Pathfinders of the Great Plains: A Chronicle of La Vérendrye and his Sons

by Lawrence J. Burpee

During all this time the elder La Vérendrye had been working at other plans for discovery and for trade in the Far West. In the year 1739, on his return from the first visit to the Mandans, he had sent his son François to build a fort on the Lake of the Prairies, now known as Lake Manitoba. When young La Vérendrye had built this fort, he went farther north to Cedar Lake, near the mouth of the Saskatchewan river, and there built another fort. The purpose was to intercept the trade of the Indians with the English on Hudson Bay. For over half a century the Indians of this region had taken their furs down the rivers leading from Lake Winnipeg to the trading-posts of the Hudson's Bay Company on the shores of the Bay, but now the French intended to offer them a market nearer home and divert to themselves this profitable trade. The first of their new forts was named Fort Dauphin, and the one on Cedar Lake was called Fort Bourbon.

Having built Fort Bourbon, François La Vérendrye had ascended the Saskatchewan river as far as the Forks, where the north and south branches of that great river join. Here he met a number of Crees, whom he questioned as to the source of the Saskatchewan. They told him that it came from a great distance, rising among lofty mountains far to the west, and that beyond those mountains they knew of a great lake, as they called it, the water of which was not good to drink. The mountains were of course the Rocky Mountains, and the waters of the great lake which the Crees spoke of were the salt waters of the Pacific ocean. François La Vérendrye had continued his work of building forts. Shortly after building Fort Bourbon, he built Fort Paskoyac, on the Saskatchewan, at a place now known as the Pas, between Cedar Lake and the Forks. It is interesting to know that a railway has just been completed to this place, and that it is to be continued from there to the shores of Hudson Bay. How this modern change would have startled the old fur-traders! Even if they could have dreamed of anything so wonderful as a railway, we can imagine their ridicule of the idea that some day men should travel from the East to the far-off shores of the Saskatchewan in two or three days, a trip which cost them months of wearisome paddling.

In carrying on his work in the West, La Vérendrye had to face difficulties even greater than those caused by the hard life in the wilderness. His base of supplies was in danger. He had many enemies in Canada, who took advantage of his absence in the West to prejudice the governor against him. They even sent false reports to the king of France, saying that he was spending his time, not in searching for a way to the Western Sea, but in making money out of the fur trade. This was not true. Not only was he making no money out of the fur trade, but, as we have seen, he was heavily in debt because of the enormous cost of carrying on his explorations. For a time, however, the truth did not help him. The tales told by his enemies were believed, and he was ordered to return to Montreal with his sons. He and they withdrew from their work in the West, left behind their promising beginnings, and returned to the East. Never again, as it happened, was the father to resume his work. Another officer, M. de Noyelle, was sent to the West to continue the work of exploration. Noyelle spent two years in the West without adding anything to the information La Vérendrye had gained. By that time a natural reaction had come in favour of La Vérendrye, and the acting governor of Canada, the Marquis de La Galissonière, decided to put the work of exploration again in charge of La Vérendrye and his sons. In recognition of his services he was given the rank of captain and was decorated with the Cross of St Louis.

While these events were ripening, the years passed, and not until 1749 was La Vérendrye restored to his leadership in the West. Though now sixty-four years old, he was overjoyed at the prospect. Not only was he permitted to continue his search for the Western Sea; the quality of his work was recognized, for the governor and the king had at last understood that, instead of seeking his own profit in his explorations, as his enemies had said, he had the one object of adding to the honour and glory of his country. He made preparations to start from Montreal in the spring of 1750, and intended to push forward as rapidly as possible to Fort Bourbon, or Fort Paskoyac, where he would spend the winter. In the spring of the following year he would ascend the Saskatchewan river and make his way over the mountains to the shores of the Western Sea, the Pacific ocean as we know it to-day. But the greatest of all enemies now blocked his way. La Vérendrye was taken ill while making his preparations for the expedition, and before the close of the year 1749 he had set out on the journey from which no man returns.

The Marquis de la Galissonière.
From an engraving in the Château de Ramezay.

After the death of La Vérendrye, his sons made preparations to carry out his plan for reaching the Western Sea by way of the Saskatchewan river. They had the same unselfish desire to bring honour to their king and to add new territories to their native land. Moreover, this project, which their father had had so much at heart, had become now for them a sacred duty. To their dismay, however, they soon found that the promise made to their father did not extend to themselves. Another officer, Legardeur de Saint-Pierre, was appointed by the governor of Canada to carry on the search for the Western Sea. They had spent years of toil and discomfort in the wilderness and endured countless hardships and dangers. They had carefully studied the languages, manners, and customs of the Indian tribes, and they had found out by hard experience what would be the best means of completing their discovery. Yet now they were thrown aside in favour of an officer who had never been in the Far West and who knew nothing of the conditions he would there be compelled to meet.

They could at least appeal for justice. In a last attempt to obtain this for himself and his brothers, François de La Vérendrye wrote this letter to the king's minister: