More tiny stories
Fort Victoria in 1846, painted by Henry James Warre, Courtesy American Antiquarian Society.
As I cobble together the 1857 chapter of “Headquarters,” I am finding some tiny stories — I might solve them before this blogpost is published, but I suggest that some of you already know the answers to my questions if I do not! As you know, my two previous books have mostly taken place in the interior of the country, and so I have a lot to learn about what happened in these years on the coast. By coast, that means at both Fort Vancouver, and Fort Victoria.
Here’s a tiny story that took place near Fort Vancouver: A nicely written letter to Governor Simpson from Alexander Caulfield Anderson, who by 1857 had been retired at Cathlamet for three or four years already. I get to work all of these descriptions in if I can, and I enjoy this letter because of the descriptions of the American soldiers outside Fort Vancouver. It makes me smile.
I have taken it for granted that you were well posted in Columbian affairs, and therefore have never, of late, attempted to swell a sheet by touching on that subject. It is certainly — or certainly ought to be — a credit to the Company’s rule and management, when we draw a comparison between the simple, though efficient, and withal humane means through which their influence was maintained, and the clatter, and turmoil, and complete and utter inefficiency of the measures pursued by the now dominant powers. The expenditure of some millions of dollars, the marching and countermarching of I know not how many troops and volunteers (voluntary soldiers, indeed, who act as they please, are that last) operates simply to make matters worse. The Indians, either confident in their own strength, or presuming on their opponents’ incapacity, are at this day more formidable in the upper country than they were a year ago. Of course they will have eventually to succumb…The influence of the old HB folk, meanwhile, is unabated; and whenever we, or any one connected with us, comes in contact with the belligerent races a hospitable reception is met with.
Anderson would not have received a hospitable reception, even as an HBC man, if he had gone into the interior of Washington Territory at this time. In March 1857, James Allen Grahame (Mactavish’s second-in-command at Fort Vancouver) reported to Governor Simpson that “the Indians about Colvile are in a very unsettled state, and Mr. [Angus] McDonald anticipates trouble with them. They are not near so friendly with the Company’s people as they have been, and evidently there is something brewing among them.”
Another of my tiny stories with news of Dr. John McLoughlin’s illness and death in summer 1857: To Governor Simpson, Dugald Mactavish wrote in his letter of August 20, 1857, that “I was up with Doctor [John] McLoughlin for a few days last week. He is dying by inches, poor man, and if he lives much longer will be, I am afraid, a perfect Lazarus, as his body is breaking out in gangerous sores in consequence of which part of one of his feet has been taken off by Doctor [Forbes] Barclay. The old gentlemen is still pretty sensible although he wanders a good deal at times in his conversation.” Poor man. McLoughlin died within ten days: in early September, Mactavish told Governor Simpson of McLoughlin’s death at his home on September 3rd, and Mactavish attended McLoughlin’s funeral a few days after his death.
Here’s another of the tiny stories I have a few questions about, and this occurs at about the same time as the tiny story above. Part I know is true: part I do not know. So here goes, from a letter written by Dugald Mactavish to Governor Simpson, February 23, 1857.
We have no intelligence of a reliable nature from the interior but some [queer] stories are current here about Indian Movements. Among others it is said that a band of hostiles had come to the Military post established among the Yakima last summer [Fort Simcoe], and drove off a great many Cattle, horses [and] taking likewise three white men prisoners — two of them have since escaped but the other is still in limbo and acts as a secretary & interpreter for the Chief who has sent into the Commander at the Dalles some extraordinary specimens of correspondence. There has been some attempts made to rescue this prisoner but without success. It is further reported that the same Indians took the Catholic Priest (a man from the south of France by name Pandosy) who has been established in their country as a Missionary for several years and resides within a few miles of the Military post, tied him up and flogged him until his back was raw and left him perfectly helpless, charging him with having revealed their plans & secrets about the War to the Government authorities…
This missionary was Father Charles Pandosy, and his mission near Fort Simcoe was called St. Joseph’s Mission, I believe. I know the second of these tiny stories is more or less true, although his biography in Dictionary of Canadian Biography does not mention what happened to him at his mission. But the first of the tiny stories? Who was the supposed prisoner? Is it rumour or truth? If true, did the prisoner ever get rescued? I am most curious, so I hope someone has this story.
Now, this next tiny story is not an 1857 story. While I was searching the BC Archives for a particular image of the steamer Beaver, I stumbled across this description of a letter or notes the archives hold in their collection. It is called “Rough notes of journeys in the Northwest,” ca. 1850. The file consists “of several pages of rough notes detailing one or several journeys between Fort Garry and Fort Vancouver in the mid-nineteenth century. A Liverpool postal stamp dated to 1851 gives a possible date. Locations and encounters are described at Fort Edmonton, Fort Ellice, Fort Pitt, Fort Colvile, and other sites. Another pages give a short itinerary of a journey from Fort Vancouver to Port Simpson [Fort Simpson] and back. The Beaver is mentioned [as] a steamer used for this trip. It is unclear if the notes are from the same journey or if they were written by the same person.” Yes I eventually got too pick it up, and here it is — the beginning of quite a long chase: https://nancymargueriteanderson.com/rough-notes/
So, another of my tiny stories, and one that turns out to be a mystery! Who the heck would this person be, who travelled (supposedly) from Red River to Fort Vancouver and (perhaps) on to Fort Simpson in 1850 (or sometime before that date)? Governor Eden Colvile came into the district in 1849, but not via Edmonton House and Fort Colvile — although he passed through those two forts on his return journey to Red River in 1850! Nor did he go up to Fort Simpson, as far as I know. Sir Edward Poore and Mr. Franklin (and their trunks) were also in the territory, having come in with the 1849 Express under John Charles. Poore was described by A.C. Anderson as “a young Baronet from Coburg, & certainly as rough and tumble a character as one often sees; flush of cash, apparently, and with exuberant spirits, but, unfortunately with rather a limited education.” (That is exactly the sort of criticism that A.C. would have leveled at these two young men.) Poore and Franklin travelled in the Beaver to Fort Rupert, on northern Vancouver’s Island: but not to Fort Simpson, as far as I know. And the other person travelling to Fort Rupert with them was clerk Neil McLean McArthur, and it doesn’t seem to be him either. It might also have been W.S. Ogden, who I think was brother to Peter Skene Ogden. But why would he have travelled to Fort Simpson, as he was not in the HBC? Who do you think it was? Take a guess, and I will look at the document and see what I can see.
So, as you can see, I have another batch of tiny stories to sort out. I know a lot will be solved as I enter the last of my information from the box of files that stands next to my desk — but its a lot of work and a lot of sorting out, I am afraid. And sometimes, even then, I do not get the answers I was expecting. When you put it together, the argument that I was suggesting for this book disappeared, and now I have to find a new one.
Copyright, Nancy Marguerite Anderson, 2025. All rights reserved.