Canada: The Empire of the North — From 1812 to 1846, part 2

Word of the two hundred settlers having been moved from Red River by the Nor'westers, of MacDonell's forcible expulsion, and of the dispersion of the rest of the colony had, of course, been sent to Selkirk and his agents in both Montreal and London.

Swift retaliation is prepared.

Colin Robertson, who speaks French like a Canadian and knows all the Nor'west voyageurs of the St. Lawrence, is sent to gather up two hundred French boatmen under the very noses of the Nor'westers at Montreal.

With these Robertson is to invade the far-famed Athabasca, whence come the best furs, the very heart of the Nor'westers' stamping ground.

Robert Semple is appointed governor of the colony on Red River, with instructions to resist the aggressions of the Nor'westers even to the point of "_a shock that may be felt from Montreal to Athabasca_."

Selkirk himself comes to Canada to interview the Governor General about military forces to protect his colony.

Robertson, with his two hundred voyageurs for Athabasca, follows the old Ottawa trail of the French explorers, from the St. Lawrence to the Great Lakes, and from the Great Lakes to {391} Red River by way of Winnipeg Lake.

Whom does he find on the shores of the lake but Selkirk's dispersed colonists!

Ordering John Clarke, an old campaigner of Astor's company on the Columbia, to lead the two hundred French voyageurs on up to Athabasca, Colin Robertson rallies the colonists together and leads them back to Red River for the winter of 1815-1816. Feeling sure that he had destroyed Selkirk's scheme root and branch, Cameron has remained at Fort Gibraltar with only a few men, when back to the field comes Robertson, stormy, capable, robust, red-blooded, fearless, breathing vengeance on Selkirk's foes.

[Illustration: SKETCH OF THE CITY OF WINNIPEG, SHOWING THE SITES OF THE EARLY FORTS]

By the spring of 1816 the tables have been turned with a vengeance.

Cameron, the Nor'wester, has been seized and sent to Hudson Bay to be expelled from the country.

Fort Gibraltar has been pulled down and the timbers used to strengthen Fort Douglas, whose pointed cannon command all passage up and down Red River.

It was hardly to be supposed that the haughty Nor'westers would submit to expulsion without a blow.

From Athabasca, from New Caledonia, from Qu'Appelle .

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they rally their doughtiest fighters under Cuthbert Grant, the {392} half-breed Plain Ranger.

From Montreal and Fort William come spurring the leading partners, with one hundred and seventy French-Canadian bullies, and a brass cannon concealed under oilcloth in a long boat.

The object of the Plain Rangers is to meet the up-coming partners with supplies for the year; but is that any reason for the riders who are striking eastward from Assiniboine to Red River, decking themselves out in war paint and stripping like savages before battle?

The object of the partners is to meet the Plain Rangers on Red River; but is that any reason for bringing a cannon concealed under oilcloth all the way from Lake Superior?

Or do men fighting a life-and-death struggle for the thing the world calls success ever acknowledge plain motives within themselves at all?

Is it not rather the blind brute instinct of self-protection, forfend what may?

[Illustration: RED RIVER SETTLEMENT, 1816-1820] "Listen, white men!

Beware!

Beware!"

the Cree chief Peguis warns Governor Semple.

What means the spectacle of white brothers, who preach peace, preparing for war over a few beaver pelts?

Chief Peguis cannot understand, except this is the way of white men.

{393} And now, unluckily for Governor Semple, he quarrels with his adviser, Colin Robertson.

Robertson, from his early training in Northwest ranks, reads the signs, and is for striking a blow before the enemy can strike him.

Semple is still talking peace.

Robertson leaves Red River in disgust, and departs for Hudson Bay to take ship for England.

The Plain Rangers, it may be explained, have uttered the wild threat that if they "can catch Robertson," they will avenge the destruction of Fort Gibraltar "by skinning him alive and feeding him to the dogs."

Also it is well known, Nor'westers of Qu'Appelle have muttered angry prophecies about "the ground being drenched with the blood of the colonists."

Still Semple talks peace, which is a good thing in its place; but this is n't the place.

"My Governor!

My Governor!"

pleads an old hunter of the Hudson's Bay with Semple; "are you not afraid?

The half-breeds are gathering to kill you!"

Semple laughs.

Pshaw!

_He_ has law on _his_ side.

Law!

What is law?

The old hunter of the lawless wilds does n't know that word.

That word does n't come as far west as the _Pays d'en Haut_.

It is sunset of June 18, 1816. Old chief Peguis comes again to the Hudson's Bay fort on Red River.

"Governor of the gard'ners!"

he solemnly warns; "governor of the land workers and gard'ners, listen!

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.

."

Not much does he add, after the fashion of his race.

Only this, "_Let me bring my warriors to protect you_!"

Semple laughs at such fears.

It is sunset of June 19. A soft west wind has set the prairie grass rippling like a green sea between the fort and the sun hanging low at the western sky line.

A boy on the lookout above one of the bastion towers of Fort Douglas suddenly shouts, "The half-breeds are coming!"

Semple ascends the tower and looks through a field glass.

There is a line of sixty or seventy horsemen, all armed, not coming to the fort, but moving diagonally across from the Assiniboine to the Red towards the colony.

And then, north {394} towards the colony, is wildest clamor,--people in ox carts, people on horseback, people on foot, stampeding for the shelter of the fort.

And up to this moment absolutely nothing has occurred to create this terror.

"Let twenty men follow me," orders Semple; and he marches out, followed by twenty-seven armed men.

As they wade through the waist-high hay fields they meet the fleeing colonists.

"Keep your back to the river!"

shouts one colonist, convoying his family.

"They are painted, Governor!

Don't let them surround you."

Semple sends back to the fort for a cannon to be trundled out.

Young Lieutenant Holte's gun goes off by mistake.

Semple turns on him with fury and bids him have a care: there is to be no firing.

The half-breeds have turned from their trail and are coming forward at a gallop.

"There 's Grant, the Plain Ranger, Governor!

Let me shoot him," pleads one Hudson's Bay man.

"God have mercy on our souls!"

mutters one of the colonists, counting the foe; "but we are all dead men."

All the world knows the rest.

At a knoll where grew some trees, a spot now known in Winnipeg on North Main Street as Seven Oaks, Grant, the Ranger, sent a half-breed, Boucher, forward to parley.

"What do you want?"

demands Semple.

"We want our fort!"

"Go to your fort, then!"

"Rascal!

You have destroyed our fort!"

"Dare you to speak so to me?

Arrest him!"

Boucher slips from his saddle.

The Plain Rangers think he has been shot.

Instantaneously from both sides crashes musketry fire.

Semple falls with a broken thigh.

Before Grant can control his murderous crew or obtain aid for the wounded governor, a scamp of a half-breed has slashed the fallen man to death.

Two or three Hudson's Bay men escape through the long grass {395} and swim across Red River.

Two or three more save themselves by instant surrender.

For the rest of the twenty-seven, they lie where they have fallen.

They are stripped, mutilated, cut to pieces.

Only one Nor'wester is killed, only one wounded.

Later, in order to save the lives of the settlers, Fort Douglas is surrendered.

For a second time the colonists are dispersed.

Before going down Red River in flatboats two of the Hudson's Bay people go out with Chief Peguis by night and bury the dead; but they have no time to dig deep graves, and a few days later the wolves have ripped up the bodies.

Near Lake Winnipeg the fleeing colonists meet the Northwest partners with their one hundred and seventy men.

No need to announce what the spectacle of the terrified colonists means.

A wild whoop rends the air.

"Thank Providence it was all over before we came," writes one devout Nor'wester; "for we intended to storm the fort."

Both crews pause.

The Nor'westers interrogate the settlers.

Semple's private papers are seized.

Also, two Hudson's Bay men who took part in the Seven Oaks fight are arrested, to be carried on down to Northwest headquarters on Lake Superior.

Then the settlers go on to Lake Winnipeg.

At the various camping places on the way down to Fort William, those two Hudson's Bay prisoners overhear strange threats.

It is night on the Lake of the Woods.

Voices of Northwest partners sound through the dark.

They are talking of Selkirk coming to the rescue of his people with an armed force.

Says the wild voice of a Nor'wester whose brother had been killed by a Hudson's Bay man some years before, "There are fine quiet places along Winnipeg River if he comes this way."

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Then scraps of conversation.

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Then, "The half-breeds could capture him when he is asleep."

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Then words too low to be heard.

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Then, "They could have the Indians shoot him."

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Then in voice of authority restraining the wild folly of a bloodthirst for vengeance, "Things have gone too far, but we can throw the blame on the Indians."

The wild words of a man gone mad for revenge must not be taken as the policy of a great commercial company.

{396} Meantime, where was Selkirk?

He had arrived in Montreal.

Secret coureur, whose adventures I have told elsewhere, had carried him word of the dangers impending over his colony.

He at once appealed to the Governor General for a military force to protect the settlers, but it must be recalled how Upper and Lower Canada were to be governed under the Act of 1791. There were to be the governor, the legislative council appointed by the crown, and the representative assembly.

The legislative council was entirely dominated by the Northwest Company.

Of the different Quebec courts, there was scarcely a judge who was not interested directly or indirectly in the Northwest Company.

Lord Selkirk could obtain no aid which would conflict with that company's policy.

Then Selkirk petitioned the Governor that, in view of the threats against himself, he might be granted the commission of a justice of the peace and permission to take a personal bodyguard at his own cost to the west.

These requests the Governor granted.

Thereupon, Selkirk gathers up some two hundred of the De Meuron and De Watteville regiments, mercenaries disbanded after the War of 1812, and sets out for the west.

Not aware that Robertson has left Red River, he sends him word to keep the colonists together and to expect help by way of the states from the Sault in order to avoid touching at the Nor'westers' post at Fort William.

The coureur with this message is waylaid by the Nor'westers, but Selkirk himself, preceded by his former governor, Miles MacDonell, has gone only as far as the Sault when word comes back of the Seven Oaks massacre.

What to do now?

He can obtain no justice in Eastern Canada.

Two justices of the peace at the Sault refuse to be involved in the quarrel by accompanying him.

Selkirk goes on without them, accompanied by the two hundred hired soldiers; but instead of proceeding to Red River by Minnesota, as he had first planned, he strikes straight for Fort William, the headquarters of the Nor'westers.

He arrives at the fort August 12, only a few days after the Northwest partners had come down from the scene of the {397} massacre at Red River.

Cannon are planted opposite Fort William.

Things have "gone too far."

The Nor'westers capitulate without a stroke.

Then as justice of the peace, my Lord Selkirk arrests all the partners but one and sends them east to stand trial for the massacre of Seven Oaks.

The one partner not sent east was a fuddled old drunkard long since retired from active work.

This man now executes a deed of sale to my Lord Selkirk for Fort William and its furs.

The man was so intoxicated that he could not write, so the afore-time governor, Miles MacDonell, writes out the bargain, which one could wish so great a philanthropist as Selkirk had not touched with tongs.

Before midwinter of 1817 has passed, the De Meuron soldiers have crossed Minnesota and gone down Red River to Fort Douglas.

One stormy night they scale the wall and bundle the Northwest usurpers out, bag and baggage.

[Illustration: MONUMENT TO COMMEMORATE THE MASSACRE OF SEVEN OAKS] July of 1817 comes Selkirk himself to the Promised Land.

There is no record that I have been able to find of his thoughts on first nearing the ground for which so much blood had been shed, and for which he himself was yet to suffer much; but {398} one can venture to say that his most daring hope did not grasp the empire that was to grow from the seed he had planted.

He meets the Indians in treaty for their lands.

He greets his colonists in the open one sunny August day, speaking personally to each and deeding over to them land free of all charge.

"This land I give for your church," he said, standing on the ground which the cathedral now occupies.

"That plot shall be for your school," pointing across the gully; "and in memory of your native land, let the parish be called Kildonan."

Of the trials and counter trials between the two companies, there is not space to tell here.

Selkirk was forced to pay heavy damages for his course at Fort William, but the courts of Eastern Canada record not a single conviction against the Nor'westers for the massacre of Seven Oaks.

Selkirk retired shattered in health to Europe, where he died in 1820. The same year passed away Alexander MacKenzie, his old-time rival.

The truth is, each company had gone too far and was on the verge of ruin.

From Athabasca came the furs that prevented bankruptcy, and whichever company could drive the other from Athabasca could practically force its rival to ruin or union.

When Colin Robertson had rallied the dispersed colonists from Lake Winnipeg, he had left John Clarke to conduct the two hundred Canadian voyageurs to Athabasca for the Hudson's Bay Company.

Clarke had been a Nor'wester before he joined Astor, and was a born fighter, idolized by the Indians.

So confident was he of success now that he galloped his canoes up the Saskatchewan without pause to gather provisions.

Once on the ground on Athabasca Lake, he divided his party into two or three bands and sent them foraging to the Nor'westers' forts and hunting grounds up Peace River, down Slave Lake, at Athabasca itself.

Weakened by division and without food to keep together, his men fell easy prey to the wily Nor'westers.

Of those on Slave Lake eighteen died from starvation.

Those on Peace River were captured and literally whipped out of the country, signing oaths never to return.

Those at {399} Athabasca being leading officers were held prisoners.

Meanwhile the Hudson's Bay Company is defeated at Seven Oaks and victorious at Fort William.

The Nor'westers at Athabasca were keen to keep the frightened Indians of the north ignorant that Selkirk had triumphed at Fort William, but the news traveled over the two thousand miles of prairie in that strange hunter fashion known as "moccasin telegram," and the story is told how the captured Hudson's Bay officers let the secret out for the benefit of the Indians now afraid to carry their hunt to a Hudson's Bay man.

Revels and all-night carousals marked the winter with the triumphant Nor'westers of Athabasca Lake.

Often, when wild drinking songs were ringing in the Nor'westers' dining hall, the Hudson's Bay men would be brought in to furnish a butt for their merciless victors.

One night, when the hall was full of Indians, one of the Northwest bullies began to brawl out a song in celebration of the Seven Oaks affair.

"The H. B.

C.

came up a hill, and _up_ a hill they came, The H. B.

C.

came up the hill, but _down_ they went again."

Tired of their rude horseplay, one of the Hudson's Bay officers spoke up: "Y' hae niver asked me for a song.

I hae a varse o' me ain compaesin."

Then to the utter amaze of the drunken listeners and astonishment of the Indians, the game old officer trolled off this stave: "But Selkirk brave went _up_ a hill, and to Fort William came!

When in he popped and out from thence could not be driven again."

The thunderstruck Nor'wester leaped to his feet with a yell: "A hundred guineas for the name of the men who brought that news here."

"A hundred guineas for twa lines of me ain compaesin!

Extravagant, sir," returns the canny Scot.