Neah Bay on palapas (a shelter made of important wood in tropical the Olympic Peninsula and at sticks and palm fronds), America; aromatic, strong, easily worked, resistant to Nootka Sound off the west coast where you can drink coco- dry rot and insect damage, of Vancouver Island. nut juice, eat ceviche or grilled it has now gone from many To reach San Blas from Puerto pescado, and watch Mexican areas where it once grew. Vallarta, you drive north for families enjoying the sun. Some of the vessels built at San Blas were constructed about three hours on the main Little is known of the early “keel to masthead” using Mazatlán highway, and then, just colonial history of San Blas Spanish cedar (Antonio de north of Tepic, take the road that and no structures dating from Pineda). wanders down to the coast that period remain. Some- 4 Other trees known to have been used include the through green, tropical country- time early in the seventeenth rubber tree (Castilla elastica), side. If you go in winter, the century Franciscans founded a soft lightweight wood streets will be dry and dusty, and a mission here and urged the used for construction; the weather pleasant, but in the Nick Doe Indians to give up their semi- mesquite (Prosopis juliflora), Above: Map of the coast of N. America tough and strong, used for summertime it often rains. nomadic hunting life style in posts and furniture; lead The land around San Blas is showing Spanish attempts at controlling the hills to the south and east tree (Leucaena glauca), a hard flat. As you move inland, the bar- the whole of the Pacific coast of North where they were difficult to heavy wood used for rier beaches give way to man- America using ships built and manned reach. Most of those that did by the Naval Department at San Blas. grove swamps, followed by fresh- so quickly succumbed to >>>

4 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Left: Part of a chart of San Blas made in 1822, shortly after Mexican independence. Not a lot has changed. The Spanish naval headquarters on the hill are marked “old monas(tr)y” and the hilltop town as “in ruins”.

machinery components; tamarind (Tamarindus indica) for the charcoal used in

, Capt. Basil Hall, 1882. Basil Hall, Capt. , making gun-powder; chicharrón (Comocladia ONWAY dodonaea), a shrub with a sap that stains, used for paints and rouge dyes; silk- cotton tree (Ceiba pentandra) for silk stuffing material; and white mangrove (Laguncularia racemosa) for firewood. A local correspondent of the author, Manuel Lomelí, had no difficulty in identifying over 50 species of indigenous trees growing in Port San Blas by Henry Foster, Master Mate of H.M.S. C Master Mate of H.M.S. Henry San Blas by Foster, Port the immediate vicinity of newly introduced diseases, or fell ill as the result José de Gálvez, responded to the crisis in “North- San Blas. 5 Other trees and plants of trading their healthy climate for that of the ern California” by ordering the establishment of used for refreshment and hot and humid river estuaries. There are reports a new naval base to control operations there. medicinal purposes of pearl fishing; salt was shipped from San Blas San Blas was chosen because of its high lati- included oranges, limes, and from Matanchén a few miles to the south; tude and sheltered harbour, its copious supplies tamarinds (candy, preserves, and seasonings), sapodilla Manila galleons bound for Acapulco sometimes of fresh water, salt, and wood, and for its access to (Manilkara zapota) (chewing sheltered here from summer storms; Jesuits sailed the agricultural produce of the interior highlands. gum), cacao (cocoa and for Baja California; and there were, no doubt, Many of the raw materials required for shipbuild- chocolate), bitterbush many unrecorded visits by pirate ships. There, the ing were obtained locally. Spanish cedar (Cedrela (Picramnia pentandra) for treating fever, gumbolimbo history of this remote and sparsely-populated set- odorata) was the most extensively used construc- (Busera simaruba) for tlement might have remained unremarkable were tion timber.3 Other trees, such as guapinole dysentery, and margarita it not for events in the northernmost reaches of (Hymenaea courbaril) whose sap was used to make (common daisy) used as a tonic and possibly as a the Pacific Ocean. varnish, and lignumvitae (Guaiacum sanctum), whose treatment for nightsweats. In 1741, Bering and Chirikov reached Alaska heavy, fine-grained wood was ideal for making 6 A packet boat (Sp. from the Kamchatka Peninsula, and in the ensu- blocks, tackles, and bearings, were also necessary paquebote) was basically a ing years, Russian fur traders, with the active and in good supply.4 Indians from near-by frigate (200 tons) with stowage space in place of encouragement of Catherine II, rap- Tequepexpan were contracted to gather pitch and heavy armaments. idly expanded their activities into the region. By tar; and vitamin-C-rich guavas, the favoured fruit 7 A late-eighteenth century 1760, all of the Aleutian Islands were supplying for the treatment of scurvy, were gathered from list of missions in California pelts of sea otters, blue foxes, and fur seals, to- the local forests.5 being supplied from San 6 Blas include: Purísima gether with walrus tusks from mainland Alaska, By the mid-1770s, packet boats built in the Concepción, San Antonio to the markets of China. Plans were made to push San Blas shipyards were plying regularly between de Padua, Santa Bárbara, farther south, and the Spanish, who for more than the coast of Nueva Galicia and missions in Alta San Buena Ventura, San a hundred years had been content to leave unex- California,7 carrying essential supplies of food, Carlos, Santa Clara, San Diego, , San plored the vast northern territories that they tools, manufactured goods, and barrels of sweet Gabriel Arcángel, San Juan claimed by virtue of having discovered the Pa- wine for celebrating Mass. It was from here that de Capistrano, and San Luis cific, were alarmed. In 1768, the visitador-general,2 Juan José Pérez Hernández sailed the San Blas- Obispo.

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 5 8 A complete list of ships built frigate Santiago north to the Queen Char- The chapel lower down the slope was built built at San Blas known to lotte Islands and Nootka Sound in 1774, to be- with the same heavy stones as the contaduría. It is have visited British Columbia in the eighteenth come the first European to have visited the na- a strangely cold ruin—cold both physically and century includes the tive peoples of British Columbia. It was from here spiritually. Its wooden roof too has gone, although brigantine Activa (213 tons), that Esteban José Martínez sailed to Alaska in 1788 the narrow, grey-black stone arches, that once the frigates Princesa (189 to meet the Russian intruders along the shores supported it still span the ten-metre wide nave.11 tons) and Santiago (225 tons), and the schooners of the “Spanish lake” as the Pacific was some- After independence, the bronze bells, at least one Sutil and Mexicana times called. And it was from here, in 1792, that of them cracked, were taken down to the town, (46 tons). Another the San Blas-built schooners Sutil and Mexicana where for a time they were mounted in a wooden schooner, the Santa Saturina set out on their historic circumnavigation of Van- frame only a metre or so high. It was a report of (32 tons), which was used in the first European couver Island, the first European vessels to do this that inspired the American poet Henry W. exploration of the Strait of so.8 Longfellow’s final work: The Bells of San Blas Georgia, was assembled at To reach the ruins of the old Spanish head- (1882). Nootka, probably from a quarters, you walk towards the bridge that crosses At least one of the chaplains that served here kit of parts made at San Blas. It returned to San Blas the San Cristóbal estuary at the entrance to the went north. Lummi Bay, near Bellingham in the in 1791 where it was used town and climb the steep, cobbled road, full of state of Washington, was known to the Spanish as for many years for local playing children, up past the town cemetery onto Ensenada de Loera (Loera’s Bay) and was so named traffic and deliveries. 9 Also known as Cerro de the flat-topped hill known as the Cerro de in 1791 by the commandant of Nootka after his 9 Contaduría, literally “hill of Basilio. The cerro has the peaceful air of an aban- ’s chaplain Nicolás de Loera of San Blas. The the counting-house doned garden. A broad path leads past the old chapel too has a northern namesake; it was dedi- (accountancy).” chapel to the ruins on the bluff where neatly- cated to Nuestra Señora del Rosario la Marinera, 10 In 1791, the staff of officers, clerks, and other painted cannon point out over the palm trees which is the name given by the Spanish to the employees at the base towards the sea. stretch of water between Vancouver Island and numbered 772. Most of the buildings on the cerro were built mainland British Columbia, now known as the 11 One arch of the chapel in of wood and of them, nothing remains to be seen, .12 particular has little curvature and is known as but here on the highest point of the hill stand Within the chapel, there are no signs of the “the flat arch of San Blas.” the massive walls of the contaduría. Half of this icons, crucifixes, and flowers that usually adorn 12 The Spanish name for the building was the administrative headquarters of holy places in catholic countries. Clearly the Strait of Georgia was later the port; the other half contained shipping and much-frequented, patched-up old church in the given to the , which separates mainland receiving offices and a large warehouse, which town square below has the affection of the towns- Washington from the San ran the length of the building.10 It was completed people, and perhaps always did. Plans for a per- Juan Islands. Nuestra Señora in 1779. The walls are about seven metres high manent church on the hilltop were first mooted del Rosario was also a and were made from volcanic rock, which was in 1772, but by 1779 only one wall had been seldom-used alias of the frigate Princesa. quarried from the hill on which they stand. Here completed and further work was held up for lack 13 The exact age of the and there, the roots of trees and shrubs are slowly of money. The priorities were elsewhere—a Customs House is not prying the walls apart and the wooden roof has much-needed hospital and a barracks for the lo- known to the author. It was long since gone. At the southern corner there is, cal troops were both completed in the interven- probably built before Mexico became appropriately, a full-grown Spanish cedar tree. ing years. Since the hilltop community was largely independent in 1821. The cannon along the cliff edge mark the site abandoned in the early 1800s, the active lifespan Thurman 1967 has a of early clashes in the Mexican War of Independ- of the chapel must have been brief indeed. photograph of the ruin in ence 1810–1821. Although the contaduría is now The naval dockyards and its associated facili- his book captioned “Inner Dock and Warehouse” but sometimes called a fortress (fuerte), the main de- ties, including some housing less prestigious than he makes no reference to it fences of the base were actually located below. that on the hill, were down by the town’s inner in his text. In the 1930s, it These comprised several gunboats, a substantial harbour. If you stand in the old Customs House was being used as a garrisoned fort (El Castillo de la Entrada) on the (Aduana), you cannot be far from where the car- coconut-oil factory. site of the present lighthouse overlooking the penters, blacksmiths, coopers, rope-makers, mast- Pozo (Arsenal) estuary, and a smaller battery at El makers, and caulkers once had their workshops. Borrego at the mouth of the San Cristóbal. They Close-by, along the riverbank, there was an arse- were not much used. Pirate attacks on galleons nal, surrounded by a stockade, where tools, lum- from the Philippines had declined considerably ber, and firearms were stored. The Aduana is a by the time the naval base was built, and no hos- two-storey building with a Roman-like arcade tile warship ever approached San Blas in colonial in the Renaissance-style, probably built in the times. early-nineteenth century.13 Only its shell remains,

6 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Photos by Nick Doe. March 1990. March Nick Doe. Photos by and because of silting, a perennial problem on Above from left to right: (1) The west corner of the administrative building and warehouse the Pozo River, its wharf is now a few minutes at San Blas, built in 1779. This was the control centre for operations in “the ”, a walk from the inner harbour. Here, where many coastline stretching from Cabo San Lucas to the Aleutian Islands. (2) The chapel and grave- ships once went about the business of empire, yard, built between 1772 and 1792. The chapel was struck by lightning in 1793 and was flocks of pelicans perform their ever-amusing abandoned in the early 1800s. (3) Inside the chapel. It had a timber roof, almost certainly of antics amidst the moored fishing fleet of the town. Spanish cedar. Most of the Spanish and Mexican explorers of the BC coast took Holy Communion here immediately before sailing north. Birds abound in and around San Blas—over three hundred species have been seen in a Christ- The decline of the naval base at San Blas after 1800 was as rapid as its mas bird count, twice the number usually re- ascent. Upper California became self-sufficient. The North American coast corded in Victoria or Boundary Bay. In the swarmed with foreign commercial vessels in uncontrollable numbers. Key evening that I wandered amongst the ruins on naval personnel returned to Napoleon’s Europe. And the concessions made the cerro, the bushes were full of rambunctious to the British at Nootka Sound, and to the Russians in Alaska, fatally weak- kiskadee flycatchers, and from the depths of the ened Spanish territorial claims in the north. woods came the startling cry of a mottled owl. Captain William Broughton, who surveyed the coast But even more abundant than birds are in- under the command of George Vancouver in the early , describes the sects. Where else but San Blas would ladies be town in 1796 as having “a very noble and picturesque appearance,” but driven to use tequila to sooth the mosquito and when the trader Richard Cleveland visited the port in 1802, he was struck jején (no-see-um) bites on their legs? At the end more by the lack of military discipline and the manifest signs of discontent of the dry season, high-ranking Spanish naval and insubordination of the inhabitants. Finally, in 1810, a small band of officers and their families moved inland to the rebels captured El Castillo from the unprotected landward side, and eleven highlands around Tepic to escape the heat, hu- years later, Mexico had won its War of Independence; the buildings on the midity, contaminated water, and disease-bearing hilltop were in ruins; and the short, but eventful, history of the Spanish insect infestations of the summer months. naval base was at an end. Alejandro Malaspina stopped briefly at San Blas in October 1791 on his voyage around the world, SELECTED SOURCES and his account leaves no doubt why proposals British Admiralty Chart 1876. 1828. Sinaloa–Mazatlán Harbour: Port San Blas (insert to relocate the port were popular: dated 1822). HMS Conway (Captain Basil Hall). Cárdenas de la Peña, Enrique. 1968. San Blas de Nayarit. México: Secretaría de Marina. ... It would be impossible to give a full idea of Castillo Ledon, Luis. 1945. El Puerto de San Blas—Su Fundación y su Historia. Boletin de the really pitiful spectacle presented at that la Sociedad Mexicana de Geografía y Estadística, 60, pp.583–595. time by the seamen and other inhabitants of Cleveland, Richard J. 1850. Voyages and Commercial Enterprises. : Charles H. Peirce. those parts. Pallid of face, enervated, ragged, Cook, Warren L. 1973. Flood Tide of Empire–Spain and the Pacific Northwest 1543–1819. and careless in their attire, forced to find in de- New Haven: Yale University Press. Gulick, Howard E. 1965. Nayarit, Mexico: A Traveler’s Guidebook. Glendale California: structive vices the only alleviation of their Arthur H. Clark. woes, making in all, a singular contrast with Gutiérrez Camarena, Marcial. 1956. San Blas y las Californias—Estudio Histórico del Puerto. the healthy and happy appearance of our México: Editorial Jus. men.... the heat was insufferable and such were Inskeep, Edward L. April 1963. San Blas, Nayarit: An Historical and Geographic Study. the swarms of mosquitoes, and such the putrid Journal of the West: 133-144. vapors arising from the immense sheets of Longstaff, F.V. 1952. Spanish Naval Bases and Ports on the Pacific Coast of Mexico, stagnant water scattered over the flats, that in British Columbia Historical Quarterly, XVI, 3 & 4, pp.181–189. addition to discomfort, such excursions Robinson, Carl, trans. 1934. Politico-Scientific Voyage around the World... 1789-1794 (by Alejandro Malaspina). Vancouver BC. Originally published 1885, Madrid. [ashore] were dangerous. Thurman, Michael E. 1967. The Naval Department of San Blas 1767-1798. Glendale California: Arthur H. Clark.

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 7 Chief Maquinna and Bodega y Quadra by Freeman M. Tovell

Freeman M. Tovell has “Maquinna is the same as Quadra and Quadra is the same as Maquinna.” So a long interest in 1 maritime exploration, did Maquinna, the chief of the Mowachaht people of the Nuu-chah-nulth and since coming to confederacy, describe his unique relationship with Juan Francisco de la British Columbia in 1978, in the Spanish Bodega y Quadra, in command of the Spanish establishment at Yuquot exploration of and (Friendly Cove) in Nootka Sound. presence in the Pacific Northwest. Mr. Tovell HE small establishment, which existed tension. The Spanish conducted occasional raids has just completed a biography of Bodega y from 1789 to 1795, was a constant irri- into the Native villages to collect planks from Quadra, the research Ttant in the relations between the Spanish supposedly abandoned houses, and periodically for which was done in and the Mowachaht. Its occupation by the Span- the Indians carried out nocturnal incursions to various archives in ish forced Maquinna’s displacement to less desir- steal barrel staves and hoops. Invariably the re- Spain, Mexico, and the able locations, especially , twenty miles in- sponse led to loss of life on both sides. The worst United States. land at the end of the Tahsis Inlet. At the time of occurrence was the murder, whether deliberate contact, Yuquot was the largest Mowachaht vil- or accidental, of Maquinna’s relative and a promi- lage and there is archaeological evidence that the nent sub-chief, Callicum,2 when Estéban José site has been occupied Martínez was setting up the establishment. It was for over 4,300 years. It a black cloud that hung over the Spanish for the was the capital of the entire five years of their presence. Yuquot-Tahsis confed- Not surprisingly, there were frequent inquir- eracy and here were ies when the Spanish would be leaving. As early held ritual feasts and as 1791, in his report to Viceroy Revilla Gigedo festivities. As it was the on the character and customs of the Natives, the best cove at the en- second commandant, , reported: trance to Nootka “The place where we are anchored is the best Sound, access to the there is in this grand port of Nuca. For this rea- ocean was easy for fish- son the [Natives] do not cease to come daily and ing and whaling, vital ask me when we are leaving.”3 to the people’s liveli- At no time did the Spanish consider the hood. Although the Mowachaht as subjects of the king of Spain. There Spanish establishment was no formal treaty to bind or control them, protected the nor was any attempt made to enlist them as allies Mowachaht from to force out other nationalities. There was no Maquinna’s more pow- formal cession of the land to Spain and no part erful neighbours, of it was donated or sold. Occupancy was based of solely on Chief Maquinna’s verbal consent be- and ginning with Martínez in 1789, ratified with Cleaskinah (“Captain Francisco de Eliza in 1790 and Alejandro Hanna”), the chief of Malaspina during the latter’s brief visit in 1791, the Ahousaht group, it and confirmed to Bodega y Quadra in 1792. Ten- also represented a bar- ancy was always limited in time to the Spanish rier to Chief Maquin- occupation of the site. As continued tenancy de- na’s exercise of his au- pended on Maquinna, constant manifestations of

Museo Naval, Madrid Museo Naval, thority over his villages friendship and recognition of his paramountcy Above: Tomás de Suria’s pencil portrait of Chief outside the Sound. in the confederacy were essential. Maquinna, executed during the visit to Yuquot of the From the beginning According to José Mariano Moziño, the multi- Malespina expedition in 1871. there were clashes and talented scientist who accompanied Bodega y

8 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Quadra to Nootka, the Maquinna known to the Island, Tlupana Inlet, five Spanish is believed to have inherited the miles into Muchalat Inlet, chieftainship when his father was killed in a war and, possibly, the south against the Tlaumases4 in 1778, the same year that coast from the entrance to James Cook visited Nootka Sound. As Cook Nootka Sound as far as Madrid. Museo Naval, makes no mention of any chief by name, it is not Breakers Point.13 A few known for certain whether the Maquinna with chiefs whose villages were whom we are concerned was the chief at that outside this realm were in time.5 varying degrees subordi- Nor do we know Maquinna’s age at the time nate to Maquinna. To the of Bodega y Quadra’s four months residence in north were the 1792. The English fur trader , who Kwakwaka’wakw, called by visited Nootka Sound in May 1788, recorded that the Spanish the Nuchimases, the chief “appeared to be about thirty years.”6 who occupied the north Alejandro Malaspina, who followed three years coast of Vancouver Island, later, estimated that “the age of this chief...is not possibly as far north as over thirty years.”7 If Meares’ estimate is correct, Laredo Sound, and with Maquinna would have been in his mid-thirties whom Maquinna’s people when Bodega y Quadra arrived in April 1792. traded peacefully. Meares described Maquinna as “of middle size, Bodega y Quadra says nothing in his journal of Above: There is no but extremely well made, and possessing a coun- Maquinna’s character, but Malaspina does. He likeness of Bodega. tenance that was formed to interest all who saw wrote: On the occasion of the him.”8 Malaspina portrayed him as “of short stat- The character of Maquinna is difficult to deci- launching of Canadian ure and ill-formed in the lower half of his body, pher. His personality seems simultaneously Coast Guard Ship Quadra but he makes up for these deficiencies with a fierce, suspicious and intrepid. The natural ten- in 1966, the Spanish spiritual air, full of majesty and nobility, with dency of his inclinations is probably much dis- government presented the Canadian Coast Guard which he inspires naturally a respect for his per- turbed on one hand by the desire of the Euro- 9 peans to cultivate his friendship, the treasure with a medallion of which son.” a detail is shown here. But if Maquinna was strong and vigorous in he has accumulated in a few years and the dis- cord between the Europeans themselves, and When the vessel was his youth, two years later Malaspina found him perhaps their attempts to obtain a monopoly decommissioned a few years “short and thin, although of a nervous disposi- of the ; and on the other, the weakness ago, the medallion was tion and soft musculature.” He complained that of his forces, the skirmishes suffered, the use- removed and it now hangs he no longer enjoyed the robustness of his youth, fulness of the trade, and the too frequent pres- in the Coast Guard largely because he had been compelled to move ence of European ships in these parts.14 headquarters in Victoria. away from Yuquot, his whaling village, to Tahsis. Visitors to Nootka Sound at this time testify to There, food was not so plentiful and he became Maquinna’s continuing suspicion of foreigners. weak and thin. He recalled to Malaspina the From the outset of the Spanish occupation of “happy time when his strength allowed him to Yuquot and the arrival of the English and Ameri- 10 harpoon a whale single-handedly.” Ten years can fur traders, he had been compelled to play a later, in 1801, John Jewitt, a survivor of the Bos- largely passive role, but one he performed with ton massacre, had a different impression. He de- consummate skill to accumulate considerable scribed Maquinna as “a man of dignified aspect, wealth and prestige. With Bodega y Quadra’s ar- about six feet in height, and extremely strait and rival in April 1792, Maquinna would acquire a well proportioned... [He] had an air of savage central position in the events of the next six 11 magnificence.” months.15 The geographic extent of Maquinna’s author- In Mexico City, Viceroy Revilla Gigedo had ity and influence cannot be defined with any firm views on how his officers should conduct precision. According to Moziño, it stretched north relations with the Natives. No longer were they from Nootka Sound up the western coast of Van- to be treated as inferior as in Mexico and Peru. couver Island as far as Cape Cook. In addition to His strict instructions called upon his command- 12 Yuquot, it included the villages of Coopti, ers to maintain vigilance over their men not to Marvinas and those in the Tahsis Inlet, the greater “insult the Indians,” even over trifling matters. Notes start on page 10 part of , the waters around Bligh >>>

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 9 1 Following their recent amalgamation, they are known They were to “leave behind a cemented friendship,” never use their arms today as the Mowachaht/Muchalat people. 2 except in self-defence, never take from the Indians anything unless offered Because of the phonetic system of spelling used by early 16 explorers, Callicum is variously spelt Ke-le-kum, by hand, and so forth. In another instruction he wrote that “Good treat- Quelequem, Calacan, etc. ment and harmony with the Indians is of the first importance to establish 3 Author’s translation. Eliza to Revilla Gigedo. N/d. in this way a solid friendship with them so that our visits should not be as “Costumbres de los Naturales del Puerto de San Lorenzo distressing as those of other voyages to the detriment of humanity and the de Nuca, propuestas para su Conquista y Utilidades que comprendo puede producir.” Archivo General de la national credit. [The] use of superiority of...arms...is...directly opposed to Nación (Mexico), Ramo Historia, 69, ff.10-16. Hereafter humanity.”17 cited as AGN. The viceroy’s expansive phrases were not mere platitudes. His policy 4 Noticias de Nutka, trans. and ed. Iris H. Wilson Engstrand. was in tune with the Age of Enlightenment and more than a superficial (Toronto: 1970, reprinted and Vancouver: 1991), 31. Hereafter cited as Moziño Noticias. He added that “I concern for native people as human beings. The policy was also dictated by have not been able to determine in what area this nation the need to recruit native support for Spanish sovereignty. Not only was resides... [Maquinna] avenged his death; going in person the viceroy anxious to avoid occurrences that would poison relations with to the enemy villages, he took them by surprise and the Natives, but Spain’s presence in the Pacific Northwest demanded sta- carried out a frightful massacre.” 5 In their oral history, however, the Nuu-chah-nulth say bility. Without it, exploration and any eventual settlement would be im- that Captain Cook was welcomed by “Chief Maquinna.” possible. It was not always easy to follow the viceroy’s policy to the letter. 6 John Meares, Voyages made in the Years 1788 and 1789 Francisco de Eliza, who reopened the establishment in 1790 after Martínez’ from China to the West Coast of America, (London: Logographic Press, 1790), 113. Hereafter cited as Meares. recall, had some success in gaining the trust of the Indians and Maquinna 7 Viaje científico y político alrededor del mundo por las corbetas in particular. There were some violent incidents in the two years he was in DESCUBIERTA y ATREVIDA, ed. Pedro Novo y Colson command, but on the whole he managed to create a modicum of trust on (Madrid: 1885), 354. Hereafter cited as Malaspina, Novo which Bodega y Quadra could build. y Colson. 8 Meares, 113. Implementation of the viceroy’s policy was a top priority for Bodega y 9 Quoted by Cutter, Malaspina and Galiano: Spanish Voyages Quadra and he would prove to be the right instrument to carry it out. to the Northwest Coast, 1791 & 1792, (Vancouver: Douglas Bodega, who earlier had made a name for himself as a maritime explorer of and McIntyre, 1991), 90. Hereafter cited as Cutter, the north Pacific and was now serving as commandant of the naval depart- Malaspina and Galiano. 10 Author’s translation. Ricardo Cerezo Martínez, Diario ment of San Blas, Mexico, had been appointed Spanish commissioner by General del Viaje, vol. II, La Expedición Malaspina (Madrid: the viceroy to meet with his English counterpart, Captain George Vancou- Ministerio de Defensa, Museo Naval, Lunwerg Editores, ver, to arrange the handing over of the Spanish establishment under the 1992), 349. terms of the of 1790. Immediately upon his arrival, 11 The Adventures and Sufferings of John R. Jewitt, Captive of Maquinna, ed. Hilary Stewart, (Vancouver: Douglas & Bodega made it clear he intended to carry out the viceroy’s enlightened McIntyre, 1987), 42. policy. He told the captains and officers of the ships of his command and 12 Also spelt Kupti and on some modern maps Coopetee. the garrison ashore that he “would view with displeasure the conduct of 13 Moziño, Noticias, 41. 14 anyone who did not show the greatest friendship and harmony towards Author’s translation. Malaspina, Nova y Colson, 354. 18 The remarkable charcoal portrait done by Malaspina’s the natives.” artist, Tomás de Suria, reflects the same sad, even wistful Bodega’s relations with Maquinna got off to a good start. Very shortly mood. Carmen Sotos, Los Pintores de la Expedición after his arrival, Maquinna came to Yuquot to welcome him and invite him Malaspina, vol. II (Madrid:1982), fig.606. to a potlatch he wanted to hold in his honour. Bodega reciprocated with a 15 For a detailed analysis of Maquinna’s role during the years of the Spanish occupation of Yuquot, see Robin standing invitation to Maquinna and his sub-chiefs to dine with him in the Inglis, “Maquinna of Nootka: Portrait of an Indian Chief commandant’s house. on the Edge of the Empire,” a paper delivered at the Unlike his predecessors, Bodega travelled frequently outside the bounds Ateneo de Madrid, 4 October 1993. Published in the series of the Spanish establishment to make regular visits to the chiefs and sub- II Jornadas sobre España y las Expediciónes Científicas a América y Filipinas, in De la Ciencia Ilustrada del Ciencia chiefs in their villages and present them gifts of blue cloth, abalone shells Romántica, ed. Diez Torre, Alejandro Mallo, Tomás y and especially much prized copper plates. They in turn responded to Bodega’s Pacheco Fernandez Daniel (Madrid: 1995). openness by offering potlatches in his honour. Tlupananutl, the chief of 16 Articles 15 and 23 of Revilla Gigedo’s instructions to Bligh Island and Tlupana Inlet and Maquinna’s principal rival, and Quio- Francisco Mourelle, printed in Henry R. Wagner, Spanish Explorations of the Strait of Juan de Fuca (Santa Ana: 1933), comasia, the chief of the Ehattesaht group, were prominent in this re- 207-208. spect.19 Tlupananutl, a frequent guest at the commandant’s house, con- 17 Revilla Gigedo’s instructions to Alcalá Galiano and stantly sought Bodega’s support for his claim to higher status and vied with Valdés, printed in John Kendrick, The Voyage of the Sutil Maquinna for his favours. Bodega was not swayed by such attentions and and Mexicana: The Last Spanish Exploration of the Northwest Coast of America (Spokane: 1991), 53. was able to discern the games they were playing, perhaps even amused by 18 “Viaje a la Costa Noroeste de la America Septentrional them. por Juan Francisco de la Bodega y Quadra del orden de Bodega y Quadra not only recognized and respected the ranking order Santiago, Capitán de Navío de la Real Armada y Comandante del Departamento de San Blas...Año de

10 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Left: Map showing Nootka Island and the surounding area as well as the location of Yuquot, Marvina, Cooptee, and Tahsis. Cooptee (modern) is spelt in many different ways such as Copti, Kupti, and Coopetee (modern).

1792.” Archives of the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ms. 145; photocopy in British Columbia Archives and Records Service, Victoria. Hereafter cited as Bodega, Viaje. 19 See Yvonne Marshall, “Dangerous Liaisons: Maquinna, Quadra and Vancouver in Nootka Sound, 1790-5,” in From Maps to Metaphors: The Cathy Chapin - Lakehead University. University. Chapin - Lakehead Cathy Pacific World of George Vancouver, ed. Robin of the chiefs in the Sound, but he did so in ing a solo dance by the chief), and exchanged Fisher and Hugh Johnston such a way as to reinforce Maquinna’s primacy. gifts. They partook in a great feast, the Natives (Vancouver: 1993). Hereinafter cited as In his Viaje, he wrote that dining on tuna and dolphin stew. As previously Marshall, Dangerous I constantly treat Maquinna as a friend, sin- arranged, the European visitors would enjoy the Liaisons, gling him out among all with the clearest “drinkables” brought by Vancouver and the “eata- 20 Author’s translation. demonstrations of esteem. He always occu- bles” prepared by Bodega’s cooks, and served on Bodega, Viaje. As pies the place of honour at my table and I Maquinna came to dinner his silver plate. In a farewell speech, Maquinna frequently, when he was myself take the trouble to serve him. I favour correctly interpreted the evening as recognition not occupying one of the him with anything that might give him of his senior status in the region. He remarked to bedrooms in the pleasure and he boasts of my friendship and Vancouver that “neither Wacaninish, nor any other commandant’s house, he very much appreciates my visits to his vil- must have occasionally chief, had ever received such a mark of respect lages.20 taken up residence at his and attention from any visitors.”21 villages closer to Yuquot, Bodega’s desire to substantiate Maquinna’s pri- Summing up the success he had achieved in possibly either Marvinas or macy was particularly manifest in the “state visit” improving relations with the Natives, Bodega Coopti. 21 A Voyage of Discovery to he suggested that he and George Vancouver pay wrote: Maquinna at his residence at Tahsis. After trav- the North Pacific Ocean and I can say with assurance that it is not possible Round the World, 1791- elling the twenty miles from Yuquot with their to mistake the confidence they have in me and 1795, ed. W.Kaye Lamb officers in the ships’ long boats, they witnessed the affection that not only the common peo- (London: Hakluyt Society, 1984), 672. Hereafter cited elaborate entertainments and dancing (includ- ple declare they have for me, but the chiefs as as Lamb,

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 11 22 Author’s Translation. well since they frequently sleep at night with The sailors, either as a result of their almost Bodega, Viaje. the satisfaction that perhaps they would not brutal upbringing or because they envied the 23 Lamb, 662. have in the houses of their most intimate rela- humane treatment the commander and other 24 ’s Journal tives. Thus I have no difficulty in establishing officers always gave the natives, insulted them of the Brigantine on a voyage to the Northwest with them a human relationship towards at various times, crippled some and wounded Coast of America, ed. Mark which my nature inclines.22 others, and did not fail to kill several.27 D. Kaplanoff, (Barre, Bodega y Quadra’s claim is substantiated by other Bodega y Quadra acknowledged that he was not Massachusetts, 1971). Entry for 4 August 1792. witnesses. Thus George Vancouver wrote: always successful and he never hesitated to pun- Hereafter cited as I could not help observing with a mixture of ish members of his crews who committed what Ingraham, Journal. surprise and pleasure how much the Spaniards he called “excesses,” both “to serve as a warning 25 The ceremony was had succeeded in gaining the good opinion and to give the Indians an idea of our justice.” In described in detail by and confidence of the people; together with Moziño, Noticias, 34-37 his view it was important politically that visitors and formed the subject of the very orderly behaviour, so conspicuously of other nationalities observe the extent to which a wash drawing by evident in their conduct toward the Spaniards the Spanish had succeeded in ingratiating them- 23 Bodega’s artist, Atanasio on all occasions. selves with the native community and the man- Echeverría. The Boston fur trader, Joseph Ingraham, and mas- 26 Marshall, Dangerous ner in which the Mowachaht demonstrated their Liaisons, 165. ter of the Hope, echoed Vancouver: support for Spanish sovereignty. 27 Moziño, Noticias, 84. “These people can never expect to have Moziño defended the Natives: 28 Moziño, Noticias, 84. among them a better friend than Don Quadra. 29 It causes me inexpressible wonder to hear Richard Inglis, “The Nothing can exceed his attention and kindness Spanish on the North various bitter criticisms of the reputation of to them, and they all seem sensible of it and the natives, when not one example can be Pacific Coast: An 24 alternative view from are extravagantly fond of him.” cited which could ever serve as proof of their Nootka Sound,” in Spain Bodega y Quadra never lost an opportunity to perversity. During the five months we were and the North Pacific Coast: present Maquinna with much valued gifts such living among them, we did not experience Essays in Recognition of the one offence on their part. They filled the Bicentennial of the Malaspina as copper. One special gift, which the chief would Expedition, 1791-1792, ed. wear on special occasions, was a beautifully em- house of the commandant day and night. Robin Inglis, (Vancouver: broidered coat of mail made of leaves of tin plate Maquinna slept in his bedroom; Quio-comasia Vancouver Maritime in the shape of scales. Maquinna reciprocated with and Nana-quius did the same in mine. There Museum, 1992). were many times when more than fifty re- gifts of prime-quality skins. He also paid mained in the living room. The occasions on Bodega y Quadra a very special honour by invit- which some small thefts were noticed were ing him and some of his people to a celebration very few, although there were at hand several at Coopti to honour his daughter, Apenas, who articles that would have been very convenient was entering into puberty and thus acquiring a for them to possess. Many of our officers went “new status in the tribe, that of entering into alone and without arms to visit a number of womanhood”.25 As festivities and ceremonies, villages, conducted in the savages’ own canoes. exchanges of gifts and reciprocated hospitality They always returned impressed by the affec- tion and gentleness they had observed in eve- were fundamental aspects of native culture, 28 Bodega was demonstrating respect for their cus- ryone. toms and cultural practices. Moreover, as Marshall More measured is the view of ethnologist Rich- has observed, ard Inglis, who has noted, [Bodega y] Quadra’s hospitality, especially the ...it is clear from the historical record that the importance he attached to rituals involving the officers lived up to the spirit of the Spanish serving of food, the attention he paid to plac- policy, and when they transgressed, they were ing people at his table according to rank, and reprimanded. But it appears they were unable his policy of housing high-ranking guests in to control the behaviour of the sailors and the his own quarters, again placing them accord- soldiers who were often brutal in their treat- ing to rank, closely paralleled local notions of ment of the native people. At the level of offic- appropriate chiefly behaviour.26 ers and chiefs the official Spanish policy was a reality, but at the level of sailors, soldiers and It should not be concluded that all was sweetness commoners there was a different reality. And it and light during Bodega’s four months at Nootka. is this reality that has been passed down in the Accounts of cruel incidents are still to be found oral traditions of the Mowachaht people.29 in Mowachaht oral history. Though many of these That Bodega meant his warning on arrival about are undoubtedly exaggerated, Moziño gives them the conduct of his people vis-à-vis the Natives is some credibility:

12 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 evident from his sharp reprimand of Salvador Maquinna went to see Wickaninnish to attempt Above: “Friendly Cove, Fidalgo at Neah Bay, who, in retaliation for the to defuse the situation, but he, Tatoosh and Hanna Nootka Sound,” Engrav- murder of one of the Spanish officers, Antonio in turn attempted to persuade him to join them.31 ing of a sketch by Harry Serantes, and fearing an attack on his ship, or- The Mowachaht chief defended the Spanish and Humphreys, 1792 dered his guns to fire at a passing canoe, killing persuaded Hanna to go to Yuquot to speak to all but two of the occupants. Bodega y Quadra. He did so, and after being ex- This incident acquired special significance as posed for two days to Bodega’s charm, the plot word spread quickly and Wickaninnish, Tatoosh was called off. The tense situation, which could and Hanna met to plan a combined assault on have had bloody consequences, had been defused the Spanish settlement at Friendly Cove and on by the diplomacy and joint action of Maquinna English and American fur traders trading in the and Bodega. region.30 A number of inferences may be drawn from A joint attack on the Spanish establishment at this affair. In a general sense, the constant tension that moment would have been devastating if not between the Natives and non-Natives was never catastrophic. Anticipating the turning over of the far from the surface. It also confirms the high establishment to Vancouver, Bodega had consid- regard in which Bodega was held, not only by erably reduced his forces. The Santa Gertrudis, his Maquinna, but by the other chiefs of the region. most powerful ship, had been sent back to San As well, the incident provides important evidence 30 Another motive was the Blas with a good part of the garrison and the of the high extent to which Maquinna and coincidental brutal killing by the fur trader, William Aránzazu under Caamaño was absent, exploring Bodega were dependent on each other. While it Brown, of a number of to the north. The only vessel on hand to defend would be misleading to say that the mutual re- Natives in Clayoquot the port was his flag ship, the Activa, and the re- spect the chief and the commandant had for each Sound. maining Catalonian Volunteers would have other “deepened into friendship”,32 each realized 31 The four chiefs were inter-related by blood and amounted to only a corporal’s guard to defend that their fortunes were inextricably connected. marriage. against any land attack. Bodega y Quadra depended on Maquinna for 32 Marshall, Dangerous the safety and security of the settlement and Liaisons; 165.

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 13 33 Christon I. Archer, Maquinna depended on Bodega for support of liveliest demonstrations of friendship?...Make “Seduction before his senior rank in the hierarchy over the more all [your men] know that Maquinna is a true Sovereignty: Spanish friend that he is far from harming the Efforts to manipulate the powerful neighbouring chiefs. It should not be Spanish...Maquinna is the same as Quadra and Natives in their Claims to assumed, however, that Bodega’s policy was not 34 the Northwest Coast,” in without purpose. As Christon Archer has ob- Quadra is the same as Maquinna. From Maps to Metaphors: the served, As proof of his innocence and esteem for the Pacific World of George commandant, Maquinna asked Bodega y Quadra Vancouver, ed. Robin Fisher Bodega made seduction and good treatment of and Hugh Johnston the Natives...into key elements in building for a launch with four or six swivel guns, manned (Vancouver: 1993), 157. Spanish claims to sovereignty...If Quadra ma- by Spanish sailors and his own people, to punish 34 Moziño, Noticias, 56-57. nipulated Maquinna to bolster Spanish claims the “treacherous ones of Itz-coac”35 who lived 35 Possibly the Hesquiats to sovereignty, the Nootka chief proved him- outside the Sound and who he was certain were who resided on Estevan Point at the southern self equally adept at using the Spanish to responsible. Though no doubt surprised at the 33 entrance to Nootka strengthen his own diplomatic position. vehemence of the chief ’s oration but not swayed Sound. On the eve of Bodega’s departure from Nootka, by it, Bodega, true to his policy of refusing to 36 Bodega, Viaje. there occurred a gruesome incident that illus- give arms to the Indians and avoiding involve- 37 Ingraham journal, entry for September 18. See also trates how Bodega y Quadra respected ment in inter-tribal quarrels and jealousies, wisely Moziño, Noticias, 55. Maquinna’s jurisdiction over his people and re- declined Maquinna’s request. Nevertheless, 38 Royal Order #162; fused to intervene in incidents between the Na- Maquinna “offered to search for the aggressors AGN, Reales Cédulas of the murder of the cabin boy.”36 #154, f.209. tives and his people unless Spanish guilt could be 39 Bodega, Viaje. established conclusively. The body of a fourteen- Bodega’s refusal to take action, other than to 40 Viana’s Diario, cited by year-old cabin boy on the Activa was found in turn the matter over to Maquinna, puzzled those Cutter, Malaspina and the woods, horribly butchered. Bodega’s imme- present. Even Joseph Ingraham, whose admira- Galiano, 105. diate reaction was to ask Maquinna to find the tion of Bodega was boundless, doubted Bodega’s guilty party. There was much speculation about decision to “choose to look over it than to risk who might have committed the crime. One ru- punishing the innocent” was the right one.37 mour, reportedly initiated by Bodega himself, Similar thoughts were expressed by Vancouver’s placed the blame on Maquinna who, hearing of people, one or two even advocating seizing it, sought out Bodega. Maquinna as a hostage until the culprit was found. In a lengthy discourse, which he described “as But Bodega’s refusal to take reprisals was sup- exciting as it was poetic”, Moziño recorded that ported by the viceroy who saw fit to report the Maquinna himself did not believe that Bodega affair to Madrid. In his reply, the minister of state, thought him responsible, but asked that he real- Aranda, reported that the king approved Bodega’s ize that judgment.38 Maquinna has a thousand obligations to be Bodega waited until the next to last day of his your friend. You have given me much copper; stay to inform Maquinna of his departure. The because of you I had many [abalone] shells to chief, he wrote, was so “startled by the news that distribute at the celebration of the first men- I wished I had not told him, but I consoled [him] struation of Apenas. Yours are the cloth, beads, with the hope that I would return.”39 At the same coat of mail, instruments of iron, glass window time, Bodega told him that panes, and many other things with which I am would be coming from Neah Bay to assume com- provided. Our mutual trust has reached the mand of the establishment. This, too, would have point of our both sleeping alone in the same room, a place in which you find yourself with- shaken the chief, who would not have forgotten out arms or people to defend you. I could the officer’s deplorable cannon blast. Maquinna have taken your life if my friendship were ca- would not yet know that Fidalgo, suspicious of pable of betrayal. One thinks very lowly of me Indians, would not continue Bodega’s open policy and of my dignity if he imagines that, seeking but accept him only as an occasional guest at his to break a friendship, I would order the mur- table. Under him, the close relationship estab- der of a boy less able to defend himself than if lished by Bodega y Quadra underwent a radical he were a woman...You would be the first change. All the proud chief could do was to wait whose life would be in great danger if we until 1795, when the Spanish finally left Yuquot, were enemies...Have not you yourself gone and recall Malaspina’s promise that the cove would accompanied by few of your men and found only that the multitude of my subjects sur- then revert to his people and the commandant’s 40  rounded you with the purpose of making the house would be his.

14 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Jacinto Caamaño: A Spaniard in BC’s Northern Waters by John Crosse

VER since Tomàs Bartroli, in the 1960s, re was of much greater import in the Spanish colo- John Crosse is a marine kindled our curiosity about our Spanish nial society of the eighteenth century. By virtue historian specializing Eheritage, interest has been growing. The of his birth the young Jacinto had not been re- in Spanish cartography. Malaspina Symposium held in Vancouver in 1991 quired to attend formal training at the Spanish went further by introducing Spanish scholars to naval academy, but went to sea first as an aventurero, 1 Henry R. Wagner and our common history. Since that time there have a young unpaid gentleman adventurer. Only af- W.A. Newcombe, Eds. been many interchanges between our two coun- ter proving his worth had he been commissioned “The Journal of Jacinto tries. As a fortunate beneficiary of one of these I into the navy of Imperial Spain. This lack of for- Caamaño. Translated by Capt. Harold Grenfell was invited to Cádiz to lecture on Jacinto mal training accounts for many of the character- R.N.,” B.C. Historical Caamaño. istics of his journal and why it is more readable Quarterly, July 1938, 189– Of all the Spanish eighteenth-century explor- that those of his brother officers. His lengthy ac- 222, October 1938, 265– ers and their voyages on our coast we know per- counts of his encounters with the Haida and 301. This account is incomplete. The first part of haps the least about Jacinto Caamaño and his Tsimshian are of particular interest and among the journal, consisting of 18 expedition to the northern waters of British the earliest to describe these nations in any de- pages of the ship’s log is Columbia in 1792. Researchers in BC have to tail. missing, as is an appendix rely mainly on an incomplete 1938 English trans- Caamaño’s ship was the lumbering old listing artifacts collected. 1 Freeman Tovell has drawn lation of his 70-page journal. More important: Aránzazu, a 205 ton frigate, built in Cavite in the my attention to a possibly the reproduction of Caamaño’s principal chart, Philippines in 1780, that had proven so slow that more complete translation originally 28 by 20 inches (72 by 51centimetres), she had been quickly transferred to New Spain, in the BC Archives, was so reduced in size as to become virtually il- where she could be usefully employed supplying probably Daylton, M.E., “Official documents legible. Thus most of us in British Columbia have the missions of Baja California. Like most Span- relating to Spanish and really been unable to profit from Caamaño’s ish ships of war she had a fuller name, Nuestra Mexican voyages of legacy, and this is a pity because he is eminently Señora de Aránzazu, Our Lady of the Thornbush, navigation, exploration and readable.2 Rather than summarizing the 1938 after the shrine of that name in the Basque coun- discovery, made in in the 18th translation I have chosen to highlight a few in- try behind Picasso’s Guernica, where the Virgin century.” BCA/A/A/10/ teresting details of the voyage, applying as it were Mary appeared five hundred years ago to a young M57t. a magnifying glass. shepherd in the mountains. There is a Spanish version It was my good fortune to be able to examine Due to the need to effect repairs to the in Special Collections at the UBC Library. Enquire Caamaño’s original manuscript, and the full-size Aránzazu, Caamaño was not able to sail from under “Pamphlets,” Call charts, in the archives of the Ministerio de Asuntos Nootka until June of 1792, somewhat late in the Number: SPAM 24506: Exteriores in Madrid.3 Here the problems of re- season for normal exploration work. His first task Colección de Diarios y Relaciónes para la Historia de production become immediately apparent. was to re-examine Bucareli Bay on the outer coast los Viajes y Descubrimientos, Caamaño used such a fine quill pen that normal of the Alaska Panhandle about fifty miles north VII: Comprende los viajes de photographic means do not pick up the details. of today’s US/Canadian border. Bucareli Bay had Arteaga en 1779 y de Thus both his route and the names he gave to been extensively surveyed by an earlier Spanish Caamaño en 1792, por la costa NO. de América, the many landmarks become indecipherable. In expedition some thirteen years previously. One Consejo Superior de addition to the main chart, Caamaño produced therefore wonders why they were going over the Investigaciónes Científicas, many smaller charts of particular locations. These same old ground again. The answer is that Spain Instituto Historico de Marina, found their way into various libraries. However, was concerned about Russian incursion from the 1975. This publication 6 includes extensive extracts individual copies of these manuscript charts vary, north, and also about the possibility that Eng- from the Caamaño journal making interpretation of the journal doubly dif- lish or American traders had established outposts in the second half. ficult.4 in what Spain still considered her own domain. 2 One notable exception. Jacinto Caamaño was the most aristocratic It was well into July before the Aránzazu’s boat See Freeman M. Tovell, “Ending the Search for the Spanish naval officer on our coast, not excluding crews had completed their investigations in Alaska. Mythical Passage of Bodega y Quadra.5 This may seem of little sig- They had found nothing except the occasional Admiral Fonte: The 1792 nificance in the egalitarian Canada of today, but encounter with Aboriginals. After a week’s delay >>>

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 15 Below: The Spanish Olive due to bad weather, Caamaño headed southwest, point of critical importance, for the chart traced Jar found off Langara surveying two small bays on the northern side of in Figure A can only be interpreted as a general Island in 1986 and . On the 20th of July he turned indication of the ship’s movements. believed to come from the south, crossing into what are today Canadian Further information is available from the ship’s Caamaño Expedition. The waters. log. Caamaño states in the log that he anchored remnant is about 30 inches at the location shown at 7:30 on the evening of high. The original was THE SPANISH OLIVE JAR OFF LANGARA ISLAND possibly 4 feet high. In 1985 two fishermen from , on the north the twentieth of July. He stayed only two nights, coast of , hauled up in their nets the and sailed at about 11 o’clock on the morning of lower half of a large earthenware urn—an olive the twentysecond with a fresh southwesterly 11 jar of Spanish origin dating from the eighteenth breeze. Low water had been two hours earlier. century. It was found off the east coast of Langara The flood would therefore have been beginning Island, a small island on the north coast of the to make to the eastward through Parry Sound. Queen Charlottes. Thermo-luminescent analy- Caamaño would have been anxious to stay close sis determined that the jar had been manufac- to the Langara Island shore so as to be as far to tured between 1720 and 1790, and was probably the westward as possible when he met the full a botija of Mexican origin. force of the flood coming in through the Dixon Although preliminary analysis by the Vancou- Entrance, so that he could pick up easily on his ver Maritime Museum7 suggested that it could survey of the Alaska coast. In doing so he passed 12 have come from the Aránzazu, the origin of this over the position where the urn was found. interesting artifact was never firmly established. It is unlikely that the jar was lost overboard as The museum’s investigators lacked the copies of they were coming in to anchor, for the crew Caamaño’s charts so essential to locate the track would then have been working the sails. A far

Vancouver Maritime Crosse Museum/John Vancouver of the Aránzazu and therefore the evidence of more likely possibility is that it was thrown over- the likelihood her having jettisoned this olive jar. board as they were clearing the decks after set- The only other Spanish vessel that had been in ting sail. The probability therefore is that, being Voyage of Jacinto the area was the Santiago in 1774, but it had not broken, the jar was thrown overboard on the Caamaño,” BC Studies, sailed down the east side of Langara Island.8 morning of 22 July 1792. no.117, Spring 1998, 5-26. However, further investigation is required be- 3 Harold Grenfell’s Judge Howay in the 1930s and Gibson more translation was made from recently9 have extensively catalogued all vessels fore provenance can be firmly established. If the the manuscript in the on the Northwest Coast in the Contact Period, botija did in fact come from New Spain, there Archivo General de la but no other but a Spanish vessel could have ac- should be other broken urns of similar manufac- Nación (AGN) in Mexico ture lying around at San Blas, the old Spanish City. quired the urn in Mexico and lost it here, since 4 For the sake of clarity I at that time Spanish ports were closed to foreign naval base north of Puerta Vallarta from which have made tracings of the vessels. We are therefore left with no choice of its the Aránzazu had originally sailed. relevant details of the charts origin but the Aránzazu. The urn from Haida Gwaii was returned to necessary for my tale. These Masset, where it has recently been installed in are exact copies with minor In Madrid, I was able to clearly establish that exception, purely to aid the Aránzazu had been in the area where the urn the newly established Dixon Entrance Maritime comprehension. was found (Figure A). In the archives there I found Museum. The finding of the Langara Island olive 5 All Spanish naval officers, a more detailed copy of the same chart of the jar, once provenance is established, will mean that with the exception of at last we have a Spanish artifact to match Cap- Pilotes had to be of noble Port of Floridablanca than is shown by Wagner birth. A relative of & Newcombe.10 The Madrid chart actually shows tain George Vancouver’s Arnold No.176 Chro- Caamaño’s was the Marquis where the Aránzazu had anchored (Figure B), a nometer, although most British Columbians will de Villagarcía, Monroy y Cusano, Conde de Barrantes y Señor de Rubianes, Vista Alegra y Charts on opposite page >>> Vilanueva, 25th Viceroy of FIGURE A—An extract from Caamaño’s Plano de los reconocimientos ... showing his route across Dixon Entrance, Peru. By comparison Entrada de Dn Juan Pérez, to and from Langara Island. (MAE Madrid). Revilla Gigedo, the Viceroy FIGURE B—The area marked on FIGURE A from the MAE copy of the Plano de Floridablanca with the anchor— of New Spain, was a mere missing on the Library of Congress copy—marking the place where the ARÁNZAZU anchored. Count. FIGURE C—Part of Caamaño’s track chart. Rose Spit is shown as Pta Ynvisible and the modern port of Prince Rupert 6 Alexander Baranof did not reach Sitka until 1794. lies behind Las Once Mil Virgenes. (Carta Reducida..., MAE Madrid) 7 Beasley, T., Hunley, D., FIGURE D—A continuation of Figure 4 showing Caamaño’s anchorage at San Roque, Zayas’s survey of Douglas Newton, W. & Williams, H., Channel (Bocas y brazos de Moniño), and the ARÁNZAZU’S eventual escape to the open sea. (Carta Reducida ...

PAGE 18 >>> MAE Madrid)

16 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Part of the chart reproduced in BC HisTORI- CAL QUARTERLY, 1938, showing the approxi-

Figure C mate areas covered by tracings made from the original charts in Madrid. Figure B Figure A Figure D

Figure B Figure A Figure D Figure C

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 17 “A Spanish Olive Jar from have to travel much further to see the jar. the Pope, she took with her eleven young friends. the Queen Charlotte But on their way home all were massacred at Islands,” Vancouver THE 11,000 VIRGINS Maritime Museum, Press One look at the next track chart of the Cologne by Atilla the Hun. Somehow or other Release, 13 December Aránzazu (Figure C) makes one wonder what the Roman figure “M,” signifying a thousand in 1990. Latin, got inserted in the story. Thus the eleven 8 Caamaño was doing, but in the days of sail a ship See H.K. Beals, ed., Juan virgins became eleven thousand.15 Pérez on the Northwest Coast: was dependent on wind and tide as to where she Six documents of his could go. Unlike a trading vessel, where the mas- The approaches to present-day Prince Rupert expedition in 1774. (Oregon ter could adjust his route to the weather, a naval seem drab without Caamaño’s colourful imagi- Historical Society, circa officer had specific orders to obey. nation. Perhaps the Board of Geographical Names 1989), 70. of BC should consider changing names like “Tri- 9 F.W. Howay, “A List of On leaving Langara Island, Caamaño had re- Trading Vessels in the turned to charting the south coast of the Alaska ple Island” and the “Tree Knob Group” to “The , 1785- Panhandle and, meeting contrary winds in Archipelago of the 11,000Virgins,” to attract more 1825,” Royal Society of Clarence Strait, had angled south toward his next visitors to this economically depressed city. Cruise Canada, Transactions & ships pass hard by the reef. Proceedings, Vols XXIV to assignment of checking out Bartolomé de Fonte’s XXVIII (1930 to 1934),. supposed Northwest Passage.13 COLNETT’S NORTHWEST PASSAGE J.R. Gibson, Otter Skins, Coasting down the shoreline, when only four Captain was one of the more im- Boston Ships, and China Goods, (McGill-Queen’s miles off Prince Leboo Island, the wind had sud- portant players in our early history. In 1787 and University Press, 1992). denly backed and Caamaño found himself in thick 1788 he had been a fur trader on the coast in the 10 Plano del Puerto de fog. A flood tide was carrying him onto the reefs Prince of Wales in company with the Princess Royal, Floridablanca ..., a large scale inshore. He named the spot Punta de Peligro, Dan- commanded by Captain Chas. Duncan. chart showing the east end of Parry Sound between ger Point, and headed back west, but, struck by Colnett had returned a year later, this time in Graham and Langara heavy squalls and then flat calm, he was forced to the Argonaut, again with the Princess Royal but Islands. Wagner’s copy came anchor. Heavy rain fell all night long. with a different captain. In the intervening pe- from the Library of Congress. Shaken by this ordeal, he coasted back beyond riod Spain had established an outpost at Friendly 11 Tidal data has been Rose Spit, on the northeast tip of Graham Is- Cove where Colnett had called the comman- supplied by Luis Sobrino, land, before renewing his efforts. Off the same dant, Estéban Martínez, a “God-damn Spaniard,”16 himself a former Spanish spot where he had anchored two nights previ- thus precipitating the Nootka Incident and the naval officer. 12 I am indebted to David ously, he again encountered fickle winds and poor Nootka Convention. Stone, Archivist and visibility. At times it would clear and again he Colnett and his ship had been taken as prison- Executive Director of the could see a hazardous coast to leeward, a mass of ers to San Blas, but after months of captivity they Underwater Archaeological small islands on which the seas were breaking. had been released, and had returned to the Pa- Society of British Columbia for all his help in Ocean freighters approaching Prince Rupert cific Northwest to continue their fur trading ac- the preparation of this today are warned tivities. However, the vessel suffered some dam- section. Because of the dangers in the approach ... and age en route and put into Nootka for repairs. 13 F.M. Tovell, “Ending the the probability that tidal streams will set a ves- There the new Spanish commandant, Don Fran- Search for the Mythical Passage of Admiral Fonte: sel towards these dangers, it is essential to be cisco de Eliza, rendered every possible assistance. The 1792 Voyage of Jacinto continually certain of your position before ap- In gratitude Colnett showed Eliza his chart of Caamaño,” BC Studies, proaching ... If good positioning is not possi- his earlier voyage and Eliza had copied this and no.117, Spring 1998, 5-26. ble it is advisable to keep an offing until con- given it to Caamaño before his voyage north. This 14 Fisheries & Oceans, Canada, ditions improve.14 Sailing Directions, British 1787-1788 chart clearly showed that Colnett sus- Columbia Coast, Vol.2 Caamaño had no such navigational advice; there pected that there might well be some substance (North Portion), 12th was no light on Triple Island as there is today. He to de Fonte’s tale that there was, at about 53° Edition, ( 1991), named the area Las Once Mil Virgenes, The Eleven North, some connection to a Hudson’s Bay Com- 127. Thousand Virgins, a name requiring an explana- 17 15 Information from Teresa pany outpost far to the east. Kirschner, Arsenio Pacheco tion. Caamaño’s most important task on this 1792 and Luis Sobrino of the After his experience with Danger Point, voyage was to lay to rest, one way or the other, Vancouver Spanish Pacific Caamaño was alarmed to see all these rocks on Colnett’s hypothesis. In sending him north, Historical Society. The reef which the white waves were breaking. As a good today is known as the “Tree Bodega y Quadra knew that on his return Cap- Knob Group.” Catholic he was reminded of the fourth-century tain George Vancouver would be at Friendly Cove 16 Sic. This is in the Spanish legend of Saint Ursula. Saint Ursula was an Eng- to finalize details of the Nootka Convention. It account of the incident. lish princess wanting to marry a pagan prince. 17 was absolutely essential that, if there was indeed a In Robert Galois’s Travelling to Rome to seek dispensation from forthcoming edition of Northwest Passage, Spain knew of it before the Colnett’s previously

18 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 British. Thus, after some hesitation, Caamaño, Nootka. Dining later with Vancouver, he gave the unpublished first voyage— following his orders, plunged down the “Princes” good captain a copy of his chart,23 which is why due this spring from UBC 18 Press—Colnett has Channel. (Figure D) so many of Caamaño’s names have been preserved recorded, opposite Douglas Colnett and Duncan had spent nearly three to this day. Channel: “Prince of Wales months at Calamity Bay on the southwest tip of Caamaño had laid to rest the ghost of Admiral & Sloops Boat overhauld Banks Island, and their ships’ boats had made nu- de Fonte, and it is with some eagerness that we these Inlets in 1787 & P[rincess] Royals in 1788. merous expeditions among the surrounding is- await the Robert Galois’s forthcoming edition The openings & Channels lands and unexplored inlets. They had reached of Colnett’s previously unpublished first voyage.24 appeard to have no End. about half-way up , as far as Sound. at the greatest CONCLUDING REMARKS Kitkatla Inlet. Caamaño was determined to ex- E[ast]ing they made was 90 A few details of Caamaño’s subsequent career fm & then no Bottom. Its plore Douglas Channel—the assumed Fonte are worth adding. In recognition of his work on the general Opinion of Strait—even farther. He rounded the bottom of this expedition Caamaño was, a year later, ap- Capt. Duncan & of all that saw those Inlets that they Pitt Island and soon afterwards anchored off a pointed a knight of the Military Order of Tsimshian village called Citiyats.19 There he dis- communicate with Hudson Calatrava, Spain’s oldest order of chivalry. For a Bay the nearest Settlement patched his Second Pilot, Don Juan Zayas, with short time he was commandant at San Blas. In of the Hudson Bay Coy. two of the ship’s boats to establish the veracity of 1800 he married Francisca de Arleta in Guayaquil. which is Hudson House is Lat 53° Long [ ] Bears [ ] de Fonte’s claim. She bore him eight children. In 1809, at the age Upon the boats’ return Caamaño records: West dist. 400 Leagues.” of 50, he retired from the navy and became port Quoted with the author’s [Zayas] brought with him a draft of the survey captain of Guayaquil, dying there in the 1830s. permission. 18 he had made, and reported that the N.E. Arm By this time Ecuador, like much of Latin America, Named by Caamaño in honour of Colnett’s Prince (the main one), up which he had penetrated had gained its independence from Spain; a grand- for a distance of 18 leagues, ... seemed to run of Wales. On a draft chart son of Caamaño was their president in the 1880s. Caamaño calls it “Canal de inland for a considerable way; also, although There are descendants living in Texas today. Principe Real.” Explorers very deep water, it as well as the others are all frequently miswrite foreign subject to a regular, but extremely sluggish, My brief time spent in the Ministry of For- names. semi-diurnal ebb and flow of the tide; and eign Affairs’s archive in Madrid was insufficient 19 Ksidiya’ats. therefore, in his opinion have little importance. to garner all the information from Caamaño’s 20 Only the AHN, Mexican These reasons, coupled with others that I shall larger charts, full-size reproductions of which are City copy of the journal, mention later,20 led me to deprive this region the one that was used by still not available. This is unfortunate because we Harold Grenfell, carries any of its name of Fonte Strait and replace it with are still unable to glean the colour from his im- further reflections by 21 that of Bocas y Brazas de Moniño. agery, decipher all the names. As an example, the Caamaño. As this would After Zayas’s return Caamaño was delayed from island of Aristizábal was named after an admiral appear to be the earliest departing by trouble with the Tsimshian. Row- version, it is my belief that with whom he had sailed as a young man, on a Caamaño did not follow up ing ashore to do their laundry, some of his crew goodwill mission to Constantinople in the old on his theory, and I have had both clothes and boat stolen. Two seamen Ottoman empire, Spain’s hereditary enemy. therefore excluded these were captured, and others fled into the woods. It aspects from this paper. In Spanish and Mexican archives a great mass 21 was a week before everything was straightened Moniño is the family of material relating to the early history of Britsih name of the Conde de out again. Columbia is gathering dust. To the best of my Floridablanca, the Spanish Bad weather delayed him further. Though knowledge, only Tomàs Bartroli, Jack Kendrick, prime minister. 22 Caamaño did not know it at the time, this con- Freeman Tovell, Jim McDowell, and Christon The area is not named fluence of the and Douglas Chan- Squally Channel for Archer have seriously penetrated this labyrinth. nothing. nel is notorious for its fickle winds. Several times Here is an opportunity for anyone interested in 23 I am most grateful to he tried to depart before having to hurriedly an- the Spanish part of our history because at least Andrew David, who chor again.22 The old chief Hammisit, who had for research in Spain, scholarships (becas) are avail- recently located this at the Admiralty Hydrographic always acted as a peacemaker, insisted on a fare- able through their cultural attaché in Ottawa. Office in Taunton, England. well feast. In a ceremony that even outshone In closing it remains but to thank Marisa Calés, The Call No. is 355/3 on Maquinna’s dancing to Vancouver and Quadra at Mercedes , and Eric Beerman, all Spaniards, Ac1. 24 Tahsis, the 80-year old veteran himself performed without whom this article would never have been Judge Howay had edited  Colnett’s journal of the a spectacular display. written. later, 1789-1791, voyage, Finally, on the thirtieth of July, the wind published by The changed and Caamaño could make his way, via Champlain Society, the Laredo Channel to the open sea and the wa- Toronto, 1940. ters of Queen Charlotte Sound, and home to

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 19 The Alexandro Malaspina Research Centre Malaspina University College, Nanaimo

N ITALY, Spain, and Latin America in Mulazzo, Italy, uses “Allesandro,” an ar- Interests, an Enlightened Opinion and there exists a lively community of chaic variant. He is better known by the Royal Intervention: Imperial Reform Ipublic and private scholarly research- Hispanicization “Alejandro” or of the Trans-Atlantic Mails.” ers into the thoughts, words, and deeds “Alexandro.” Malespina himself used Aside from the above activities, an im- of Alexandro Malaspina the Italian navi- “Alexandro,” and that the spelling the portant function of the Centre is the gator, one of many such who served the Centre has decided to employ. maintenance of liaison with its counter- Spanish Crown. Their interests have been ACTIVITIES OF THE CENTRE parts overseas, provincial and other ar- echoed in maritime history conferences The Centre has focused in the first years chives, maritime historical societies such in various parts of the English-speaking of its existence on activities in three areas: as the Vancouver Spanish Pacific Histori- world, but it is fair to say that nowhere in publishing, Web site development, and cal Society and the Hakluyt Society, Britain, Canada, the United States, or Aus- public lectures and events. They include: maritime historians such as John Crosse, tralia is there a level of scholarly interest (1) The translation by Teresa and Don Robin Inglis, and John Kendrick, who in Malaspina studies which rivals the in- Kirschner of Dario Manfredi’s biography have been working on Malaspina for a tense commitment of these investigators. of Malaspina, previously published in number of years, and the Malaspina fam- In an attempt to redress the balance, the Spanish in the volume La América Imposible. ily. Alexandro Malaspina Research Centre The completed volume is awaiting publi- THE FUTURE was created in 1999 at Malaspina Uni- cation. (2) The Centre has also published Although the Alexandro Malaspina Re- versity College in Nanaimo. a chapbook, Proceedings of the Inaugural Sym- search Centre has been especially active Not only was Alexandro Malaspina a posium, October 1999, which, while stocks over the last two years and has developed pivotal figure in the history of European last, is available free of charge to readers of a virtual location on the Internet, it is contact with First Nations peoples on the BC Historical News (See page 47 for fur- still seeking a physical home on the cam- West Coast of North America, but he also ther information). (3) The Centre’s Web pus of Malaspina University College. Its made important contributions to a site, www.mala.bc.ca/~black/amrc/ physical archive of secondary scholarship number of academic disciplines, includ- amrc.htm. contains an electronic archive is growing, and plans are afoot for an ex- ing physics, applied astronomy and po- of images, research materials and articles pansion of the library, which will include litical philosophy. His achievements were pertaining to Alexandro Malaspina and a dedicated research facility. celebrated in the naming of Malaspina related figures, as well as news of events, Among a variety of future research University College when the institution publications and recent research. (4) A lec- projects is one close to my own heart: was founded three decades ago, and in ture by John Kendrick on his biography the translation and compilation of a criti- opening the Centre the institution has of Malaspina, in April 1999. (5) The Inau- cal edition of Malaspina’s political writ- acknowledged the significance of gural Symposium, in late 1999, which ings, most notably the Axiomas políticos Alexandro Malaspina as an explorer of the brought together scholars from British sobre la América. Other research associ- conceptual as well as of the physical world. Columbia and overseas, First Nations and ates have been discussing a parallel his- The interdisciplinary character of the Spanish dignitaries, and members of the tories approach to the reconciliation of research supported by the Centre reflects local community for an evening of lec- the perspectives of European history with both the wide range of its subject’s intel- tures and an exhibition of photographs of First Nations oral tradition as it concerns lectual interests and the reputation for artwork from the Malaspina Expedition. contact on the West Coast. There is much excellence, which the University College (See Nick Doe’s report in BC Historical work to be done, and a great enthusiasm has gained in recent years through its own News, Vol. 33/1). (6) The Fall Lecture Se- for doing it! interdisciplinary degree programs. The ries, which in 2000 welcomed John In all its endeavours, the Centre ad- Centre also promotes the cordial relations Gascoigne from and Virginia heres to what it considers an important the University College has with contem- González Claverán from Mexico as well principle: that historical understanding, porary members of the Malaspina family as local researchers. The theme of the free so vital to confronting the future, is best and with the corresponding centres of public Lecture Series for 2001 is Contact: served by collaboration between the aca- Malaspina Studies activity in Italy, Spain, First Voyages, First Peoples. It begins on nine- demic world and the greater community. and elsewhere. teen September with a talk by G. Douglas In order to maximize interaction be- Some readers might pause over the Inglis, Director and Research Professor of tween these two spheres of interest, we spelling “Alexandro” used for the navi- History at the Texas Tech. University do our best to make the results of our gator’s first name. The standard Italian Center in Sevilla, Spain, entitled “Vested work as accessible as possible. spelling is “Alessandro.” The birth record JOHN BLACK, R ESEARCH A SSOCIATE

20 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Translating Malaspina by Andrew David

Andrew David, retired director of the Malaspina to be published in his lifetime Malaspina during the latter’s voyage, him- Admiralty Hydrographic Office, Taunton, was Relación del viage hecho por las goletas self got into political difficulties and was Somerset, is perhaps best known here as Sutil y Mexicana en el año de 1792 the sub- forced to flee to London, taking with him the editor of The Charts and Coastal Views of Captain Cook’s Voyages published by the sidiary voyage to the Strait of Juan de Fuca many documents relating to the voyage, Hakluyt Society between 1988 and 1997. under the overall command of Dionisio some of which were returned to Spain on Alcalá Galiano. This was published in Ma- his death, others were dispersed and a few drid in 1802, possibly in response to the were purchased by the British Museum HEN Alejandro Malaspina, an publication of Vancouver’s voyage in Lon- and are now held in the British Library. Italian-born Spanish naval The vast majority of the Malaspina docu- officer, returned to Cádiz in W ments, however, remained in Spain. the Descubierta on 21 September 1794 at At about this time the Russian ambas- the end of his five-year scientific, politi- sador in Madrid obtained a copy of one cal, and hydrographic voyage to the Pa- of the versions of Malaspina’s journal, ena- cific, he was granted permission to go to bling the first full account of Malaspina’s Madrid to report in person to Antonio voyage to be published unexpectedly in Valdés, the Minister of the Navy. On ar- St Petersburg. The editor appears to have rival in the capital Malaspina was taken been Admiral Krusenstern, who had him- by Valdés to El Escorial where he was pre- self commanded a Russian voyage to the sented to King Charles IV and Queen Pacific and around the world between Maria Luisa. Malaspina then settled down 1803 and 1806. It appears that the journal in Madrid where he proceeded to draw was first translated into French before be- up an ambitious plan to publish his voy- ing finally translated into Russian, when age in a number of volumes, which would it was published in six lengthy instalments surpass in scope the published voyages of between 1824 and 1827. Cook and La Pérouse. As well as includ- The first relatively full account of the ing his own journal Malaspina planned to voyage in Spanish occurred with the pub- publish the scientific results of the voyage lication in 1849 in his native Montevideo based on the works of Antonio Pineda, of the journal of Francisco Xavier de Viana, the chief scientist, Tadeo Haenke, the natu- who had served on board the Descubierta ralist from Prague, and Luis Née, the ex- Museo Naval, Madrid Museo Naval, during the voyage. Finally, in 1885 the pedition’s French born botanist. Unfor- Alejandro Malaspina. Spanish naval historian Pedro Novo y tunately, while he was working on his Pastel drawing by José Maria Galván. Colson published in Madrid the first full journal, Malaspina involved himself un- account in Spanish of the voyage based wisely in politics at the highest level, writ- don in 1798. All mention of Malaspina by primarily on one version of Malaspina’s ing to the Queen suggesting that Manuel name in this account was ruthlessly struck journal under the title, Viaje político cientifico Godoy, the chief minister, should be dis- out. However, some softening of the offi- alrededor del mundo por las corbetas Descubierta missed. Unfortunately the letter fell into cial attitude took place in 1809 when José y Atrevida, al mando de los capitanes de navío the hands of Godoy with the result that Espinosa y Tello published Memorias sobre Don Alejandro Malaspina y Don José Malaspina was arrested on 22 November las observaciones astronómicas hechas por los Bustamante. 1795 and tried on a charge of conspiracy. navegantes españoles en distintos lugares del However, the vogue for translating such He was sentenced to imprisonment in the globo, which contains a number of refer- voyages into English had long passed and fortress of San Antón in the harbour of La ences to Malaspina by name as well as a this important voyage remained virtually Coruña in the north-western province of number of mentions of his voyage. unknown amongst English-speaking Galicia, where he remained for almost In spite of the official embargo on any- scholars. Thus when J. C. Beaglehole pub- seven years until released through the in- thing to do with Malaspina, a massive ar- lished the third edition of his The Explora- tervention of Napoleon and exiled to his chive relating to his voyage was retained tion of the Pacific in 1966, he dismissed native Italy, where he died on 9 April 1810. in the Depósito Hidrográfico in Madrid, Malaspina’s voyage in just twenty lines, Before his arrest Malaspina had com- the forerunner of the present-day Museo while Ernest S. Dodge in his Beyond the pleted work on several versions of his jour- Naval in the same city. In 1823 its direc- Capes: Pacific Exploration from Captain Cook nal but its publication was suppressed and tor, Felipe Bauzá, who had served under to the Challenger (1776-1877), published in the only one of the volumes planned by

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 21 1971, does not mention Malaspina at all. extant version of Malaspina’s journal, to- is that potential editors proposing the pub- When the American scholar Henry R. gether with a series of volumes relating to lication of a foreign language journal are Wagner began researching Spanish voy- Malaspina’s scientific and political activi- required to translate it themselves or to ages to the northwest coast of America in ties. The first volume was published in edit a translation already made by some- the 1930s he included a short account of 1987, followed in 1990 by Malaspina’s one else since the Society does not have the Malaspina expedition in his influen- journal in two parts, with the series being funds to pay for such a translation. Both tial Cartography of the Northwest Coast of completed in 1999 with volume IX, the Professor Williams and I, who was by now America to the Year 1800, commenting journal of Malaspina’s second-in-com- also a vice-president of the Society, were rather unfairly “It cannot be said that mand José Bustamante, the series being eager to propose an English edition of Malaspina achieved any great success.” coordinated by Maria Dolores Higueras Malaspina, but neither of us was sufficiently The Malaspina mantle was taken up in Rodríguez, Jefe de Investigación of the fluent in Spanish to undertake the trans- 1960 by Donald C. Cutter when he pub- Museo Naval, who edited the final vol- lation. At this juncture an English aca- lished Malaspina in California, the first of a ume and also a number of other articles demic, Dr Felipe Fernández-Armesto, well number of books and articles relating to and books and, in particular, Catálogo crítico known for his publications on Columbus, Malaspina on the northwest coast that he de los documentos de la expedición Malaspina joined the proposed editorial team. continues to write. In 1977 the Oregon (1789-1794) del Museo Naval, which con- Through his Spanish contacts Dr Historical Society mounted a small exhi- tains over 3,500 entries. Thus in the space Femández-Armesto was able to raise suf- bition relating to Malaspina on the north- of a little more than two decades a con- ficient funds to enable the necessary trans- west coast, borrowing a number of draw- siderable corpus of books and articles re- lation to be undertaken, and so in 1996 ings and charts from the Museo Naval and lating to Malaspina has been published. the Society agreed to our proposal to pub- the Museo de America in Madrid. By this The publication by the Museo Naval of lish an English translation of Malaspina. time interest in Malaspina was awakened the earliest known version of Malaspina’s The search now began to find translators in Spain with the publication in 1982 of journal was also significant as far as the with suitable qualifications, a task which the pictorial record of the Malaspina ex- Hakluyt Society was concerned as it was proved more difficult than was anticipated. pedition by Carmen Sotos Serrano in her clearly the most authentic account of the Fortunately we were assisted in this by one Los Pintores de la expedición de Alejandro voyage. But before the Hakluyt Society of the Society’s Spanish members, Carlos Malaspina, followed in 1984 by the publi- could proceed they had to receive and Novi, who had been resident in London cation by the Museo Universal of one of evaluate a firm proposal. for many years and had formerly been em- the versions of Malaspina’s journal, Viaje In April 1992 Vancouver’s Simon Fraser ployed as the chief Spanish translator to científico y politico a la America Meridional...en University hosted a conference to cel- the International Maritime Organization. los años de 1789, 90, 91, 92, 93 y 95...por ebrate the bicentenary of Captain George Carlos Novi was elected to the Council los capitanes de navío D. Alejandro Malaspina Vancouver’s arrival on the Pacific north of the Hakluyt Society in 1999 and shortly y D. José Bustamante. The later volume was west coast, attended by many scholars from afterwards was invited to join the edito- edited, with two others, by Mercedes Palau around the world, a number of whom rial team. Through his contacts Carlos Baquero of the Ministerio de Asuntos were interested in Malaspina’s voyage and Novi was able to find a number of possi- Exteriores (Ministry of External Affairs), others who were members of the Hakluyt ble translators and the task of translation who has subsequently made a number of Society. During the conference a special began. Soon a number of translation diffi- visits to Vancouver Island in connection meeting was convened by Professor Glyn culties became apparent. Letters “b” and with her interest in Malaspina as well as Williams of Queen Mary College Lon- “v” were clearly interchangeable. Certain writing and editing a number of other ar- don and a vice president of the Hakluyt words were found to have different mean- ticles and books and organizing several im- Society to gauge what interest and sup- ings in nautical and astronomical contexts. portant conferences. port there would be for an English edi- Thus cuarto de círculo was an astronomical This renewed interest in Malaspina did tion of Malaspina’s voyage. The outcome quadrant and not a quarter of a circle; not go unnoticed in London and in par- was universal support for such a proposal, péndulo was an astronomical clock, a very ticular by members of the Hakluyt Soci- if a viable proposal could be made. Later accurate long case clock, not simply a pen- ety who had been aware for some years the same year the Spanish Government, dulum. Later in the voyage a pendulum that the lack of an English translation of under the auspices of the Ministerio de was embarked for conducting gravity ex- this important Spanish voyage was a ma- Asuntos Exteriores, hosted a major con- periments, which was designated péndulo jor gap in the Society’s publications. On ference on Malaspina, which attracted a simple or péndulo invariable. These difficul- one occasion a proposal to publish such number of important Malaspina scholars ties served to slow the translation process, an edition was put forward by a Spanish from around the world, followed by a but work has now been completed on the scholar but he was forced to withdraw due smaller conference in 1993 in Mulazzo, first of three volumes, which the Hakluyt to other commitments. Meanwhile the Malaspina’s birthplace in northern Italy. Society plans to publish later this year, with Museo Naval had embarked on an ambi- The problem now facing the Hakluyt the remaining two volumes, hopefully, tious undertaking to publish the earliest Society, which is a charitable organization, within the next three years.

22 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Fraudulent Bay Spanish Explorations of Boundary Bay by Nick Doe

ONCE lived in White Rock, in a house on Now I didn’t know much Spanish then, still Nick Doe is the editor the hillside overlooking the sea, and it was don’t, but I knew enough to know that, loosely of SHALE, Journal of here that I first developed an interest in local translated, the annotation meant “inlet of white the Gabriola Historical I & Museum Society. history. Perhaps unlike most, I can pinpoint the floweriness”. Being interested in the natural his- time this happened very precisely; it was the af- tory of the Fraser delta, I spent the next week ternoon of Saturday, 29 July 1989. That day, the walking the dykes, searching in libraries, quiz- local newspaper, The Peace Arch News, published zing local naturalists, trying to figure out what an article by local writer and historian Bill Hast- white flowers could possibly have impressed the ings. Spanish so. Bill’s article was about the Spanish explora- Had we had the Internet then, the mystery tions of Boundary Bay and was based on the work wouldn’t have lasted long; and maybe I never of Major J.S. Mathews, Vancouver’s one-time would have become interested in historical puz- “crusty but loveable archivist” (as Bill put it). The zles; and maybe I would never have been writing article included a brief description of the this; but I didn’t have the Internet then, so it wasn’t “Narvaez Chart of 1791”, which is the first chart until I looked up “Floridablanca” in the Ency- ever made of the Strait of Georgia. The chart is clopedia that the mystery was solved. By then, I well known among local historians, and much was, as the former editor of BC Historical News has been written about it over the years, but I would say, a “local history buff ”. didn’t know that at the time. What particularly It turns out, as most historians know, that caught my eye that Saturday afternoon was the “Floridablanca” was just an aristocratic title— annotation Boca de Florida Blanca (see Figure 1). nothing at all to do with the local flora. José This, Bill explained, was the Spanish name for Moñino, conde de Floridablanca, was prime min- the estuary of the . ister in Spain from 1776 until he was summarily

Left: Figure 1 —The Narvaez Chart annotated by Major J.S. Mathews showing Boundary Bay and the lower BC mainland. The “Semiahmoo Indian Village” is at the site of present-day White Rock. Points Roberts and Grey were perceived as islands.

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 23 Right: dismissed in February 1792, in part because of Boundary Bay were the Semiahmoo, with vil- Figure 2 his intransigent opposition to the French Revo- lages at the mouth of the little Campbell River, A small segment of lution. Most Spanish placenames were in fact, like Drayton Harbor, Birch Bay, and probably others Galiano’s copy of the Captain Vancouver’s, the names of important peo- elsewhere. They spoke Straits Salish. The imme- Narvaez chart in his book ple—saints, politicians, aristocrats, viceroys, naval diate neighbours of the Semiahmoo to the south, of sketchmaps. Point bureaucrats, people like that—but there are a few were their Straits-Salish-speaking relatives, the Roberts (Y [Isla] Cepeda) is on the left shown as an examples of names Lummi, and beyond island. The small dark that are descriptive— them, on Samish and rectangular “blob” to the the Ballenas Islands Guemes Islands, the right of the “d” in Cepeda (islands of whales); Samish. indicates a major Indian Patos Island (island of The Semiahmoo also village, almost certainly the ducks); and Rio de las had linguistic relatives ruined one at Lily Point. Grullas (river of immediately across 1 For those who love cranes, now English- from them on Vancou- “interesting facts”, Narváez man River). Although ver Island, including the was only 23 years old at the my immediate puz- (T’Sou-ke), the time. We have his chart, but zlement over the in the Victo- not his journal. 2 It was Puget incidentally name Florida Blanca ria area, the Saanich who makes reference in his had been resolved, (Wsanec), and others. unpublished log to a “white there is, as it happens, The people round the bluff ” while in Semiahmoo a further puzzle with coast from the Bay, a reference some have taken as referring to “the the name, but that re- Semiahmoo were the hump” at White Rock. Alas quired rather more who for White Rockers, Puget’s than a week to resolve spoke, not Straits, but accompanying compass and I’ll come back to the language of the reading makes it plain that Courtesy Museo Naval he was in fact referring to it later. people who live all the cliffs at Point Roberts. Boundary Bay was visited several times by along the Fraser River, Halq’eméylem. Accord- 3 In Morag Maclachlan’s European explorers before settlement in the area, ing to tradition, the Nicomekl (Snokomish) peo- editorial introduction to which began with the establishment of the Hud- ple, who also spoke Halq’eméylem, formerly oc- The Journals, 1827–30, p. 12, a further son’s Bay Company (HBC) trading post at Fort cupied a territory extending from Boundary Bay voyage by the HBC in Langley in the summer of 1827. The explorers to the Fraser River, but they were almost com- 1826 is mentioned. After who have left records of their visits include José pletely wiped out by the devastating smallpox researching the whereabouts of McKenzie Narváez, who came with the Eliza expedition of epidemic of 1782–1783. 1 and of the vessels available 1791; Dionisio Alcalá Galiano who, along with There once was a very large Indian village on to him for such a trip, I’m Cayetano Valdés, circumnavigated Vancouver Is- the shores of Boundary Bay. It stood on the south- inclined to believe there land in the Sutil and Mexicana in 1792; east tip of Point Roberts, known today as Lily was no such voyage, and 4 that McLoughlin’s “last fall” who was with Captain Vancouver’s expedition, Point. This was the site of the Wadhams cannery, 2 was a slip of the pen; he also in 1792; Francis Annance (of Annacis Is- which was built in 1891, the same year as the meant 1825. land) and John Work, who were clerks on the Drysdale cannery on Semiahmoo Spit. The can- 4 Later the Alaska Packers HBC canoe expedition to the Fraser River in nery has long since gone, and the site has re- Association Cannery. See Point Roberts, USA: The the winter of 1824; and furtrader Alexander verted to its natural state. Attention was first drawn History of a Canadian McKenzie and ship’s surgeon and amateur bota- to the old village by Peter Puget, who records in Enclave, by Richard E. nist Dr. John Scouler, who were aboard the HBC his log that on the afternoon of 11 June 1792, Clark. 5 brig William & Ann when it visited Point Roberts ...we stopped to dine at a deserted village… Deserted villages were 3 common after smallpox had in 1825. [which] must, by its size, have formerly been killed an estimated two- The Aboriginal people who lived around and the habitation of near four hundred people, thirds of the population in frequented Boundary Bay for the most part spoke but was now in perfect ruins and overrun with 1782–1783. Which peoples one of two languages, both with several dialects. nettles and some bushes….5 The body of the lived year-round on Point The first is called nowadays Straits Salish, and the village consists of three rows of houses, each Roberts before European row divided by a narrow lane and partitioned contact is not known for second Halq’eméylem. These languages are two off into four or six square houses and every certain. The historical of the five spoken by people belonging to the evidence is that the one large and capacious…. This frame, the fairly loose cultural and linguistic grouping called only remnant of the village, must have given >>> Coast Salish. The year-round inhabitants of

24 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 the Native inhabitants an infinite trouble in by Galiano supplies the long sought for refer- the construction, and it still remains a mystery ence. To be sure, it is a bit obscure to those not to me by what powers of mechanism they familiar with the Spanish charts of the time, but have been able to lift up the heavy and long be assured that the small rectangle on the east logs of timber which are placed on [top of the side of the peninsula, close to the south-eastern uprights]. tip, is Galiano’s usual symbol for a sizeable Na- One of those trivial curiosities that tend to in- tive habitation. It is certainly enough to satisfy trigue local historians is that, conspicuous though me that Galiano did indeed note the presence of the ruins of the village evidently were, nowhere the village in 1792, even though he was too pre- in any of the records of the Spanish explorations occupied with other things to write about it. of Boundary Bay has anyone managed to find Figure 1 is an often-reproduced segment of a Below: Figure 3A any reference to it. Both Work and Annance larger chart (Carta Que Comprehende...), showing Segment of “Carta Que mention it in their 1824 journals; and when southern Vancouver Island and the adjacent main- McKenzie was there in 1825, the ruined village Comprehende,” Narváez’s land. The segment—here annotated by Major chart, showing the BC was being used by some Saanich Indians as a tem- Matthews— appears to contain what must seem and porary shelter. Well, we can now put that right. to anyone not familiar with the countryside adjacent coast in Washing- Figure 2 from a previously unpublished sketch around the Fraser estuary, an appalling error in ton State.

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 25 Right: Figure 3B The chart computer corrected for elementary scaling and orientation errors superposed on a modern chart (lighter lines).

salmon-fishing site at Lily Point, on the southeastern tip of the peninsula, was used seasonally as a traditional right by all the Straits-Salish speakers, particularly the Semiahmoo and Lummi, and from Vancouver Island, the Saanich. Less surely, we can add to the list of those who used Lily Point, the people who used the Fraser-River fishery, that is, the Halq’eméylem-and-dialects speakers: Tsawwassen, Kwantlen, Nicomekl, and from Vancouver Island, the Nanaimo, Cowichan, and Malahat. 6 Point Roberts itself is made up of sediments deposited in the cool wet Nick Doe period immediately before the last ice age. that it shows a large, non-existent body of water scured by refraction caused by the sun drying 7 Also not adequately stretching northwards from between Point out and heating up the air above the mudflats at explained is why Narváez Roberts (Isla de Zepeda) and Kwomais Point in low tide. All of these phenomena, except flood- would want to make such a Surrey (Punta de San Rafael) towards the Burrard ing, which is prevented by modern dykes, often trip and, if he did, why he couldn’t tell the difference Inlet. In fact, this is a perfectly understandable give the high ground at Point Roberts, quite strik- between flooded fields and mistake by Narváez. The land between the north ingly, the appearance of an island, which undoubt- the open ocean. Matthews’ arm of the Fraser and Boundary Bay has been edly it was just a few thousand years ago.6 account is nevertheless very created since the end of the last ice age 10,000 The second feature of interest in Figure 1 is entertaining. See Vancouver Historical Journal, No. 4, years ago, and is still just a few feet above sea the apparent continuation of the shoreline from 1961. level. Now agricultural land, but formerly wet Boundary Bay almost all the way through to the 8 Nick Doe, “Some meadows and marshes, this land is difficult to see Indian Arm of (about where it says Anomalies in a Spanish from any distance away from the shoreline in Boca de Florida Blanca). This distortion led the Chart of Vancouver Island—1791, Lighthouse, Boundary Bay. Explanations for Narváez’s error incautious Major J.S. Mathews in his account of Journal of the Canadian include the lowland around Point Roberts being “incidents presumed to have occurred” to go as Hydrographic Association, 56, flooded by the Fraser, being below the horizon, far as to assert that the Spanish made an overland Fall 1997, 7-20. being shrouded in low-lying mist, or being ob- expedition to the Fraser River. This assertion is

26 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 still occasionally repeated as fact in local history clockwise by twenty degrees. A mistake here was Below: publications and pamphlets, but there is no hint the second type of error, an orientation error. Figure 4 that this might be true in any of the Spanish The third type of error occurred when it came A sketch from Galiano’s records.7 to adding the latitude and longitude grid to the book of sketchmaps This segment of the Carta Que Comprehende... final version of the chart. It was quite impractical showing the soundings made in the fruitless search I find particularly interesting because it nicely for the surveyors to measure their geographic for the Boca de Florida demonstrates two fairly common types of carto- positions as they worked (no GPS in those Blanca in Boundary and graphic error. These errors can sometimes be days!)—even a rough longitude determination Mud Bays. Point Roberts amusing because they cause endless controversy required many careful celestial observations to is on the left. The annota- and speculation as to what the explorers were up be made. What was done therefore was to estab- tions are references to low to, when alas the simple truth is that some anony- lish the latitude and longitude of just one place wooded country. mous cartographer made a silly arithmetic mis- on the chart, and then use the distances, meas- take and misdrew the chart. ured by dead reckoning, to construct the rest of Charts and maps of large areas, such as Van- the grid. The problem here was that sometimes couver Island, had of course to be pieced together the geographic coordinates of two points on the from collections of much smaller field maps. Each chart were known and because of errors in both small map represented the work of one or two distance measurements and coordinate days’ work by a small surveying crew. The com- determinations, the two did not agree. This was plete chart Carta Que Comprehende... was made up of about eighteen segments which were rather hurriedly “pasted” together in the fall of 1791 at Nootka by Narváez, Pantoja, Verdía, and Eliza be- fore being sent down to the Spanish naval estab- lishment at San Blas, where made a fair copy. Although most of the individual seg- ments that went into the chart have long been lost, some years ago I discovered that they could still be identified in the final version of the chart by scanning the chart for cartographic errors, and noting that these errors tended to occur in small patches. Each “patch” had a characteristic set of errors that differed from those of adjacent patches; and there is little doubt in my mind that these “patches” actually correspond to the original con- stituent segments from which the chart was as- sembled. The three types of error that occur are (i) scal- ing, (ii) orientation, and (iii) geographic location.8 I won’t go into these in detail here, but briefly, these errors arise in the following ways. Each sketch map of a small part of the coast was likely originally drawn to its own scale; so the first task in incorporating the small sketches into a much larger map, was to redraw all the segments to the same scale. If this re-scaling was not done cor- rectly, then we had the first type of error, a scal- ing error. Field maps were very often oriented to compass (or magnetic) north, which in this part of the world is about 20 degrees east of geo- graphic (or true) north. Since it is conventional to use geographic north at the top of published charts, all the constituent segments with com- pass north at the top had to be twisted around Courtesy Museo Naval.

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 27 9 Possibly the oversizing is sometimes rectified by changing the scaling of point at the entrance (probably ) was related to the fact that one the map in the east-west direction until it agreed given the name Punta de la Bodega, after Juan Fran- nautical mile is almost exactly 50 percent more with the longitudes; and similarly scaling in a cisco de la Bodega y Quadra, the then comman- that one minute of north–south direction until it agreed with the dant of the naval station at San Blas, an impor- longitude at these latitudes. latitudes. Such independent east–west and north– tant person without doubt, but nowhere near the About a third of all the 18 south scaling distorts the shape of the land if done rank of the prime minister of Spain. Somebody segments of the chart exhibit this error. incorrectly, as it often was because longitude and at the top clearly considered this boca to be of the 10 Tomàs Bartroli, Genesis of latitude were not easily measured with great ac- utmost importance. Vancouver City: Explorations curacy, and such distortion constitutes the third The rest of the story is really history—in 1792, of its Site 1791, 1792 & type of cartographic error. the Galiano and Valdés expedition arrived in 1808, Vancouver, 161-163. 11 John Kendrick, The Voyage Figures 3A and 3B show the original chart Boundary Bay and, with great anticipation headed of Sutil and Mexicana: 1792, together with the corrected version. The segment northward between Point Roberts (Punta de Spokane 1991, 112. from up to Mud Bay has simply Cepeda) and Kwomais Point (Punta de San Rafael). 12 The Gabriola Island been drawn fifty percent too large, a common In no time at all, their boat found itself in shal- sketches are discussed in 9 detail in Nick Doe, “Acalá mistake. The segment representing the North lower and shallower water. “In addition…”, their [sic] Galiano’s sketchmaps of Shore Mountains has simply been drawn with report states, “…we did not see any opening at Gabriola,” SHALE, Journal compass, not geographic north at the top—the the end of the bay; only that it terminates in low of the Gabriola Historical & Museum Society, v. 1, second kind of error. The segment showing the land subject to flooding and covered with trees.” November 2000, 12-21. land between Point Roberts and Point Grey has The soundings on Galiano’s sketchmap (Fig- also been drawn with the incorrect orientation. ure 4) wonderfully illustrates Galiano’s comment This segment also shows an asymmetric scaling “…our imagination had been so coloured by the error, which might be a type-three error; or which configuration on the map, and by the word we might be a simple error in measuring the dis- had received of the expedition of the previous tance between the two points. That there was year, that we could not shake off the belief that some confusion over orientation is suggested by [the inlet] reached far into the continent…”11 It the inscription inserted in Boundary Bay that was at this juncture no doubt that the disap- reads Declin.on Observ.a N.E. 12°30'. This figure is pointed Galiano gave Boundary Bay the name quite wrong. Although the compass variation, or Ensenada del Engaño, “the bay of deceit,” and, prob- declination as it is called here (the difference be- ably with much lessened optimism, directed that tween compass and true north), does vary by a his ships look elsewhere for the hoped-for north- few degrees over long periods, there is no evi- west passage. dence that in historical times it fell to as little as ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 12°30’E. Figures 2 and 4 are two of a series by Galiano As Figure 3B shows, the extended coastline contained in a hand-sewn book covering the pas- heading for Indian Arm actually represents the sage of the Sutil and Mexicana (11–14 June 1792) border between the 300-feet (90-m) high Sun- from Isla de San Vicente (Cypress Island) to En- shine Heights (or Hills) in the District of Delta trance Island, Gabriola Island, immediately be- and the adjacent Fraser lowland, a natural bound- fore Cala del Descanso (Pilot Bay, Gabriola). The ary to suppose that existed between the land and sketches were originally in pencil, but someone, the sea when seen from a distance to the south in probably in the distant past, has gone over them a small boat. in ink and in places the ink has bled through the These simple errors evidently engendered page. The book is held by the Museo Naval in some excitement when the 1791 expedition re- Madrid (Borradores, MS 2456) and is not cur- 10 ported them to their superiors in Mexico, just rently catalogued. Local historians, including as in a later century they were to do among the myself, are very grateful to John Crosse of Van- local historians in Vancouver. The Boca de Florida couver who first brought this delightful little book Blanca was evidently in reality no more than a to our attention. A photographic copy, courtesy very vague indication of the perceived presence of John Crosse, is now held by the Malaspina of the , yet in the uncorrected chart Research Centre at Malaspina University-Col- it looked like it might be a significant entrance lege in Nanaimo under the direction of Dr. John to the interior of the continent. In all of the sur- Black.12 I would like to thank the Museo Naval viving reports and journals of the 1791 expedi- in Madrid for their anticipated consent to fur- tion there is little or no reference to this inlet. A ther publish these sketchmaps here.

28 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Reports

A Brief Chronology of the A Narrative from Friendly Cove Re-establishment of a Historical by Robert Eberle Relationship THE MOWACHAHT, a band in the Nuu-chah-nulth Nation, have occupied the During the summer fest at Yuquot, in August village of Yuquot for at least 4,300 years. Located on a narrow spit of land on 2000, Señora Mercedes Palau of the Ministry of the southern tip of Nootka Island, the village sat between two crescent beaches. Foreign Affairs of Spain presented to the Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nations, on behalf The houses faced the calm waters of Friendly Cove with their backs turned to of the Spanish Government, a special photo- the inhospitable winds that pound the outer shore.Yuquot was the Mowachaht’s graphic display of drawings of Yuquot. summer home. The band sought refuge from the winter storms by moving the The photographs are primarily of the works entire village to the protected waters of Tahsis. The Mowachaht still retains of the artists Tomás Suria and José Cardero, mem- ownership of the original village site with each family owning their historic bers of the expeditions visiting Yuquot and the house sites. waters of Nootka Sound in 1791 and 1792. They During the late 1700s Spanish explorers spent years charting the northwest include an image of the famous Suria drawing of coastal waters of North America. Here they made contact with the local Chief Maquinna. The original work comes from populations, drew maps of the coastline, kept informative diaries, and sketched collections housed in the Museo Naval and the Museo de America, both in Madrid. The presen- the people and their habitat. Two artists who accompanied the Spanish explor- tation of this exhibition to Mowachaht/ ers, Tomás de Suria and José Cardero created the original drawings of the First Muchalaht First Nations by the Government of Nations village of Yuquot. Spain recognizes the re-establishment of a his- More than two hundred years after the last Spanish ships sailed from these torical relationship. waters, the government of Spain and the Museum of Ethnology in Barcelona This re-establishment started in 1991, when a donated an exhibit of photographic reproductions of the work of de Suria and delegation of Spanish scholars, in Vancouver for Cardero as a gift to the Mowachaht people. After leaving Spain the exhibit had a symposium on Spanish explorers and the open- toured through Mexico and North America before it arrived in Vancouver. ing of the exhibition “Enlightened Voyages” was Robin Inglis, director of the North Vancouver Museum and president of the invited by then Chief Ambrose Maquinna to visit Yuquot. A year later, the Spanish Ambassador to Vancouver Spanish Pacific Historical Society was asked to deliver the repro- Canada participated in the commemoration of ductions to the Mowachaht/Muchalaht, descendants of the principle subjects the 1792 meeting of Maquinna, Bodega y Quadra, of the drawings, and to set up the exhibit, packed in three heavy crates, in the and Vancouver. abandoned church at Yuquot. In the fall of 1999, the First Nations welcomed I was excited to be going to Yuquot with Robin to install the exhibit. At last another Spanish delegation which included I would see Yuquot, home of Chief Maquinna and the Mowachaht. Yuquot, Señora Mercedes Palau of the Ministry of Foreign “where the wind blows from all directions.” Yuquot—known as Friendly Cove Affairs and Dr. Alex Malaspina, a member of the by the overseas visitors—at the entrance to the Muchalaht Inlet and Nootka family of Alexandro Malaspina, whose expedi- Sound, close to Cove, the site of Captain Cook’s first landing on tion, in 1791, brought artists, map makers, and scientists to Nootka. the North West Coast. Yuquot, the place of first contact, first European settle- In March 2000, Chief Mike Maquinna, accom- ment, site of the first Spanish fort, first garden, the meeting place of Captain panied by his daughter Marsha, gave a presen- George Vancouver and Captain Juan de la Bodega y Quadra. The place of the tation on Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nations’ sea otter traders, the sinking of the ship Boston, the captivity of John Jewitt, and culture and heritage in Madrid on the occasion British Columbia’s first national historic site. of a major exhibition of historical and contem- On Monday 26 June 2000, driving west from Gold River to the dock we porary Northwest Coast art. met the coastal supply ship, the Uchuck III, to arrange transport of the crates to In 1998, Chief Mike Maquinna was the guest Friendly Cove. The Uchuck, “Healing Waters” in Nuu-chah-nulth, would de- of the Spanish and participated at the opening part the next morning and was expected to arrive at Yuquot sometime around of an exhibition about Nootka and the Spanish presence on the west coast of Vancouver Island noon. She has served the coastal area for 40 years. Built in 1942 as an American at the end of the eighteenth century at the Mu- minesweeper, she has been totally refitted with a coffee shop and comfortable seum of Ethnology in Barcelona. After that the lounge. Today she carries up to a hundred passengers and a good quantity of exhibition, Nootka regreso a una historia olvidada freight. Yuquot was an unscheduled stop for the Uchuck on its way to Tahsis, but (Nootka: return to a forgotten history) toured the owners of the vessel were anxious to help delivering the exhibit. For our through Spain. own personal transportation Margarita James, Director of Cultural and Herit- It was this collection of photographs that was age resources for the Mowachaht-Muchalaht First Nations, arranged transpor- donated to the Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Na- tation with Jim, fishing guide, owner, operator and captain of a small open tions. Bob Eberele’s narrative talks about its in- fibreglass boat. stallation at Yuquot. Information supplied by After a backbreaking ride over the choppy waters we were not welcomed Margarita James, Director of Cultural & Heritage Resources, by a group of canoes, but still, my first sight of the pebbled crescent of Friendly Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nations

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 29 Cove was a thrill. As Jim slowed the boat I felt that we should be paddling to the shore. I could see that the magic and charm still remained, despite the fact that only two houses occupied the beach where once the longhouses stood. A modern lighthouse is now perched on Pig Island, called Isla de los Cerdos by the Spanish as this was where they had kept their pigs. On the adjacent San Miguel Island, now an extension of Pig Island, the Spanish once established for a few years a defensive battery. At that time the beach was lined with the buildings of the Spanish garrison. Where the Spanish commandant’s home had once dominated the vil- lage, a new two-storey house stood. Further behind the tall midden-shore that fringed the beach—witness of the long-time occupation of this site—stood the gleaming white church, com- plete with belfry and spire. Beyond the beach, the shore, and the church stretched another shore, with its pebble beach, the Pacific Ocean, and a long white bank of fog. We were met by Ray Williams; he and his wife Teresa are the only remaining members of the band residing full time at Yuquot. In 1967 the Federal Government moved the inhabitants of the village to the mainland village of Ahaminaquuis, at the end of Muchalaht Inlet where we started our journey on the water, and later to Tsaxana near Gold River. The main source of employ- ment at Yuquot, the cannery, had closed, as had the school, forcing the band to relocate. Ray and Teresa Williams live in a small two- room house while they are building the larger two-storey dwell- ing beside it. The remaining structures were torn down leaving only the Williams’s houses and the church. The church, a tall wooden structure, is located on a prominent site seen from the water on both sides of the narrow isthmus. The first church, constructed in 1889 by Father Augustin Brabant, burned down in 1954. The existing 1956 building is no longer used as church; it serves as cultural centre and museum. The build- ing shows signs of recent maintenance, notably a new roof and a new coat of paint. We climbed the stairs to the front door and found that from the top of the stairs one gets a wonderful view of the cove with the coastal mountains rising in the background. On the walls of the vestibule a small display of photos and newspaper clippings greeted us and provided an historical intro- duction. Going through the main door we were met with pat- terns of coloured light from the stained glass windows on either side; gifts from the Spanish government. One window depicts the meeting of Vancouver and Bodega y Quadra, with a few Mowachaht looking on. The other window shows Spanish Father Catala preaching. The inside came as a surprise: a high-arched ceiling, freshly painted bright white; simple, stained-glass windows emitted a soft, yellow light. The altar, pulpit, and other signs of its former life as a Catholic church had been removed and were replaced with two very striking and colourful totem poles mounted against the wall

where the altar had been. A look back to the choir loft over the Bob Eberle Photos by entrance revealed two Maquinna house poles standing on either side of the doorway with a thunderbird mounted above creating Top: Margarita James, director of cultural & heritage resources of the an archway. The effect of these large, brightly coloured figures Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nations and Robin Inglis, president of the dominating the traditional western church structure was quite Spanish Pacific Historical Society showing images of eighteenth-century stunning. The band was clearly transforming the building into its residents on the dock at Yuquot. own space. Robin suggested using the choir loft for the Spanish Middle: Robin Inglis putting the finishing touches on the exhibit. exhibit, and that is where we worked for three days on its instal- Bottom: The former church at Yuquot is used as cultural centre and lation. museum.

30 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Marsha Maquinna, daughter of Mike Maquinna, the current chief, stayed for a short time at Yuquot in the former priests’ living quarters at the far end of the church. She was in charge of six rental cabins that the band had constructed. The cabins, modest two- room Panabode structures, are located on a narrow stretch of land between the ocean and Spirit Lake, bet- ter known as Jewitt Lake after John R. Jewitt, the English blacksmith who survived the capture and sinking of the American trading ship Boston. Jewitt, who was held captive for more than two years from 1803 to 1805 by Chief Photos by Bob Eberle Photos by Maquinna, kept a well- known journal of his stay at Yuquot which was published soon after his return to Left: The old Henry Jack pole at rest. Boston in 1817. Top right: Pebble beach on the other side of the landspit. A small island at the far end of Jewitt Lake blends into the shore. This was the Bottom right: The UCHUCK III alongside the dock at location of the Mowachaht’s sacred Whalers’ Shrine. The shrine was a well-kept Friendly Cove. In the background the lighthouse on Pig secret to Yuquot’s many foreign residents including John McKay, the surgeon from Island and to the left San Miguel where the Spanish at James Strange’s trading ship, who lived in Yuquot between 1786 and 1787, John one time built a battery. Meares who built a ship here in 1788, the soldiers in the Spanish establishment between 1789-1795, and John Jewitt. The first published reports about the shrine’s existence appeared in 1817 when the French explorer Roquefeuil visited the area. family images for the new work. The Nootka Whalers’ Washing House has been described as one of the most We went to see the 100-foot high lighthouse on significant cultural sites in Canada. Here the whalers would prepare for the danger- Pig Island to sign the guest book. The Nootka light ous and demanding whale hunt. The surrounding lake was used for cleansing the station is one of the last on the coast to still have a body while the shrine with its numerous carvings and human skulls prepared the keeper and has been cared for by Ed and Pat Kidder spirit. In 1904, during the absence of most of the Mowachaht chiefs, the shrine was for 30 years. The beam of the light can be seen for 25 “collected” for a small fee by “salvage anthropologists” and sold to the American kilometres. Signing the book and reading the entries Museum of Natural History in New York. The assembly is so large and complex was a lot of fun. Most visitors were sailors who sounded that it has never been put on display. People who have recently visited the artifacts happy and sometimes fortunate to be back on land. report that it has enormous power. The community at Yuquot has requested that it For thousands of years the Muchalaht people oc- be returned, although many seem happy to leave it where it is. cupied this land.Viewing the cove from the lighthouse Along the beach, past Ray Williams’s house, lies an old totem pole now buried it was easy to imagine the arrival of the sailing ships, in the grass. This pole was the last one erected at Yuquot. It was carved by Chief mainly under the flags of Spain and England, entering Henry Jack and set in place in 1929. The event was witnessed by Canada’s Gover- and occupying the protected waters of the harbour. nor General, Lord Willingdon. The pole fell down in the early 1990s during a For a brief moment Nootka became the centre stage winter storm. After much debate it was allowed to return to the earth as all the in a dispute between Spain and Britain. Those years poles had before. This left the village with no totems poles, just like Cook and the brought together some remarkable personalities, whose Spanish had first found it. The old Henry Jack pole lies here, slowly disintegrating, voices are still echoing today in oral tradition and writ- covered by ferns and long grass, some growing through its finely carved features. ten history, and in the drawings of the artists who came We were delighted to find a new pole under construction in front of the Williams’s along. But most of those who were here are now for- house. Ray’s son Sanford had recently returned to Yuquot from Hazelton where he gotten. The original inhabitants and the travellers from worked on nine poles as an apprentice and on two of his own as a master. He makes foreign shores who were here only for a brief stay or his living as a carver selling masks in and Campbell River. Ray was de- for a few years were just absorbed back into the earth; lighted to see the first new totem pole being carved since the Chief Henry Jack’s like that overgrown fallen pole will be one day  pole 70 years ago. Sanford told us that he had asked his grandmother to select the soon.

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 31 Book Reviews Books for review and book reviews should be sent to: Anne Yandle, Book Review Editor BC Historical News, 3450 West 20th Avenue, Vancouver BC V6S 1E4

Cook’s visit to Nootka Sound; the Spanish Daniel W. Clayton Islands of Truth: The Imperial presence and Vancouver’s circumnavigation Islands of Truth: The Imperial Fashioning Fashioning of Vancouver Island of Vancouver Island, of Vancouver Island; and the Oregon Daniel W. Clayton. Vancouver: UBC Press, reviewed by Phyllis Reeve. boundary dispute with the United States. 2000. 330 pp., maps. $85 hardcover, $29.95 While unravelling rich historical tales in their Betty C. Keller paperback. Pender Harbour Cowboy: The Many Lives of labyrinthine contexts, he critiques the REVIEWED BY PHYLLIS REEVE. Bertrand Sinclair, narrators, from Cook andVancouver and their reviewed by Richard J. Lane. In 1924 UBC historian Walter Sage reported contemporaries to Alan Moorehead, Robin Karen Piffko to the British Columbia Historical Fisher, and Marshall Sahlins, and finds that The Life and Times of Texas Fosbery: Association on a ceremonial journey to historians too, and history itself, are within, The and Beyond, Friendly Cove and the unveiling of a cairn and contributors to, the contexts. After a few reviewed by Donna Jean MacKinnon. commemorating Cook’s 1778 discovery of chapters Clayton announces “there is no Gordon Hak Nootka Sound. A recent issue of the British original or definitive Cook.” Turning Trees into Dollars: The British Columbia Historical News (Vol. 33/1 Winter But this is not the “end of history” so much Columbia Coastal Lumber Industry, 1858 to 1999/2000) carried two reports of as the beginning of an endless and fascinating 1913, commemorative visits to the same area, in investigation in which investigators are part reviewed by Ken Drushka. November 1998 by the Society for the of what must be investigated. Identifying Richard Somerset Mackie History of Discoveries and in October 1999 preconceptions, mythologies, agendas, and Island Timber: A Social History of the Comox by participants in the Inaugural Symposium oversights, Clayton does not consign them Logging Company, Vancouver Island, of the Alexandro Malaspina Research Centre. to oblivion. To trash others’ agendas would reviewed by Ken Drushka. In 1978 and 1992 academic conferences be to impose his own. marked the bicentenaries of Cook’s and Sandra Djwa As a geographer, Clayton directs attention Professing English at UBC: The Legacy of Vancouver’s arrival on the British Columbia to the maps made by explorers, traders, Roy Daniells and Garnett Sedgwick; the coast. What exactly do we keep on admirals, and diplomats. Outlines and spaces 1999 Garnett Sedgwick Memorial Lecture, celebrating? include and exclude; and what they more reviewed by Phyllis Reeve. Daniel Clayton looks at the 1924 and more excluded as navigators became ceremony and leads from it into a new kind discoverers and discoverers became Chris Yorath A Measure of Value: The Story of the of history, by way of an intensive, complex, developers, was evidence of the peoples and D’Arcy Island Leper Colony, and breathtaking examination of what, who, cultures already inhabiting the “new” land. reviewed by Marie Elliott. why, and whether we celebrate. But before I That evidence still existed for Cook, alienate my friends who are members of the whose investigations as a matter of course Frank Porter Patterson worthy bodies mentioned above, be assured included cross-cultural encounters and The Cutting Edge: Reminiscences of Surgery that this is not simplistic or trendy interaction. Yet even he, by drawing a map, at the Vancouver General Hospital and the University of British Columbia, revisionism. Clayton, who is a “geographer” imposed his own order on the fluidities of reviewed by Phyllis Reeve. rather than a “historian”, does not demand human contact. By the time Vancouver our repudiation of familiar historical arrived, the “invigorating hand of commerce” Irene Stangoe narratives as wrong, wicked, or politically was pushing the Native people literally off History and Happenings in the Cariboo– incorrect. He does want us to unroll those Chilcotin: Pioneer Memories, the map. His cartography reinvented the reviewed by Esther Darlington. narratives, shake them thoroughly, and refuse island as empty space at the disposal of to return them to their accustomed imperial and mercantile initiative. Joyce and Peter McCart pigeonholes. The clash of Spaniards and Britons at On the Road with David Thompson, Now a teacher in the School of Geography Nootka in 1790 had more to do with reviewed by R.J. (Ron) Welwood. and Geosciences at St. Andrew’s University, European politics and revolutions than it did Walter Guppy Scotland, Clayton studied at the University with Nootka itself. By 1820 Native land title A Place for Gold, of British Columbia under the mentorship went unnoticed and irrelevant; Britain and reviewed by Werner Kaschel. of Derek Gregory and Cole Harris. He works the United States “constructed the Oregon Douglas Cole “out of the critical field of vision developed Territory as an exclusively Anglo-American Franz Boas: The Early Years, 1858–1906, by Michel Foucault and Edward Said.” But space of geopolitical dispute.” Their visions reviewed by Brian Gobbett. even a “post-colonial” study begins with of permanent occupation allowed no room E.C. Coleman narrative, and Clayton is a skilled narrator. for the suggestion that the territory was Captain Vancouver, North-West Navigator, He discusses events we thought we knew: already occupied. The territory was “emptied reviewed by J.E. Roberts of its prior significations.”

32 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Maps of Vancouver Island indicated places researched, well written, and as fast-paced as eventual breakdown of the marriage, but for on the coastal outline fringing the unknown a piece of pulp fiction, may have left the a fuller account of this period, additional interior occupied only by wild animals and reader asking for more. Now Betty C. Keller research may be needed at the forthcoming wild men, by Native peoples who has expanded the available literature on B.M. Bower Archive (which will be a part of “underutilized” what was already thought of Sinclair considerably with her new biography, the Western History Collections at The as “Crown” land. Pender Harbour Cowboy: The Many Lives of University of Oklahoma, in Norman, OK). Clayton concludes: “When I worked Bertrand Sinclair. The reference to multiple Eventually, after Sinclair’s affair with Bower’s through Cook’s sojourn at Nootka Sound lives in the title is important, since Sinclair cousin Ruth, the marriage was over; Sinclair and discovered a diverse field of interaction brought to his fiction writing diverse and Ruth headed for Vancouver. The next and representation a judge’s handling of experiences born of an innate restlessness, his six chapters of the biography deal with historical evidence came to mind and led me love of the “wild west,” the British Columbian Sinclair’s long and adventurous life in British towards a wider methodological discussion coast, and his attempts to live and learn of Columbia; this would be the place where his of how British Columbians have narrated the industries situated in BC that formed most successful novels would be written, such their relationship with the land.” It is more than the back-drop to his novels as North of Fifty-Three (1915) and Poor Man’s important to “open up different sides of the (although his novels can be called “romances” Rock (1920); this was also where he would past from different cultural and geographical such industries are also what those novels are eventually find two simultaneously positions” and to “simultaneously evaluate the fundamentally about). permanent homes: in his cabin at Pender past and unsettle its implications for the Drawing mainly from correspondence Harbour, and on his boat the Hoo Hoo. Keller present.” held at UBC Special Collections Division, explores Sinclair’sVancouver life, starting with This book does unsettle, and stimulate, as well as referring at times in some depth to his arrival in 1911, and his increasing output inform, excite. Research and documentation the novels and short stories, Keller starts and of westerns in the form of short stories and are impressive. When Clayton takes issue with ends with “Sinclair Bay” on the Sunshine “novelettes”; important early sales included other geographers or historians, he does so Coast, probably the place where Sinclair was silent-film rights, as well as material to Popular. without polemic and as part of his wider most at home. The latter may be disputed, The novelette North of Fifty-Three eventually methodological discussion. His publisher given his love of the “wild west”, but as Keller became a best selling novel, and Sinclair used could have served him better by backing notes he had “...arrived on the Montana his time well at Spell-Check with human readers capable of range just as it was ceasing to be The Old researching the industry that would become retrieving missing prepositions and West...it would be a few years before he an integral part of his next novel, Big Timber correcting typos. A pity. realized that he had come too late.” (p15) (1916). Both novels were turned into films. Reviewer Phyllis Reeve is a librarian and Keller fills in the background to these years, While Europe and its dependencies were bookseller who reads Edward Said. covering the main players in the region, first going to war, the socialist-leaning Sinclair was with the ranch owners and notorious ranch falling in love with a boat! Although an idyllic hands, the rugged environment, the myths lifestyle of cruising, exploring and trolling Pender Harbour Cowboy: The Many and legends of the range, and then with the followed, Sinclair’s anti-war sentiments Lives Of Bertrand Sinclair. more literary representation of that caused him problems with the manuscript Betty C. Keller. Victoria: TouchWood, environment, with Sinclair’s exasperated of Burned Bridges, eventually published in 2000. 224 pp. Illus. $18.95 paperback response to texts such as Owen Wister’s The 1919. Keller does well exploring the REVIEWED BY RICHARD J. LANE Virginian in the form of his own short stories, intersecting tensions in Sinclair’s life from this He wrote popular novels and short stories starting with “The N-Bar Freak” published point; his marriage to Ruth was deeply set in British Columbia that in the main sold in the Argonaut in 1902. Keller moves on to problematic due to personality clashes, and extremely well and are still cherished by two main aspects of Sinclair’s literary later her illness and move to Livermore collectors today; he left his name attached to development: the powerful relationship Sanatorium; his friendship with daughter the Sunshine Coast and the memories of between Sinclair and Bertha Bower (who Cherry grew ever stronger as she loved the some of the people who live there; his papers would become an extremely successful lifestyle he sought, especially with their move are deposited at The University of British western writer) as well as his peripatetic to Pender Harbour, and all the time there Columbia Special Collections Division studies, auditing classes at The University of was the pressure and contradictions inherent where he has been studied by literary critics, Washington and Stanford University. Chapter in Sinclair’s desire to write literature with biographers, and historians; and yet it will Two of the biography is aptly titled “Writing the overriding need to make money from still come as a surprise to some readers to the Range,” covering Sinclair’s romances and pulp fiction. As Keller notes, learn that his name is Bertrand William transformation into full-time pulp-fiction the decision Sinclair made was to “...write Sinclair. Who? For a long time, the best place author, and his relationships with “cowboy- wolf-chasers for Popular and literary novels to find an answer to that question was Laurie artist” Charles Russell, and Bertha Bower for Little, Brown.” (p.99) What followed was Ricou’s Dictionary of Literary Biography entry who had by this time left her husband research into the fishing industry for Poor (Gale Research, 1990); also a number of other (Sinclair and Bower were married in 1905). Man’s Rock, another anti-war novel, The academic papers have been published about Keller touches upon some of the strengths Hidden Places (1922), and the socialist critique Sinclair (see BC Historical News 32/3, for of the relationship with Bower, as well as the of The Inverted Pyramid (1924); sales of the more details). Ricou’s Dictionary of Literary rivalries (her publications were fast making last two novels were poor in comparison to Biography entry, while informative, well profits that exceeded Sinclair’s) and the Sinclair’s formula fiction. Financial pressures

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 33 had increased with Ruth’s stay at Livermore Note: for more information on the B.M. give the reader a sense of being guided from and the break-up of the marriage was some Bower Archive, which will be a part of the one point to the next. Even if you miss some time coming. The return to successful literary Western History Collections at The University of the details, however, it is hard not to be models was inevitable, thus Wild West (1926) of Oklahoma, please contact: Donald L. caught up in the life of this adventurer who was born. Keller turns to the Depression years, DeWitt, Curator, Western History Collections, has obviously carved his place in the life and the loss of publishing income and a series of Monet Hall Room 452, University of work of rural British Columbia. personal disasters, which Sinclair responded Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019. Telephone Reviewer Donna Jean MacKinnon is archivist to in an unusual way: he became a salmon 405-325-3641 or 405-325-2611 for the BC Teachers Federation. troller. The last sections of the biography are E-mail: [email protected]; taken up with this unusual, but somehow URL: http://libraries.ou.edu/depts/westhistory/ characteristic move of Sinclair’s, along with I would like to thank Reed Doke for providing his new marriage and later companionship me with this information and for permission to Turning Trees Into Dollars: The British after the death of his third wife, his immense share it in this review. Columbia Coastal Lumber Industry, feats of strength as he continued trolling to Reviewer Richard J. Lane lives and teaches in 1858 to 1913. the age of 83, and then the final, long years England. Gordon Hak. Toronto, University of of decline. Toronto Press, 239 pp. Map. $22.95 Keller’s biography works well, recovering paperback. $65.00 hardcover. this “lost” or forgotten author: his complex The Life and Times of Texas Fosbery: Island Timber: A Social History of the personal relationships, his development as a Comox Logging Company, Vancouver writer across genres and in relation to The Cariboo and Beyond different environments that make him a Karen Piffko. Surrey: Heritage House Island. “western” writer in more ways than one, the Publishing, 2000. 189 pp. Illus., maps. Richard Somerset Mackie, Victoria, Sono contradictions and tensions in his work. But $16.95 paperback. Nis Press, 309 pp. Illus., map. $39.95 if we are to take seriously Sinclair’s place as a REVIEWED BY DONNA JEAN MACKINNON. paperback. British Columbian writer then a more This true-life recollection of a kind of REVIEWED BY KEN DRUSHKA. comprehensive biography may be called for quintessential British Columbian takes the After decades of neglect, British Columbia which takes these claims more fully into reader from one man’s earliest working days forest history is finally coming into its own. account. Maybe all that is needed is some as a cowboy in the Cariboo to prospecting This is important, not just because the forest further critical apparatus, such as a more with his father after the Second World War sector is still the primary driver of the comprehensive bibliography of Sinclair’s in the Yukon, to “driving cat”(Caterpillar) as provincial economy, but because BC is almost publications, e.g., the novels and selected an independent contractor in different parts entirely forested and the use or misuse of short-stories (which were published in of the province for the rest of his life. these forests is a matter of great interest to America, Canada and the UK), a “You might say the Cariboo is in my most citizens. Unfortunately, most of those comprehensive bibliography of critical works blood,” Fosbery is quoted as saying early in citizens have little or no knowledge of the either about, or which mention in significant this book, as the often rambling reminiscences history of their forests and of how they have ways, Sinclair (for example, Jean Barman fill the pages with his travels and work-a-day been used. This is in the process of being refers to Sinclair in her History of BC, The migrations to numerous BC locations remedied. These two recent books by West Beyond The West [1991), and perhaps a including Westbank, Big Creek, Stewart professional historians, amid a flood of other guide to the Sinclair archival holdings at River, Fort Selkirk, Hell’s Gate, and Dawson publications on the subject, are worthy of UBC, which are of a fairly extensive nature. City, Yukon. special regard. Of course, as with many other obscure or Interspersed with details of working Hak’s book is remarkable for the scope of “forgotten” authors, new material is conditions are recollections of cold winters, its subject matter. He is a history professor at constantly coming to light and forthcoming of moving from one town to another, of Malaspina College in Nanaimo, but unlike work on B.M. Bower (including a accidents and injuries (including a hair- most academics does not limit himself to a forthcoming biography by Kate Baird raising boating accident), and of encounters dry recitation of laboriously unearthed Anderson) may add to the Sinclair stockpile with wildlife. Along with the inevitable historical information acquired through as well as providing a different perspective tribulations come unique highlights of living orthodox research methodologies. on Sinclair’s personal and professional and working in remote environments. He does that task too, of course, and relationships. But it would be foolhardy to Fosbery speaks with awe of the times he saw includes some important new information criticize a biography for what might become the northern lights and the thrill of travelling on the development of early forest policies, available or what might be written in the in the Yukon on the “Top of the World” the corporate structures of the period, and future. I for one would like to see either an highway. other contextual material. But he also expanded edition of Keller’s biography, and This book will appeal to those who’ve includes well researched and written sections a collection of critical essays written by lived in the northern and interior parts of on the logging and sawmilling sectors, which historians, geographers, literary critics, and the province, or who worked in some of the give the book a more fully rounded character. so on, who may have an interest in Sinclair same occupations as Fosbery. For those Also, by limiting himself to a brief but and the way in which the man and his unfamiliar with the time and place, the historically important period, Hak has writings have become part of the very fabric writing could use a tighter edit to clarify and provided a clear portrayal of an era that can of British Columbia.

34 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 be grasped and understood by a wide monstrous steam-powered machinery and, about Daniells than about Sedgwick, and audience. This is one of those rare species: an finally, with modern logging equipment. more to say about academic politics than academically sound book that can be read Mackie’s story is much more than just an about anything human. No reader will be and enjoyed equally by readers ranging from account of this company, however. He has overwhelmed by nostalgia. But if you want professional historians to loggers and mill successfully woven this story into the broader to know what happened at UBC in the sum- workers. account of the region’s social and economic mer of 1953 while Daniells visited New Having said this, it should be noted Hak’s history. His book shows how the Comox Zealand as a visiting lecturer, this is your book is not without its problems. His critique Logging company was central to the lives of opportunity. of the forest industry, and the policies that all the people in the Comox region and how, Reviewer Phyllis Reeve received her MA in En- underlie it, is characterized by a trait common in turn, these people influenced the fortunes glish from UBC in 1965. to most mainstream contemporary Canadian of the company. The advantage of working historians. With rare exceptions, they have outside the often-stifling requirements of adopted an off-the-shelf left-wing political academic publishing is very evident in Island A Measure of Value, the Story of the perspective that colours their historical Timber. It is an eclectic mix of well-written D’Arcy Island Leper Colony understanding. In Hak’s case, this has led him text, photographs with informative captions, Chris Yorath. Victoria: Touchwood to give undue attention to a few marginal sidebars, and oral history excerpts. They are Editions, 2000. 176 pp. Illus. $17.95 forest-sector critics of the period his book skilfully blended together (and for this the paperback. covers, and to ignore some of its major figures. book’s designer, Jim Bennett, deserves credit) REVIEWED BY MARIE ELLIOTT. His book entirely ignores two prominent into an intriguing whole. Until the twentieth Century, leprosy had North American conservationists who The book consists of a corporate history, been the scourge of mankind, its victims resided in BC during this period and who a detailed account of how the logging and doomed to a life of poverty and isolation. had a profound influence on the development sawmilling ends of the operation worked, a Norwegian physician Gerhard Hansen of forest policies in this province. Sir Henri history of the , and personal identified the bacillus in 1874, hence the Joly de Lotbinière, who was Lieutenant- histories of a large portion of the community’s name “Hansen’s disease,” but humane medical Governor of BC from 1900 to 1906, and residents. All these elements have been care took several decades to develop in the Judson Clark, BC’s first professional forester, brought together into a captivating and western world. were far harsher critics of forest policies up compelling account. No wonder this book Chris Yorath presents a thoroughly to that time, and far more influential in jumped to the head of the BC best-seller list, researched history of how British Columbia changing those policies, than any of the anti- surpassing even the year’s blockbuster treated victims of leprosy from the 1890s to capitalist critics mentioned. Encyclopedia of BC. Its publisher, Sono Nis 1924. Most of the sufferers were Chinese Nevertheless, Hak’s book is only Press, is to be commended for producing such males, although there was one Caucasian, and  marginally weakened by such shortcomings a unique book. a teenage Chinese girl was detained until her and it is hoped he will produce further Ken Drushka is the author of several books on friends could raise enough money to send volumes on succeeding periods. the B.C. forest industry and writes a weekly her back to China. Yorath provides medical Richard Mackie is one of those rare column on forestry for the Vancouver Sun. descriptions of the disease, and examines the individuals holding a doctorate in history politics of public medicine that required who chooses to work outside the academic municipal, provincial, and federal co- world as a historian and writer. He is a skilled Professing English at UBC: the Legacy operation. The city of Victoria initially carried researcher and author, and his book on of Roy Daniells and Garnett Sedgwick; the financial burden of providing care but Comox Logging is the most thorough and the 1999 Garnett Sedgewick Memorial Vancouver soon took responsibility for its engaging of its kind. This is no ordinary Lecture. victims. Although the dominion government coffee-table history of what, in the final Sandra Djwa. Vancouver: Ronsdale Press, fully supported the only other lazaretto in analysis, is merely a local forest company and 2000. 32 pages. Illus. paperback. Canada, at Trincadi, , it did its evolution. Mackie’s research is exhaustive REVIEWED BY PHYLLIS REEVE. not take over British Columbia’s facility until and innovative. He has culled every archival 1906. source imaginable and interviewed about 150 From 1920, two years after its founding, until The first victims discovered in Victoria people, some of them several times. As well, 1948, the Department of English at the Uni- were transported to D’Arcy Island, located he has brought together a marvellous versity of British Columbia was headed by in , between Victoria and Sidney. collection of photographs that add texture Garnett Sedgwick, followed from 1948 to The city built accommodation and provided and clarity to his story. 1966 by another distinguished teacher and medical care and food and clothing. Supplies Comox Logging and its predecessor memorable personality, Roy Daniells. Dur- were transported to the island every three companies operated in the rich eastern ing the Department’s eightieth anniversary months and a medical doctor made Vancouver Island forests around Courtenay year 1998-9, Sandra Djwa became the first infrequent visits. Victims soon arrived from from about 1900 until it was absorbed into a woman scholar to give the Sedgwick Me- elsewhere in the province. D’Arcy was used larger integrated company 50 years later. This morial Lecture, the text of which is published as a lazaretto from 1891 until 1924, when period encompassed what has been called the in this little book. new accommodation was built on Bentinck Glory Days of coastal logging, when giant Despite the commanding cover photo of Island, located offshore from the William trees were logged, first by hand, then with Sedgwick, the discussion has more to say Head quarantine station near Victoria.

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 35 In attempting to give “A Measure of Value” decade, he chronicles the surgical specialties History and Happenings in the to the victims, and to make their story more and the outstanding surgeons within each dramatic, Yorath created scenarios and specialty. He points with pride to the growth Cariboo-Chilcotin: Pioneer Memories dialogue. This was not necessary. The of quality medical training—and therefore Irene Stangoe. Surrey: Heritage House, 2000. photographs and medical descriptions suffice of quality health care—through intern and 159 pp. Illus., maps. $14.95 paperback. to impress most readers. Yorath attempts a residency programs, examinations, REVIEWED BY ESTHER DARLINGTON. middle road between apologism and anger, certification, and fellowships. Three Irene Stangoe’s third publication, History and but the latter dominates his vivid descriptions institutions matter particularly in the story: Happenings in the Cariboo-Chilcotin, promises of the suffering that the men endured. the medical school at the University of British more in the title than it delivers in the text. This is a small book, one of the first in an Columbia, the Vancouver General Hospital The book should more appropriately be attractive new series of Touchwood Editions, (and other teaching hospitals), and the British considered footnotes on some of the history an imprint of Horsdal & Schubart Publishers Columbia Medical Association. and events in an area of British Columbia Ltd. It is a welcome addition to British This is not a gossipy book, and only as Dr. that has become a legendary country Columbia’s local history, and especially to its Patterson introduces us to one after another romanced by numerous writers over the past sparse medical history. after another do we recognize the pride, half century. Historian Marie Elliott writes profusely on BC respect, and affection he is revealing for his Irene Stangoe knows her region as well as history. colleagues and protégés. He remembers and the back of her hand. She has probably a reminds us who did what, and when. When mountain of material from which to select he refers to the province’s first kidney her subject matter. But the production of a The Cutting Edge: Reminiscences of transplant in 1968, he tells us that the man paperback history requires of necessity some Surgery at the Vancouver General holding the knife on that particular cutting strenuous selectivity. Hospital and the University of British edge was the “friendly, conscientious, It is scarcely possible to begin a history of Columbia 1915-1985 concerned” Patrick Moloney, remembered, the Cariboo-Chilcotin without at least a Frank Porter Patterson, M.D. Vancouver: not always fondly, for “making ward rounds recap of the salient facts about the gold rush Hatzic Publishing, 2000. 235 pp. Illus., in the middle of the night.” Of Peter Allen, of 1858. Irene Stangoe’s sections on the gold appendices. $44.00 hardcover. who did much of the pioneering research in rush begin interestingly enough, and a few REVIEWED BY PHYLLIS REEVE. cardiac surgery at VGH, we are told: “His pages on the pioneer photographer Frederick Dally seems infinitely appropriate. Dally was Dr. Patterson’s book reminds us that, despite major asset, I think, is his infectious the Matthew Brady of BC interior history. the increasing and distasteful politicization enthusiasm.” His pictures reflect more about the colour of medicine and education, the dual purpose The list is impressive, all the more so when and the character of the time than much of of our hospitals and universities is to mend we recall that this is only part of the story. the material that has been produced by bodies and to train new generations of better We shall have to look to another writer to numerous writers. Dally left a legacy of menders. Its message will therefore have document the non-surgical members of the haunting images of the Cariboo during those importance and meaning for others besides medical team. formative years. the health care professionals (and health care The only woman given significant One would have thought the gold rush spouses, such as this reviewer), who will attention is Mrs. Gladys Bealing, first secretary and events around it would have been inevitably be its first readers. and subsequent administrative assistant of the contained in a single section of the book. Frank Porter Patterson was the second of Department of Surgery, 1949–1978. But that But this is not the case. The story of the gold that name to practise orthopaedic surgery seems to have been the way it was. Women rush is dispersed between sections on Chief with distinction in British Columbia. His who trained as surgeons did not then stay to Anahim by Benny Jack, and the Bayliff family father, after pioneering in his profession, work at VGH or UBC. of Redstone, who were early ranchers. There became leader of the provincial Conservative Obstetricians do not enter into the history, is also a vignette on Fort Chilcotin. The gold Party and leader of the opposition during because their specialty was not part of the rush theme is then resumed with the section the premiership of T.D. Pattullo. Department of Surgery. Ironically, Dr. titled Barkerville Days. I found this breakup As Head of Orthopaedics from the Patterson’s field, orthopaedics, has since his of theme and geography—and this occurs beginning of the UBC Medical School, and retirement acquired its own academic throughout the book—makes for a rather Head of the Department of Surgery 1973– department and would therefore be ineligible disjointed presentation of the region’s history. 1981, Dr. Patterson the Second developed for inclusion. Sections dealing with stopping houses innovative training programs and fostered Political problems within the medical such as 150 Mile House Hotel, the stopping new specialties within his discipline. administration receive only the most house at Beaver Lake, and hotels in Williams According to a note on the jacket and a unavoidable and briefest mention. Dr. Lake, and notes on the pioneer operators of newspaper clipping reproduced at the end at Patterson’s book, like his life, testifies to these enterprises make for a good start on the narrative, he was the originator of joint generations of energies, talents, and interesting subject matter, particularly those reconstruction. But he refers to his personal personalities dedicated to medicine, medical  around Williams Lake, where the author and life and accomplishments only as they research, and medical education. her husband Clive produced a very popular contribute to the story of surgery at the Reviewer Phyllis Reeve is a librarian who lives newspaper, the Williams Lake Tribune. But teaching hospitals of Vancouver. Within each on Gabriola Island. again, the subject matter is interrupted by a

36 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 section not applicable to the area covered, growing appeal for regional histories, or the Endnotes, a comprehensive bibliography, and and a story about the train robberies at publishers wouldn’t be printing them. One a good index are also included. Mission, BC, and Ducks, near , hopes that the standards of the publication However, the most impressive ingredient quite outside the Cariboo-Chilcotin region, of these pocketbooks relating to layout and in this book is the authors’ scrupulous, breaks the narrative. photo reproductions will only improve with empirical analysis of Thompson’s records. The laying out of a manuscript of a time. Nineteenth-century locations are precisely regional history that includes a large number Reviewer Esther Darlington is a resident of Cache identified on a twentieth-century map. This of pictures as History and Happenings in the Creek in itself must have been a daunting task Cariboo-Chilcotin does, complete with a wide considering the way man has so drastically variety of subject matter, is never a On the Road with David Thompson altered the landscape with roads, bridges, straightforward business. Very often the dams, and other large-scale projects. By Joyce and Peter McCart. , AB: Fifth juxtaposition of pictures and text requires methodically retracing Thompson’s footsteps House Ltd., 2000. 260pp. Illus., maps. some artful juggling. Nevertheless, the sheer and critically analyzing his records, the $18.95 paperback. variety of the subject matter with its McCarts have even managed to correct some necessarily brief treatment leaves the REVIEWED BY R.J. (RON) WELWOOD. well-known historians who did not, or could impression of a revolving Lazy Susan of Just over two centuries ago David Thompson not, do on-site analysis. goodies moving too fast for convenient began his renowned series of ventures into This work provides an excellent template fingering. the Pacific Northwest. Thompson’s detailed for an On the Road series about long forgotten I felt the sections on Cariboo families like journals together with his accurate maps explorers of western Canada. On the Road the Bayliffs, a Chilcotin family who came provide an outstanding exploration and with David Thompson serves both as a from England with all the British genteel observation record of the British Columbia, functional travel guide and, more importantly, finesse in a wilderness outback, would have , Montana, Idaho, Washington, and as a valuable history book about David deserved more attention than they received. Oregon landscape. Thompson. Likewise, the Felker family of Blue Tent fame However, until now there has been no Reviewer R.J. (Ron) Welwood is a past president connection drawn between Thompson’s is a family worthy of a book in itself; few of the British Columbia Historical Federation. Cariboo Chilcotin families can compare with travels and today’s network of roads. On the the Felkers for color, character, tragedy—you Road with David Thompson makes that name it. Also mentioned with little more than connection. As the authors state in their A Place for Gold introduction, “We’ve written it for travellers encyclopaedic information, are the Walter Guppy. Tofino: Grassroots Publication, who tour the northwest by car, motorhome, Hamiltons of Beaver Lake, Lord Cecil Martin 2000. 164 pp. Map. $15.95 plus mailing, bicycle, or even on foot, in the hope that and his religious community at 100 Mile paperback. Available from Walter Guppy, PO they might enjoy the company of a man who House, the Farwells of the Riske Creek area, Box 94, Tofino, BC VOR 2Z0 and finally, the Durrells of the Chilcotin River walked, rode, and canoed the same routes two REVIEWED BY W ERNER KASCHEL. valley. I think these illustrious families would centuries ago. For the benefit of the armchair have been served better if their brief histories travellers, we’ve included descriptions of the Walter Guppy’s book, A Place for Gold, had run one after the other, rather than to passing scene—both in Thompson’s words provides the readers with a grassroots have been broken up by other unrelated and our own.” perspective of the placer- and hard-rock material dealing with the growth and This book has certainly achieved that goal mining history in Vancouver Island from the development of the town of Williams Lake. and more. The McCarts have combined their 1860s to the present day. The author focuses There are maps, an index, a lengthy talents to produce an excellent publication on all major metal mining explorations and narrative poem by Gwen Pharis that is well organized and informative. Joyce’s operations (gold, silver, copper and iron) Ringwood—a regional playwright who experience as an editor and technical writing found on the island. The book in large part made an extremely valuable contribution to instructor, and Peter’s background in biology is a culmination of Guppy’s personal the cultural life of Williams Lake when the research and field work are evident. experiences in the mining field that started town was little more than a dusty village— On the Road covers David Thompson’s in the Bedwell River area in the late 1930s and there is a tribute to Cariboo landscape exploits on behalf of the North West and some primary research. artist, Sonia Cornwall, all combining to give Company between 1800 and 1811. There is The author starts with the small albeit the reader a lively and useful guide to the consistency throughout the book. Each of important placer gold rushes on Vancouver region. the thirteen chapters begins with a cameo- Island, such as Leech River, China Creek, Regional histories like Stangoe’s generally shaped landscape photograph and an abstract. and the Bedwell River area. He continues have limited appeal. Visiting tourists and of On the verso of this page is a map outlining with hard-rock metal mining on the island, course the residents of the Cariboo-Chilcotin the watercourses, communities and roads in which started in the 1890s, with copper being themselves, some of whom will have family close proximity to Thompson’s route(s)—a discovered on Mount Sicker in the Cowichan members mentioned in the book, are the detailed road map is recommended to region. Guppy argues that the mining likely readers. As a research source however, supplement this general map. The text is well industry has been very instrumental in pocket book histories seldom convey much written, fluid, informative and sprinkled with community development and growth on the fresh material. Very often there is a rehash of appropriate Thompson quotations gleaned island, especially with such mines as the old material. But there is undoubtedly from either his journals or narrative. Privateer discovered during the depression

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 37 in Zeballos, the Brynnor Iron Mines of the tape) introduced by the Barrett, Van der Zalm, Island. More 1960s, and the Island Copper Mine. The and Harcourt governments restricted and information could have been added to the author recounts one of the most important hindered the development of the mining early placer mining such as the Leech River was the Western Mines, located within industry. As well, special interest groups, such and China Creek gold discoveries. A Place Strathcona Park, which later became Westmin as the many environmental organizations for Gold presents interesting arguments about Resources. Numerous other companies (see existing today and First Nation land claims, the rise and demise of the metal mining Appendix I on page 160-63 for listing of have an influence on what the government industry onVancouver Island, but the strength mining companies, years of operation, and imposes in these resource-based industries. lies in the stories and evolution of mining in production of metal ores) were influential in He deplores that mining activities are and around Strathcona Provincial Park. the economy and development ofVancouver disappearing as mining in some cases in BC Reviewer Werner Kaschel teaches Social Studies Island as well as certain individuals that is relegated to the “sidelines.” He explains in Surrey. promoted and helped foster the mining the reasons for this are high extraction costs industry—to name a few are John Buttle, Sam coupled with low metal prices, and special Craig, and Dr. Franc Joubin. Throughout the interest groups with political clout Franz Boas: The Early Years, 1858-1906 mining history, the industry employed influencing provincial governments who no Douglas Cole. Vancouver: Douglas & thousands of people from many parts of longer support this industry. In this hostile McIntyre/Seattle: University of Washington Vancouver Island and had great economic climate, the author states, mining in the Press, 1999. 360 pp. Illus. $45 hardcover. spin-offs. Guppy states that many province has no future. Guppy believes that REVIEWED BY BRIAN GOBBETT. communities both directly and indirectly, BC’s governments should have provided Franz Boas was one of the seminal figures in such as Zeballos, Tofino, , and Port more support to an industry that has the early development of North American Hardy, may not have developed as early or as historically been part of the economic anthropology. His output was prodigious: significantly as they did if it were not for the backbone of this province. He asserts that the even as a young scholar he could rightly claim mining industry. governments should provide some assistance “that no one here [in North America] has A recurring theme in the book is the to these mining companies and employees accomplished as much as I have (p 167),” and controversy that emerges and develops as time since they were so influential in the province’s his early influence was felt in projects such as progresses between the environmentalists and heritage and economy. Yet, he sees the revival the anthropological exhibit at the Chicago the mining community, especially in and of mining as a vicious circle where the World’s Fair, the Jesup Expedition, and the around Strathcona Park, after its creation in provincial government may support the American Museum of Natural History, as well 1911. He discusses the evolution of new park opening or restructuring of mines, then as in the establishment of several prominent acts and legislation affecting mining in special interest groups respond by protesting academic journals. Perhaps as important, he Strathcona Park (see page 97 for an these developments, thus influencing the supervised a cadre of graduate students informative chart describing the additions government’s final decision. He suggests that (mostly after 1906), several of whom achieved and deletions to the park). Being a mining one method to assist existing mines in peril enormous prominence within the advocate it is evident to see Guppy’s dislike could consist of subsidizing some of the anthropological community and beyond. towards the special interest groups that operation costs. However, in spite of this obvious and formed to protest against mining activities The shortcomings of the book are: several significant role in American anthropology, within the park’s boundaries (i.e., the punctuation and spelling errors and there has been no adequate Boas biography, Wilderness Advisory Committee, Friends of unnecessary repetition of information a failing that the late Doug Cole long Strathcona Park, and the Strathcona Park throughout the book; too many quotes were recognized and lamented. In the first of what Advisory Committee). Starting in the 1960s used in the first eight chapters, some being a was to become a two-volume study, Franz and up to now, environmentalists have been page in length. The author does not mention Boas: The Early Years is a significant protesting with the use of road blocks and the source of the historic maps that he contribution in filling that void. rallies against logging and mining, concerned analyzed for the report on the Strathcona Boas’s rise to prominence within about a scarred and barren landscape, polluted Park boundary survey conducted by Mr. R. American anthropology was not inevitable water, and a destroyed habitat for animals. Thomson (p 38). A bibliography should have of course. Unable to find a university post in Guppy believes that the economic and been included for reference of maps, letters, Germany, Boas turned to North America and recreational benefits far outweighed any and other primary documents used. The the emerging discipline of anthropology in minor problems created by the mines. He author does however cite on some occasions his search for an academic position. Despite states that environmental awareness increased the source of his information such as book his scholarly achievements, the theme of with access to BC’s wilderness. This access titles, dates of newspapers, and years of mining failure was prominent prior to his permanent to recreational sites in Strathcona Park and reports. Because geography is an important appointment at Columbia: early positions at in other regions was provided by the roads factor in mining, it is disappointing to find Science, Clark University, and the Chicago made by mining and logging companies. no mining maps in the book. Topographical Fair proved ephemeral, his first lectures in Historically, the provincial governments or more detailed copies of the old mining English were utter failures, and his near-ten- in British Columbia have supported mining, maps of the various mining camps or regions year association with the American Museum especially in the development of roads and of the island would have been a great visual of Natural History ended in an unsatisfying trails to mines. Guppy asserts that increased aid to this literature, especially when fashion. Likewise, in contrast to Edward Sapir, mining fees and strict mining legislation (red describing the rich and vibrant mining Margaret Mead, and a host of other successful

38 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 protégées, Boas’s first PhD student, A.F. matters that has as its genesis first-hand Chamberlain, a Canadian, proved to be experience in today’s navy and from actually decidedly mediocre. Though his wife Marie partaking in Arctic exploration. In the course Newsworthy wrote in loneliness and frustration that she of four trips to the Arctic he has followed Books listed here may be reviewed at a did “often wish there never had been an the trail of the Franklin Expedition and has later date. For further information on Indian (p 219),” Boas was indefatigable in uncovered previously hidden traces of their any title, please consult book review his avocation of professional anthropology encampments on the fatal trek to find an editor Anne Yandle. and his status within it. The driven nature of escape. Captain Cook’s World: Maps of the Life the mature anthropologist becomes more At first glance, the lack of endnotes and and Voyages of James Cook, R.N. John understandable in light of the enormous an index would suggest that the author was Robson. Seattle, University of struggle and sacrifice that Boas and his family not serious about telling the story of Washington Press, 2000. $59.95 underwent in his early career. Vancouver’s life and work, but this is Captain McNeil and His Wife the Nishga Doug Cole was one of the principal immediately put to rest when one gets into Chief. Robin Percival Smith. Surrey, interpreters of the intellectual and cultural reading Coleman’s text. What would have Hancock House, 2001. $14.95 history of the Pacific Northwest. His greatest ended up in countless end notes has been High Grade & Hot Springs: A History of scholarly contribution, as a recent issue of skillfully incorporated into the narrative to Ainsworth Camp. Edward L. Affleck. BC Studies dedicated to him makes clear, heighten one’s interest into knowing what is Historical was as a historian of anthropology, and coming next. Once one starts reading, it is Society, 2001. Available from Marco previous studies on the potlatch law (with hard to put the book down. Polo Books, 3450 West 20th Ave., Ira Chaikin) and the curio trade were notable The omission of an index and a more Vancouver, BC V6S 1E4 $22 for their massive amounts of research, readable extensive bibliography resulted from cost- Naming Canada: Stories about Canadian style, and sometimes controversial cutting measures by the publisher over the Place Names. Alan Rayburn. Univer- conclusions. Franz Boas: The Early Years author’s objections. It is to be hoped that a sity of Toronto Press, 2001. $24.95 continues in this vein and, in Boasian fashion, Canadian publisher can be found to produce paperback. shows the effects of years of meticulous a paper-back edition that should be able to On the Edge of Empire: Gender, Race, and research on both sides of the Atlantic. Like be marketed at less than half its present cost. the Making of British Columbia, Boas, Professor Cole’s influence also lives on Taking today’s rate of exchange and adding 1849-1871. Adele Perry. University in his students: Ira Chaikin and Alex Long, sea postage the cost amounts to around $50; of Toronto Press, 2001. $24.95 two former graduate students, obviously by air the cost is about $58, which places it paperback. laboured diligently to ensure that this volume out of the range of the average buyer, no Princeton, our Valley. Princeton History reached publication. The result is a superb matter how interested he, or she, may be in Book Committee, 2000. Available biography of Franz Boas’s early life and career the subject. from Box 670, Princeton, BC VOX by one of the outstanding historians of our I could find only one error of substance 1WO $80 era. and that was the author’s designation of the School Leadership: Essays on the B.C. Reviewer Brian Gobbett, just graduated from the village at Cape Mudge as being of Kwakiutl Experience, 1872-1995. Thomas University of Alberta, now teaches history in origin. This is a common error made by many Fleming, ed. Mill Bay, BC, Bendall writers on Vancouver, including Dr. Lamb. Books, 2001. $34 Other errors are mainly on points of Ships of Steel. T.A..McLaren and Vickie Captain Vancouver, North-West Navigator interpretation that enliven discussions Jensen. , Harbour E.C. Coleman. Whitby, North Yorkshire: between authors and do not detract from an Publishing, 2000. $39.95 hardcover Caedmon of Whitby, Upgang Lane, YO21 enjoyment of adding to one’s knowledge by Steele’s Scouts: Samuel Benfield Steele and 3JJ, England. 152 pp. Illus. £20 the reading of a fine piece of literature on the North-West Rebellion. Wayne F. what is often considered such a dry and Brown. Surrey, Heritage House, REVIEWED BY J.E. ROBERTS boring subject as history. 2001. $16.95 paperback. During over fifty years of study and research If one was looking for a scholarly work Tom Wright: Recollections of a Pioneer into the life and work of Captain George one would be better advised to try to obtain Forester and Tree Farmer. John Vancouver, your reviewer held the fervent the Hakluyt Society’s four-volume work The Parminter. Forest History Associa- hope that one day, someone with a Voyage of George Vancouver 1791-1795, edited tion of BC, 2000. $15 paperback. knowledge of, and experience in, the Royal by Dr. Kaye Lamb, which is without question Navy would undertake to write a book on the finest work done on George Vancouver. the great surveyor’s life which would be Lt. Coleman has distilled 1,752 pages of this devoid of the purple prose that has infected opus into 152 pages of readable and much of what has been published to date. informative text on Vancouver’s life and his This work, by Lt. E.C. Coleman RN, Captain Vancouver, North-West Navigator is a (Retd.) has achieved my fondest wish and must read for anyone wishing to learn the stands as the best single-volume work on particulars of our maritime heritage. Vancouver to date. Lt. Coleman brings an Reviewer Ted Roberts is one of Captain understanding of eighteenth-century naval Vancouver’s best friends.

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 39 Family History by Brenda L. Smith Trapped in Amber or Placed on the Pyre: Will researchers ever see original post-1901 Canada Census data?

In the next issue Brenda Smith will the full census record to the National the apparent attempts by some historians, start with a column dedicated to Archives for general release. The 1901 social scientists and journalists to family history. Brenda ‘s experience includes time as Community Editor Canada Census primary record was persuade us that the right to collect and of the Quesnel Cariboo Observer. released for public use, as anticipated, in disseminate information should trump Presently, she lives in Maple Ridge, 1993. Previous releases of these census every other right in the book. …I where she edits the Maple Ridge His- enumerator’s schedules suggested that in cheerfully acknowledge that what we torical Society – Family History News- 1998 researchers would see the release have here is a conflict or a clash between letter. Brenda presents lectures and classes on family history research at of the 1906 western census, and in 2003 two legitimate principles, one having to institutions throughout the Fraser we would be able to gain new do with access to information and the Valley. perspective on our nation from the 1911 other having to do with privacy.” Canada Census. However, to date The clash goes to the heart of the “CENSUS RECORDS are the bedrock of Statistics Canada declines to transfer relationship between government and research for those historians and control to the National Archives of all governed. At the highest levels we find genealogists who use population data….” post-1901 census material on the power struggles between the intent of asserts National Archivist, Ian E. Wilson. strength of one section of the Statistics the government in office to maintain According to Wilson “Census records Act that seems to override the secrecy surrounding its decisions and underlie our country’s notion of “notwithstanding any other Act of actions, and Canadian citizens’ right to democracy and portray a vision of Parliament” clause of the Access to disclosure. In “The Government Waffles,” Canadians to Canadians.” He declares: Information Act. Section 17 has been the Genealogical Society urged “Census records are an essential tool for interpreted by privacy advocates to place its members to contact Brian Tobin, the creating not only a sense of personal a blanket of secrecy over all post-1901 present federal Minister of Industry, identity but also for forming connections nominative census records. responsible for Statistics Canada. Tobin with their country as the stories of their The National Archives keeps paper was not in Parliament during the last ancestors move across the expanse of and microfilm returns from the 1825 to session, and “therefore may not be aware time.” 1871 censuses, and all the censuses up to of the level of concern this item Canadians stand to lose the and including 1901 are freely available. generated.” However, Tobin’s press release opportunity to learn about their progress The paper returns for censuses after 1901, of 15 December 2000 certainly through the twentieth century in the way from 1906 up to 1991, were destroyed articulated the government’s concerns that we have used the data of nineteenth after being microfilmed. These films regarding release, including the issue of century census records to learn about remain under the control of Statistics whether respondents to the 1911 census the creation of our country. Canada and are stored by the National had been promised perpetual Statistics Canada—originally the Archives. And the paper records for the confidentiality, the need for further Census Bureau created by Wilfred most recent 1991 census have not been consultation, and the government’s “deep Laurier’s government in 1905—is the filmed. commitment to privacy.” agency charged with responsibility for Knowledge is power. The Canadian Information Commissioner, the collecting census material. The agency, government alone controls and interprets Honourable John M. Reid, in his 1999- in accordance with the Statistics Act, uses the information that we Canadians are 2000 Report to Parliament, challenged the census and resulting survey compelled to reveal to census the “commitment to privacy”, calling it information to shed light on emerging enumerators, and therefore reserves for obstruction in his 16 October 2000 press social and economic issues in the form itself the power to determine our view release: “This year I’m sending out an of selected aggregate reports. These of the past. SOS. Hostility in government against the interpretations inform the established FACETS OF THE CONTROVERSY public’s right to know is stronger than entitlements of citizens to government There are three aspects of the conflict ever before. In this regard the report programs and services, parliamentary that drives the present government’s singles out the PMO (Prime Minister’s representation, and the sharing of tax inaction on the question of post-1901 Office), PCO (Privy Council Office), revenues with provinces. census release. Senator Lowell Murray Treasury Board and Justice for Traditionally, after holding the data for expressed the view for non-release when consideration.” 92 years, Statistics Canada surrendered he said “…we should be on guard against

40 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 In his report regarding genealogists, or bona fide historians, for implementation of the Access to purposes that have been peer reviewed SOURCES Information Act, Reid detailed many as being legitimate research....it is Abella, Irving and Bill Waiser, 9 February concerns about the relationship between permitting the release only for very 2000. Canadian Historical Association Brief the dynamics of the government in specific and constrained purposes for to the Expert Panel on Access to Historical power and his responsibility to facilitate individuals who…have to be sworn to Census Records. Downloaded 19 March 2001: www.statcan.ca/english.census96 access to government-held information secrecy.” Expert Panel on Access to Historical Census by Canadians. He cites the issue of release EXPERT PANEL ON A CCESS TO HISTORICAL Records (2000). Downloaded 19 March of census material as “…a good CENSUS RECORDS 2001: www.statcan.ca/english.census96 illustration of a situation where the In November 1999, as part of his Hansard Proceedings of Canada’s Senate, legitimate need for some secrecy (to response to the volumes of mail received Monday, 16 October 2000. protect individual privacy) has not been by Members of Parliament expressing Industry Canada, 12 November 1999. adequately balanced against the support for the release of the 1911 “Minister Manley Announces Members of the Expert Panel on Access to Historical legitimate interests in having census Canada Census, former Minister of records made available for public use and Census Records.” Downloaded 19 March Industry John Manley created the Expert 2001: www.statcan.ca/english.census96 consultation. Panel on Access to Historical Census —————15 December 2000. “Minister The balance Reid identifies lies Records. In May 2000, the Expert panel, Tobin Releases the Report from the Expert between the right of access to chaired by Dr. Richard Van Loon, Panel on Access to Historical Census information the government holds about President of Carleton University, Records.” Downloaded 19 March 2001: Canadian citizens, and the right to presented to Minister Manley its www.statcan.ca/english.census96 privacy of individuals and institutions. comprehensive report regarding the McNally,Grant. 2 February 2001. Letter from The Canadian government position is implications of providing access to Member of Parliament to constituent Hugh Coleopy. revealed in the words of former Privacy historical census records. The Panel’s Commissioner Bruce Phillips. Phillips Murray, Hon. Lowell. Issue 7, Tuesday, scope of consideration was the public November 16, 1999. Debates of the Senate stated, while he was charged with release of historical census records, (Hansard), 2nd Session, 36th Parliament, implementation of the Privacy Act, that excluding the public release of survey Volume 138. he was intent on suppressing, in and administrative data records, and ————Issue 6, Tuesday, November 4, 1999. perpetuity, all post-1901 census data. including “the release of records for all Debates of the Senate (Hansard), 2nd Indeed, he advocated “…my position census periods including the future.” The Session, 36th Parliament, Volume 138. today is consistent with what I have said two issues it examined were: (1) What Newsleaf, Ontario Genealogical Society, in the past. The information in census are the elements of the difference of February 2001, “The Government Waffles.” Phillips, Bruce. 9 February 2000. The Census returns is collected for a specific, stated opinions between Canadians who would purpose. …once that purpose has been Returns, Privacy, and Questions of Govern- seek to maintain the protection of ance: A submission by the Privacy Commis- achieved, the information should be personal information and those who sioner of Canada to the Expert Panel on destroyed.” would like to examine personal or Access to Historical Census Records. Conflict arises between the promise— community histories? (2) What options Downloaded 19 March 2001: implied or otherwise—that what exist to provide access to historical census www.statcan.ca/english/census96/return individuals tell census enumerators records? Reid. John M. 2000. “Annual Report to remains private forever, and on the other On 15 December 2000, “…day 89 of Parliament for the Fiscal Year 1999–2000.” hand, the stated intention that census the 90-day period within which the The Office of the Information Commis- sioner of Canada. Downloaded 19 March records will be preserved for the use of government was required by law to future generations. Senator Murray’s 2001: http://infoweb.magi.com/-accessca. release the report because of my access Smith, Brenda L. ed. “Census Caught in the comments exemplify the view for to information request,” co-chair of the Bind” in Maple Ridge Historical Society Family restricting access: “…I certainly would Canada Census Committee, Gordon A. History Newsletter, January 2001. In the not want [historians] Michael Bliss or Watts, secured public release of the January 2001 issue readers were urged to Ramsay Cook pawing over all that Expert Panel’s report. The contact their Members of Parliament to information and coming to their own recommendations of the Expert Panel express concern for the implications of tendentious and highly prejudicial fully support the continued timely suppressing the scheduled release of interpretations of the data. I say long live release of full census data. In part: “…the censuses. Watts, Gordon A. “The Post-1901 Census Sir Wilfrid Laurier and Bruce Phillips Panel is firmly convinced of the benefits and to hell with these historians.” Project” in Global Gazette Online Family of the release of historical census records. History Magazine, Volume V, No. 01, 4 In October 2000, Phillips was replaced The Panel is of the view that with the January 2001. Downloaded 19 March 2001: as Privacy Commissioner by George passage of time, the privacy implications www.globalgenealogy.com/Census/ Radwinski. In response to questions of the release of information diminish Wilson, Ian E. 9 February 2000. The Census from the Senate Committee of the and that the passage of 92 years is Records, Submission to the Expert Panel on Whole he summarized his position as a sufficient to deal with such concerns.” Access to Historical Censuses. Downloaded “compromise that the census data would Canadian Historical Association 19 March 2001: www.statcan.ca/ be made available to qualified (CHA) President Irving Abella and CHA english.census96.archive.htm

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 41 Archives Committee Chair Bill Waiser, snapshots of individual families, societies. The Report of the Expert Panel in their submission to the Expert Panel, neighbourhoods, and our nation on the on Access to Historical Census Records asserted that examination of primary recording day. Since 1998, the may be obtained from Industry Minister census data is an important exercise of Government of Canada has released no Brian Tobin’s office, Attention: Heidi democratic rights, facilitating the historic census material. So far, the Bonnell, Press Secretary. understanding of “the past lives of Expert Panel’s clear recommendations One more action that you should take everyday people who made up the fabric for release have been ignored. And if is to keep a personal record of the of this country.” In the CHA Statistics Canada and the Privacy information your household submitted presentation, Abella and Waiser spoke on Commissioner have their way, no new on the May 2001 Census. Even if a gap behalf of the Institute d’Histoire de primary Canadian census material will develops in the national record, we can l’Amerique Francaise, the Writers’ be released, the information could be all take responsibility for keeping our of Canada, the Association of Canadian destroyed or at least access severely own stories. Archives and genealogical, archival and limited. heritage organizations. They urged As on-going beneficiaries of the rich amendment of Section 17 of the Statistics collection of raw census data, we have FURTHER READING the opportunity to continue to press the Act to make it consistent with existing Sager, Eric W. “Census Days, Past and legislation. government for amendment of Section Whether the present parliament will 17 of the Statistics Act to make the Act Present.” The Beaver, April/May 2001. acknowledge the concerns of Canadians consistent with existing access and Smith, Brenda L. ed. “Census Caught who have petitioned actively for timely privacy legislation. in the Bind” in Maple Ridge Historical release remains in doubt. According to We need to add our voices to Society Family History Newsletter, advocate Gordon Watts, the Government convince the government that its need January 2001. of Canada has received at least five for secrecy is outweighed by our right Waring, Marilyn. (1999) Counting For reports recommending public access to to information about ourselves. We can: census records since the early 1970s. But (1) Accept that the campaign for release Nothing: What Men Value And What in the House of Commons, the only of future census data has returned to Women Are Worth. Toronto: University discussion that has resulted in a vote starting position, and that we must renew Of Toronto Press. sidesteps the issue of release of the advocacy for the timely release of all post primary census records created after 1901 primary census data; (2) Sign and Comments and questions about the 1901. promote the new petitions to the House release of post-1901 census records In January 2001, Hugh Coleopy, of Commons and Senate of Canada. (3) can be found on an international list Write letters to Industry Minister Brian member of the Maple Ridge Historical by emailing Canada-Census-Cam- Society wrote to his Member of Tobin, Heritage Minister Sheila Copps, [email protected] with the Parliament, Grant McNally, expressing Justice Minister Anne McLellan, Senator his concerns regarding suppression of Lorna Milne, your Member of word “subscribe” in the subject line. census data. Coleopy forwarded copies Parliament, and other Members of of his letter to Minister Tobin and to Parliament who have not committed to Lorna Milne, the Canadian Senator who support release of future censuses. has demonstrated vigorous support for As of 1 August 2001, one hundred the release. In February, McNally replied twenty-seven Members of Parliament to Coleopy that, in the last Parliament, supported release, eight were opposed, he had supported a Canadian Alliance sixty-six are non-committal, and 100 had Private Member’s motion passed in failed to respond. Of ninety-six Canadian amended form (26 September 2000). Senators, ten are in favour of release, two The amended bill read: “That, in the are opposed, four are non-committal, and opinion of this House, the government eighty have failed to respond. To should consider taking all necessary steps determine which MPs and Senators can to release the 1911 census records once be applauded for supporting release, and they have been deposited in the National which need convincing check the Archives in 2003.” McNally went on to Parliamentary and Senate Score Boards say that the “Liberals have made no at www.globalgenealogy.com/Census/ indication that they will release such Index6. information.” Models for the letters and petitions HOW TO BECOME AN ADVOCATE are available on the “Post 1901 Census As historians, we use primary census data Project” Web site at http:// to develop portraits of our ancestors and globalgenealogy.com/census. You can also their community relationships. The find the petition at some public libraries, census enumerators’ schedules are and by contacting local family history

42 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Archives and Archivists Editor Frances Gundry

British Columbia’s Moving Past, Preserved by Dennis J. Duffy, Archivist, Access Service, British Columbia Archives

ONE of the lesser-known aspects of the British Columbia Archives is its moving image collection. Established in 1979 with an initial deposit of about 200 items, the collection grew by leaps and bounds throughout the 1980s and early 1990s. Although the pace of acqui- sition has slowed in recent years, the archives remains a key reposi- tory for British Columbia’s film and video heritage. Its holdings now include more than 2,500 titles, in a variety of formats, spanning the first century of film history. When people talk about filmmaking in British Columbia, they tend to focus on the “Hollywood North” phenomenon—the high- profile production of feature films and television series. While the archives has very few feature films, it does hold a rich selection of other films made in the province. These include travelogues, indus- trial and promotional films, documentaries, newsreels, educational films, dramatic and experimental shorts, and family home movies. They were produced by ministries and agencies of the provincial and federal governments, crown and private corporations, television I-61555 Archives BC stations, and local production companies, as well as freelance and Above: A Vancouver Motion Pictures crew on location for the film Beau- amateur cinematographers. tiful British Columbia, sponsored by the BC Government Travel Bu- Since the British Columbia Archives is the principal repository reau. This image is a frame enlargement from another Travel Bureau pro- for BC government records, government productions form the back- duction, Tourism: a British Columbian Industry (1940) which was bone of the collection. Major government accessions include mate- shot by Clarence Ferris and depicts the operations of the bureau. rial from the departments or ministries of Agriculture, the Environ- ment, Forests, Fisheries, Highways, Lands, Recreation and Conser- vation, and Tourism, as well as the BC Government Travel Bureau in the archives’ collection. The books can be found in many public and the BC Provincial Museum. A number of provincial crown and university libraries. corporations are also represented—notably, the BC Hydro and Power Motion Picture Production in British Columbia, 1898-1940: A Brief Authority, BC Rail, and the Expo 86 Corporation. Many more gov- Historical Background and Catalogue, by Colin Browne. British Co- ernment productions from the 1980s and 1990s exist in unprocessed lumbia Provincial Museum Heritage Record No. 6. Victoria: Brit- accessions. ish Columbia Provincial Museum, 1979. The BC Archives also has substantial holdings of non-govern- Camera West: British Columbia on Film, 1941-1965, by Dennis J. ment productions. Major collections include films sponsored by the Duffy. Victoria: Provincial Archives of British Columbia, 1986. This BC Electric Company, BC Packers, MacMillan Bloedel, book includes a supplement with updated information on pre-1940 Helicopters, and Seaspan International. These films reflect the work films. of industrial producers like Leon Shelly and Lew Parry, whose ef- The Archives’ collection includes some of the first footage shot in forts fostered the development of BC’s film industry from the 1930s BC in 1899, as well as glimpses of the first years of the twentieth to the 1960s. Talented amateur cinematographers like F. J. Barrow, century. However, it is the era from 1935 to 1985 that is most strongly Alfred Booth, Carleton P. Browning, Dorothy and Oscar Burritt, documented. This was a period of tremendous change—not just in and Stanley Fox captured many lesser-seen aspects of the province. terms of industrial development, but in the domestic and working VHS reference copies exist for a small percentage of these film lives of British Columbians, in their farms and factories, their large and video items, and may be viewed in the reference room during cities and isolated communities. These facets of BC history, often regular service hours. Although some collection-level inventories captured in no other way, are uniquely documented in the moving are available in-house, no moving image catalogues, indexes or find- image collection of the British Columbia Archives. ing aids are yet accessible via the BC Archives Web site. However, the Archives’ Emerging and Applied Information Technologies group Sometime this winter Dennis Duffy will give a talk on the BC Ar- is now in the process of converting legacy data about the holdings chives film collection and show representative film to the Friends of the BC Archives. If you are interested in joining the into an electronic format, which they hope to make available online Friends for the lecture or as a member please call Frances by mid-2002. Gundry or Ron Greene. Their addresses and phone numbers For now, though, there are two published filmographies that list can be found on the inside cover. films made in British Columbia before 1966, including many items

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - SUMMER 2001 43 Token History: Two Dairies by Ronald Greene Arthur Graham Lambrick and Dairy Arthur Graham Lambrick was born in Cornwall in 1892. In 1911 as a young man he came to Victoria. He first worked at the Foundation Shipyard and then as a teamster for the City of Victoria. He told me that he bought himself a cow in 1913 because he did not care for the milk that was available in Victoria—his father had a dairy in the old country and Arthur knew good milk. He gradually entered the business as more and more of his neighbours started asking for milk. In either 1923 or 1924 Mr. Lambrick moved from Kings and Shelbourne out to Torquay Drive in the Gordon Head district of Saanich where he purchased 44 acres of good farm land. There he had as many as 60 producing head and was the largest dairy selling raw (unpasteurized) milk in the area. He had a passion for the taste and quality of milk and intensely disliked pasteurized milk. He called it “paralyzed milk”and complained of its lack of taste. Mr. Lambrick was a strong opponent of the movement for compulsory pasteurization and a list that he compiled in mid-1935 of producer-vendors to aid in his fight against this process showed almost 130 producer-vendors and another dozen vendors operating in Victoria. Lambrick was also a public spirited man. He served several terms on Saanich council including two terms as reeve. He retired from the dairy in February 1966, selling off his herd and equip- ment at auction. He wanted Saanich to have his property for public and recreational use and sold it to the for less than he would have received if he had subdivided it for housing. Today his name is commemorated in Lambrick Park Secondary School and Lambrick Park, both of which are situated on his old farm. The old farm house was one of the first houses designated as a heritage structure by Saanich. Arthur Graham Lambrick passed away in October 1967, age 75, leaving Clara, his wife of 53 years, three sons and two daughters. Mr. Lambrick started using aluminum tokens about 1930 and continued using them until 1952 when he replaced them with plastic tokens. The plastic tokens have the name Gordon Head Dairy on them, the name under which he had been operating since 1940. The Mayland Dairy of Saanich James (Jimmy) Filmer started the dairy in 1912 or 1913 at which time he held a job building the Douglas Street extension. At first he operated the dairy before and after his regular job, thus working up to 16 hours a day. Later on the dairy became his only work and he had as many as 40 head, plus some 2,000 chickens. Mr. Filmer retired in 1942 and had a long retirement, passing away in 1982 at the age of 93. Filmer Road, off Maplewood in Victoria, where he lived for many years, was named after him. In the days of door-to-door delivery there were several advantages for a dairy to use tokens. The first was that the dairy could get their money upfront, which always helped the cash flow. Sec- ondly, tokens were less likely to be stolen from the milk bottles than cash was. Paper tickets were also used, but printing was a recurring expense and the tickets tended to stick inside the bottle. Jimmy Filmer’s tokens read “good for one pint of milk.” Two tokens could be used for a quart.

44 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - SPRING 1999 Web-site Forays Innovation & by Gwen Szychter Imagination

’VE BEEN a historian now for over a decade. In the several years Celebrating the Spirit of that I’ve been exploring the Internet, I’ve found an ever-increas- Education in British Columbia, Iing number of Web sites that claim to contribute to our under- standing of our own history, some of which fail to deliver. However, one that I’ve found unfailingly useful is Hugh Armstrong’s Web site, 2001-2002 for which the URL is http://www.rootsweb.com/~canbc/bc.htm. THE 2001–2002 academic year will be a banner year for education Although some might consider it primarily a genealogical site, I find and for history in British Columbia. We’ll be marking the 100th lots of historical gems that fill gaps in my own research on Delta, BC. anniversary of advanced education (1901-2001) and the 150th anni- Others no doubt might think that the site is too bare-bones plain, versary of public education (1852-2002). We’re also marking 65 years as in “just the facts, ma’am.” Since I’ve already declared myself as not of provincial vocational programs and 20 years of public educational being a fan of frills, animation and songs to surf by, the plainness suits television. me just fine. If anything, it makes the information more readily ac- I’m working with the provincial government on activities and cessible. programs to mark these milestones. We’re planning an interactive, What can we find on this site? A page of lists, extracted from year-long campaign called “Innovation and Imagination: Celebrat- various documents created by the Provincial Government, includ- ing the Spirit of Education in British Columbia.” ing the Sessional Papers of British Columbia, (a highly under-rated My intention here is to alert readers of the British Columbia His- resource, in my opinion) and the British Columbia Gazette (equally torical News to these anniversaries and to encourage local and re- under-rated). gional societies affiliated with the British Columbia Historical Fed- Some of these entries may appear at first glance to be merely a list eration to organize anniversary events in their communities. of names that primarily genealogists and family historians would The Innovation and Imagination campaign will revolve around find helpful. I disagree. For example, in scrolling through the list two themes—“Achievement” and “Exploration.” We want to look contained in “Teachers and Trustees, 1888-90”, I found an entry for back in history, to acknowledge the contributions of those who have Delta (what we now think of as “East Delta”). That particular item built our education system (parents, teachers, trustees, administra- helped settle a discussion I’d been having only a few days earlier as to tors, and others); and we want to look forward to the future, to con- the existence of a school in East Delta in the late 1880s. sider how our education system and how our communities might Other reports of interest include “Report of Select Committee develop in the years ahead. on Ogden Point Lands” (now , Victoria, BC) and During the campaign, we’ll be emphasizing the fact that British “Places of Interest In and Around Victoria” from Lynch’s Ready Guide Columbia has a tradition of innovation: we were trailblazers in the to Victoria and B.C., 1892. This latter reference was enough of a tease use of educational technologies (from school radio broadcasts in the that I’ll have to look up the book itself to find out what Lynch had 1930s to computers in the 1960s) and we were pioneers in the fields to say about other parts of British Columbia. of adult education and distance education. British Columbia also led Hugh Armstrong’s Web site has been around a while, and many the way in establishing links between home and school. The first readers may be familiar with it. However, one of its many com- Parent-Teacher Association in Western Canada was organized at mendable features is the fact that its owner adds new lists periodi- Craigflower School, near Victoria, in 1915. cally. For instance, in July a searchable database for the1901 Census We have lots to celebrate during the 2001/2002 school year! And for Victoria appeared at the top of the index, with red lettering to we’re planning lots of celebratory events, including classrooms of the indicate “New”. If you haven’t visited in a while, it may be time to past at the Royal BC Museum and regional museums, and class- have another look. In this he has included not only the census infor- rooms of the future at Science World in Vancouver. mation that we would expect to find, but some additional bonuses, Additional information about anniversary events is posted on The such as the list of streets in Victoria at the time of the census, an FAQ Homeroom: British Columbia’s History of Education Web site: http:/ page and other relevant lists. /www.mala.bc.ca/homeroom/ In addition, Hugh Armstrong has a genealogy site, with informa- We intend to create an anniversaries bulletin board, where people tion of a more national scope. The URL for that site is http:// can share ideas and suggestions for local events and activities. Mean- members.home.net/hughlarmstrong/index.htm. I have made use of time, please feel free to contact me about the campaign and about it also, and had only one tiny “spot of bother”. There is a page enti- the milestones we’re celebrating. tled “Canadian Parliamentary Divorces, 1826–1946”relating to di- Patrick A. Dunae vorces granted by the Dominion Government during that period. Innovation & Imagination, “Achievements” Coordinator In this province, divorce petitions were heard and granted by the e-mail: [email protected], [email protected] Supreme Court of British Columbia, but there is no direction as to phone: 250.380.1633 (Victoria) where this information might be available. 250.741.2130 (Nanaimo) If you have comments on this Web site or my review of it, please contact me at [email protected]. Feedback is always welcome. Manuscripts dealing with the history of our education for publication in BC Historical News are particularly welcome in this year of celebration!

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - SUMMER 2001 45 News and Notes Please send information to be published in News and Notes to the editor in Whonnock before 15 August, 15 November, 15 February, and 15 May .

charmed audiences with his “Two Teenage Ted Affleck, an expert on BC’s steamboats, Warriors.” Susan Hulland, of Crawford Bay, commented that in September 1898, Frank fascinated listeners with “The Risky Life of Wright could not have boarded the Henry Rose,” and Carolyn McTaggart fol- at Okanagan Landing, because that vessel was lowed her fictitious “Gunpowder Gertie” not comissioned till the summer of 1914. with the tale of real life photographer, pio- Astute readers like these two keep your edi- neer mine cook, mother, and traveller Mattie tor on his toes. History writers and their edi- Gunterman. Carolyn has also participated in tors should question their sources relentlessly; storytelling festivals in Whitehorse and San even if they are primary sources. The infor-

B. Wark B. Francisco and given workshops for would- mation used by Robert Allen came from HARRIS RIDGE DESIGNATED be storytellers in the . Frank Rice’s personal papers!—FB Other speakers from across the Kootenays R.C. “Bob” Harris, 1922–1998, was an en- ALBERT OLIVER 1911-2001 were Anne Edwards of Moyie, Lillian gineer who loved the outdoors. He retraced, Kimberley lost one of its charter members Corriveau of Kimberley, Naomi Miller of mapped, and wrote about many historic trails, of its heritage society and volunteer host at Wasa, Hank Hastings of Sandon, Mike contributing many articles to BC Historical its museum with the death of Albert Oliver. Halleran of Meadow Creek, Buddy Devito News in the 1970s and 1980s. Harris also Albert and his wife were also charter mem- (former mayor) of Trail, David Miller of planned and conducted summer camps for bers of the East Kootenay Historical Asso- Procter, and Marilyn James, spokesperson for the Natural History Society. This year, two ciation who worked hard conducting tours, the Sinixt people. one-week camps for the Vancouver Natural preserving rural cemeteries, hosting two Procter found a wonderful way to present History group were held in early August in BCHF conferences, and more. Albert con- local history to approximately seven hundred the Cinnabar Basin in the South Chilcotin. centrated on saving the first mine school- people per weekend.—NAOMI MILLER (see Beautiful British Columbia magazine, house then numerous pieces of mine ma- Summer 2001). At that time Bob’s widow chinery that had been discarded in the bush dedicated a nearby ridge as “Harris Ridge” COMMENTS FROM READERS Robert Allen’s article on Frank Dwight Rice as his “retirement” project. He worked on and a plaque was set in Camel Pass at a view- these restoration projects as long as his health point beside a major trail. (BC Historical News 34/3) triggered reactions permitted.—NAOMI MILLER —NAOMI MILLER from Greg Nesteroff and Ted Affleck, keen to set the record straight. TERRY REKSTEN 1942–2001 PROCTER: K OOTENAY STORYTELLING FESTIVAL Greg Nesteroff writes (slightly shortened): Just before the official publication date on Procter, a village of three hundred on the “In the otherwise excellent article on Frank British Columbia Day of perhaps her best West Arm of , hosted its third Dwight Rice, the last sentence of the first book, The Illustrated History of British Colum- annual storytelling festival in July. Members paragraph states: ‘The booming community bia, Terry Reksten died. She came to Van- of its local historical society planned and of Greenwood, where he ended his journey, couver’s West End in 1947 and graduated organized the festival to share and showcase was named after Mr. Green, the then mayor, from UBC (History and English) in 1963. Kootenay history using the old schoolhouse and Frank Rice’s uncle, Robert Wood.’ But She moved to Oak Bay in 1969 and became and an old church. The villagers worked very Greenwood never had a mayor named Green. active in local politics and heritage preserva- hard to present a welcoming face that week- In fact, it was Robert Wood who was mayor tion. Through numerous articles on heritage end. Gardens and boulevards were groomed; at the time (1898). According to the Akriggs and history and through presentations she volunteers directed the parking of cars; food in British Columbia Place Names,… ‘Green- helped popularize heritage and local history services were arranged under two big tents; wood was named after another mining camp, in the Victoria area and beyond. Her books children’s programs were going on adjacent Greenwood in Colorado.’ The 1958 Bound- found a wide readership. Terry Reksten’s first to the venues; musicians filled the break times ary Historical Report says that Greenwood book—on Francis Mawson Rattenbury— with pleasant tunes; a bookshop and an art was ‘[c]alled Greenwood by C. Scott Gallo- published in 1978, received the BC Book display were set up for browsing and buy- way, one of the founders of the town, owing Award. Several other books followed, includ- ing. Procter, at the end of a spur road off to the green nature of the forest which com- ing books on the Dunsmuirs and the Em- Highway 3A, throbbed with friendly activ- posed and surrounded the new townsite.’ In press Hotel. Terry Reksten offered an after- ity for the festival weekend. his book on the tokens of Greenwood and noon workshop at the 1997 BCHF Confer- Guest speakers—each allowed twenty min- Phoenix, Ron Greene writes ‘Greenwood ence in Nelson. She did “…a fantastic job utes—presented a variety of topics from grew out of the vision of Robert Wood....The on short notice. She combined the assign- Kootenay history. Each spoke three times a city name derived from the green wooded ment on ‘Researching’ with ‘Writing local day, in different rooms. Three leading story- hills around the townsite [but] at least one history’…[and] spoke with enthusiasm im- tellers from the first festival were back with source indicates that the “wood” part arose parting her experience and expertise.” (BC new stories. Joe Pierre, a young Ktunaxa, from Robert Wood’s name.’” Historical News 30/3)—FB

46 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 Chief Ambrose Maquinna 1928-2001 CHIEF AMBROSE MAQUINNA passed away sud- in 1997, to recognize the thousands of years denly at the age of 73 on 13 July 2001. of Mowachaht history and the significant role Chief Maquinna was a hereditary chief of the the Mowachaht played in the fur trade and Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation. He was international politics of the area during the the seventh generation to carry the chiefly late eighteenth century. name Maquinna, and held the Tyee Hawiih As part of his work for recognition ofYuquot, position (number one chief) in the Chief Maquinna encouraged re-establishing Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation until he international relations with Spain and Great passed it on to his eldest son, Michael. three Britain. He strongly supported the Yuquot years ago at a ceremony at Yuquot. celebration, now in its ninth year, where the RBCM PN16351 Chief Maquinna worked all his life in the Mowachaht/Muchalaht people annually host Above: Detail of a 1991 photograph showing fishing and forestry industry on the west coast dignitaries and guests from around the world. Chief Ambrose Maquinna and his son, the present of Vancouver Island. He retired twelve years He also opened the international exhibit. Chief Michael Maquinna, standing next to the ago, but remained active in political life for “Enlightened Voyages: Malaspina and image of their eighteenth-century ancestor. his community. Chief Maquinna was a strong Galiano on the Northwest Coast” at the advocate for Yuquot (Friendly Cove), a place Maritime Museum in Vancouver in 1991. that he held dear to his heart. He was instru- Chief Maquinna was a respected leader who mental in attaining the redesignation of was dedicated to his people. He will be Yuquot as a national historic site by the His- deeply missed by all who knew him. toric Sites and Monuments Board of Canada —RICHARD INGLIS

RANALD MACDONALD DAY McDonald’s Letters from the Columbia, 1822– VANCOUVER SPANISH PACIFIC On 4 August 2001, in Curlew, ten miles south 4. (See also BC Historical News 32/4). HISTORICAL SOCIETY of the USA border at Grand Forks, mem- Also part of the Ranald Macdonald Day in The Vancouver Spanish Pacific Historical bers of the Boundary Historical Society Curlew was a seminar dealing with the so- Society is dedicated to the promotion of in- joined the Ferry County Historical Society cial and economic forces that influenced the terest in the activities of Spanish explorers for the celebration of Ranald MacDonald personality and career of Ranald MacDonald. in the North Pacific at the end of the eight- Day. Near Curlew is the gravesite of Ranald Those who participated included historian eenth century. MacDonald. Ranald was the son of Archibald Jean Cole; Eiji Nushiya, director of the Rishiri Simon Fraser University and the Society co- MacDonald (McDonald) and Raven, daugh- Museum in ; Fredrick Schodt, Japanese sponsor the “Malaspina Lectures’” with sup- ter of Chief Concomly of the Chinooks translator from San Francisco; Atsumi port by the Embassy of Spain in Ottawa. (Flathead Indians). The adventurous Ranald Tsukimori, TV personality for the Spokane This year’s Malaspina Lecture is to be held spent almost a year (1848-1849) as a pris- Japanese channel; and Wyman MacDonald on Tuesday, 18 September 2001, at 7:30 P.M oner in Nagasaki, Japan. During this time he from Clarkston,Idaho. Mary Waring, presi- at Simon Fraser University Harbour Cen- taught English to a few Japanese students. dent of the Ferry County Historical Society tre Campus. Lecturer is Dr. Douglas Inglis Later, in 1854, some of these students were was the moderator. Other events were the from Seville, Spain, an expert on commu- interpreters when Commodore Perry landed Thompson Brigade demonstrating skills of nications within the . The in Japan. the fur trader, and members of the Colville lecture is open to everyone free of charge. It was wonderful that several representatives Confederated Tribes performing their drum- (See page 20 for information on the from Rishiri Island in Japan joined in the ming and dancing.—ALICE GLANVILLE Nanaimo lecture.) celebrations, showing the esteem they still PROCEEDINGS—FREE FOR OUR READERS The Society sponsors the presentation of the have for this first teacher of English in Japan. The Proceedings of the Inaugural Symposium of exhibition of photographs of work from art- Rishiri Island is where Ranald came ashore the Alexandro Malaspina Research Centre, con- ists on the Spanish expeditions. The next in 1848. taining articles on the Malaspina Expedition showing will be at the Vancouver Museum The narrative of Ranald MacDonald’s life, and its historical legacy, is made available free at the end of January 2002. published in 1923, has been reprinted with a of charge to the readers of BC Historical News. For further information visit www.vanspan.org foreword and afterword by Jean Cole. Jean For information contact John Black, at or contact the Society by e-mail at Cole is a great-great-granddaughter of Malaspina University College, 900 Fifth [email protected] or send a letter to the Archibald McDonald and author of Exile in Street, Nanaimo BC V9R 5S5, by e-mail: Vancouver Spanish Pacific Historical Society, the Wilderness, a Biography of Archibald [email protected], or by phone: 250.753- 209 West 4th Street, NorthVancouver, BC V7M McDonald, and This Blessed Wilderness, Archibald 3245, local 2171. 1H8. Memberships cost $10 per year.

BC HISTORICAL NEWS - FALL 2001 47 Federation News W. KAYE LAMB Essay Scholarships Deadline 15 May 2002 Revelstoke 2002 The British Columbia Historical Federation awards two scholarships annually for essays REVELSTOKE Museum and Archives is looking forward to hosting the conference of written by students at BC colleges or the British Columbia Historical Federation on the weekend 9-11 May 2002. universities on a topic relating to British Our theme, “Revelstoke–History & Heritage,” is taken from the title of Ruby Columbia history. One scholarship ($500) Nobb’s 1998 book on Revelstoke’s history. We will be showing delegates why is for an essay written by a student in a first- or second-year course; the other ($750) is Revelstoke is now considered a heritage- and cultural- tourism destination. We will for an essay written by a student in a third- be working with the Revelstoke Railway Museum, Revelstoke Heritage Advisory or fourth-year course. Committee, Mt. Revelstoke and Glacier National Parks, Revelstoke Dam, the newly To apply for the scholarship, candidates established B.C. Interior Forestry Museum, and other organizations, to showcase must submit (1) a letter of application; (2) an essay of 1500-3000 words on a topic the best that Revelstoke has to offer. We plan having a panel discussion on different relating to the history of British Columbia; aspects of Revelstoke’s development and future vision as well as sessions highlight- (3) a letter of recommendation from the ing Revelstoke’s fascinating history. Tours will include the National Parks (depend- professor for whom the essay was written. ing on the snow!), Revelstoke Dam, Railway Museum, walking & driving heritage Applications should be submitted before tours, cemetery tours, and several other possibilities that we are still investigating. 15 May 2002 to: Frances Gundry, Chair BC We are very much looking forward to inviting you to Revelstoke in May 2002. Historical Federation Scholarship Commit- We will leave you with a question, the answer to which we will publish in the tee, PO Box 5254, Station B, Victoria, BC V8R 6N4. December issue of BC Historical News: A member of the Palliser expedition of the The winning essay submitted by a third- 1860s returned as a visitor to this area in 1903 with his son. The son became ill or fourth-year student will be published in while at Glacier House and was brought to Revelstoke, where he died. The son was BC Historical News. Other submissions may buried in Revelstoke and a large memorial stone was erected in his memory. What be published at the editor’s discretion. is the name of the Palliser expedition member? –CATHY ENGLISH, C ONFERERENCE CO-ORDINATOR BC History Web Site Prize Below: Recently President Wayne Desrochers travelled to Revelstoke to personally pass on “The The British Columbia Historical Federa- Measure” to our 2002-conference host, the Revelstoke and District Historical Association. Wayne is tion and David Mattison are jointly spon- shown here handing over “The Measure” to Cathy English, Conference Coordinator. A rejoicing wit- soring a yearly cash award of $250 to rec- ness is standing behind him. ognize Web sites that contribute to the un- derstanding and appreciation of British Co- lumbia’s past. The award honours individual initiative in writing and presentation. Nominations for the BC History Web Site Prize for 2001 must be made to the British Columbia Historical Federation, Web Site Prize Committee, prior to 31 De- cember 2001. Web site creators and authors may nominate their own sites. Prize rules and the online nomination form can be found on The British Co- lumbia History Web site: http:// www.victoria.tc.ca/resources/bchistory- announcements.htlm.

Best Article Award

A CERTIFICATE OF MERIT and fifty dollars

Courtesy Wayne Desrochers Courtesy Wayne will be awarded annually to the author of the article, published in BC Historical News, that best enhances knowledge of British Co- MANUSCRIPTS submitted for publication Should be sent to the Editor of BC Historical News in Whonnock. Submissions should preferably not exceed 3,500 words. Please send a hard copy and if lumbia’s history and provides reading en- possible a disk copy of the manuscript by ordinary mail. Submission by e-mail of the manuscript joyment. Judging will be based on subject and illustrations is also welcome. All illustrations should have a caption and source information. development, writing skill, freshness of ma- It is understood that manuscripts published in BC Historical News will also appear in any elec- terial, and appeal to a general readership in- tronic version of the journal. Authors publishing a feature article in the BC Historical News for the terested in all aspects of BC history. first time will receive a one-year complimentary subscription to the journal.

48 BC HISTORICAL NEWS - VOL. 34 N O. 4 British Columbia Historical Federation Organized 31 October 1922 Affiliated Groups Maple Ridge Historical Society The British Columbia 22520 116th Ave., Maple Ridge, BC V2X 0S4 Historical Federation is Archives Association of British Columbia Nanaimo & District Museum Society an umbrella organization British Columbia Genealogical Society 100 Cameron Road, Nanaimo BC V9R 2X1 embracing regional Nanaimo Historical Society societies. Member Societies PO Box 933, Nanaimo BC V9R 5N2 Nelson Museum Alberni District Historical Society Local historical societies 402 Anderson Street, Nelson BC V1L 3Y3 PO Box 284, , BC V9Y 7M7 are entitled to become Nicola Valley Museum Archives Association Anderson Lake Historical Society Member Societies of the PO Box 1262, Merritt BC V1K 1B8 PO Box 40, D’Arcy BC V0N 1L0 BC Historical Federation. North Shore Historical Society Historical Society All members of these c/o 1541 Merlynn Crescent, PO Box 819, BC V0G 1R0 local historical societies North Vancouver BC V7J 2X9 Atlin Historical Society shall by that very fact be North Shuswap Historical Society PO Box 111, Atlin BC V0W lA0 members of the Federa- Box 317, Celista BC V0E 1L0 Boundary Historical Society tion. PO Box 1687, Grand Forks BC V0H 1H0 Okanagan Historical Society Bowen Island Historians PO Box 313, Vernon BC V1T 6M3 PO Box 97. Bowen Island, BC V0N 1G0 Princeton & District Museum & Archives Affiliated Groups are Bulckley Valley Historical & Museum Society Box 281, Princeton BC V0X 1W0 organizations with Box 2615, Smithers BC V0J 2N0 Historical Society specialized interests or Historical Society 587 Beach Road, objects of a historical 6501 Deer Lake Avenue, Burnaby BC V5G 3T6 Qualicum Beach BC V9K 1K7 nature. Valley Historical Society Revelstoke & District Historical Association PO Box 172, Chemainus BC V0R 1K0 Box 1908, Revelstoke BC V0E 2S0 Cowichan Historical Society Richmond Museum Society Membership fees for PO Box 1014, Duncan BC V9L 3Y2 Minoru Park Plaza, 7700 Minoru Gate, both classes of member- District 69 Historical Society Richmond BC V6Y 7M7 ship are one dollar per PO Box 1452, Parksville BC V9P 2H4 Salt Spring Island Historical Society member of a Member East Kootenay Historical Association 129 McPhillips Avenue, Society or Affiliated PO Box 74, Cranbrook BC V1C 4H6 Salt Spring Island BC V8K 2T6 Group with a minimum Finn Slough Heritage & Wetland Society Silvery Slocan Historical Society membership fee of $25 9480 Dyke Road, Richmond BC V7A 2L5 Box 301, BC V0G 1S0 and a maximum of $75. Galiano Museum Society Surrey Historical Society 20625 Porlier Pass Drive Box 34003 17790 #10 Hwy. Surrey BC V3S 8C4 Galiano Island BC V0N 1P0 Terrace Regional Historical Society Branch BCHF PO Box 246, Terrace BC V8G 4A6 c/o A. Loveridge S22, C11, RR # 1 Texada Island Heritage Society Galiano Island BC V0N 1P0 Box 122, Van Anda BC V0N 3K0 Hedley Heritage Society Trail Historical Society PO Box 218, Hedley BC V0X 1K0 PO Box 405, Trail BC V1R 4L7 Jewish Historical Society of BC Union Bay Historical Society 206-950 West 41st Avenue, Box 448, Union Bay, BC V0R 3B0 Vancouver BC V5Z 2N7 Vancouver Historical Society Kamloops Museum Association PO Box 3071, Vancouver BC V6B 3X6 207 Seymour Street, Kamloops BC V2C 2E7 Victoria Historical Society Koksilah School Historical Society PO Box 43035, Victoria North 5213 Trans Canada Highway, Victoria BC V8X 3G2 Koksilah, BC V0R 2C0 Yellowhead Museum Kootenay Lake Historical Society Box 1778, RR# 1, Clearwater BC V0E 1N0 Questions about PO Box 1262, BC V0G 1M0 membership should be Langley Centennial Museum directed to: PO Box 800, Fort Langley BC V1M 2S2 Terry Simpson, Historical Society Membership Secretary, c/o Box 274, Lantzville BC V0R 2H0 Application for membership received from: BC Historical Federation, London Heritage Farm Society Historical Society 193 Bird Sanctuary, 6511 Dyke Road, Richmond BC V7E 3R3 Box 571, Lions Bay BC V0N 2E0 Nanaimo BC V9R 6G8 Phone: 250.754.5697 [email protected] Please keep the editor of BC Historical News informed about corrections to be made to this list. Return Address: Canadian Publications Mail Product Sales Agreement No. 40025793 British Columbia Historical News Publications Mail Registration No. 09835 Joel Vinge, Subscription Secretary 561 Woodland Drive Cranbrook, BC V1C 6V2

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CONTACT US: THE BRITISH COLUMBIA HISTORICAL FEDERATION BC Historical News welcomes your INVITES SUBMISSIONS OF BOOKS FOR THE 19TH ANNUAL letters and manuscripts on subjects COMPETITION FOR W RITERS OF BC HISTORY. dealing with the history of British Columbia and British Columbians. Any book presenting any facet of BC history, published in Please send stories or essays on any 2001, is eligible. This may be a community history, biogra- aspect of the rich past of our prov- 2001 phy, record of a project or an organization, or personal recol- ince to the Editor, BC Historical lections giving a glimpse of the past. Names, dates and places, News, Fred Braches, PO Box 130, with relevant maps or pictures, turn a story into “history.” Whonnock BC, V2W 1V9. Note that reprints or revisions of books are not eligible. Phone: 604.462.8942 The judges are looking for quality presentations, especially if fresh material is E-mail: [email protected] included, with appropriate illustrations, careful proofreading, an adequate Send books for review and book index, table of contents and bibliography, from first-time writers as well as reviews directly to the Book Re- established authors. view Editor, BC Historical News, The Lieutenant-Governor’s Medal for Historical Writing will be awarded to an Anne Yandle, 3450 West 20th individual writer whose book contributes significantly to the recorded his- Avenue, Vancouver BC V6S 1E4, tory of British Columbia. Other awards will be made as recommended by Phone: 604.733.6484 the judges to valuable books prepared by groups or individuals. E-mail: [email protected] Winners will receive a Certificate of Merit, a monetary award and an invita- News items for publication in BC tion to the BCHF annual conference to be held in Revelstoke May 2002. Historical News should be send to the editor in Whonnock. SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS: All books must have been published in 2001 and should be submitted as soon as possible after publication. Two copies of each book Please send correspondence about should be submitted. Books entered become property of the BC Historical Federa- subscriptions to the Subscription tion. Please state name, address and telephone number of sender, the selling price of Secretary, Joel Vinge all editions of the book, and, if the reader has to shop by mail, the address from which 561 Woodland Drive it may be purchased, including applicable shipping and handling costs. Cranbrook BC V1C 6V2 Phone/Fax: 250.489.2490 SEND TO: BC Historical Federation Writing Competition E-mail: [email protected] c/o Shirley Cuthbertson Subscriptions #306-225 Belleville Street Victoria BC V8V 4T9 Individual $15.00 per year Institutional $20.00 per year DEADLINE: 31 December 2001 For addresses outside Canada add $6.00