Creating A Fur Trade Post, 1751

Creating a Fur Trade post, 1751

(Copy obtained by Government of Ontario from archives of the Department of the Marine and Colonies, Paris )

Grant of the Post a la Carpe, North of Lake Nepigon, and extending to the Shores of Hudson’s Bay:

Governor La Jonquiere to Sieur Simblin, 1751.

 

DECREE OF M. DE LA JONQUIERE, WHICH PERMITS SR. SIMBLIN, ENSIGN OF THE TROOP IN CANADA, TO CONSTRUCT AT HIS OWN EXPENSE AT LAC A LA CARPE, A FORT, A HOUSE AND A STOREHOUSE, WITH THE POWER TO COMMAND THEM, AND THERE TO CARRY ON EXCLUSIVE COMMERCE DURING THE TERM OF SIX YEARS.

[Sieur Simblin lived in interesting times: - Gainsborough was painting his Masterpieces; Ben Franklin was playing with his kites and lightning; the Halifax Gazette was putting out its first edition; and France and England were mixing it up “big time” for the control of Canada.]

27^th February, 1751

Seeing the Petition which has been presented to us by the Sr. de Simblin, second ensign in the troops of this colony, with the petition {? Plan} appended to it, after having given attention to the reasons contained in the said petition, and having seen with evidence, by the said plan, that the savage nations which are in the interior of the northern part of the said lands, and of whom certain are yet to be known, the French are obliged to supply their needs at Hudson’s Bay, and there to carry on their commerce with the English in passing by way of the three arms of the river marked on said plan, not being in position to carry on their traffic elsewhere.  We, having been assured that they have never carried it on at Nepigon, nor any other French Post, that it would be very possible to cut all commerce and connection of the savages with the English in establishing a fort at the lake called Lac a la Carpe, which has not been up to the present occupied by the French, nor comprised in the limits of any of our posts, and we not being able ourselves to refuse the invitation which a chief of the said savages has given us by the Sr. de Simblin, in the name of said nations, to found the said establishment.

Persuaded in other respects that the said establishment could not but be, in every way, very advantageous to the benefit of the King’s service, to the interests and to the service of the colony;

Taking into account the excellent evidence that has been given to us of the zeal , the fidelity, the experience, the credit which the said Sr. de Simblin has acquired amongst these savage nations, and that he is very capable of forming the said establishment, and the closest alliance between the said nations and the French,

We, in virtue of the power which has been given to us by the King, have received and receive the offer which has been made to us by Sr. de Simblin, to found the said establishment at his own expense;  and in consequence have appointed, and appoint him, under the good pleasure of His Majesty, to proceed next spring to the said Lac a la Carpe, there to establish a fort, a house, and a storehouse, the whole to be built of logs;  of which we have given to him, and by these presents, the command and the exclusive trade from the said Lac a la Carpe, extending from the shore of Hudson’s Bay in the eastern section, and from the west to 30 leagues of distance, for the time and term of six consecutive years, which shall commence in the spring-time of the year, 1752, and will finish in the spring-time of the year 1758.

ON CONDITION:

First, that he will bear the expenses of the said establishment at his risk and with his fortune, without His Majesty being liable on anything, directly or indirectly;  that he will not lay claim to any annual indemnification during the said six years, nor to any compensation when said six years are finished;  that he will not carry on any trade except with the nations which shall go to said post.

Second, that he shall have caused the said fort, house, and storehouse, to be constructed in the spring-time of the next year, 1752;  that he shall have there during the said year, and until the end of his command, the merchandise necessary to carry on trade with the savages;  and that he shall not found any establishment nor winter on the River du Cassetete, having only the liberty to pass by the Lake of the Nepigon and the said River du Cassetete in order to proceed to his post;  and neglecting one of these conditions these presents will remain void.

And on this condition we shall send forward to him gratis each year, our permission for the departure of the canoes which shall make transport of the said merchandise, and it will be free to him to buy the bark canoes and his provisions at Missilimakinac for these purposes.  In testimony whereof, etc.,

Done at Quebec, etc.

LA JONQUIERE

View from the Water, 1823

View from the Water, 1823

From L.M. “Buzz” Lein’s archival collection (Nipigon Historical Museum)

From his research at Fort William Public Library:

Excerpt from: Dr. John Jeremiah Bigsby’s (1792 – 1881) “The Shoe and Canoe,  Vol II” published in London 1850

Reprinted Paladin Press, N.Y. 1969  L.C. #69-19549

 pages 223-228 (minus illustrations)

page 186:… “Having had our boat carted by oxen across the British Portage (Sault Ste. Marie) we commenced on the 19^th of June, 1823, our coasting voyage, so easily made now along the north shores of Lake Superior as far as the Grand Portage a distance of 445 miles.”

Page 223:

NIPIGON BAY

From Cape Verd westward to Fort William (ninety to ninety-five miles by canoe) the north shore of Lake Superior is divided into three very large bays – Nipigon, Black, and Thunder Bays.  They require separate notice.

The first of these, Nipigon proper, extends to Gravel Point , on the great peninsula of the Mammelles, a distance of forty-six miles, outside of the islands soon to be mentioned.

Nipigon Bay may be roughly stated as thirty-six miles across from east to west, four to six miles deep at its east end, and sixteen on its west end.  Its wide mouth (or outer face) is closed up with a dense belt of large and small islands, which, taken together, are denominated “The Pays Plat,” a translation from Chippewa language , and refers only to the shallow black or red floor of the lake hereabouts. (According to the colour of the amygdaloid or porphyries subjacent. The lake, too, is remarkably transparent here: for miles from land we see its bottom.) [ Now that is something that I can attest to still being the case as I was puttering around in an out-board in that area in 1966.- B.B 2016]

It is true that there is one large island, very level in parts, and covered with shingle and loose rocks; but, generally speaking, it is an elevated region. I cannot describe this splendid bay and archipelago with any minuteness.  Mine was only a reconnaissance.  The surveyor and naturalist will follow.

The islands are numerous.  I made the circuit of the whole by going outside in June, and inside- page 224 – in the ruder month of September. St. Ignatius, the most westerly island save one, is much the largest.  There are three or four others, extending from it to Cape Verd, girded with some that are smaller.

St. Ignatius

The Island of St. Ignatius, according to Captain Bayfield’s map, is twenty-six miles long by twelve broad.  It is oblong in shape.  Its centre is table land, sometimes 1300 feet high, and dipping on all sides in rough declivities and precipices, whose features change with the component rock.  If this be porphyry (common here), we have long pilasters, beginning at the crest of some sterile height, and ending below on a slope of ruins, thinly wooded.  This we see on the south side of the island, in Fluor Island, at the west end of St. Ignatius, and in Stag’s –Home, Detroit. ( Fluor Island is in hummocks, and rises to the height of 1000 feet.) The high black cliffs of the latter are very impressive and gloomy.  If the cliffs be of red sandstone (often as hard as jasper, and fissured horizontally), they are only in patches at the very summits of lofty flanks buried in woods.

The islands east of St. Ignatius are often very high;  their sandstone precipices are occasionally formed nearer the level of the lake, and then they are worn by watercourses into singular shapes, - page 225- such as pillars, arches, recesses (for statues!) and window-like apertures, which not a little resemble a street of ruined chapels and chantries shrouded by mosses, vines and forest trees.  We have this fissured state of the rock both in the inner and outer routes.

Wherever the sandstone or red porphyry is found all the beaches and bare places are red; but as much of the Pays Plat is of black trap and amygdaloid, the colour there is rusty black.

On one of the islets at the west end of the Pays Plat we have a beautiful display of true basaltic columns.  A sketch was given me by Captain Bayfield.

The island called La Grange is in a fine open basin not far from Nipigon River, with a few others about it having flat tops.  It is a naked mass of trap rock, springing high and perpendicular out of a slope of coppice.  It is exactly like one of the long barns of Lower Canada, and thence its name.  We passed it on a lovely evening towards sunset.  Not far from this island I took as a memorial, perhaps unwisely, from off a jutting point, the skull of a bear placed on a pole.  It was as white as snow, and must have been there many years as a land-mark.

The trappose and amygdaloidal districts are here thickly wooded, but the trees – mountain ash (very common), - page 226- spruce, pitch pine, birch, etc. – are hide-bound and small, sheathed in the trailing moss called goat’s- beard.

Nipigon Bay and the River

The region around Nipigon Bay is full of enchanting scenery.  As we journey up this great water we have the ever-changing pictures presented by the belt of islands on our left; while on our right we have the Nipigon mainland, an assemblage of bold mountains from 900 to 1200 feet high, tabular, rounded, or in hummocks, or sugar-loaf, and only separated by very narrow clefts or gorges.

My sketches give a poor idea of all this, as I could only draw where I had opportunity, not in the finest situations.

The bay is a beautiful lake of itself, so transparent that we can, for miles together, see its red pavement, and the living and dead things there inhabiting.  It is sprinkled with a few isles of conical or tabular rocks, each with its girdle of verdure, in which are little coves, inviting to repose, with bright red beaches, reminding one of the Aegean Sea, or the Friendly Isles.

The Nipigon, Alempigon, or Redstone River, enters the bay at its west end.  It is from 80 to 100 yards broad at its mouth, and discharges a muddy grey water.  Its  length is ninety miles, and on it are seven cascades and three rapids.  It comes from –page 227 – Lake Nipigon (or St. Anne), which is sixty miles round, and in a barren country. [ Note – these are odd mileages, so he must be quoting someone – because the Nipigon River isn’t that long! – B.B. ]

Footnote; From Mr. Mackenzie of Fort Nipigon, who told me a singular story of the momentary resurrection of an Indian about to be buried without his arrows and medicine bag etc., some years before Beckford’s Italian legend of a similar kind was in English print.  It shows that human nature repeats itself all over the world, with modifications.

THE MAMMELLES

The Mammelles Hills are 21 and a half miles from Gravel Point, a well-known resting-place. There are several, but the two most conspicuous are cones of soft and beautiful outlines, at least 800 feet high, and close together at the south-west corner of the great promontory between Black and Nipigon Bays, being the southern extremity of a long ridge coming from the north.

The Mammelles district consists of this head-land and the multitudinous islands which are in front of it.  It bears a strong resemblance to the Nipigon country.  Space forbids our entering into a detailed description of it.

We slept, on the 23^rd of June (1823), on the edge of a beautiful basin, two miles and a half south-east of the Mammelles Hills, and next morning plunged into a charming labyrinth of porphyritic, amygdaloidal, and sandstone islands, sheltered even from a hurricane.  From time to time we saw the free lake at the bottom of a long vista of pine-clad islands; and we were glad, for the sake of change, - page 228 – to come suddenly (nine miles from camp) into open water, opposite Thunder Mountain, seven miles from us, at Point Porphyry.

BLACK BAY

This magnificent headland is a principal feature in Lake Superior, and forms the north-west end of Black Bay. This Bay I am informed by Captain Bayfield, is forty-six miles deep, and extremely woody. It receives a large river.  The mouth of the bay is partially guarded by a great assemblage of woody, and for the most part low islands.

The high hills at the bottom of Black Bay are visible from its mouth, of course much depressed below the horizon.  Several islands occupy the centre of the bay.

It is not always that a boat can cross from the Mammelles to Thunder Mountain; but on the 24^th of June the lake was as smooth as glass. We greatly enjoyed the gradual unfolding, as we approached, of the various parts of the great basaltic cape.

Footnote: Count Andriani, an Italian nobleman, about the year 1800 fitted out a light canoe at Montreal, through the agency of Messrs. Forsyth and Richardson, and circumnavigated Lake Superior.  He occupied himself in astronomical observations and the admeasurement of heights, mingling also freely with the Indians

Treaty Day, Long Lac

E. C. Everett photos.

Conflicting dates from 1923, 1927 to 1930 on photos.

 

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E.C. Everett photo

Treaty day, Long lac

 

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Treaty Day, Long Lac

Barrel of Ice Cream on dock.

possible Wallace Everett standing behind it.

E.C. Everett photo

 

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Treaty Day, Long Lac
Bea Everett (back left), nurse
(date given for this as July 1927)

 

Treaty Day, Nipigon House, 1910

Treaty Tent, Nipigon House, 1910

David Haig photo

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Treaty Day, Nipigon House, Lake Nipigon, 1910

David Haig photo

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David Haig photo, Nipigon House, 1910

 

ACTION AT NIPIGON, 1877

Action at Nipigon, 1877

From the old Thunder Bay newspaper.. The Sentinel, August 16, 1877

Nipigon Correspondence

Reported by A. Walpole Roland

Work is progressing on the R.C. Mission and Indian Reserve. (This would be current day -2016-St. Sylvester Church and Lake Helen Reserve / Red Rock Band -ed)

Rev’d Father Hebert, S.J.  arrived at Red Rock (that is the name of the Hudson’s Bay Co. post at Nipigon at that time-ed.) on 3^rd. ultimo with building material for the above works,  and since that date has been zealously superintending workmen, laying out town and family lots, roads, boundary and drainage;  and making his “native employees” happy with a liberal – and much required allowance of tea, flour and pork.  The ground selected for the Mission is in many essential points very suitable, although there was but one or two lots left to choose from.  It has long been a favorite summer and fall camping and fishing station of the Indians, many of whom announce their intention of building “wigwam like white man” and dwelling permanently on the Reserve.

Services are held twice daily at the Mission, and on Sundays in the large building of the H.B.Co., Red Rock.

A full description of progress, and variety of work, might extend this letter to an inconvenient length.  Capt. Joseph White, of Ottawa, called here on the 10^th ultimo from Battle Island, where he just finished the new light-house.  He has also en route for this place visited the new and old light houses near the “Nipigon Straits” St. Ignace.  At the former he found Mr. Michelson at his post, and all well; at the latter, windows and doors were removed, and the place “cleaned out of much valuable Government property.  House breaking is sometimes heard of in this section.

Much dissatisfaction prevails among the Nipigon Indians in consequence of their Agent and payments not appearing within some weeks of time announced.  Their Chief says, that, “When Indian has a vote , it will be very different.”

Trout fishing has commenced in earnest,  and the weather for the past week or two has been favorable for sport and the enjoyment of the superb scenery of the district.

The following are among the earliest and most distinguished arrivals, 1^st party, Algerman, H. Percy, England;  Dr. A.B. Farnham, M.D., New York;  B.K. Miller, Milwaukee;  G. P. Miller, do.

2^nd.- Thos Collins, Collingwood;  C.K. Wilkins, Palestine, Mass.; G.S. Grange, Guelph, Ontario; A. Ramsay, Bradford, Ont.;  F. Fraser, Rimouski, Ontario.

The above parties arrived and departed by steamers “Manitoba” and “ Cumberland”, two of the most popular boats on this route.

3^rd.- Hon. John Simpson, Bowmanville, D.B. Simpson, do;  J.M. Simpson do;  D.F. Burke, P.A. Landing; A.H. Walbridge, New Castle;  L. Stronge, do.; F. Levekin, do.;  Hon. Geo. Alexander, Woodstock; Geo. MacWhirter, do.

The above gents with Mr. L. Wylie of P.A. L. arrived by a rather smart looking propeller named “Kate Marks”, S. St. Mary and Thunder Bay, and were much pleased with their trip.  After coaling the” Kate” steamed swiftly down- stream rounding the “Grecian bends” in good style.

The following are more of the arrivals by the propeller, “Kate Marks”.

4^th.- Thos M. Stelson, New Bedford, Mass.; E.S. Faber, do.

August 4^th. – As the mist cleared off this morning, a fleet of large and small craft might be seen under full press of canvas for the river.  Upon being sighted by the numerous dusky warriors camped around the Fort, a procession of canoes was formed, and were soon on their way to meet their expected Agent and escort him safely into port.

Foremost among the incoming sail was the schooner “Tomboy”, 50 tons, commanded by Capt. Donald Walker, of Chicago, with a party of American sportsmen from various States of the Union.

The following are the most prominent names: Messrs J.H. Stauffer, New Orleans;  C.W> Whetmore, Marquette; S.D. Warren, Boston, Mass.

Capt. Walker refused the services of a pilot,  and although an entire stranger to this coast, sailed up to the dock with the confidence of Capt. Symms.

The “Tomboy” is the largest sailing vessel ever brought up to the Fort;  she remains three weeks to await her party who are now on Lake Nipigon.  The other sails were from Pic River and Fort William, viz “Flowery Land” and Schooner “Penassee”  with lumber for R.C. Mission.

Our next distinguished arrivals (same day) were by steam Yacht  “Maggie L. Wilson”, viz. “A.A. Eustapheive”, Buffalo;  Capt. Dimick, do.; J.McGowan, do;  J.P. Merritt, N. York;  A.W. Hegeman, do; W.G. Larrison, Brooklyn, N.Y.

Capt. Dimick is decorated with the Royal Humane Society gold medal for services rendered the officers and crew of the transatlantic steamship “L. Amerique”  during one of her many perils.

About 10 p.m. on the 8^th inst Capt. W. Pritchard, of Fort William, made our old red rocks re-echo with the clarion notes of his Tug “Watchman”.

Arrivals by the Watchman – Amos Wright, Indian and Crown Land Agent;  Dr. A.A. Clarke, P.A. Landing.  By sail boat at the same hour; W. A. Preston, P.A.L.;  J.C. Sproule, do;  F. Beattie, do.

With a few other enterprising Merchants and traders from P.A.L.  and Fort William.

Early on the morning of the 9^th Mr. Amos Wright received the Indian Chief in his tent where amicable speeches were made by both parties, the Chief accepting Mr. Wright’s explanation as quite satisfactory.  The aboriginies then formed up, and payments were made in a quiet and orderly manner.  During the day business appeared lively at the marquees of the opposition traders.  The H. B. Co., as usual doing a steady trade in substantial goods.

The “Watchman” leaves today with an excursion party of Indians, with banners, music and dancing.

11^th Aug.- The “Watchman” left the River at 4 a.m. this morning for Prince Arthur.

Mr. D.F. Burke, of the Ontario Bank, P.A.L. left by the “ Watchman” after spending some 14 days on the Nipigon.

Hon. John Simpson and party will leave on the 12^th inst by Steamer “Manitoba.”

11^th inst 11a.m. Schooner “Mary Ann Hulbert,” Captain Jno. O’Mally, of Bayfield, Wis., just arrived at the dock.  Passengers for Nipigon: James Chapman, Bayfield, Wis., P.W. Smith, do., J.L.L.Bridges, Berlin, do.; Senator H.S. Sacket, do.; and F.W. Sacket, do.

A.W.R.  Camp Weeks, August 12, 1877

P.A.L. = Prince Arthur’s Landing ( today’s Port Arthur part of Thunder Bay)

While all this was going on in Nipigon in 1877 another column in the same newspaper reports “Indian Fight in Montana” . A terrible battle between Gen. Gibbon’s command and the Nez Perces on the Big Hole River.

Treaty Pay 1879

from the Thunder Bay Sentinel, Thursday, July 31, 1879:

"Excursion from Cleveland.  On Monday evening last, the side wheel steamer "Flora" came into our Port.  Before reaching here, they stopped at Silver Islet and Nipigon where the Indian payment was going on.
( Note:  this vessel was on a charter holiday cruise with 108 passengers.)

Meeting of the Clans, Nipigon, 1931 continued

Nipigon, 1931, meeting of the clans, nmp1465
E.C. Everett photo