Produced by Al Haines
[Frontispiece: Thomas Douglas, Fifth Earl of Selkirk. From the
painting at St Mary's Isle]
THE
RED RIVER COLONY
A Chronicle of the Beginnings of Manitoba
BY
LOUIS AUBREY WOOD
TORONTO
GLASGOW, BROOK & COMPANY
1915
_Copyright in all Countries subscribing to
the Berne Convention_
TO
MY FATHER
{ix}
CONTENTS
Page
I. ST MARY'S ISLE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
II. SELKIRK, THE COLONIZER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
III. THE PURSE-STRINGS LOOSEN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
IV. STORNOWAY--AND BEYOND . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
V. WINTERING ON THE BAY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
VI. RED RIVER AND PEMBINA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
VII. THE BEGINNING OF STRIFE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
VIII. COLIN ROBERTSON, THE AVENGER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
IX. SEVEN OAKS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
X. LORD SELKIRK'S JOURNEY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
XI. FORT WILLIAM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
XII. THE PIPE OF PEACE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
{xi}
ILLUSTRATIONS
THOMAS DOUGLAS, FIFTH EARL OF SELKIRK . . . . . . . _Frontispiece_
From the painting at St Mary's Isle.
PLACE D'ARMES, MONTREAL, IN 1807 . . . . . . . . . . _Facing page_ 20
From a water-colour sketch after Dillon in
M'Gill University Library.
JOSEPH FROBISHER, A PARTNER IN THE
NORTH-WEST COMPANY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . " " 22
From an engraving in the John Ross Robertson
Collection, Toronto Public Library.
THE COUNTRY OF LORD SELKIRK'S SETTLERS . . . . . . . " " 48
Map by Bartholomew.
HUNTING THE BUFFALO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . " " 58
From a painting by George Catlin.
PLAN OF THE RED RIVER COLONY . . . . . . . . . . . . " " 64
Drawn by Bartholomew.
FORT WILLIAM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . " " 116
From an old print in the John Ross Robertson
Collection, Toronto Public Library.
SIMON M'TAVISH, FOUNDER OF THE NORTH-WEST COMPANY . " " 118
From a water-colour drawing in M'Gill
University Library.
WILLIAM M'GILLIVRAY, A PARTNER IN
THE NORTH-WEST COMPANY . . . . . . . . . . . . . " " 122
From a photograph in M'Gill University Library.
{1}
CHAPTER I
ST MARY'S ISLE
When the _Ranger_ stole into the firth of Solway she carried an
exultant crew. From the cliffs of Cumberland she might have been
mistaken for a trading bark, lined and crusted by long travel. But she
was something else, as the townsfolk of Whitehaven, on the north-west
coast of England, had found it to their cost. Out of their harbour the
_Ranger_ had just emerged, leaving thirty guns spiked and a large ship
burned to the water's edge. In fact, this innocent-looking vessel was
a sloop-of-war--as trim and tidy a craft as had ever set sail from the
shores of New England. On her upper deck was stationed a strong
battery of eighteen six-pounders, ready to be brought into action at a
moment's notice.
On the quarter-deck of the _Ranger_, deep in thought, paced the
captain, John Paul Jones, a man of meagre build but of indomitable
will, and as daring a fighter as roved the ocean {2} in this year 1778.
He held a letter of marque from the Congress of the revolted colonies
in America, and was just now engaged in harrying the British coasts.
Across the broad firth the _Ranger_ sped with bellying sails and shaped
her course along the south-western shore of Scotland. To Paul Jones
this coast was an open book; he had been born and bred in the stewartry
of Kirkcudbright, which lay on his vessel's starboard bow. Soon the
Ranger swept round a foreland and boldly entered the river Dee, where
the anchor was dropped.
A boat was swung out, speedily manned, and headed for the shelving
beach of St Mary's Isle. Here, as Captain Paul Jones knew, dwelt one
of the chief noblemen of the south of Scotland. The vine-clad,
rambling mansion of the fourth Earl of Selkirk was just behind the
fringe of trees skirting the shore. According to the official report
of this descent upon St Mary's Isle, it was the captain's intention to
capture Selkirk, drag him on board the _Ranger_, and carry him as a
hostage to some harbour in France. But it is possible that there was
another and more personal object. Paul Jones, it is said, believed
that he was a natural son of the Scottish nobleman, {3} and went with
this armed force to disclose his identity.
When the boat grated upon the shingle the seamen swarmed ashore and
found themselves in a great park, interspersed with gardens and walks
and green open spaces. The party met with no opposition. Everything,
indeed, seemed to favour their undertaking, until it was learned from
some workmen in the grounds that the master was not at home.
In sullen displeasure John Paul Jones paced nervously to and fro in the
garden. His purpose was thwarted; he was cheated of his prisoner. A
company of his men, however, went on and entered the manor-house.
There they showed the hostile character of their mission. Having
terrorized the servants, they seized the household plate and bore it in
bags to their vessel. Under full canvas the _Ranger_ then directed her
course for the Irish Sea.
Thomas Douglas, the future lord of the Red River Colony, was a boy of
not quite seven years at the time of this raid on his father's mansion.
He had been born on June 20, 1771, and was the youngest of seven
brothers in the Selkirk family. What he thought of Paul Jones and his
marauders can only be {4} surmised. St Mary's Isle was a remote spot,
replete with relics of history, but uneventful in daily life; and a
real adventure at his own doors could hardly fail to leave an
impression on the boy's mind. The historical associations of St Mary's
Isle made it an excellent training-ground for an imaginative youth.
Monks of the Middle Ages had noted its favourable situation for a
religious community, and the canons-regular of the Order of St
Augustine had erected there one of their priories. A portion of an
extensive wall which had surrounded the cloister was retained in the
Selkirk manor-house. Farther afield were other reminders of past days
to stir the imagination of young Thomas Douglas. A few miles eastward
from his home was Dundrennan Abbey. Up the Dee was Thrieve Castle,
begun by Archibald the Grim, and later used as a stronghold by the
famous Black Douglas.
The ancient district of Galloway, in which the Selkirk home was
situated, had long been known as the Whig country. It had been the
chosen land of the Covenanters, the foes of privilege and the defenders
of liberal principles in government. Its leading families, the
Kennedys, the Gordons, and {5} the Douglases, formed a broad-minded
aristocracy. In such surroundings, as one of the 'lads of the Dee,'
Thomas Douglas inevitably developed a type of mind more or less
radical. His political opinions, however, were guided by a cultivated
intellect. His father, a patron of letters, kept open house for men of
genius, and brought his sons into contact with some of the foremost
thinkers and writers of the day. One of these was Robert Burns, the
most beloved of Scottish poets. In his earlier life, when scarcely
known to his countrymen, Burns had dined with Basil, Lord Daer, Thomas
Douglas's eldest brother and heir-apparent of the Selkirk line. This
was the occasion commemorated by Burns in the poem of which this is the
first stanza:
This wot ye all whom it concerns:
I, Rhymer Robin, alias Burns,
October twenty-third,
A ne'er-to-be-forgotten day,
Sae far I sprachl'd up the brae
I dinner'd wi' a Lord.
One wet evening in the summer of 1793 Burns drew up before the Selkirk
manor-house in company with John Syme of Ryedale. The two friends were
making a tour of Galloway on horseback. The poet was in bad humour.
{6} The night before, during a wild storm of rain and thunder, he had
been inspired to the rousing measures of 'Scots wha hae wi' Wallace
bled.' But now he was drenched to the skin, and the rain had damaged a
new pair of jemmy boots which he was wearing. The passionate appeal of
the Bruce to his countrymen was now forgotten, and Burns was as cross
as the proverbial bear. It was the dinner hour when the two wanderers
arrived and were cordially invited to stay. Various other guests were
present; and so agreeable was the company and so genial the welcome,
that the grumbling bard soon lost his irritable mood. The evening
passed in song and story, and Burns recited one of his ballads, we are
told, to an audience which listened in 'dead silence.' The young mind
of Thomas Douglas could not fail to be influenced by such associations.
In 1786 Thomas Douglas entered the University of Edinburgh. From this
year until 1790 his name appears regularly upon the class lists kept by
its professors. The 'grey metropolis of the North' was at this period
pre-eminent among the literary and academic centres of Great Britain.
The principal of the university was William Robertson, the {7}
celebrated historian. Professor Dugald Stewart, who held the chair of
philosophy, had gained a reputation extending to the continent of
Europe. Adam Smith, the epoch-making economist, was spending the
closing years of his life at his home near the Canongate churchyard.
During his stay in Edinburgh, Thomas Douglas interested himself in the
work of the literary societies, which were among the leading features
of academic life. At the meetings essays were read upon various themes
and lengthy debates were held. In 1788 a group of nineteen young men
at Edinburgh formed a new society known as 'The Club.' Two of the
original members were Thomas Douglas and Walter Scott, the latter an
Edinburgh lad a few weeks younger than Douglas. These two formed an
intimate friendship which did not wane when one had become a peer of
the realm, his mind occupied by a great social problem, and the other a
baronet and the greatest novelist of his generation.
When the French Revolution stirred Europe to its depths, Thomas Douglas
was attracted by the doctrines of the revolutionists, and went to
France that he might study the new movement. But Douglas, like so many
of his {8} contemporaries in Great Britain, was filled with disgust at
the blind carnage of the Revolution. He returned to Scotland and began
a series of tours in the Highlands, studying the conditions of life
among his Celtic countrymen and becoming proficient in the use of the
Gaelic tongue. Not France but Scotland was to be the scene of his
reforming efforts.
{9}