| Summary: | And Early Explorations 551 The Selkirk Settlement The Hudson Bay Company, which was formed by London merchants, and chartered by the British crown in 1670, was given all the land draining to Hudson Bay—an enormous tract. Thomas Douglas, a Scottish Protestant gentleman, better known as Lord Douglas, Earl of Selkirk, later came to own some 40 percent of that company's stock and with his wife's relation controlled the business. He early espoused the cause of the Scotch people in the Highland Clearances and Ejections. These people were tenants in the Highlands of Kildonan and vicinity, especially in the Duchess of Sutherland's estate, and were forced by their landlords to abandon their homes without cause so that game preserves and hunting parks could be established for the pleasure of the titled owners. Immense flocks of sheep were also placed on the pastures and when the people refused to move they were ejected and the buildings and all their belongings burned. Lord Douglas conceived the idea of colonizing- these people and induced the Hudson Bay Company to allow him a large grant of land along the Red River of the North, where he could plant his colony. On the advice of Colin Robertson he selected the locality at the mouth of the Assiniboine River as the place to send the colonists. In 1810 he selected Miles MacDonell to be governor of the Red River colony who in July, 1811, set out from Scotland with some one hundred colonists. They arrived at York on Hudson Bay, late in September, where they were obliged to spend the winter as it was too late in the season to travel on to their destination. Miles MacDonell was a Catholic, as were many of the colonists, and Father Burke, an Irish priest, accompanied the party to York. The remainder of the colonists were Scotch Presbyterian. At York, in the early spring of 1812, this priest officiated at the marriage of a Scotch Presbyterian couple who had been wounded by Cupid's dart. This was the first Christian marriage solemnized in the great Northwest. The colonists arrived at the Red River late in August, 1812, having consumed over two months on their journey from York, and established Fort Douglas where the city of Winnipeg now stands. No preparations had been made for their coming and it was then too late to secure a food supply for the winter. This Scanned with a Zeutschel Zeta book scanner at 300 dpi. Edited with Multi-Page TIFF Editor.
|
|---|