The Journey to the Polar Sea

by John Franklin

CHAPTER 5.

TRANSACTIONS AT FORT CHIPEWYAN. ARRIVAL OF DR. RICHARDSON AND MR. HOOD. PREPARATIONS FOR OUR JOURNEY TO THE NORTHWARD.

TRANSACTIONS AT FORT CHIPEWYAN.

March 26, 1820.

On the day after our arrival at Fort Chipewyan we called upon Mr. MacDonald, the gentleman in charge of the Hudson’s Bay Establishment called Fort Wedderburne, and delivered to him Governor Williams’ circular letter which desired that every assistance should be given to further our progress, and a statement of the requisitions which we should have to make on his post.

Our first object was to obtain some certain information respecting our future route and accordingly we received from one of the North-West Company’s interpreters, named Beaulieu, a half-breed who had been brought up amongst the Dog-ribbed and Copper Indians, some satisfactory information which we afterwards found tolerably correct respecting the mode of reaching the Copper-Mine River which he had descended a considerable way, as well as of the course of that river to its mouth. The Copper Indians however he said would be able to give us more accurate information as to the latter part of its course as they occasionally pursue it to the sea. He sketched on the floor a representation of the river and a line of coast according to his idea of it. Just as he had finished an old Chipewyan Indian named Black Meat unexpectedly came in and instantly recognised the plan. He then took the charcoal from Beaulieu and inserted a track along the sea-coast which he had followed in returning from a war excursion made by his tribe against the Esquimaux. He detailed several particulars of the coast and the sea which he represented as studded with well-wooded islands and free from ice close to the shore in the month of July, but not to a great distance. He described two other rivers to the eastward of the Copper-Mine River which also fall into the Northern Ocean, the Anatessy, which issues from the Contwayto or Rum Lake, and the Thloueeatessy or Fish River, which rises near the eastern boundary of the Great Slave Lake; but he represented both of them as being shallow and too much interrupted by barriers for being navigated in any other than small Indian canoes.

Having received this satisfactory intelligence I wrote immediately to Mr. Smith of the North-West Company and Mr. McVicar of the Hudson’s Bay Company, the gentlemen in charge of the posts at the Great Slave Lake, to communicate the object of the Expedition and our proposed route, and to solicit any information they possessed or could collect from the Indians relative to the countries we had to pass through and the best manner of proceeding. As the Copper Indians frequent the establishment on the north side of the lake I particularly requested them to explain to that tribe the object of our visit and to endeavour to procure from them some guides and hunters to accompany our party. Two Canadians were sent by Mr. Keith with these letters.

The month of April commenced with fine and clear but extremely cold weather; unfortunately we were still without a thermometer and could not ascertain the degrees of temperature. The coruscations of the Aurora Borealis were very brilliant almost every evening of the first week and were generally of the most variable kind. On the 3rd they were particularly changeable. The first appearance exhibited three illuminated beams issuing from the horizon in the north, east, and west points, and directed towards the zenith; in a few seconds these disappeared and a complete circle was displayed, bounding the horizon at an elevation of fifteen degrees. There was a quick lateral motion in the attenuated beams of which this zone was composed. Its colour was a pale yellow with an occasional tinge of red.

On the 8th of April the Indians saw some geese in the vicinity of this lake but none of the migratory birds appeared near the houses before the 15th when some swans flew over. These are generally the first that arrive; the weather had been very stormy for the four preceding days and this in all probability kept the birds from venturing farther north than where the Indians had first seen them.

In the middle of the month the snow began to waste daily and by degrees it disappeared from the hills and the surface of the lake. On the 17th and 19th the Aurora Borealis appeared very brilliant in patches of light bearing North-West. An old Cree Indian having found a beaver-lodge near to the fort, Mr. Keith, Back, and I accompanied him to see the method of breaking into it and their mode of taking those interesting animals. The lodge was constructed on the side of a rock in a small lake having the entrance into it beneath the ice. The frames were formed of layers of sticks, the interstices being filled with mud, and the outside was plastered with earth and stones which the frost had so completely consolidated that to break through required great labour with the aid of the ice chisel and the other iron instruments which the beaver hunters use. The chase however was unsuccessful as the beaver had previously vacated the lodge.