An interesting side-light is thrown on the changing conditions of the West by our finding that in the late eighties a detachment of Police was sent by request from that Province into southern Manitoba. This detachment, under Inspector J. A. McGibbon (recently Assistant Commissioner at Regina, now retired), who had done important work at Moose Mountain and other far western points, had headquarters at Morden. The business of this detachment was to patrol the whole country near the boundary line, to grant special "Let Passes" to people who were entitled to cross backwards and forwards, to prevent wood being taken from the Canadian side by Dakota settlers, and generally to stand for law and order. In connection with other work I was up and down that region a good deal in those days, and recall the sense of general security the scattered settlers had because of the presence of McGibbon and his men.
After five years in command of the Prince Albert district, which had been the critical storm centre around which the winds of the Riel rebellion had beaten fiercely, Inspector A. B. Perry, before changing to another command, makes another valuable contribution to the development of Western history when he writes some special paragraphs in regard to the future of the half-breeds. Game was disappearing and the occupation of freighting on the prairie was being rendered useless by the incoming of railways. Perry says, "The mass of the half-breed population must therefore turn their attention to other methods of making a living. They have no alternative: farming must become their occupation in earnest. The English and Scotch half-breeds have already done this successfully; but very few of French descent have yet made any real attempt at it." Perry was right. These people had the blood of the nomad and the volatile in their veins. Perry continues, "As farming is the inevitable pursuit of the French half-breeds, all who are friendly to them should agree in urging and encouraging them to remain on their present holdings, so that they may at once face their destiny and ultimately obtain the position of a self-supporting people. They should be treated with patience and aided generously, remembering that it is not easy for white men possessing all the advantages of education and civilization to change their occupation. Can the half-breed hunter or freighter be expected to be more apt in adapting himself to change? It would be an astonishing thing if they quietly and quickly adapted themselves to the work of a farm on which success is only obtained by hard, patient and continuous labour." And Perry goes on to advise special instruction for these people. And he concludes, "There is a tendency on the part of some to regard the problem of the future of these people as insolvable. Knowing their many sterling qualities I cannot despair, but believe their descendants will be prosperous and desirable citizens of our North-West Territory." Words like these could not be written by a man who contented himself with the routine duty of a policeman, but by a wide-awake Canadian who was anxious for the future of his country and his fellow-citizens, and it is because there were so many in the Force who saw these questions in the light of Canada's future that we have always placed the Mounted Police amongst the real nation-builders of this new Dominion.
And the decade which ended with 1890 finds one of the new pages in the story of the Police in the patrol by Inspector J. V. Begin across the stormy waters of Lake Winnipeg up to the bleak shores of Hudson Bay at the famous old post of York Factory. This patrol involved much hardship and danger, but it stabilized conditions in that remote Keewatin area. In this regard Inspector Begin's trip was successful, but during his absence in the north there occurred the wreck of the Police boat on Lake Winnipeg, taking down with it Corporal Morphy and Constable Beaujeu, to both of whom the Inspector was warmly attached. They were splendid young men, full of gallantry and courage, but they answered the last roll-call while in the discharge of duty in a Force that has always been on active service.
CHAPTER X
CHANGING SCENERY
The decade from 1890 to 1900 witnessed changes and incidents that were fully up to the Police history record for matters of thrilling importance. In 1891 Sir John A. Macdonald, who was the originator of the Force, and who had always taken great pride in its splendid efficiency, passed away after a brief illness at the historic homestead, Earnscliffe, in Ottawa. Not even Sir John's most rabidly partisan friends had ever claimed perfection for their political idol, but I did hear one man say that he was so devoted to "The old Chieftain," that he was quite prepared to support him whether he was right or wrong. This was probably an extreme case, but it illustrates the extraordinary magnetism of the remarkable man who had been the chief pilot in taking the country through the shoals and rocks that threatened to wreck Confederation at its launching. Sir John's Canadianism was intense and so was his Imperialism, for was it not he who said, "A British subject I was born and a British subject I will die"? The undoubted political lapses in his career seemed to proceed from his being possessed with the idea that his presence at the head of affairs was so necessary for the well-being of the country that he should get there and stay there at any cost. His two great achievements in connection with Western Canada were his inauguration of the Canadian Pacific Railway, and his organization of the Mounted Police. This does not mean that in these two projects he had not the aid of others, for in some measure he had the support of even his political opponents, who differed from him in considerable degree on the railway policy, but who supported him in his proposal to organize the Mounted Police.
When I last heard this Disraeli-looking man speak, it was in Winnipeg, when he was making his first and last trip across Canada on the railway for which he had done and ventured so much. In his semi-humorous and semi-serious way he said, "I used to state that I never expected to live long enough to see the road completed, but that when my friends would be crossing the continent upon it, I would be looking down upon them from another and better sphere; my opponents said I would be looking up, but in reality to the surprise of both, I am doing it on the horizontal." On that same trip the veteran took great delight in seeing the scarlet and gold uniforms of his favourite corps on their "native heath" in the great prairie land of the West. Such was Sir John's interest in the Force that, despite his heavy duties, he retained the headship of the corps to the end of his days. In later years Sir Wilfred Laurier, Sir Robert Bordon, and the Hon. N. W. Rowell were outstanding also in their high opinion of, and their great interest in, the riders of the plains. In fact all public men who really understood the Western situation and the wide-reaching influence of the Police on Western history have always been ready to estimate highly the great services rendered by these remarkable men. During that same decade which rounded out the century Colonel MacLeod, who had been appointed to the Bench and whose fine character had endeared him to the Police and the country, crossed the Great Divide amid the grief of all who knew him. The Assistant Commissioner, W. M. Herchmer, who had throughout nearly thirty years served with distinction in the Militia and the Police, died much regretted, and was succeeded by Superintendent John H. McIlree, who retired in 1911 after thirty-eight years of most valuable service.
It was in that decade also that the gold-rush into the Yukon took place, as we shall see, and furnished a new occasion for one of the most remarkable periods in the history of the Police, replete with incidents of adventure and tales of endurance along with a devotion to duty and a triumphant enforcement of law which added immensely to the already great prestige of the Force, and made a record that not only astonished but won the admiration of the world. We will, however, review some notable events of that decade before coming to the Yukon.
Tragic but glorious was the fate of a young constable near Pendant d'Oreille, who was out on special duty when a blinding snow-storm gathered to the height of a blizzard across his path. Losing the way, the troop-horse stumbled into a ravine and broke his neck. But the athletic young policeman, who had developed muscle as well as mind in his university, extricated himself and struggled on in his determination to carry out his commission. The odds of blizzard and cold were too heavy, and the gallant lad succumbed in the unequal contest. But he would bring no discredit on the Police tradition, and when his body was discovered by a search party the following words, scribbled with freezing fingers, were found on a paper in his dispatch bag, "Lost. Horse dead. Am trying to push on. Have done my best." In the long roll of honour there are few more remarkable incidents than this of the young policeman battling with the relentless elements which some of us have witnessed raging on these Western plains. But he did not fail. From his numbing hands he had passed on to others the supreme duty of upholding the great tradition.