It was perfectly natural that the Nor’Westers should regard the rights of first possession as stronger than any English charter.
Which was right, Nor’Wester, or Hudson’s Bay? Little gain to answer that burning question at this late day! From their own view, each was right; and to-day looking back, every person’s verdict will be given just and in exact proportion as feudalism or democracy is regarded as the highest tribunal.
All unconscious of the part he was acting in destiny, thinking only of the fearful needs of Earth’s Dispossessed, dreaming only of his beloved colony, Lord Selkirk was pushing feudalism to its supreme test in the New World. Of the nobility, Selkirk was a part of feudalism. He believed the powers conferred by the charter were right in the highest sense of the word, valid in the eyes of the law; and no premonition warned that he was to fall a noble sacrifice to his own beliefs. Where would the world’s progress be if the onward movements of the race could be stopped by a victim more or less? Selkirk saw only People Dispossessed in Scotland, Lands Unpeopled in America! The difficulties that lay between, that were to baffle and beat and send him heartbroken to an early grave—Selkirk did not see.
The rights of the Company had been pronounced valid. On February 6, 1811, Lord Selkirk laid his scheme before the Governing Committee. The plan was of such a revolutionary nature, the Committee begs to lay the matter before a General Court of all shareholders. After various adjourned meetings the General Court meets on May 30, 1811. A pin fall could have been heard in the Board Room as the shareholders mustered. Governor William Mainwaring is in the chair. My Lord Selkirk is present. So are all his friends. So are six Nor’Westers black with anger, among them Sir Alexander MacKenzie, and Edward Ellice, son of the Montreal merchant. Their anger grows deeper when they learn that two of the six Nor’Westers cannot vote because the ink is not yet dry with which they purchased their Hudson’s Bay stock; for shareholders must have held stock six months before they may vote.
In brief, Lord Selkirk’s scheme is that the Company grant him a region for colonizing on Red River, in area now known to have been larger than the British Isles, and to have extended south of modern Manitoba to include half Minnesota. In return, Lord Selkirk binds himself to supply the Hudson’s Bay Company with two hundred servants a year for ten years—whether over and above that colony or out of that colony is not stated. Their wages are to be paid by the Company. Selkirk guarantees that the colony shall not interfere with the Hudson’s Bay fur trade. Other details are given—how the colonists are to reach their country, how much they are to be charged for passage, how much for duty. The main point is my Lord Selkirk owning £40,000 out of £105,000 capital and controlling another £20,000 through his friends—asks for an enormous grant of land larger than the modern province of Manitoba—the very region that Colin Robertson had described to him as a seat of empire—the stamping ground of the great fur traders.
Promptly, the Nor’Westers present rise and lay on the table a protest against the grant. The protest sets forth that Lord Selkirk is giving no adequate returns for such an enormous gift—which was very true and might have been added of the entire territory granted the Hudson’s Bay Company by Charles II. If it was to the interests of the Hudson’s Bay Company to sell such valuable territory, it should have been done by public sale. Then there are no penalties attached to compel Selkirk to form a settlement. Also, the grant gives to the Earl of Selkirk without any adequate return “an immensely valuable landed estate.” And, “in event of settlement, colonization is at all times unfavorable to the fur trade.” Other reasons the memorialists give, but the main one is the reason they do not give—that if Selkirk owns the central region of the fur country, he may exclude the Nor’Westers.
The protest is tabled and ignored. Sir Alexander MacKenzie is so angry he cannot speak. This does not mean the grand monopoly of the fur trade which he had planned. It means the smashing of the fur trade forever. Ellice, son of the Montreal potentate, sees the wealth of that city crumbling to ruins for the sake of a blind enthusiast’s philanthropic scheme.
Some one asks what the Hudson’s Bay Company is to receive for their gift in perpetuity to the Earl.
Two hundred servants a year for ten years!