FRENCH AND ENGLISH ON THE BAY
Every year three ships were sailing to the Bay and returning to England
laden with peltry; but in 1672 it was observed by the traders at the
fort that fewer Indians than usual came down the river with furs. In the
next year there were still fewer. For some reason the trade was falling
off. Radisson urged Bayly to establish new forts on the west coast, and
at length the governor consented to go with him on his regular summer
cruise to Nelson. When they came back to Rupert in August they were
surprised to find the fort tenanted by a Jesuit from Quebec, Father
Albanel, who handed letters to Radisson and Groseilliers, and passports
from the governor of New France to Bayly. The sudden decrease of trade
was explained. French traders coming overland from the St Lawrence had
been intercepting the Indians. But France and England were at peace and
bound in closest amity by secret treaty, and Bayly was compelled to
receive the passports and to welcome the Jesuit, as the representative
of a friendly nation, to the hospitality of Fort Charles. What the
letters to Radisson and Groseilliers contained we can only guess, but we
do know that their contents, made the French explorers thoroughly
dissatisfied with their position in the Hudson's Bay Company. Bayly
accused the two Frenchmen of being in collusion with the Company's
rivals. A quarrel followed and at this juncture Captain Gillam arrived
on one of the Company's ships. The Frenchmen were suspected of
treachery, and Gillam suggested that they should return to England and
explain what seemed to need explaining.
The Admiralty records for 1674 contain mention of Captain Gillam's
arrival from Hudson Bay on the _Shaftesbury Pink_ with 'a French Jesuit,
a little ould man, and an Indian, a very lusty man.' This Jesuit could
not have been Albanel, for in the French archives is conclusive proof
that Albanel returned to Quebec. The 'little ould man' must have been
another Jesuit found by Gillam at the Bay.
The winter of 1673-74 found Radisson and Groseilliers back in England
pressing the directors of the Company for better terms. The Governing
Committee first required oaths of fealty. Conferences were multiplied
and prolonged; but still Radisson and Groseilliers refused to go back to
the Bay until something was done. On June 29, 1674, the Governing
Committee unanimously voted that 'there be allowed to Mr Radisson £100
per annum in consideration of services, out of which shall be deducted
what hath already been paid him; and if it pleases God to bless the
Company with good success, hereafter that they come to be in a
prosperous condition, then they will reassume consideration.'
'Prosperous condition!' At this time the shareholders were receiving
dividends of fifty and one hundred per cent.
Now, in Radisson's pockets were offers from Colbert, the great minister
at the French Court, for service in the French Navy at three times this
salary. Abruptly, in the fall of 1674, the two Frenchmen left London and
took service under Colbert. But now another difficulty blocked
Radisson's advance. Colbert insisted that Radisson's wife should come to
France to live. He thought that as long as Madame Radisson remained in
England her husband's loyalty could not be trusted. Besides, her
father, Sir John Kirke, was a claimant against France for £40,000
damages arising out of the capture of Quebec in 1629 by his relatives
and its restoration to France in 1632 without recognition of the
family's rights. If Sir John's daughter was residing in Paris as the
wife of a French naval officer, the minister saw that this dispute might
be more easily adjusted; and so he declined to promote the two Frenchmen
until Madame Radisson came to France.
In 1679, during shore leave from the navy, Radisson met one of his old
cronies of Quebec--Aubert de la Chesnaye, a fur trader. 'He proposed to
me,' Radisson says, 'to undertake to establish the beaver trade in the
great Bay where I had been some years before on account of the English.'
It may be supposed that naval discipline ill-suited these wild
wood-wanderers, and after this it is not surprising that we find
Radisson and Groseilliers again in New France at a conference of fur
traders and explorers, among whom were La Salle, Jolliet, Charles Le
Moyne, the soldier with the famous sons, and La Chesnaye. No doubt
Radisson told those couriers of the wilderness tales of profit on the
sea in the north that brought great curses down on the authorities of
New France who forbade the people of the colony free access to that rich
fur field. La Chesnaye had introduced the brothers-in-law to Frontenac,
the governor of New France, and had laid before him their plans for a
trading company to operate on the great bay; but Frontenac 'did not
approve the business.' He could not give a commission to invade the
territory of a friendly power; still, if La Chesnaye and his associates
chose to assume risks, he could wink at an invasion of rival traders'
domains. A bargain was made. La Chesnaye would find the capital and
equip two ships, and Radisson and Groseilliers would make the voyage.
The brothers-in-law would sail at once for Acadia, there to spend the
winter, and in the spring they would come with the fishing fleets to
Isle Percé, where La Chesnaye would send their ships.
During the winter of 1681-82 La Chesnaye persuaded some of his friends
to advance money for provisions and ships to go to the North Sea. Among
these friends were Jean Chouart, Groseilliers' son, and a Dame Sorrel,
who, like the English Lady Drax, was prepared to give solid support to a
venture that promised profit. Thus was begun the Company of the
North[2] (_la Compagnie du Nord_) that was to be a thorn in the side of
the 'Adventurers of England' for over thirty years. Frontenac granted
permission for two unseaworthy vessels, the _St Anne_ and the _St
Pierre_, to fish off Isle Percé. Strange bait for cod lay in the
lockers.
[2] While there are earlier records referring to the Company of the
North, this year (1682) is generally given as the date of its founding.
Similarly 1670 is taken as the date of the founding of the Hudson's Bay
Company, although, as we have seen, it was practically begun three years
earlier.
With profound disappointment Radisson and Groseilliers saw at Isle Percé
in July the boats which they were to have. The _St Pierre_, outfitted
for Radisson, was a craft of only fifty tons and boasted a crew of only
twelve men. Groseilliers' vessel, the _St Anne_, which carried his son,
Jean Chouart, was still smaller and had fifteen men. Both crews
consisted of freshwater sailors who tossed with woe and threatened
mutiny when the boats rolled past the tidal bore of Belle Isle Strait
and began threading their way in and out of the 'tickles' and fiords of
the ribbed, desolate, rocky coast of Labrador. Indeed, when the ships
stopped to take on water at a lonely 'hole in the wall' on the Labrador
coast, the mutiny would have flamed into open revolt but for the sail of
a pirate ship that appeared on the horizon. Thereupon Radisson's ships
crowded sail to the wind and sped on up the coast. What pirate ship this
was may be guessed from what happened three weeks later.
Early in September the two vessels reached the Hayes river, which
Radisson had named twelve years before and where he had set up the arms
of the English king. Advancing fifteen miles up-stream, they chose a
winter harbour. Leaving Groseilliers to beach the boats and erect
cabins, Radisson and young Jean Chouart canoed farther up to the
rendezvous of the Cree and Assiniboine Indians. The Indians were
overjoyed to meet their trader friend of long past years. The white
man's coming meant firearms, and firearms ensured invincible might over
all foes. 'Ho, young men, be not afraid. The Sun is favourable to us.
Our enemies shall fear us. This is the man we have wished for since the
days of our fathers,' shouted the chief of the Assiniboines as he danced
and tossed arrows of thanks to the gods.
When the voyageurs glided back down-stream on the glassy current, other
sounds than those of Indian chants greeted them. The Hayes river, as we
have seen, is divided from the Nelson on the north by a swampy stretch of
brushwood. Across the swamp boomed and rolled to their astonished ears the
reverberation of cannon. Was it the pirate ship seen off Labrador? or was
it the coming of the English Company's traders? Radisson's canoe slipped
past the crude fort that Groseilliers had erected and entered the open Bay.
Nothing was visible but the yellow sea, chopped to white caps by the autumn
wind. When he returned to the fort he learned that cannonading had been
heard from farther inland. Evidently the ships had sailed up the Nelson
river. Now, across the marsh between the two rivers lay a creek by which
Indian canoes from time immemorial had crossed. Taking a canoe and three of
his best men, Radisson paddled and portaged over this route to the Nelson.
There, on what is now known as Seal or Gillam Island, stood a crude new
fort; and anchored by the island lay a stout ship--the _Bachelor's
Delight_--cannons pointing from every porthole. Was it the pirate ship seen
off Labrador? It took very little parleying to ascertain that the ship was
a poacher, commanded by young Ben Gillam of Boston, son of the Company's
captain, come here on illicit trade, with John Outlaw and Mike
Grimmington, who later became famed seamen, as first and second mates.
Radisson took fate by the beard, introduced himself to young Gillam, went
on board the ship--not, however, without first seeing that two New
Englanders remained as hostages with his three Frenchmen--quaffed drinks,
observed that the ship was stout and well manned, advised Ben not to risk
his men too far from the fort among the Indians, and laughed with joyous
contempt when Ben fired cannon by way of testing the Frenchman's courage.
[Illustration: ON THE HAYES RIVER From a photograph by R. W. Brock]
There was enough to try Radisson's courage the very next day. While
gliding leisurely down the current of the Nelson, he saw at a bend in
the river the Hudson's Bay Company's ship _Prince Rupert_, commanded by
his quondam enemy, Captain Gillam, sailing straight for the rendezvous
already occupied by Ben Gillam. At any cost the two English ships must
be kept apart; and at once! Singly, perhaps they could be mastered by
the French. Together, they would surely overpower Radisson. It was
nightfall. Landing and concealing his comrades, Radisson kindled such a
bonfire as Indians used to signal trade. The ship immediately anchored.
There was a comical meeting on the _Prince Rupert_ the next morning, at
which Radisson represented to the new governor, John Bridgar, who was on
the ship with Gillam, that each of his three paddlers was a captain of
large ambushed forces. Charity will, perhaps, excuse Radisson for his
fabulous tales of a powerful French fort on the Nelson and his
disinterested observation that this river had a dangerous current higher
up. It appears that Radisson succeeded completely in deceiving the
Englishmen. Had they known how helpless he was, with only a few rude
'shacks' on the Hayes river garrisoned by twenty or thirty mutinous
sailors, surely they would have clapped him under hatches. But he was
permitted to leave the ship, and Bridgar began the preparation of his
winter quarters on the shore.
Some days later Radisson came back. His old enemy Gillam was suspicious
and ordered him away; but Radisson came again, and this time he brought
with him the captain's son, young Ben, dressed as a wood-runner. This
was enough to intimidate the old captain, for he knew that if his son
was caught poaching on the Bay both father and son would be ruined. One
day two of Bridgar's men who had been ranging for game dashed in with
the news that they had seen a strange fort up the Nelson a few miles
away. This, of course, Bridgar thought, was Radisson's fort, and Captain
Gillam did not dare to undeceive him. Then a calamity befell the English
winterers. A storm rose and set the tidal ice driving against the
_Prince Rupert_. The ship was jammed and sunk with loss of provisions
and fourteen men, including the captain himself. So perished Captain
Zachariah Gillam, whom we first met as master of the _Nonsuch_, the
pioneer of all the ships that have since sailed into the Bay in the
service of the Hudson's Bay Company.
[Illustration: ENTRANCE TO NELSON and HAYES RIVERS
Map by Bartholomew]
The wreck of the ship left Bridgar helpless in his rude fort without
either food or ammunition, and he at once began to console himself for
loss of ship and provisions by deep drinking. Then Radisson knew that he
had nothing further to fear from that quarter and he sent food to the
starving Englishmen.
Ben Gillam was outwitted through defiantly accepting an invitation to
visit the French fort. Gillam visited his rivals to spy on their
weakness, and openly taunted them at the banquet table about their
helpless condition. When he tried to depart he was coolly told that he
was a prisoner, and that, with the aid of any nine Frenchmen Ben chose
to pick out from 'the helpless French,' Radisson purposed capturing the
poacher's fort and ship. The young captain had fallen into a trap.
Radisson had left French hostages at Gillam's fort for his safe return,
but these had been instructed to place firearms at convenient places and
to post themselves so that they could prevent the sudden closing of the
gates. Such precautions proved unnecessary. Radisson walked into the New
England poacher's fort and quietly took possession.
A few days later Bridgar, who had learned too late that the fort on the
Nelson was not French but English, marched his men up-stream to contrive
a junction with young Gillam's forces. When the Hudson's Bay men knocked
on the gate of the New Englanders' fort for admission, the sentinel
opened without question. The gates clapped shut with a slamming of
bolts, and the Englishmen found themselves quietly and bloodlessly
captured by the intrepid Radisson.
Meanwhile Groseilliers and his son, Jean Chouart, had been plying a
thriving trade. To be sure, the ice jam of spring in the Hayes river had
made Radisson's two cockle-shell craft look more like staved-in barrels
than merchant ships. But in the spring, when the Assiniboines and Crees
came riding down the river flood in vast brigades of birch canoes laden
to the waterline with peltry, the Frenchmen had in store goods to barter
with them and carried on a profitable trade.
Radisson now had more prisoners than he could conveniently carry to
Quebec. Rigging up the remnants of his rickety ships for a convoy, he
placed in them the majority of the Hudson's Bay Company and New England
crews and sent them south to Rupert and Moose. Taking possession of Ben
Gillam's ship, the _Bachelor's Delight_, he loaded it with a cargo of
precious furs, and set out for Quebec with Bridgar and young Gillam as
prisoners. Jean Chouart and a dozen Frenchmen remained on the Hayes
river to trade. Twenty miles out from port, Bridgar and young Gillam
were caught conspiring to cut the throats of the Frenchmen, and
henceforth both Englishmen were kept under lock and key in their cabins.
But once again Radisson had to encounter the governing bodies of Quebec.
The authorities of New France were enraged when they learned that La
Chesnaye had sent an expedition to the North Sea. In the meantime
Frontenac had been replaced by another governor, La Barre. Tax
collectors beset the ships like rats long before Quebec was sighted,
and practically confiscated the cargo in fines and charges. La Barre no
doubt supposed that the treaty of peace existing between England and
France gave him an excuse for seizing the cargo of furs. At all events
he ordered Radisson and Groseilliers to report at once to Colbert in
France. He restored the _Bachelor's Delight_ forthwith to Ben Gillam and
gave him full clearance papers. He released Bridgar, the Company's
trader. His stroke of statesmanship left the two French explorers
literally beggared, and when they reached Paris in January 1684 Colbert
was dead.
But, though Ben Gillam secured his release from the governor of New
France, he did not escape the long hand of the Hudson's Bay Company, who
had written from London to Mr Randolph of the American Plantations to
effect the arrest of Ben Gillam at any cost. At the same time they sent
Randolph a £10 present of silver plate. On reaching Boston, Ben Gillam
was duly arrested. He afterwards became a pirate, and his ultimate fate
was involved with that of the famous Captain Kidd. Both were sent to
England to be tried for crimes on the high seas; and it is supposed
that, like Kidd, Ben suffered execution. Bridgar, suddenly freed from
all danger, as suddenly regained a sense of his own importance. He made
drafts on the Company and set out from Quebec in such state as befitted
his dignity, with secretary and interpreter and valet. He rode hurriedly
along the old post-road between Boston and New York, filling the
countryside with the story of his adventures. Then he took ship to
England; but there his valour suffered a sudden chill. The Company had
refused to honour his bills. They repudiated his drafts, reprimanded him
severely, and suspended him from service for several years. Mike
Grimmington and Outlaw and the others, who had been shipped down from
Nelson to Moose and Rupert, promptly took passage home to England on the
Company's yearly ship. By the time Radisson and Groseilliers reached
Paris, Europe was ringing with the outrage involved in their exploits.
Radisson found small comfort in Paris. Possibly Colbert's death had
deprived him of a sympathetic protector, and the French court was as
reluctant now to interfere with the actions of the colonial authorities
at Quebec as it had been twenty years before. After petitioning vainly
for consideration, Groseilliers seems to have given up the contest and
retired for the remainder of his life to a small patrimony near Three
Rivers. Not so Radisson! He was bound to the Old World by marriage; and
now international complications came to bind him yet more completely.
'It is impossible,' wrote Louis XIV to Governor La Barre, 'to imagine
what you mean by releasing Gillam's boat and relinquishing claim to the
North Sea,' At the same time Louis was in a quandary. He would not
relinquish the French claim to the North Sea; but he dared not risk a
rupture of his secret treaty with England by openly countenancing
Radisson's exploit on the Nelson river. Radisson was secretly ordered to
go back to the Bay and, unofficially, in his private capacity, restore
the Nelson river fur posts to the Hudson's Bay Company. The words of the
order in part are: 'To put an end to the differences between the two
Nations touching the settlements made by Messrs Groseilliers and
Radisson on Hudson's Bay, the said Groseilliers and Radisson shall
return and withdraw the French with all effects belonging to them and
shall restore to the English Company the Habitation by them settled to
be enjoyed by the English without molestation.'
At the very same time that these royal orders sent Radisson to restore
the forts, a privateering frigate was dispatched from France to Quebec
with equally secret orders to attack and sink English vessels on the
Bay. The 'Adventurers of England,' too, were involved in a game of
international duplicity. While Mr Young, the fashionable man about town,
wrote letters imploring Radisson to come back to England, Sir James
Hayes bombarded the French court with demands that the Frenchman be
punished. 'I am confirmed,' he wrote, 'in our worst fears. M. Radisson,
who was at the head of the action at Port Nelson, is arrived in France
the 8th of this month and is in all post haste to undermine us on the
Bay. Nothing can mend but to cause ye French King to have exemplary
justice done on ye said Radisson.'
On May 10, 1684, Radisson arrived in London. He was met by Mr Young and
Sir James Hayes and welcomed and forthwith carried to Windsor, where he
took the oath of fidelity as a British subject. The Company, sunk a
month before in the depths of despair, were transported with joy and
generous rejoicings, and the Governing Committee voted Mr Young thanks
for bringing Mr Radisson from France. Two days after Radisson's
arrival, Sir James Hayes and Mr Young reported to the Company that Mr
Radisson had tendered his services to the Company, that they 'have
presented him to our Governor, His Royal Highness, who was pleased to
advise he should again be received in service, under wage of £50 per
annum and benefit of dividends on £200 capital stock during life, to
receive £25 to set him out for this present expedition.' On May 21 Sir
James Hayes reported that he had presented Mr Radisson with 'a silver
tankard, charged to the Company at £10 14. 0.'
Radisson returned to the Bay on the _Happy Return_, sailed by Captain
Bond. On the same ship went the new governor, William Phipps, who had
been appointed to succeed Bridgar, and a boy named Henry Kelsey, of whom
we shall hear more later. Outlaw, who had been with Ben Gillam, had a
commission for the Company and sailed the _Success_. His mate was Mike
Grimmington, also of the old poacher crew. There was a sloop, too, the
_Adventure_--Captain Geyer--for inland waters.
When Radisson arrived at the Hayes river and told Jean Chouart--who, as
we have seen, had been left in charge of the French trade there--of the
looting of the fur cargoes at Quebec and of the order from the French
king to transfer everything to the English, the young Frenchman's rage
may be imagined. He had risked his entire fortune on the expedition from
Quebec; but what account did this back-stairs trick of courtiers take of
his ruin? Radisson told him that he had been commissioned to offer him
£100 a year for service under the English, and £50 each to his underling
traders. Jean listened in sullen silence. The furs gathered by the
Frenchmen were transferred to the holds of the English vessels, but Jean
and his companions evinced no eagerness to go aboard for England. On
September 4, just as the sailors were heaving up anchors to the
sing-song of a running chant, Phipps, the governor, summoned the French
to a final council on board the _Happy Return_. Young Jean looked out
through the ports of the captain's cabin. The sea was slipping past. The
_Happy Return_ had set sail. The Frenchmen were trapped and were being
carried to England. In an instant, hands were on swords and the ship was
in an uproar. Radisson besought his countrymen to bethink themselves
before striking. What could five men do against an armed English crew?
Once in England, they could listen to what the Company had to offer:
meanwhile they were suffering no harm. The Frenchmen sullenly put back
their swords. The boat reached Portsmouth in the last week of October.
Radisson took horse and rode furiously for London.
If the adventurers had been exultant over his return from France, they
were doubly jubilant at his victorious return from the Bay. He was
publicly thanked, presented with a hundred guineas, and became the lion
of the hour. The Governing Committee on November 14, 1684, three weeks
after Radisson's return, voted that he had 'done extraordinary service
to the great liking and satisfaction of the Company...the committee are
resolved to bestow some mark of respect to the son of Mr Groseilliers
and order 20s. a week paid him beginning October 30.' A present of seven
musquash skins was now given Mr Young for having induced Radisson to
resume his services.
Radisson was requested to make terms with the young Frenchman, but this
was not such an easy matter. Some one suggested that Jean Chouart should
follow the example of his uncle and marry an English wife. Jean shrugged
his shoulders. In a letter to his mother at Three Rivers he wrote: 'I am
offered proposals of marriage to which I will not listen. I would
leave, but they hold back my pay, and orders have been given to arrest
me in case I try. Cause it to be well known that I never intended to
follow the English. I have been forced to this by my uncle's subterfuge.
Assure M. Du Lhut of my humble services. I will have the honour of
seeing him as soon as I can. Tell the same to M. Péré and all our good
friends.' To M. Comporte he writes: 'I will be at the place you desire
me to go, or perish.' As M. Du Lhut had been dispatched by the Company
of the North with the knowledge of the governor of Quebec to intercept
Indians going down to the English on Hudson Bay, and M. Péré and M.
Comporte were suave diplomats and spies in his service, it may be
guessed that the French passed secret messages into the hands of young
Jean Chouart in London, and that he passed messages back to them. At all
events, from being doggedly resistant to all overtures, he suddenly
became complaisant in March of 1685, and took out papers of
'deninization,' or naturalization, in preference to the oath of
fidelity, and engaged with the English Company at £100 a year. He was
given another £100 to fit him out, and his four comrades were engaged
at from £45 to £80 a year. How could the gentlemen of the Company guess
that young Jean was betraying them to the Company of the North in
Canada, where a mine was being laid to blow up their prosperity?
The Hudson's Bay Company declared dividends of fifty per cent, and
chartered seven vessels for the season of 1685--some from a goldsmith,
Sir Stephen Evance; and bespoke my Lord Churchill as next governor in
place of James, Duke of York, who had become King James II.