Warre and Vavasour’s Report

This is image na-3934-16, from Glenbow Archives, and is used with their permission. The packhorses that the HBC men used were probably smaller than these horses, but the scene would be very similar to this.

I am perusing Warre and Vavasour’s Report of their Military Reconnoissance in Oregon over the winter of 1845-46, and finding it very interesting. The fun part of reports and records written by those who do not work for the HBC is all the things you learn, that the fur traders themselves never mentioned.

I didn’t do a blogpost last week, and I will slow down a little on the posts as I am deep in the writing of my next book, and need to concentrate on that and get it done, quickly. All of these things that I am writing today will be relative to the new book, but for you, they will also relate to The HBC Brigades — and to a lesser extent, perhaps, The York Factory Express.

My books, The York Factory Express: Fort Vancouver to Hudson Bay, 1826-1849, and The HBC Brigades: Culture, Conflict, & Perilous Journeys… can be ordered from Amazon, at https://amazon.com/author/nancymargueriteanderson

If you don’t want to order from Amazon, you can order the books from me via the Contact sheet. I will invoice you via Pay Pal, and mail a signed copy of the book[s] to you. (You don’t have to have a Pay Pal account.)

You can also order The York Factory Express here: https://ronsdalepress.com/york-factory-express-the/ 

So, let’s go! I am not going to worry about the reasons why this expedition was organized (although that, too, is interesting). For the most part I will talk only about the expedition itself. It began with a letter from Governor George Simpson, of course. It continued, somehow, with the commander of the British forces in Canada selecting his Aide-de-camp Henry James Warre, and Lieutenant Mervin Vavasour, of the Royal Engineers, and his instructing them to report to Governor Simpson, at Red River, who would give them their instructions. “It would be absurd to attempt to give detailed instructions for the survey of a country of which the instructor knows nothing,” said the military man who sent Warre and Vavasour on this survey. Governor Simpson would give them their instructions when they met him at Lachine or Red River.

I wondered, firstly, what an aide-de-camp was. An aide-de-camp is an assistant to an important military officer, so I guess that is how Warre got chosen for this position. Vavasour, who was a Royal Engineer, was chosen because he was an engineer. His instructions were to report on the HBC posts in the Oregon Country (and in fact, all the way from Rainy Lake to Edmonton House), and their ability to defend themselves against the Americans who might attack them.

Governor Simpson took charge of the two military men and had them conveyed from Lachine to Red River, where they arrived on June 5, 1845. On June 16 the two men joined Peter Skene Ogden and began their journey west to the Oregon Country.

But why was Ogden coming west? Well, we know why, but McLoughlin did not — Ogden was to be made a member of the soon-to-be-formed Board of Management that would, in part or in whole, replace Chief Factor John McLoughlin, who was currently in charge of the Oregon District. But Ogden couldn’t exactly tell McLoughlin he was coming west to replace him, so he needed another reason: an excuse for his presence at Fort Vancouver. So, as far as John McLoughlin knew, Ogden came to the Oregon Country with special instructions from Governor Simpson to take possession of Cape Disappointment for the Company, and also to take possession of any other places that were deemed significant to the HBC. In other words, to make land claims for these properties (including the Willamette properties that McLoughlin was so fond of). This is a reason that McLoughlin would understand and appreciate, and it got Peter Skene Ogden in the door. It is also clear that he took over responsibility for New Caledonia, from a distance. We know this because it was Peter Skene Ogden who travelled upriver to Kamloops and Fort Colvile, who made a decision on where a new brigade trail to the Pacific might run, and who ordered A.C. Anderson to explore for this trail. (It was nice to discover that complicated story, but I did not learn it from Warre and Vavasour’s journal, as it happens.)

So, what preparations did the two military men make for their arrival in the Oregon Country? They were coming west, supposedly as gentlemen-tourists, so they couldn’t wear their military uniforms. They disguised themselves with beaver hats, at $8.88 apiece. They also bought frock coats that cost $26.40 apiece; cloth vests and figured (?) vests; tweed trousers and buckskin trousers; tooth brushes (don’t soldiers brush their teeth?) and nail brushes; hair brushes (don’t soldiers brush their hair?); shirts and shoes; tobacco, wines, whiskies, extract of roses, and everything else “that was essential to high-class travellers in an American wilderness.” And then they also had to pack all this stuff, plus their surveying equipment, across the Rockies to the Columbia River! Amazing!

In some of their reports Warre and/or Vavasour described their route through the mountains: the sources are from various places in this report, and put in chronological order. First, they “embarked at La Chine on the 5th of May, in boats made of birch bark, the usual conveyance of the agents of the Company.” On June 5 they arrived at Red River, and on June 16 they left it, travelling west with Peter Skene Ogden and Richard Lane. I don’t know when they arrived at Edmonton House, but…

On the 25th July we entered the Rocky Mountains, crossed the Bow River in canoes made of skins (carried with us for the purpose) and commenced the passage of the mountains. 

Our daily journeys were now necessarily very short, and much impeded by the dampness of the forests, the height and ruggedness of the mountain passes.

We crossed, by means of the skin canoes, the headwaters of the McGillivray’s [Kootenay] River, on the 28th July, crossed with considerable difficulty another range of mountains, and encamped on the 31st on the Lake from whence flow the waters of the Columbia.

Without attempting attempting to describe the numerous defiles through which we passed, or the difficulty of forcing a passage through the burnt forest, and over the highlands, we may venture to assert, that Sir George Simpson’s idea of transporting troops, even supposing them to be at Red River, with men, provisions, stores, etc., through such an extent of uncultivated country, and over such impracticable mountains, would appear to us quite impossible. 

We descended the right bank of McGillivray’s [Kootenay] River, crossed a range of Mountains thickly covered with pine and cedar trees, to the Flatbow Lake, on the Flathead River, which we crossed and descended on the left bank to Fort Colville on the Columbia, where we arrived on the 16th August, having lost 34 horses from lameness and fatigue out of 60 with which we left Edmonton, distance about 700 miles.

The country on the west of the Rocky Mountains is very much broken and covered with dense forests of pine and cedar growing in many instances to an immense size.

The rivers or mountain torrents are very numerous and extremely rapid. They are scarcely navigable for the small Indian canoes, are subject to the sudden rising of the water and difficult to ford — thereby causing great delay in the construction of canoes, rafts, etc.

On their arrival at Fort Colvile Warre and Vavasour described the post: “Fort Colville is situated on a small plain surrounded by lofty sand hills at the head of an unnavigable rapid called La Chaudiere Falls [Kettle Falls]. It is said to be 2,049 feet above the level of the sea, 824 [?] miles from the boat encampment on the Columbia (whence the northern portages of the Rocky Mountains). It is 84 miles below McGillivray’s River [Kootenay] and 672 miles from the Pacific Ocean.

The buildings are similar in construction to the trading posts on the east side of the mountains, and calculated only to resist the sudden attacks of Indians…

One hundred and thirty-seven miles below Colville is Fort Okanogan on the left bank of that river, which is navigable for canoes and boats for some distance into the interior…. One hundred and eighty miles below Okanogan the Snake, or south branch of the Columbia River, joins the north, and nine miles below the junction is Fort Nez Perces, on the Walla Walla River, built of mud, 120 yards square, and better adapted than any of the other posts to resist a sudden attack…

Here is a little nugget of information that I have sometimes questioned, and now I have the answer. I know that in 1826, as James Birnie came into the territory with the incoming Express, he was one of the men who herded the newly purchased horses down the Columbia River to Fort Vancouver. The first thing they did at Fort Nez Perces, according to Aemilius Simpson, was:

The forenoon was occupied by Sending the Horses across the River, which was aa very great caution for these poor animals, some of the younger ones were nearly drowned. 53 horses & 4 colts succeeded in crossing, with which Messrs Birnie & Barnston, with 5 men, proceeded for Fort Vancouver.

So the HBC brought their horses down the Columbia on the north bank of the river. And here, Warre and Vavasour say this, re: the route of the incoming Oregon Trail wagons making their way to the Willamette Valley from Fort Nez Perces: 

From the “Dalles” the River Columbia is deep and uninterrupted to the Cascades (48 miles), where it forces a passage through a range of lofty mountains, extending from latitude 49 degrees into California, parallel with the sea coast, and where it again become unnavigable for a distance of three miles. The south bank is impassable at this point. The emigrants descend on the north side, recross the river about 15 miles below the rapids, from whence they strike across a thickly wooded country to the Clackamas River, which they descend to the valley of the Willamette.

This is, I guess, not important to the story, but I found it interesting. And only a year later, in 1846, the Barlow Road was built: explored for by Lieutenant Fremont, and opened in 1846 by Jesse Applegate. (Am I right?) Warre and Vavasour’s story continues:

The current of the river varies according to the season, having a rise of 19 feet at Fort Vancouver in the spring of the year. In ascending the river the chief difficulty is in the scarcity of fir wood, drift wood being the only obtainable fuel, which the Indians collect and sell to the traders for their culinary purposes. 

The boats in which we descended are admirably adapted for this dangerous river navigation and for the conveyance of troops. Each boat would carry 15 or 20 men. But from the depth of water between the rapids, where it is necessary to make a “portage,” there is no reason why a much larger boat might not be constructed for the conveyance of troops, etc.

The boats he described in the paragraph above are the Columbia boats.

In his journal, Thomas Lowe described Warre and Vavasour’s arrival at Fort Vancouver on August 25, 1845:

About 7 o’clock this morning we were agreeably surprised by the arrival of Chief Factor Ogden, Mr. Lane, and two English Officers. The Party left Red River on the 15th June, came on horseback as far as Colvile, and from thence down the Columbia in a River Boat, having been 70 days on the trip. Mr. Ogden, who was formerly in charge of New Caledonia, and went across the Mountains in the Spring of 1844, has since then been to Europe, and again returned to this Department. Mr. [Richard] Lane, who was Accountant at Red River comes to Vancouver to act in the same capacity… The two officers are on leave of absence from their regiments, stationed in Canada, and have come it seems principally on a pleasure trip, although they are also furnished with instruments for making geographical surveys. One named Vavassour [sic], is a Lieutenant, and the Lieutenant Warre belongs to the 54th Regiment, and is Aide de Camp to Sir Richard Jackson, Commander of the Forces in Canada. They both intend to recross the Mountains with the Express next Spring, making Vancouver their headquarters for the winter. 

So, when they arrived at Fort Vancouver, Warre and Vavasour did not appear to hide the fact that they were officers in the military. How odd — considering they obviously purchased expensive “costumes” (beaver hats, vests, trousers, perfumes, etc.) that would act to disguise the fact that they were soldiers before they even left on this cross country journey. They must have somehow changed their stories as they crossed the prairies.  

In their reports, Warre and Vavasour described Fort Vancouver and its environs: “Below the Cascades the Columbia is navigable to the Pacific (150 miles), although occasionally obstructed by sand bars. Ships of 300 tons burden are constantly navigating its water to Fort Vancouver, 35 miles below the Cascades (the principal depot of the Hudson’s Bay Company west of the Rocky Mountains), on the north bank of the river, situated in a small plain, which is partially inundated by the spring freshets. 

Fort Vancouver is similar in construction to the posts already described, having an enclosure of cedar pickets 15 feet high, 220 yards in length and 100 yards in depth. At the northwest angle is a square blockhouse containing six 3-lb. iron guns. There is a small village occupied exclusively by the servants of the H.B. Co., on the west side, extending to the river.

The fort was formerly situated on a rising ground in the rear of its present position, but was removed on account of the inconvenient distance from the river, for the conveyance of stores, provisions, etc. The present site is ill-adapted for defence, being commanded by the ground in the rear. 

About five miles above the fort, on a small stream falling into the Columbia, is an excellent saw mill, and on another small stream one mile distant is a grist mill, capable of grinding 100 bushels of wheat daily. 

From Lieutenant Mervin’s Vavasour’s report we find another description of Fort Vancouver:

Fort Vancouver on the north bank of the Columbia River in 45 degrees, 36 min. N. Lat., and 122 degrees 39 min. W. Long., 100 miles from the Pacific Ocean, at the head of the ship navigation, is the principal post of the Hudson’s Bay Company on the west of the Rocky Mountains. 

The present fort is placed near the end of a small plain on the bank of the Columbia River, which is nearly inundated by the spring freshets. A ridge of the high land on which the old fort was situated confines this plain on the north, in the rear of the present site, over which it has a command. 

This establishment contains several large store houses, made of squared timber, one small stone powder magazine and several framed dwelling houses; these are surrounded by a picket fence 15 feet high and 226 yards by 106 yards. At the N.W. angle there is a bastion block-house 20 feet square, the two lower stories are loop-holed, the upper is an octagonal cap containing eight 3-pound iron guns. The establishment was removed from the rising ground before mentioned in consequence of the inconvenient distance from the river side, for the conveyance of goods and procuring water, the latter defect has been remedied by sinking two wells in the present fort, which are supplied by the river, the water filtering through the soil, which is composed of gravel and sand a few feet below the surface, these wells rise and fall with the variations of the river. The plain is inundated in the same manner, the water rising through the earth and forming a. lake, before the banks are overflowed.

Like I said, you get some interesting information from people who are not HBC men: the Fort Vancouver wells. Vavasour’s recommendations for defending Fort Vancouver, should the Americans attack, was this:

The simplest method of strengthening this post against sudden attack would be to dig a ditch round it, throwing the earth against the pickets, which should be loop holed and a banquette formed on the interior, erecting another small block house at the S.E. angle, to flank the south and east sides, and placing small traverses behind the gates. 

So we have brought Warre and Vavasour across the prairies and down the Columbia River to Fort Vancouver. They will explore the Willamette Valley, the Columbia River to Fort George, and the Cowlitz to Fort Nisqually and, eventually, Fort Victoria. They have lots to say, but the most entertaining part of this, for me at least, has been their journey across the mountains to Fort Colvile.

Copyright, Nancy Marguerite Anderson, 2024. All rights reserved.

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