The Conquest of the Great Northwest; Being the Story of the Adventurers Of
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THE CONQUEST OF.' THE GREAT NORTHWEST Collier's famous picture of Hudson's Last Hours. THE CONQUEST OF THE GREAT NORTHWEST Being the story of the ADVENTURERS OF ENGLAND kno'wn as THE HUDSON'S BA COMPANr. Ne'w pages in the history of the Canadian North'west and Western State; BY AGNES C. LAUT Author of "Lords of Me Nor/h," "Pathfinders of the West," et,. TWO VOLUMES IN ONE NEW YORK MOFFAT, YARD AND COMPANY MCMXI Copyright, 190$, by THE OUTXNG PUI3LISHING COMPANI1 Entered at Stationers' Hall, London, England AU Rit: Rmrved NEW EDITION IN ONE VOLUME Ocrosaz. 1911 Th5 OWNN I 100111 00. PIlls M011y, N. 4. TO G. C. L. and C M. A. CONTENTS OF VOLUME I PART I CHAPTER I PAGE Henry Hudson's First Voyage 3 CHAPTER II Hudson's Second Voyage CHAPTER III Hudson's Third Voyage CHAPTER IV Hudson's Fourth Voyage 49 CHAPTER V The Adventures of the Danes on Hudson BayJens Munck's Crew . 72 PART II CHAPTER VI Radisson, the Pathfinder, Discovers Hudson Bay and Founds the Company of Gentlemen Adventurers 97 CHAPTER VII The Adventures of the First VoyageRadisson Driven Back Organizes the Hudson's Bay Company and Writes his Journals of Four VoyagesThe Charter and the First ShareholdersAdventures of Radisson on the BayThe Coming of the French and the Quarrel. Contents CHAPTER VIII PAGE Gentlemen Adventurers ofEngland"LordS of the Outer MarchesTwo Centuriesof Company Rule Secret OathsThe Use ofWhiskeyThe Matrimonial OfficesThe Part the Company Played in theGame of International JugglingHow Tradeand Voyages 132 Were Conducted - CHAPTER IX If Radisson Can Do Without the Adventurers,the Adven- turers Cannot Do Without RadissonTheEruption of the French on the BayThe Beginningof the 162 Raiders . - CHAPTER X The Adventurers Furious at Radisson, Find it Cheaper to Have him as a Friend than Enemy and Invite him BackThe Real Reason Why Radisson Returned The Treauhery of StatecraftYoung Chouart Out- raged, Nurses his Wrath and Gayly Comes on the Scene Monsieur PréScout and Spy .x8o CHAPTER XI Wherein the Reasons for Young Chouart Groseiller's Mysterious Message to Our Good Friend "Péré" are ExplainedThe Forest Rovers of New France Raid the Bay by Sea and LandTwo Ships SunkPéré, the Spy, Seized and Sent to England .i98 CHAPTER XII Pierre le Moyne d'Iberville Sweeps the Bay 211 CHAPTER XIII D'Iberville Sweeps the Bay (conti,iued) . 228 CHAPTER XIV What Became of Radisson?New Facts Days of the Famous Pathfinder x Contents PART III CHAPTER XV The First Attempts of the Adventurers to ExplorePAGE Henry Kelsey Penetrates as far as the Valley of the SaskatchewanSanford and Arrington, Known as "Red Cap." Found Henley House Inland from Albany Beset from Without, the Company is also Beset from WithinPetitions Against the CharterIncrease of CapitalRestoration of the Bay from France 277 CHAPTER XVI Old Captain Knight, Beset by Gold Fever, Hears the Call of the NorthThe Straits and BayThe First Harvest of the Sea at Dead Man's IslandCastaways for Three YearsThe Company, Beset by Gold Fever, Increases its StockPays Ten Per Cent, on Twice Trebled CapitalComing of Spies Again .298 CHAPTER XVII The Company's Prosperity Arouses OppositionArthur Dobbs and the Northwest Passage and the Attack on the CharterNo Northwest Passage is Found, but the French Spur the English to Renewed Activity 320 CHAPTER XVIII The March Across the Continent BeginsThe Company Sends a Man to the Blackfeet of the South Saskatche- wanAnthony Hendry is the First Englishman to Penetrate to the SaskatchewanThe First Englishman to Winter West of Lake WinnipegHe Meets the Sioux and the Blackfeet and Invites them to the Bay 334 CHAPTER XIX Extension of Trade toward Labrador, Quebec and Rockies. Hearne Finds the Athabasca Country and Founds Cumberland House on the SockatchewanCocking Proceeds to the BlackfeetHowse FindS the Pass in Rockies - 35 Conlen2s CHAPTER XX rAGS "The Coming of the Pedlars' '-' 'A New Race ofWood- rovers Throngs to theNorthwestBandits of the Wilds War Among ThemselvesTales of Border War- fare,Wassail and GrandeurThe New Northwest theCompany Hudson's Challenges Bay the Authority Company and Feudalism ......389 of FOREWORD HAS become almost a truism to say that no complete account of the Hudson's Bay Adven- ITturers has yet been written.I have often wondered if the people who repeated that statement knew what they meant.The empire of the fur trade Adventurers was not confined to Rupert's Land, as specified by their charterLords of the Outer Marches, these gay Gentlemen Adventurers setting sail over the seas of the Unknown, Soldiers of Fortune with a laugh for life or death carving a path through the wildernesswere not to be checked by the mere fiction of limits set by a charter.They followed the rivers of their bay south to the height of land, and looking over it saw the unoccupied territory of the Great Lakes and the Upper Mississippi.It was American territory; but what did that matter? Over they marched and took possession in Minnesota and the two Dakotas and MontanaThis region was reached byay of Albany River Then they fol- lowed the Saskatche'v an up and looked o er its height of landTo the north were MacKenzie River and the Yukon, to the west, the Fraser and xv Foreword the Columbia.By no feat of imagination could the charter be stretched to these regions.Canadian merchants were on the field in MacKenzie River. Russians .claimed Alaskt.Americans claimed Ore- gon down as far as -the Spanish Settlements; but these things did not matter.The Hudson's Bay Adventurers went over the barriers of mountains and statecraft, and founding their fur empire of wild- wood rovers, took toll of the wilderness in cargoes of precious furs outvaluing all the taxes ever collected by a conqueror. All this was not enough. South of the Columbia was an unknown region the size of half EuropeCalifornia, Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Idaho. The wildwood rovers of the Hudson's Bay Adven- turers swept south in pack-horse brigades of two- and three-hundreds from the Columbia to Monterey. Where Utah railroads now run, their trappers found the trail.Where gold seekers toiled to death across Nevada deserts, Hudson's Bay trappers had long before marched in dusty caravans sweeping the wil- derness of beaver. Where San Francisco stands to- day, the English Adventurers once owned a thousandL acre farm. By a bold stroke of statecraft, they had hoped to buy up Meiico's bad debts and trade those debts for proprietary rights in California.The story of why they failed is theme for novelist or poet rather than historianSuffice to say, their Southern Bn- xvi Foreword gades, disguised as Spanish horsemen, often went south as far as Monterey.Yet more! The Hud- son's Bay Adventurers had a station half way across the Pacific in Hawaii. In all, how large was their fur empire?Larger, by actual measurement, much larger, than Europe. Now what person would risk reputation by saying no complete account had yet been written of all Europe? The thing is so manifestly impossible, it is absurd.Not one complete account, but hundreds of volumes on different episodes will go to the making of such a complete history.So is it of the vast area ruled by the Hudson's Bay Company. The time will come when each district will demand as separate treatment as a Germany, or a France or an Italy in its history.All that can be attempted in one volume or one series of volumes is the portrayal of a single movement, or a single episode, or a single character. In this account, I have attemptedto tell the story of the Company only as adventurer, pathfinder,em- pire-builder, from Rupert's Land to, California feudal lord beaten off the field by democracy.Where the empire-buildererges with the colonizer and pioneer, I have stopped in each case.In Manitoba, the passing of the Company was marked by the Riel Rebellion,inBntish Columbia, by the mad gold stampede,in Oregon, by the terrible Whitman Foreword massacres;in California, by the fall of Spanish power.All these arc dramas in themselves worthy of poet or novelist; but they arc not germane to the Adventurers.Therefore, they arc not given here. Who takes up the story where I leave off, must hang the narrative on these pegs. Another intentional omission.From the time the Adventurers wrote off £Ioo,000 loss for search of the North-West Passage, Arctic Exploration has no part in this story.In itself, itis an enthralling story; but to give even the most scrappy reference to it here would necessitate crowding out essential parts of the Adventurers' recordsuch as McLoughlin's transmontane empire, or the account of the South Bound Brigades.Therefore, latter day Arctic work has no mention here.For the same reason, I have been compelled to omit the dramatic story of the early missions.These merit a book to themselves. Throughoutwith the exception of four chapters, I may say altogetherI have relied for the thread of my narrative on the documents in Fludson's Bay House, London; the Minute Books of some two hundred years, the Letter Books, the Stock Books, the Memorial Books, the Daily Journals kept by chief factors at every post and sent to London from 1670 These documents are in tonsThey are not xviii Foreword open to the public.They are unclassified; and in the case of Minute Books are in duplicates, "the Foule Minutes"as the inscription on the old parch- ment describes thembeing rough, almost unread- able, notes jotted down during proceedings with interlinings and blottings to be copied into the Minute Books marked "Faire Copic."In some cases, the latter has been lost or destroyed; and only the un- corrected one remains.It is necessary to state this because discrepancies will be foundnoted as the story proceedswhich arise from the fact that some volumes of the corrected minutes have been lost.