England and Canada / A Summer Tour Between Old and New Westminster, with Historical Notes

by Sandford Fleming

It will scarcely be believed that a notice was served on those who remained, signed by four partizans of the North-West Company, sternly requiring them to leave the settlement. It had to be entirely abandoned. The better to show their power, in the temporary absence of the Governor, they removed the cannon, implements and other property from Fort Douglas. The proceeding was doubtless calculated to show the strength of the North-West Company, side by side with the impotent character of Lord Selkirk’s protection. There was no course open but compliance. The exiles took canoes and paddled down the Red River to Lake Winnipeg, and reached Norway House, to the north of the lake. They had not been long here when they were met by Collin Robertson and some twenty employés passing up Jack River on their way to join the settlement. Robertson was a man of determination, and saw that there was no good reason why the enterprise should be abandoned, and that such an outrage, with one of Selkirk’s character, would only call for renewed effort. He induced the settlers to return. They found their houses burned and their property destroyed. This occurred in August, but in October an additional number came, and the settlement had regained more assured strength. We have now arrived at 1816.

In the half century which had elapsed since the conquest that which may almost be called a new race of men had sprung up: the children of the French voyageurs of the North-West Company, who had married or lived with Indian women in the neighbourhood of the several forts. They obtained the name of “Bois-Brulés.” They were powerful in frame, disinclined to restraint, attached to a wandering life and unsettled habits, mostly without education. They were easily accessible to those who knew how to appeal to their prejudices. They had courage, and under able leaders became a formidable foe. Their sympathies were difficult to determine. Perhaps the leading feature of their character was jealousy of their individual rights. In subsequent years their self-assertion took so threatening a form that the presence of Imperial troops more than once became necessary. Early in June, 1816, a party of them gathered at Portage-la-Prairie, on the Assiniboine. They had but one object in view. It was, in a sentence, to retain the country for themselves, and to drive out all whom they had learned to look upon as intruders. There is everything to show that they were perfectly organized. They were armed, it is said that they were painted and disguised, and every precaution taken to make their movements appear an act of the genuine Red man. The evidence, accessible to those who will examine it, shows that the Indians were in no way mixed up with the expedition. It was confined to the men whose sympathies were with the North-West Company. Their operations commenced by seizing some boats and furs at Portage-la-Prairie, belonging to the Hudson’s Bay Company, and advancing to Fort Douglas, at Red River.

At the fort itself the intrigues and intentions of those hostile to the settlement were known, and in some undefined way it was felt that danger was near. What form it would take, or whence it would come, none could say, but a watch was kept night and day. It would appear that the attack came earlier than was looked for. On the evening of the 17th June the alarm was given of the approach of the Bois-Brulés. Semple was the Governor. He was a man of courage and had served. He did what little he could with the resources which at that hour were available. He collected a few men and started onwards to meet the advancing party. Seeing the numbers increase, he sent for a cannon and more force, and in the meantime continued to advance. As the opposing parties approached, each leader asked the other what he wanted. It is stated that one of the Governor’s party fired a shot in the air, on which a shot from the Bois-Brulés brought down Mr. Holte, who held the rank of lieutenant in the settlement. The firing became general. Governor Semple was killed and his men fell around him. Twenty-two in all were shot. There is no report of a death on the side of the Bois-Brulés. No further resistance was attempted, and Fort Douglas was given over to the North-Westers. The settlers were compelled to take to their canoes and find a refuge where they could. The settlement was again entirely broken up.

Such was the celebrated affair of Seven Oaks on the 17th June, 1816, yet sung in the songs of the Bois-Brulés and chanted as the hymn of victory.

Lord Selkirk had heard the story of the attack of the preceding year, and at once hurried to Canada. He passed the winter of 1815 in Montreal, the season being too late for him to go west. Governor Semple was held to be in all respects competent, and Lord Selkirk had given him his full confidence; so it was thought that until his own arrival no further difficulty would be experienced. He was, however, convinced that the attacks had not ceased, and that if the settlement had to be defended a force sufficient to meet such outrages had to be found. The deMeuron and Watteville regiments were on the eve of being disbanded, and Lord Selkirk obtained from their ranks the men he required to recruit the colony. These regiments were two of the foreign legion raised during the Peninsula war; they had been ordered to Canada in 1812. At the peace after Waterloo their disbandment was resolved on. They left the British service with the highest reputation for discipline and conduct. Early in June, 1816, the expedition started from Montreal with four officers and eighty men of the deMeuron corps. At Kingston the number was increased by seventy of the Watteville regiment. It proceeded up to Drummond’s Island on Lake Huron to receive a sergeant and six men of the Imperial army, who were to be present at Red River as a proof of the countenance given to the settlement by the home authorities.

Selkirk joined the expedition at Sault St. Mary His purpose was to have proceeded to Duluth, Fond du Lac, and to have crossed overland to Red River. They had not advanced far when they met Miles Macdonnell bringing down the news of the second destruction of the colony and of the violent death of the Governor and twenty-one of his people. Selkirk at once started for Fort William to meet the foe on his own ground. They arrived on the 12th August and encamped on the Point deMeuron, some five miles from the mouth of the Kaministiquia, a name it still retains, and which the reader may remember I alluded to when visiting that locality. A demand was at once made on the fort for the parties captured, who had been brought there as prisoners. The North-West people denied the fact of the arrest, and sent them to Point deMeuron.

Lord Selkirk had now before him the evidence of such of his people who had suffered at Seven Oaks to confirm the opinion that the trouble had been caused by the North-West Company. Fort William was unable to resist him. He arrested McGillivray, McKenzie and others of the Company who were then present, by warrant. They were allowed to remain for a time at Fort William, but as it was evident a rescue was intended, he sent them down as prisoners to York, now Toronto, under an escort. Selkirk wintered on the Kaministiquia and collected provisions. On the 1st May, 1817, he started for Red River, and arrived there the last week in June, passing over the distance in seven or eight weeks, which recently I travelled by rail in twenty-four hours. The settlement was again established.

Like all men who take a prominent part in life’s drama, Lord Selkirk has his admirers and defamers. There are those who can see in his conduct only the most self-interested motives and an example of arbitrary, tyrannical self-assertion. He lived in an age when his unselfish views were rare. To-day we can better understand that his object in urging emigration as a scheme to aid the poor and struggling masses of an overcrowded country, sprang from philanthropy and a desire to relieve suffering humanity. His personal comforts and benefits lay in the opposite direction to the course he pursued. A calculation of the chances could promise only misconception of his motives and personal annoyance. He lived half a century before his time. Of late years his theories have been accepted as admitted truths. Every facility has been established to carry them out. The shores of this Continent yearly bear witness in the number of immigrants who arrive, that it is the policy of all wise governments to aid the less fortunate of a people to seek a home on the unoccupied lands which are open to them. Such was Selkirk’s view. Moreover, he desired to keep up the national prestige. His aim was to transplant those who were willing to struggle to better their future to a land of promise beyond the seas, where they were required to adapt themselves to no new political existence; where they changed, it is true, the scene of their lives, but still remained subjects of the mother land whence they had sprung.

In 1821 the Hudson’s Bay Company and the North-West Company united their fortunes, and have since continued under the name of the Hudson’s Bay Company.

Here I shall leave the subject. The events which grew out of the proceedings above described are too near the present day to suggest that any comment should be made upon them in the circumstances under which I write. For the next half century the colony passed through many difficulties. It had no assistance in the shape of emigration. The Bois-Brulés often caused trouble. After Lord Selkirk’s death, which took place in Paris in 1820, the wants of the settlers were cared for by his relatives. In 1835 they gave up all control to the Hudson’s Bay Company.