Theatre Part 1y

What Goes Around Comes Around: The Early Theatre of Mackenzie Eskimo Evangelization 1799-1859 Walter Vanast

McGill University “Everything goeth, everything returneth . . . For every Here rolleth the ball turning There . . . Crooked is the path of eternity. ” F. Nietzsche

Introduction Four things had to happen to let the Inuit of the Mackenzie Delta first hear of Jesus in 1859. For a start, fear between whites and this tribe, stoked by G’Wichin Indians, had to end. Next Hudson’s Bay Company1 profit had to stall, which made it look further north for a new source of hides. Then in London the Company had to be so hurt (by a former employee who said it blocked missions) that it wished to be seen aiding God wherever it did business. Lastly, the Inuit had to want a post in their own midst. Their 1859 delegation to that end reached Fort Simpson, a thousand miles distant, at the same time as two HBC-assisted clerics. A week of meetings followed and a ten-year-old girl was left behind.

The Ends of the Earth, the HBC, and the Loucheux To arctic-coast tribes in pre-contact days history was a circle, as each newborn received the name of someone just deceased and became that very person.1 But to whites who met them it led straight from Adam to the rise one day of all the dead and (depending on faith in Jesus during life) their assignment to heaven or hell. What follows here is how that came to be told to the Inuit of the Mackenzie2 Delta. After whites first saw the Mackenzie in 1786, its banks were soon plied by Northwest Company traders from Montreal. So difficult were conditions (including the high cost of bringing in trade goods, hostility from Dene Indian tribes, scant provisions, natural shifts in wildlife, and competition further south from the London-based HBC) that the project was later abandoned. But in 1821 the NWC joined the HBC under the latter’s name and posts were manned again. Success seemed guaranteed, as parliament in Britain granted the new entity a monopoly licence to the Indian or North West Territories, which included the Mackenzie. The Company already held Rupert’s Land, a vast terrain that stretched above the United States border from the Rockies to Ungava, and whose charter, obtained in 1670, was valid for two hundred 1 At times referred to as HBC or Company hereafter.

years. So except for white colonies on the eastern side, 3most of British North America was now in its hands. The Mackenzie was the part most distant from London and sustained but a very small number of people, yet it often figured in the public eye. Each time the North West Territory licence was about to end (in the early 1840s and late the next decade) the Company sought extension, a goal it could only achieve with the support of the people of Britain. And that became tough as free-trade views gained steam, monopolies drew disdain, and fierce debate went into the repeal of laws that shut out competition. Such was the case when parliament ended the fixed price of corn, known as wheat in North America, which had made landowners rich at the expense of ordinary people. Then, too, many Britons held the North close at heart and for Christians it held special meaning. To them an Old Testament text, “He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river until the ends of the earth,”4 urged preaching at far-off sites. So at strategic times the Company sent explorers to the arctic coast, and somewhere on its land helped missions. As in “theater-in-the-round,” its work was hued by what Britons thought, and vice versa. All along, shareholders had to be pleased. So like any business eager to raise its worth, the HBC expanded by sending its men west of the Mackenzie in the Yukon. When that failed to raise profit it looked north to the coast and furs such as fox that brought a good price. That this resource had not been tapped before was due to the G’Wichin, then known to Europeans as Loucheux, a Dene Indian nation living south of the treeline adjacent to the Delta. It was the Loucheux who bought goods from whites and bartered them to the tribe to their north. And like the HBC, they were determined to keep making a profit. To that end they used violence to keep Delta bands from meeting whites, and convinced the latter of the treacherous nature of these people. For fifty years that policy worked remarkably well.

The Kukpugmiut Except for a strip near the Beaufort Sea, the Delta was for much of the year empty of natives. In winter most people lived on the coast, and in warm months, too, few from its northwest edge ever went upstream. But those from the other side traveled each spring to the Delta’s southern tip, now known as Point Separation. Nearly always in the nineteenth century it is they who are subject of fur-trade letters from the Mackenzie. What we know of them is scant. The Loucheux only told whites what suited their own ends. Arctic explorers (and parties looking for lost ones) saw the Delta every decade or two, but only very briefly and while passing through.5 So what traders wrote about the tribe, when they wrote anything at all, was second-hand and concerned only the most southerly part of their migration.6 Still, works from

archeologists and people who lived with them later (on the assumption the material can be applied backwards) give a sense of their lives at this stage. The Eastern Channel at its downstream end turns quite wide, so one of the names its people applied to themselves was Kukpugmiut, or People of the Large Water. For simplicity’s sake (rather than name people by each locality) that term is used here for all from that side of the Delta. Their number fell over time, but may at one point have been as high as six to eight hundred. They were nomads, but in a particular sense. Each family had a permanent driftwood home in one or more villages on the coast. Such sites (of which there were half a dozen at any time) had at least one hall, or kajigi, where men fixed their tools and told stories, and at night with the women danced to drums. Shamans at such times communicated with spirits. This happened almost nightly in August, when the Kukpugmiut speared belugas, small white whales, in the shallow tidal water of settings like Kittigazuit. 789 Shortly after, many left to spend the dark part of the year in villages further northeast, and from there made journeys for fish and caribou at the Eskimo Lakes.10 Then in spring a large part of the tribe turned south, spending a month to reach Point Separation, where trade with the G’Wichin occurred.1112 At times they got along well, at others there was war; meetings always held potential for danger.

Contact (and lack of it) with Whites At the time Europeans reached their world, the Kukpugmiut looked unkindly on anyone entering the Delta. This followed in part from conflict with the G’Wichin, but religious belief also played a role, for the sudden apparition of persons with strange features meant spirits had taken human shape and were coming frightfully near. Death followed sight of some, but grimaces and shouts made others part, and left no ill effect. If outsiders responded in an aggressive way, the Kukpugmiut’s bow-and-arrow skill could quickly do them in. And that held even if their opponents had firearms (the range of a gun and an arrow was about equal). Alexander Mackenzie faced no such problem when in 1786 he explored the river that now carries his name. Following the Central Channel to the coast, he met not a soul, for it was August and the Kukpugmiut were then further east. But the next white man to enter these waters, a trader who came north in June, met an awful death near Point Separation with most of his crew. 13 Despite the loss the NWC soon after built Fort Good Hope14 on the Mackenzie, just a few days upstream from the disaster. Whites, it seems, still hoped to deal directly with the Kukpugmiut, but gave it up on the first try when in 1809 one of them was threatened on reaching the Delta. 15 That allowed the Loucheux to continue as intermediaries in trade, a role they firmly protected. If Kukpugmiut thought of passing them by, they killed one or more and stopped it from coming about. And since each death brought a cycle of revenge, they could always blame the other side. 1617.18

NWC men in those early years were not all taken in, and saw G’Wichin themselves as19 aggressive.20 Traders such as Peter Dease knew it was they who caused many fights, and profited if they dragged on, for then they received bribes to end them.21 And even when they lived side-by-side with Kukpugmiut for weeks, they let none go south to trade with whites. Such was the case in 1822, when Delta people spoke of going to Good Hope.22 23 24 On hearing of this, the clerk at that post asked the G’Wichin for help to bring them near, but was rebuffed and found them much “displeased.” 25 The fort would be thrashed, they warned, if these people came by. So no visit took place, and the G’Wichin kept their role in trade. Four years later Capt. John Franklin and Dr. John Richardson of the British navy traversed the Delta to reach the coast (one on each side, with Richardson on the eastern). On a prior arctic journey they had almost starved and Franklin had gained fame as “the man who ate his boots,”26 but this time he was well prepared. Aware of the fate of the trader who had met Kukpugmiut a quarter century before, he studied contacts with “primitives” elsewhere on the globe. Whites often died, he learned, because of harsh response to native gesture and shouts. So he chose a passive approach. (Franklin 99). The tactic worked well at the Delta’s outer ends, as bands were startled by the sudden appearance of strangers. [see Richardson’s illustration of the Kukpugmiut in the Eastern Branch ]27 Though they lost their fear and plunder was tried, no one was hurt. PFJlZm1hbj48Q2l0ZT48QXV0aG9yPkZyYW5rbGluPC9BdXRob3I+PFllYXI+MTgyODwvWWVhcj48 UmVjTnVtPjkzPC9SZWNOdW0+PElEVGV4dD5OYXJyYXRpdmUgb2YgYSBzZWNvbmQgRXhwZ WRpdGlv biB0byB0aGUgc2hvcmVzIG9mIHRoZSBQb2xhciBTZWEsIGluIHRoZSB5ZWFycyAxODI1LCAxODI 2 LDwvSURUZXh0PjxQYWdlcz45OS0xMTIsIDExOS0xMjA8L1BhZ2VzPjxNREwgUmVmX1R5cGU9I kJv b2ssIFdob2xlIj48UmVmX1R5cGU+Qm9vaywgV2hvbGU8L1JlZl9UeXBlPjxSZWZfSUQ+OTM8L1Jl Zl9JRD48VGl0bGVfUHJpbWFyeT5OYXJyYXRpdmUgb2YgYSBzZWNvbmQgRXhwZWRpdGlvbiB0 byB0 aGUgc2hvcmVzIG9mIHRoZSBQb2xhciBTZWEsIGluIHRoZSB5ZWFycyAxODI1LCAxODI2LDwvV Gl0 bGVfUHJpbWFyeT48QXV0aG9yc19QcmltYXJ5PkZyYW5rbGluLEouPC9BdXRob3JzX1ByaW1hcnk + PERhdGVfUHJpbWFyeT4xODI4PVJlcHJpbnQgYnkgTS5HLiBIdXJ0aWcsIEVkbW9udG9uLCAyMDA 3 PC9EYXRlX1ByaW1hcnk+PEtleXdvcmRzPmRlbHRhPC9LZXl3b3Jkcz48S2V5d29yZHM+ZXhwbG9y YXRpb248L0tleXdvcmRzPjxLZXl3b3Jkcz5NYWNrZW56aWU8L0tleXdvcmRzPjxSZXByaW50Pklu

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wv RGF0ZV9QcmltYXJ5PjxLZXl3b3Jkcz5hcmN0aWM8L0tleXdvcmRzPjxSZXByaW50Pk5vdCBpbiBG aWxlPC9SZXByaW50PjxQdWJfUGxhY2U+VG9yb250bzwvUHViX1BsYWNlPjxQdWJsaXNoZXI+Q 2hh bXBsYWluIFNvY2lldHk8L1B1Ymxpc2hlcj48WlpfV29ya2Zvcm1JRD4yPC9aWl9Xb3JrZm9ybUlE PjwvTURMPjwvQ2l0ZT48L1JlZm1hbj5= (Franklin 99-112, 119-20;Richardson 193-202;Franklin and Davis) Still, the assaults gave the world a dreadful sense of these people. Franklin’s account showed a horde of men storming the boats with knives.28 G’Wichin, by contrast, got much praise. When Franklin told of their delight at his passing through their land,29 the HBC showed no surprise, for they had “always been hospitable to strangers.” 30 Kukpugmiut, however, had again schemed “to take advantage of the weakest.” Given their constant desire for war, there were worries for Good Hope.31 But pressure for profit was such that, despite the danger, the HBC considered having its men move even closer to the Delta. On returning from the coast Franklin had found a stream at the Delta’s southwest edge that he called the Peel. And since he thought it rich in fur-bearing creatures, the HBC at once planned a fort on its bank. But just then the G’Wichin told of increased danger from this “very treacherous and hostile” people. So the post was not built.32 By this time Loucheux stories of treachery by the Delta people had been repeated so often that the new generation of HBC traders, including John Bell (married to Dease’s daughter), became entirely convinced. And since at Good Hope he had no contact with the Kukpugmiut themselves, there was never occasion to change their views. Even what good they heard about these people was perceived as yet another form of deception. This happened in 1828, when Loucheux despite their dark reports again camped at length with the Kukpugmiut near Point Separation.33 That, time, too, it seemed the latter were about to visit Good Hope, but Bell34 put no faith in such thought and turned out to be right. 35 On meeting a youth alone (so he was told) Kukpugmiut used “the first opportunity” to kill. War flared, hunts diminished, and the post got few furs.36 The Loucheux chief still made a trading trip to the Delta, but likely laid a trap. When people he met began a “rant” he downed three with one shot.37 In revenge three G’Wichin wives were “inhumanly butchered,”38 39 and her people in turn planned to shoot three foes to match the dead.40 Yet despite the toand-fro nature of the murders, Bell laid all blame on the Kukpugmiut. It was they who were “always the aggressor.” The cycle of deaths might have gone on for a while, but the Delta people did not came south the next year, and quiet reigned.41 Also contributing to peace was Good Hope’s move more than a hundred miles south. G’Wichin now had to travel a week longer (and into another Dene tribe’s land42) to reach the

post, but there was an advantage. Kukpugmiut were even less likely than before to think of heading south to meeting with whites. As a result for a while there were no reports of killings. And when they did occur it related to an extortion scheme gone bad: a Delta band met a G’Wichin for whose death they had long paid fines, so they killed him for good along with his companions. (Simpson 101) When in 1837 Peter Dease (by now chief trader in another district) returned to the Mackenzie District and entered the Delta, 43 matters had turned chilling. But because of his route he met no Kukpugmiut, and had no difficulty with people on the northwest side. At HBC behest Dease44 had come to map the coast, assisted by Thomas Simpson, nephew of HBC governor George Simpson. (get exact ref.) (Dease) 45 During three consecutive summers they mapped the Alaska shore to Point Barrow,46 named terrain (later found to be one of the world’s largest islands) after newly installed Queen Victoria, 47 and almost defined the Northwest Passage. As a result HBC prestige was raised, its two governors were knighted, and the admiring atmosphere made for easy renewal of its North West Territory licence.48 At the local level, the finding in Alaska of the Colville,49 thought to be a beaver-rich stream, led to the building of forts from the lower Mackenzie towards it. 50

Isbister Dease’s expedition had another effect that initially seemed minor. While heading home in the fall of 1839 he and his assistant stayed for months at Fort Simpson, HBC headquarters on the Mackenzie, where the latter likely contributed to the decision of Alexander Isbister, a fur-trade apprentice, to leave his employ. Peacock-like in his sense of self, Simpson crowed about gaining highest honors at the University of Aberdeen, from which he held an M.A. Afterwards he had been secretary to Governor George Simpson, which had not worked out. So he may have fanned the young man’s mounting dislike of his employer.51 Once it was known Isbister would not stay past the end of his contract (of which a year remained) he received no further training. Instead, the chief trader52 in the 1843 spring took him to Good Hope and handed him to Bell as an extra hand to start the chain of forts towards the Colville. [ref] Loucheux warnings of the decade before were ignored, and the first was placed on the Peel. In July Bell set out53 to found the post then referred to as simply Peel’s River, 54 55 and was met near the Delta by “kindhearted” Loucheux. Dancing in joy they escorted the boats to protect them from Kukpugmiut and their “uniform hostility to whites.”(Isbister 332-45) Only later did he learn the Loucheux had just shot eleven Eskimo men and numerous women and children. After a winter at Peel’s River with absence of wildlife (part of a natural cycle) and much suffering by Loucheux, Isbister started for home by walking to Good Hope. It was good he made the trip then, and not a year later, for by then Indians had become so famished they were killing and eating others

of their tribe. On meeting some women on the very same trail and in the same season, two HBC men lost their lives. The miscreants were named, but Governor Simpson refused to have them hurt. Whites would do the same, he judged, in want of such extreme.56 At the time the men became a meal, Isbister was ensconced at one of the prettiest spots [ref? in the Red River Settlement57 (now Winnipeg), at the Anglican boarding school he had left three years before. 58 Still in charge was his former teacher,59 who held an M.A. from King’s College in Aberdeen, hated Indians, and used sadistic rule of the sort inflicted on David Copperfield and other boys in the novels of Charles Dickens. But he and Isbister got along very well. Taken aback at the intensity of Isbister’s views against the HBC, the teacher ascribed it to his half-breed status (his mother and grandmother were native) which blocked promotion past the level of post-master, the lowest officer rank.60 But he thought of a solution: the fierceness would turn to good if used to spread God’s word. The student agreed and started training at once. By summer he was off to King’s College to complete his studies and earn ordination.61

Peers and MacLean As he left the country Isbister met Augustus Peers, an apprentice clerk just arrived from England who was the following spring (1843) assigned to the Mackenzie. There he proved his worth at once: when the chief trader shot off his own right hand, he tied the artery and saved his life.62 The accident led to a twist in that John MacLean, who had worked for the HBC in Ungava, was sent north to help. Expecting full command the next year when the wounded man went home, he was crushed to learn he chief trader who had left in 1840 (the one who had sent Isbister to Peel’s River) was about to return and would take charge instead. Instead of managing a district, Mclean was to run a single post.63 The blow may have been caused by McLean’s intent to marry Clarissa, daughter and only child of Wesleyan missionary James Evans, whom the governor had installed a few years before (just ahead of the first expiry of the HBC licence) at Norway House in a district further south. His overbearing conduct had caused much friction, as had his stress on Sabbath observance and his insistence on having Indians quit the woods and live by his church. Also disruptive were the social missteps of his daughter and wife. So Sir George may not have wanted Clarissa as leading lady of the Mackenzie. Several authors have noted the minister’s close attachment (too close, one suspects)64 to the girl. Perhaps the governor feared he would insist on being with her.65 When news of the non-promotion arrived, McLean began a jeremiad against the HBC. He had long sought its higher ranks, but now hated its all; conversion to critic could not have been swifter. In 1845, manuscript in hand, he settled in Ontario with Clarissa, 6667 whose leaving caused new problems in her parents’ mission home. Her father continued having young women live in his house, but his physical

contact (“play”) with them now reached a point where several spoke up. 68 Called to Britain, he died there shortly after mission leaders reviewed the charges. 6970 There were those, of course, who blamed the HBC. Since the settling of natives lowered intake of fur, they accused it of scheming the minister’s fall.71 He died of a “broken heart,” as McLean put it in his book. [ref?] Whether he contacted Isbister prior to its 1849 London publication is not clear, but he most certainly did so thereafter.(Cooper 245) The work’s shrill tone closely matched what the former apprentice had been saying for years. Despite his teacher’s hope, his bile had continued to flow.

The Aborigines Protection Society Soon after arriving in Aberdeen, Isbister had lost the urge to serve God. He studied for a while (including, he briefly claimed, two years of medicine) but earned no degree. After a few months at the University of Edinburgh,72 he dropped out again, and in 1845 began a frenzy of tries for all sorts of employ in London and overseas. Several were with the Company, and two involved medical positions for which he lacked qualification (see appendix 1). Rejected everywhere, he became a schoolteacher, a position for which no degree was required and which, as in Dickens’ tales, was held in low esteem.73 But means to boost respect presented itself just then. Disgruntled residents of the Red River Settlement asked him (at least, so he put it) to present their complaints about the HBC to parliament in Britain. Jumping at the chance, he now became the Company’s most rabid public critic. In his view it did worse than make natives slaves, for it blocked them from hearing of Christ. Its lucre came from buying fur with trifles; its conduct brought famine, disease, cannibalism, and death. 74 To raise pressure Isbister joined the Aborigines Protection Society,75 a London group with Quaker roots. Years before it had tried to help Ojibway in Upper Canada 76who had been forced from their forests to barren ground. At issue was not the move itself, but absence of arable land, for tilling was thought crucial to conversion. Natives who farmed, it was also held, were spared the dying off that elsewhere followed whites’ presence. As proof the APS quoted Wesleyan cleric James Evans, then at work near the Great Lakes at many sequential sites (in retrospect another item of suspicion). Though this had nothing to do with the HBC, Isbister applied similar lines to his former employer. The only means to save natives (last of a “noble” race) on its terrain, was to make them farm and teach them of Christ. To prevent further wrong their nomadic ways must stop, and the Company’s charter must end. [ ] Irony was that at that very time Peers was trying to tell the Kukpugmiut of the benefits of trading at Peel’s River.

Drawing in the Kukpugmiut: Peel’s River 1847-1853

During five years with the HBC Peers had become an excellent trader, trusted by whites and natives alike (MacFarlane 12-15). To test his mettle he was in 1847 placed in charge at Peel’s River, by then the Mackenzie’s most strategic site. There, as expected, he superbly handled both local tasks and the sending of goods across the mountains to just-founded Fort Yukon,77 second post in the chain toward the Colville. Problem was, the better transport worked, the more hides Fort Yukon could buy. And that meant less remained for barter among bands who had in prior years brought them to the Peel. Though Peers’ skill showed in every way, his “returns” (intake of pelts) dropped a lot.78 The only means left to raise profit was to draw in the Kukpugmiut, trade with them directly, and cut out the Loucheux. The need to make money sped conversion of the HBC view of the Delta people. The change occurred despite an attack on whites in the Eastern Channel that again involved Dr. Richardson. His friend and former commander Sir John Franklin had disappeared during a search for the Northwest Passage, so in 1848 he had come to look for him on the coast. The HBC gave him as assistant John Rae, its surgeon on James Bay and a seasoned arctic traveler.79 As before, the Kukpugmiut tried to seize what was in the boats, and again, no one was hurt. Richardson saw this benignly and published to that effect, while Rae took an unhappy view but kept it to himself, at least for then. To the Kukpugmiut it was surely a big event. Despite aggression, whites had stayed calm, and trade had taken place. 80 The contact occurred just as Peers at the Delta’s other end was trying to show good will. When his hunter Ghendong81 brought gifts to a group near the mouth of the Peel, they promised to meet him in fall.82 But they did not turn up, and given what later occurred, it is hard to know what was really said and what role Ghendong played.83 It was the Kukpugmiut’s habit as they came south to have the kayaks travel ahead of the umiaks, the large boats that contained belongings, dogs, women, and children. They hunted along the way and also acted as scouts in terms of routes to follow, choice of camping site, and early detection of danger. In 1850 near Separation Point six men engaged that way happened to come across an HBC boat on its way from Good Hope to Peel’s River. None of the crew had met Kukpugmiut before, did not speak their language, and were unsure what to do. One wanted to have them come along to trade at Peel’s River; another, Manuel, feared them very much. Having just passed Ghendong and others of his tribe, they called them to the scene, and what happened then was pitiless killing.84 The G’Wichin offered trade while surrounding their prey, shot the unsuspecting victims, and ritually sliced the bodies. Manuel also fired his gun.85 The deaths were like previous ones inflicted to block Delta bands from meeting with whites, but no such attack had previously been witnessed. And since Ghendong headed the assault, it was all the more necessary to explain it in terms that made sense to Peers, 86 [ref.?] So given what he knew of their

beliefs, the G’Wichin told that a tribesman had died, which could only be due to a spell sent from the Delta, and that therefore the murders were correct.87 What the Kukpugmiut saw or thought of the attack we can only surmise, but a meeting on the coast that year showed that whites could be quite benign. In August the Investigator, a large British naval vessel88, sailed east along the coast searching for Franklin. On board as translator was Moravian cleric Johannes Miertsching, who had worked among Labrador Inuit and always wore their clothes. When he and the captain landed near an Eastern Delta band,89 natives shrieked, but then abruptly turned friendly. A chief showed his house and a son with a gangrenous leg. But nothing could be done, nor was there time to tell of Jesus, for the tide was going out, so all rushed aboard. 90 The meeting surely warmed the Kukpugmiut’s view of whites. Arriving on a giant, initially terrifying vessel, they had paid a visit, done some barter, and stayed pleasant throughout. Their spokesman, moreover, wore clothes like theirs and used words they could grasp. All this was retold in homes and kajigis in winter. And it prepared the ground for new attempts to have the Kukpugmiut come to Peel’s River. When in 1851 a G’Wichin with gifts was well received at a Delta camp, Peers rushed to the site and found it empty. Worried the emissary might return with hostile men, all had fled. Still, the work paid off as next year he was visited by a chief and two other men. First to enter a trader’s post, they were “most taken up with everything they saw.” 91 Then death again intervened. Peers, who had rarely been ill, passed away in the course of several days. [citation?] To whites it seemed strange, as did the loss of his will. Given native perception of unexpected demise, some may have thought a G’wichin spell had made him die to stop contact with the Delta people. But of that, or poisoning, or any other malfeasance there is not a word in the archives. In public all regretted the young trader’s loss. Had he lived, wrote Sir George, he would soon have received “a more responsible and conspicuous position.”92 An assistant of whom he had spoken well93 took over the post and his wife and three young children.[HBCPS] Yet Peers, as we will see, had not entirely left the scene.

Theater in Britain: Eskimos as Man-Eating Primitives John Rae was not among several whites who after seeing the Delta a book. Had he done so just then, it would have hurt his cause and that of the HBC. While on the coast with Richardson he was made a chief factor, and after a brief bout in charge of the Mackenzie was sent on other arctic explorations. On the first he named a large strait after the queen, and on the next he heard from Inuit that Franklin’s men had died after eating the flesh of fellow sailors. Rushing to England he expected praise, but faced hostile words instead. Since cannibalism was an unspeakable offense,94 the news could not be believed.

When Franklin’s widow set out to discredit Rae,95 Charles Dickens proved an ally. In his widely read journal Household Words he had always drawn Eskimos in noble light, but now depicted them as savage and by analogy to African tribes proved their taste for human meat—a concept of primitives long held by whites. When two centuries earlier an image of Eskimos first appeared96 the text explained they were “entirely wild people and cannibals” who lived like cattle.97 Rae’s view of the Kukpugmiut fit that picture. “Stout, and broad-shouldered, with great strength of arm and hand,” they were worse than South Sea pirates as they swarmed the boats. One could not imagine “a more fierce, daring, and truculent-looking set.” Had this been published shortly after the trip, rather than decades later, Dickens would surely have used it. Even so, he raised doubt about Rae and his Franklin account. To prove naval men could not have eaten their companions, Dickens wrote a tale in which a shipwrecked group avoid anthropophagy by telling each other tales. (Trodd 201-25) He also created a play, The Frozen Deep, in which two officers make a desperate escape from the Arctic. The stronger one instead of killing and consuming the other (Frank), gives up his life to deliver him to his sweetheart Clara. The plot brought many tears as Dickens played the hero’s role and gasped his last on stage. 98 Production started in 1857, just as hearings began in parliament on the wisdom of extending HBC rule. When the queen saw the play she was deeply touched, (Brannan 67-68) and the more that was so the more the HBC was hurt. As Rae later put it, the truth did not matter—what was said about the North was mostly “balderdash.”[(Bunyon et al.)[that citation is incorrect] All that counted was public perception. Decades before, Dease and Simpson had smoothed the way for first renewal of the monopoly licence. But sending Rae north just before it expired again had the opposite effect. He, too, had named a major arctic feature after the queen. More than that, he had learned Franklin’s fate, which had worried all the world. Yet The Frozen Deep showed Rae and his story, and therefore his employer, unworthy of trust.99 What astounds is that the very opposite picture of Eskimos—i.e. of a gentle, kindly people—could be propagated at the very same time and also work against the HBC.

Eskimos as a Noble People What Richardson wrote in his 1851 book unknowingly raised anti-HBC feeling, for his fine depiction of the Kukpugmiut showed that fur-trade contact with them should have been an easy matter, and that there was no excuse for it not having happened to date. Stories that accused them of slaughter, treachery, and “very bad character” were untrue, and due to distortions by the G’Wichin.100101 It was the latter who were mean in their ways, and always attacked from ambush. The Kukpugmiut, by contrast, fought in the open. Though their enemies had guns and they had none, they came south each year to trade. Hardy travelers, “brave and resolute,” they deserved admiration like Norsemen.

Given such excellent character, it was all the more chilling to find in a book that came out two years later (by a Franklin searcher who happened to be on the Mackenzie shortly after it happened) a long and lurid second-hand account of the 1850 massacre of Kukpugmiut at Point Separation. Throughout, the words evoked horror, especially in terms of the role of Manuel: “Alas the day that so foul and bloody an act of treachery could be perpetrated! and alas, shame and degradation that a white man could be found worse fiend than the untutored savage!”102 The consequence would be “extensive and irremediable.” Whites were now included in Eskimos’ “undying” vengeance. Company men at Peel’s River would be killed by a people “so cruelly wronged.” (Hooper 373) What the public did not know was that that by the time this appeared the Kukpugmiut had visited the fort and established good rapport with its trader. None of that, however, mattered to Isbister and his friends. Isbister’s role in the Aborigines Protection Society had by then advanced to being a member of its board, whose stance against the HBC he directed.103 In an 1856 appeal to Secretary of Colonial Affairs Henry Labouchère,104 the Society (i.e. Isbister) used a legal pirouette to show the Company had “betrayed” its charter. But rather than quote that seventeenth-century parchment, it quoted orders to colonies of around the same time. (Aborigines Protection Society) These directed that natives receive no “provocation,” and that no British subject, “nor any of their servants,” do them harm. Should they suffer violence, governors must “severely punish” the perpetrators. The quotes and their assembly could not have been put in a way that more closely applied to the 1850 Point Separation killings and the participation of Manuel. The orders also insisted salvation reach all tribes “though never so remote.” Italicized in the APS pamphlet, the words proved the HBC had failed to live up to obligations and must therefore forfeit its hold. (Aborigines Protection Society Appendix I, 19, 23 ) Isbister ensured the appeal’s appearance in many newspapers, including leading ones in Upper Canada.(Aborigines Protection Society 11), and fed them information that triggered comment against the HBC. Some of the stoking came from his uncle William Kennedy, a few years older than he, who had been raised for years by Isbister’s mother. The two were almost siblings.105 For a while a trader in Ungava, Kennedy had become disgruntled with the HBC, left the fur trade and moved to Upper Canada. In the north his time and McLean’s overlapped, and their houses near Guelph were within a short ride of each other. Overbearing in faith (“religious cant” as Sir George called it)(Cooper 242), he was sure of his cause. 106 To Toronto merchants Kennedy spoke of gold and other riches easily to be had on Company land. Much of his talk concerned the Mackenzie District, where he had never been, and details of which he likely got from Isbister and McLean: coal abounded, a vast supply of tar served only to seal trader’s

boots, and copper lay above ground. Whales sported at the river’s mouth, but given HBC apathy it would likely fall to the people of San Francisco to get them.(Aborigines Protection Society 11-12) As editors responded, Isbister packed their lines into an APS pamphlet, admixed with his comment. Couched in concern for natives, what it again boiled down to was that their travels must stop. To make that point, he quoted The Economist, which referred to John McLean’s 1849 book and his “enthusiastic” depiction of converted Indians “living on their farms, grouped round their Protestant Pastor [James Evans].” (Aborigines Protection Society 6) But instead of becoming Christians in such settings, natives were left to “degradation.” Tens of thousands perished while alcohol and syphilis wrecked their lives. It followed that parliament must end HBC rule, and open its land to immigration.(Aborigines Protection Society 3,5) What next came into play was a report from the Investigator. After passing the Delta in 1850 its journey had ended in the Central Arctic where it was entombed by ice, and from there its crew two years later trekked to rescue on the Atlantic side. Only after further delays did they get back home. So the public did not read their reports until nearly a decade after they left Britain. Miertsching’s diary was lost, reconstituted by himself, and not published till a century later. But it shows what sentiment he conveyed to others on board. As he saw it, tribes on the coast were ripe for the message of Jesus. Delta natives put Christians to shame by their thrift and hard work, 107 and others further east shouted in amazement when he told them of God. “Why,” he cried, “has the Lord banished these folk here where no missionary can reach them?”(Neatby 54,63) The 1857 book by ship’s surgeon Alex Armstrong reflected these thoughts. He lauded Eskimos’ ingenuity, tenacity, and endurance. They were “unequalled to any other race on the face of the globe.” Most striking was their kindness and civility towards whites. (Armstrong 198, 167) That made it all the more deplorable to find in the Empire a people “so utterly neglected.” Armstrong does not tell whom he spoke to on reaching home, but his stance exactly matched that of Isbister and the APS. That no one had lifted “heathen darkness” did not surprise, for monopoly blocked progress. Parliament should “destroy” the one consisting of the HBC. Only when its grip had gone could Eskimos use the North to their own “permanent advancement and happiness.” (Armstrong 156, 198-9) By such reasoning the Company did as much wrong where it was not as where it had long been. In a last-minute footnote, Armstrong told how happy he was that Colonial Secretary Labouchère had raised the matter in the House of Commons. Its committee was now digesting the sad information as it deliberated what to do with the HBC. (Armstrong 198)108

The 1857 Parliamentary Hearings At the 1857 parliamentary hearings on renewal of the HBC licence, several of the star witnesses, most prominently Isbister, had spent time in the Mackenzie. He answered more questions than anyone else, and was the only witness allowed two full day sessions, separated by several months.

His style had changed from that of an attack-dog—the tone was quite calm, the wording moderate, the reasoning confident, even though he had not been in the Northwest for fourteen years. There was a tactical retreat as he claimed that a decade earlier he had had nothing to do with the wording or content of the Red River petition, and that his role had been entirely restricted to presenting it to parliament. And evasion showed when he was asked if opening the Company’s lands to colonists would harm natives. Much to the frustration of the one parliamentarian who supported the Company, he refused to say yes or no. Since a great deal depended on the issue, his interrogator wondered why of a sudden this most vocal of HBC critics could not speak. That Isbister took this new, more confident, more gentlemanly and learned approach had to do with several factors. For one, his campaign against the HBC had born fruit and he knew that a number of the committee members were allies. In fact he met with some after hours to prepare them for the next session. So he himself could now speak in a more subdued tone. Moreover, these hearings were themselves a means to boost the respect he had long wanted, and his appearance there would help boost his career. There was also a matter of impending academic recognition—an honorary M.A. from the faculty of arts at the University of Edinburgh. Somehow he had arranged to have it bestowed, and in the meantime had to be on best behavior, showing himself worthy of the laurel. One might speculate that the sponsor was a former professor at Aberdeen with whom he had a private relationship, or one of the committee members who wished to thank him for his role in preparations for the hearings. Also a candidate is Lady Jane Franklin, who might have wanted to thank him for his work against the HBC, including his testimony before the committee. Perhaps, too, she wished to show in this way her gratitude to his uncle William Kennedy, who had left his business in Upper Canada in 1853 and, despite knowing nothing of sailing, led an arctic searching expedition for her husband. Whoever or whatever was behind it (senate records from the university in Edinburgh reveal neither) the recognition was to be formalized exactly a year after the start of the parliamentary hearings. The one time Isbister resorted to abusive language was in discussing the churches. That they had not complained about HBC tactics towards missions was due its giving preachers at each post an emolument for teaching school. The money was a “sop” designed to halt criticism of its dreadful treatment of natives and its constant block of missions. The Rev. Corbett, and Anglican cleric at odds with most of his Red River colleagues (he was funded by the high wing of his church, rather than the evangelical one to which the others belonged) backed the charges up, along with numerous others designed to show the HBC blocked the spread of the gospel. But when the Anglican bishop of the Northwest was asked about the sop, he instantly denied it, pointing out that the church itself would have paid its men for teaching had the Company not done so.109

Sir George Simpson testified in a single session that took up parts of two consecutive days. And since Isbister attended, it gave him time in the evening to speak to allies on the committee and help them focus questions. Three issues came up time and again. First, there was the occurrence of cannibalism among native tribes. No one at the hearings, other than HBC staff, recognized that the Far North could support only a very small human population and that the smallest vagary could bring about disaster. In Isbister and the committee’s view there was no such thing Machiavelli’s necessità—matters humans cannot change, so they laid all hunger and misery at the Company’s feet. Here Sir George made a major error in denying that cannibalism ever occurred. Since the committee had copies of letters giving the exact time and place, including one from William Kennedy during his days in Ungava, and another from John Bell at Peel’s River by Loucheux outside his own gates, the governor looked deceptive. In defence he might have brought up the incident in 1842 on the trail between Peel’s River and Good Hope, showing that his own men lost their lives over a natural calamity (the disappearance of wildlife) that recurred every six or seven years. He may have been influenced by his perception that no matter what the Company did or how its men behaved, outsiders would turn it against them. It may also be that his memory was failing. Similarly, Isbister had the committee primed to get at the 1850 killing of Kukpugmiut at Point Separation and the participation of Manuel in that affair. Here Simpson was either exquisitely foxy or again short of recall, for he managed to turn the attention of his interrogators (who could not grasp fine distinctions of locations and tribes) to an incident two decades earlier near Great Bear Lake where HBC men, laborers at the lowest level, had killed Indians to gain access to their wives. One of the perpetrators had been sent to Montreal for trial. When it came to shabby treatment of retired company servants, Simpson failed to mention that the Company often provided permanent help to native widows of company men and to laborers injured on the job. Only after HBC staff reminded him of this did he tell the committee on returning the second day. But rear action of that sort did little to dispel the sense that he either did not know important facts about HBC rule, or was hiding them from view. This sense of deception on the Company’s part was heightened by the appearance of Rae, who because of his story of cannibalism by Franklin’s men had become a widely known figure. In the public mind it was he, more than anyone else, who represented HBC values. At the very time he was appearing before the committee Dickens’s play the Frozen Deep was destroying his claim and showing he could not be trusted. So it did not help when Rae at the hearings attempted to explain how the Company’s barter looked unfair when viewed from a single angle, but that overall it served natives best and kept the balance of animal life intact.

By paying too little for the best of fur, Rae explained, and too much for that least wanted, the Company ensured that certain creatures got a chance to live, and thereby ensured a continuing source of income to natives. And if they paid what seemed an extravagant amount for a single needle, there was ample compensation through their being able to buy other items at unduly cheap cost. The argument might have held water except that Rae used his experience in the Mackenzie to back it up. While in charge of that district in 1849-1850, Governor Simpson had become concerned about the ugly publicity generated by Isbister in London. The former apprentice had given wide circulation to the list of exchange used while he was at Fort Simpson and Peel’s River. By telling people only of the high prices charged for trifles, he was showing Britain that the Company was abusing native people. In response, Simpson ordered Rae to have the prices changed. Rae told the committee of these instructions, but then volunteered he had ignored them, feeling that matters were fine as they were (he had, in effect, refused to bow to outside critics). To make matters worse, when he was asked to explain the “made beaver” system of trade he botched it completely and at last admitted he had never really understood it himself. So instead of defending the Company, Rae inflicted a major wound. As effectively as Dickens, and while meaning to do the opposite, he created doubt about the integrity of himself and his employer. Apart from cannibalism and the high price of trifles, a major subject pre-occupying the committee was the agricultural potential of the Mackenzie. This followed from Isbister’s relentless drive to tie his own mission of revenge to Christian views about farming and conversion—and also to white colonists’ desire for Company land. If it could be shown that the Mackenzie would support farms then there would be two good reasons to end Company rule. First, it would show that Indians could have been brought in from the woods to till land and learn of Jesus. Second, there would be no loss to the economy if HBC men were no longer present, for white colonists could remove the trees, produce crops, and grow livestock. And if this held for the Mackenzie, the Company’s most remote terrain, all of the terrain south of it (which presumably would be even warmer) could also be devoted that purpose. The potential for immigration was immense. What fed that thought was that Isbister and MacLean had made the government aware of the HBC farm at Fort Simpson, and the potatoes, barley, and milk it provided. That the concept of Mackenzie River farming was mostly myth no one at the hearings seemed to grasp. So, time and again, from this angle and that, committee members probed to make it seem such a project was a reasonable thought. When Rae was asked about farming at James Bay, where he had long worked , he replied that nothing had come of it, as fields were prepared and natives handed potatoes, but that after an initial planting they never came back. [see mission picture of potato fields at Moose Factory]. The person most suited to puncturing dreams of farming in the Far North was General John Lefroy, an expert on nature’s magnetic force, who had in the spring of 1844 when still a junior army

officer spent several months at Fort Simpson (while Peers and MacLean were there). He pointed out that it sat on island created by alluvial soil, carried there by the river, and happened to sit in a spot where warm winds from the mountains sometimes reached the shore . But everywhere else, permafrost extended deep into the ground, and the yield of crops would be next to nil. Unfortunately for the HBC, Lefroy happened to mention, just as he ended his testimony, that while traveling on a Company boat downstream from Fort Simpson on the Mackenzie he had had to share space with a cow (almost every post then had one or two, and sometimes a bull as well). That made it seem husbandry of all sorts of creatures might easily be achieved in that distant location. It added another blow to HBC prospects, and gave further credence to what Isbister and MacLean had been saying all along.

Missionaries on the Mackenzie At the very time that HBC prestige was day-by-day being chipped away in London, Anglican Rev. James [xxx] Hunter in 1857 asked the Church Missionary Society for leave from his Red River Settlement parish. He yearned to go north to convert the Eskimos of the Delta. 110 Thirteen years earlier, he had come from Britain to Cumberland House on the Saskatchewan (near the upper end of Lake Winnipeg) an important post since it was there brigades turned north toward the Mackenzie. 111When his wife died shortly after, leaving him an infant son, he soon married again— this time to Jean, daughter of Donald Ross at Norway House, the most influential chief factor in that part of the world, and a confidant of Governor George Simpson. The young woman, who had at one point briefly been betrothed to McLean, spoke fluent Cree and provided much help in the young missionary’s work.112 In 1849, he was promoted to archdeacon. Five years later Hunter moved to the Red River Settlement, with its high societal stress. The Rev. xxxx Corbett, Anglican clergyman in an adjacent church, held rabid anti-Company views and stoked them among the English-speaking population. Still, there was hope for improving Hunter’s life. The bishop113 was aging, and he may have thought to gain the prelate’s post. One way to raise his chance was to scout remote terrain. Hunter also had religious motives. Oblates of Mary Immaculate, the shock-troops of their faith, had bypassed Anglican sites and nearly reached the Mackenzie. 114 He planned to drive “right through their ranks” to Fort Simpson and Peel’s River. “Papal darkness” would still hold the center, but “rays of the Protestant truth” would rule the far side. The trip meant absence from home and wife (a fourth child had just arrived), but he looked forward with pleasure to planting the cross on the coast. 115 [also HBC personnel sheet] That prospects were good was shown by Peter, an Eskimo servant who with his master, an Anglican cleric, had just arrived from Ungava. “Remarkable in honesty and truthfulness . . . faithful,

unsophisticated and diligent,” he showed the hopeful nature of his people. It affirmed Rae’s words (apparently prior to his 1848 trip to the Delta) that they were the country’s “fairest” tribe and the “easiest to bring under Christian instruction.”116 But nothing came of plans to learn Peter’s tongue and take him on the journey, for he “drooped” and passed away—it was said because of the climate.117 The death did lessen Hunter’s drive, for in addition to Inuit he hoped to convert the Mackenzie’s Dene tribes. As he told the CMS, they “well disposed toward the gospel” and must at once be brought into the Protestant fold. Delay meant yielding them to Rome, for if priests gained hearts it could not be reversed. Hence his rush to “get possession” of Fort Simpson. Success was likely, for Bernard Rogan Ross, in charge of the district, had asked him in.118 They knew each other well from the years both had spent at posts on the Saskatchewan River. More than that, they were brothers-in-law, for Bernard had taken one of Chief Trader Donald Ross’s younger daughters as partner. [ ] Hunter left for the “blessed work” on an HBC brigade in June 1858. 119 As he passed certain posts, he wistfully thought of the two young Oblates who had opened missions there and had already been promoted to bishop.120 At Fort Resolution he met Father Henri Grollier, a man of sharp words and fanatical views who was making his mark. In winter he had married Charles Gaudet, a young trader from Catholic Montreal, and his mixed-blood wife. (Payment 1-14) As it pained him to see the “enemy” advance, he chose to leave the local work and travel at Hunter’s side. 121 [ref.] The minister feared Grollier would gain souls, for Oblates had the support of French-speaking “half-casts” (descendants of fur-trade servants born in Quebec) and native wives, all adherent to Rome.122 Meanwhile his opponent felt certain God wanted it that way: it was his happy role to take possession of the Mackenzie, which the machinations of “fanatical Orangism,” (i.e. Chief Trader Bernard Ross, raised in Northern Ireland) would otherwise have handed to Hunter. [citation?] That Ross hated Rome was clear, for when Indians at Fort Simpson flocked to the priest, he sent him back south at once. That winter at another Mackenzie District post123 Hunter’s work was marred by a half-breed woman (baptized a Catholic years earlier in the South) who told everyone “the difference between priest and minister.” Indians now understood Hunter was “l’homme d’une femme,” a man linked to a woman, while Oblates belonged to God. For making that point Grollier thought she deserved “limitless recognition.” [ref.?] But her tone in 1858-9 may have been especially sharp, for her daughter was the wife of Gaudet, who had just renounced his Catholic faith and adopted that of Hunter.124 Peer pressure likely caused the move, for the Oblate advance had raised officers’ ire, especially that of Bernard Ross.125 Now that a priest had arrived on the Mackenzie, Gaudet may have feared that being a “Papist” would stall his career. His switch that winter was Hunter’s only success, for natives (except for a few who did so briefly) would not come his way. Grollier gleefully wrote that in July he left in shame to rejoin his “dear other half.” [ref.?]

Hunter’s view of the people on the coast had by now greatly changed. Rather than peaceful and eager to learn, they were “a very treacherous and blood thirsting race.”126 A Loucheux’s recent murder of his Eskimo wife had made them vow revenge, so given the risk he had not gone past Good Hope. The threat was overblown, for that very year an HBC clerk127 visited the Kukpugmiut on the coast. Well received, he found them “anxious for a settled intercourse” with whites. Still, given the hatred between them and Loucheux, Chief Trader Bernard Ross felt they must not come to Peel’s River. And he dared found no post in the Delta without a competent translator. If some Loucheux were capable of communicating with the Kukpugmiut, as other parts of this story seemingly show, they seem to have lost that skill when it suited them. Having lost the battle in terms of keeping whites away from the coast, one might well conclude they were using language to keep up a barrier. Whether is true or not, Ross was frustrated by the inability to explain his fur-trade plans and needs to the people on the coast. Why, he impatiently asked Sir George, was it not possible to get a translator from Ungava or Hudson’s Bay, where the HBC had long dealt with these people? 128 The need was strong because he had sent another clerk, Roderick MacFarlane, to the tribe at the mouth of the Anderson, east of the Mackenzie. If a post were built there, it would serve not only nearby bands but people from the Delta. The latter through frequent contact would soon turn “docile” and a second fort, just for them, could then be built. The site had already been picked129 130 From the Kukpugmiut’s point of view, the HBC plan changed their plight. If a fort on the Anderson came about, they would share whites’ attention with other tribes. Travel there would be mainly overland, and besides would not fit their spring migration through the Delta. Fortunately (as they may have seen it) MacFarlane’s two forays to the coast did not go as well as he had hoped.131 The presence of Dene in his party caused problems. [reference?] To avoid such issues, MacFarlane asked for a boy to take south for training as an interpreter. Though he failed, Ross hoped a similar request by Gaudet (who had taken over at Peel’s River) would bring success. His stay with the Kukpugmiut in 1858 boosted HBC fortunes, as he “enjoyed their hospitality” and got many pelts.132 But it seems his suggestion a youth go and live among whites needed time for discussion. Families on the coast, with few exceptions, consisted of four people: an adult couple, a boy, and a girl (a formula that changed in tandem with the number of wives the man might have). Other offspring were left to die or given up for adoption. By the time a boy reached ten he was capable of helping with hunts. The same held for girls assisting their mother. To give one up at that stage meant great loss in terms of day-to-day life and security for the future. Besides, bonds of love were tight. On the other hand, contrary to the perception many southerners still hold have of that world, some children were miserably unhappy. For those who past the infant stage had been orphaned or given

away, the relationship with parents was that of master and slave. Though worked the hardest, they were last to be fed, and wore decrepit clothes. [reference from Nuligak] During the winter the following may have happened. The Kukpugmiut decided to let two children go. But in return, they wanted a post in the Delta. On hearing their wish in spring, Gaudet advised it would carry more weight if posed directly to Ross. Then he arranged for emissaries (Tiktik and his group) to go with him a few months later to Fort Simpson. Gaudet did not know it, but the scheme fit perfectly with new pressure from Sir George, who wanted a fort near the coast built at once. “You will apply yourself with energy” he ordered Ross, “to the early accomplishment of that object.” The Company could send no interpreter from the East, as none were in its employ, so the only remedy was “to offer sufficient inducement to the Esquimaux to allow one or two or more children” to be raised among staff. For both this and the fort there was no limit to cost.133 Ross got the letter in July 1859 on arriving with the district’s furs at Portage La Loche. Debarking at that point was Hunter who was returning south (where his daughter Maria would die before he got home) and coming aboard was his replacement, William Kirkby. The new man’s role was to stay in the North and start a mission and school at Fort Simpson.134 The governor’s missive also told that the HBC licence to the Far Northwest had not been renewed. So its role in helping Anglicans was no longer as governing body, but as “private individuals.” That applied as well to Father Grollier, who would join the brigade as it made its way north and stay at Fort Simpson until the boats from the Lower Mackenzie went home. He was on his way to start a mission at Good Hope. Implicit in all this was HBC concern for its hold on Rupert’s Land, the giant area from Ungava to the Rocky Mountains for which its charter would be up for review just a few years on. After the nasty things said about the Mackenzie District at the 1857 parliamentary hearings and made public in preceding years (much of it through Isbister’s machinations), it was here that the Company had to show its willingness to trade with the people of the Arctic Coast. As well, it had to been seen supporting churches in the endeavor to teach them of Jesus. And that held true even though the Mackenzie was not a part of Rupert’s Land. Sir George, as a result, ordered the Mackenzie’s chief trader to avoid all conflict with clerics and help them to the full extent local conditions permitted. [ ] He had already rapped Ross for shipping Grollier south the prior year, [ref.] after his bishop had lodged a complaint.[reference?] The immediate effect was that whites gathered at Fort Simpson might shun Father Grollier while he was at the post, but he was free to roam around.

Perfect Kneeling At each Mackenzie District post, the clerk’s summer departure was timed to reach Fort Simpson just as the chief trader returned there with goods from the South. That way crews (whose number came

close to a hundred) only briefed strained supplies. Gaudet arrived August 15, less than twenty four hours after the Portage brigade. With him was James Flett and family from a site subsidiary to Peel’s River.135 But what made for excitement was the presence on board of Tiktik and his companions: a man and wife and their boy, and nine-year-old Attingarek, who had come without her parents.136 The crowd was thrilled by their height, intelligence, good nature, exotic dress and “remarkably fine” looks. The children “would pass among a number of Europeans without notice.” Kirkby was beside himself with joy. “Here,” he wrote in his journal, “is a new tribe to the Redeemer. May his glorious Kingdom be speedily established among them.”137 The promise seemed especially strong because these people spent part of the year in permanent dwellings. Given were they lived, they could not, of course, be made to farm, the sine qua non of approaches to conversion in the South. But there was no need to collect them in communal settings since they already did so themselves. Their “large villages” on the coast were “all so many facilities to the progress of the Gospel.” Already, Ross had promised accommodation at the fort to be built nearby. Grollier, too, had asked to go, but was not allowed.138 To Tiktik and his fellow Kukpugmiut the link between mission and trade must have seemed very close. In the mess room the day after their arrival Ross told them he would place a post wherever they wished. But he needed an interpreter and asked that the boy and girl be left with Kirkby for training. When the men agreed, Kirkby “lept with joy.” He could not believe his good fortune. Within days of reaching his posting he had the privilege of training two young Eskimos in the ways of the Lord. They were means for “carrying the glorious tidings of salvation to the whole of their numerous countrymen.” As the session ended, the chief trader was about to make gifts when Gaudet asked for a change in procedure. To establish an “attraction” between cleric and future converts, he suggested Kirkby hand out the goods. And that was how it was done.139 Next morning, a Sunday, the Eskimos came to worship in the same packed room and behaved “with the greatest decorum.” They stood, sat, and kneeled “as if they had been used to it for years.” Never before had Kirkby so strongly felt “the gracious assistance” of his God.140 On Monday in Kirkby’s room in the officers’ quarters the visitors left nothing untouched. A clock and umbrella intrigued them most, but they were not content just to look. Wanting goods to take home, they made signs for knives, scissors, and needles. Kirkby took them to the store and purchased it all. Then Gaudet brought a translator (a Loucheux who had come on the journey from Peel’s River) so that Hunter could speak at length “of Jesus and salvation.”141 By Tuesday all except the woman appeared in European clothes. The men and the boy proudly wore suits, the girl a dress and bonnet, which Ross had had the tailor make. But Kirkby was aghast, for the priest had hung a crucifix from their necks. The figure, he had told them, was “the child of the sun” and if worn without fail (like the amulets on their own clothing) would save them from harm. Gaudet

threw the crosses to the ground while raising a hand “as if in horror and disgust,” afterwards explaining this was the best way of preventing Delta people from accepting such items again.142 It was not until a week after the Kukpugmiut’s arrival, as they boarded Gaudet’s boat for home, that the boy realized he was to stay at Fort Simpson. He wailed so strongly and clung to his mother so tightly that (to Kirkby’s immense distress) she relented and took him along. Attingarek, without parents to appeal to, was the only one left behind. At Peel’s River, where a large number of Kukpugmiut met the boat, the delegates told of their excellent treatment. So good was the news, many offered to go the next year. But when matters related to Attingarek came up, conflict arose. Chief Trader Ross had sent a present to the girl’s father, and as he stepped forward to claim it another man wanted it also. It turned out she had belonged to two families in sequence. At some point one had given her up to the other, and there she was raised. It was the second father who argued the gift should go to him, for he was taking the greater loss. As a fight was about to erupt, Gaudet proposed the gift be shared, to which the men agreed.143

Attingarek HBC postmaster James Flett (who remained at Fort Simpson that winter) and his Loucheux wife next received Kirkby’s attention, as he sanctioned their marriage and baptized their brood. None of it impressed Attingarek, “the poor little Eskimo girl,” who looked dull and withdrawn. Many tried to keep her busy, but without success.144 The only one to comfort her was a “pure Loucheux” boy, an orphan Gaudet had brought from Peel’s River who knew enough of her tongue to converse. Though called William Flett, he had no tie to families with that name. Mrs. Flett spoke some Eskimo, and it was in her home that Attingarek stayed.145 Each day with William and four others she went to Kirkby’s school. As they gained skill in saying letters and body parts, she pulled out of her depression. Smart as the rest, she was “perfectly happy and anxious to learn.”146 Over time she became fluent in English. In 1861 one of Attingarek’s fathers, also a chief, came to Peel’s River and told Gaudet he wanted to see her the next year. 147 But to make the trip to Fort Simpson by Company boat he needed consent from Bernard Ross, who in spring refused it, preferring he come the next year.148 And by then something had happened to the chief’s relationship with Gaudet, who counseled against his going.149 150 So reunion of the two never took place. Attingarek further lost connection to home when her name was changed. It may at first have happened in an informal way, but was documented when Augustus Peers, though long dead, arrived at the fort. During postings at Fort Norman and Peel’s River, he had often expressed “a strong dislike, in the event of his death, that his bones should rest at either spot.” So in early 1863 Gaudet dug his wellpreserved body from the permafrost at Peel’s River and took him to Good Hope. From there Roderick MacFarlane, clerk at that post, brought him the rest of the way.(MacFarlane 12-15) All along strange

howling was heard at night, and at Fort Simpson, as Ross and MacFarlane spoke in the dark from adjacent beds before falling asleep, they had a sudden, overwhelming sense that Peers was present and trying to speak with them. The trade Peers had started with the people of the Delta was about to take a leap, for MacFarlane was during that visit instructed to build a fort near the coast. But it was on the Anderson River, and not in the Delta as the Kukpugmiut had hoped. The Reverend Kirkby, who seems not to have grasped just how far that would be, quickly baptized Attingarek and the boy William Flett, so MacFarlane could report the news “to their friends.” [xxxx] Baptism in that era involved assigning a new first name, often one from the bible. Rarely, however, did ministers choose one of special liking to the Roman Church. So it may seem strange that Kirkby called the girl Maria, after Jesus’ mother, to whom Rome gave what Protestants thought was idolatrous adulation—and that all the more so since the pope a few years before had proclaimed her immaculate conception (i.e. that unlike other humans she was born without sin). In Rome strong push for the doctrine had come from the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, the very order whose priests in the North were the Anglicans’ fierce opponents. Yet the minister probably had no choice, as many Scottish women were called Mary, including the sister of Chief Factor Bernard Ross, as well as his deceased mother-in-law (long the wife of a Chief Factor at Norway House), who held the same relationship to Archdeacon Hunter. Perhaps also in play was the 1857 death of the latter’s daughter Maria. In any case, Attingarek was now Maria Ross. Despite the hope raised by Tiktik’s visit to Fort Simpson, Kirkby made no effort to contact the Kukpugmiut and instruct them further. Three years later, on his way to the Yukon, and quite by accident, he came across a group at Point Separation. The men carried knives, spears, and arrows, but used none as they grabbed his boat and stole some goods. In an account published by the Smithsonian Institution, he featured their good looks, which he thought reflected an intellect higher than that of Indians, a claim he bolstered by referring to Attingarek. Left with him not long before, she now spoke and read English “with considerable accuracy.”(Kirkby 416-20) Despite that fine result, however, she brought him no help in evangelization. Girls on the coast became sexually active at a young age and often experienced trial marriage before setting up a permanent home. And in the fur-trade world (Isbister’s father is an example) men took very young brides. As Franklin noted on his Mackenzie journey four decades earlier, “The girls at the forts . . . are given in marriage very young: they are frequently wives at 12 years of age, and mothers at 14.”151 So it is no surprise that Attingarek at age thirteen became partner to William Brass, a postmaster who spent time at Fort Simpson. In telling the Church Mission Society of the marriage (which seems to have occurred à la façon du pays during his absence) Kirkby failed to hide dismay in noting her new station: “As far as earthly

things go she has a comfortable home for her future life.” He made no mention of the hereafter, but hoped she might still help his work. At present Brass was at a post well south of the treeline,152 but Kirkby hoped that if plans came through to place him at Peel’s River (where he had been before), Attingarek could “tell her poor countrymen something of Jesus.”153 None of that came about. The next year Brass included private matters in a business report to Fort Simpson, but since that broke the usual code, he was thoroughly chewed out.[citation?] None of it was transcribed in the correspondence book and no personal letters by him have to date been found. How long Attingarek stayed his wife, whether she bore children, or what age she attained, no one seems to know.154

Envoi Despite their Fort Simpson visit, the Kukpugmiut did not get a fort in their midst. Nor did they find much use for the one on the Anderson River. Chief Trader Ross in 1861 confidently wrote Sir George (not knowing he was dead) that it would bring “an important and lucrative trade.” 155 When instead for two years it led only to costs, a decision was made to move it to the Delta. 156 A site was chosen, wood was cut, and frames for buildings prepared. Then that plan, too, was stopped. Given reprieve, Fort Anderson made further loss and by 1865 stood empty. Inuit later burnt it down for nails. Promise of a new establishment among the Kukpugmiut was made from time to time, especially when Russian trade via coastal tribes hurt profit at Peel’s River, but that, too, came to naught. (Vanast) When in 1889, as William Kennedy had warned, Americans began to whale the Beaufort Sea, the HBC once more planned a post in the Delta. It was in such a place Stringer thought he would stay on first coming north. But it was whalers themselves who at Herschel Island put up a trading post, and after their departure for better whaling further east, Stringer from 1896 to 1901 ran it for them. He lived in one of their buildings and established his mission there. As in 1859, trade and evangelization could not have been more closely bound. What Tiktik thought in later years of his stay at an HBC post and his talk with white shamans we will never know. It is likely he came many times to Peel’s River in spring, but the only time it was noted was in 1873 when he arrived among the earliest at the post.157 But there may have been years when quarrels at home stopped his travels, as he played a central role in a cycle of killing between his own and another family.158 Also causing decline in Kukpugmiut numbers was epidemic illness, which swept through Loucheux and Inuit bands alike. When Tiktik’s wife died in November 1885, she was brought to Peel’s River, and lay frozen in the warehouse beside the bodies of three G’Wichin.159 It seems likely that in spring she was buried in the same grounds where Peers had for a decade lain. Were she dug up today her features would be starkly intact (as in the case of some of Franklin’s men, disinterred a century and a half after death).[ ]

Of Tiktik no word can be found past his wife’s demise. He was no longer there when in 1892 Anglican missionary Isaac Stringer arrived from his family’s farm in Ontario (on the very terrain that in the 1830s had raised Aboriginal Protection Society ire because of the removal of Indians). The young cleric’s ally was soon Takochikina, whose people had been Tiktik’s opponents in the feud.

Sukayak Very close to the time of the death of his wife, either sometime before or after, Tiktik had a new daughter. It may be the child was her, or that like a number of Kukpugmiut men, he had several wives, and that after the loss of the older one, the younger one remained. It may also be that he took a new woman into his household at this time. Perhaps the name the little got Sukayak (the fast one) reflected the speed with which she arrived, though it is more likely it came from someone who died. It may even have been Tiktik’s deceased wife. Married when very young, Sukayak she lost her husband to a stray bullet, fired from inside a tent by a whaling captain in 1896. Soon after, she became the wife of Ivitkuna, a Kukpugmiuk who each year made a journey to Herschel Island. Conversely, they were among the people who welcomed Isaac Stringer when he visited them in winter far in the Eastern Delta—as at Koowachuck and Tapkok, well out on the Tuktoyaktuk Peninsula. In the spring of ending in 1901 the couple worked briefly for the Anglican mission, where Isaac took a photograph of them that has to date not been found. He did chores such as bringing in wood from the Yukon coast; she sewed beautiful caribou coats (trimmed with beaver and wolf, and finely crafted strips of white skin from intra-uterine deer) for Isaac and Sadie and their two children. It was in these garments that in the fall they had themselves photographed in a studio in San Francisco. They also wore them years later to tour Britain and meet the king and queen. Ivitkuna and Sugkajoq left for the Eastern Delta in April 1901 and Stringer met them there when he visited as bishop eight years later. Contrary to the claim of anthropologists such as Diamond Jenness that their culture had been wiped out, they were among the many Kukpugmiut (about 120 of 200) who survived back-to-back 1901-1902 viral epidemics. They were camped with others at Nalugogiak and it was there, in Ivitkuna’s tent, that a “a hearty service” was held. Stringer’s successor Charles Whittaker baptized them the next summer at Kittigazuit. What made it into books about Kukpugmiut in the early twentieth century comes in part from Tiktik’s daughter and her husband. Nuligak writes about the couple at that time (he and his uncle with Ivitkuna went fishing), and when Stefansson met them at Kangianuk in 1906 he measured their heads. On his second expedition his companion Anderson visited them at Baillie Island, where they lived in a snowhouse, which he thought a structure only rarely used by these people. He took pictures of them there, and more near Kittigazuit later that year.

In April 1912 Stefansson found them at Igloryaraluit (which whites sometimes spelled Iglogzyooit) surviving on ptarmigan alone. But matters improved and late the next year they made a Christmas offering of a red fox to the Anglican Church. Their ties to that institution remained strong, and when in 1921 their son was married by Christian rite, a man named Jerry Tiktik (of whom more below) was a witness. The last we hear of them, and therefore of the original Tiktik’s line, is in 1924, when they were interviewed by Knud Rasmussen, who mentions them in his Notes. But their descendants are surely alive and with a little work could easily be found today. Between 1898 and1900 Stringer mentions a younger Tiktik five times.160 Ethnologist V. Stefansson reported how this man and his wife Julia (then forty-one years old) in 1907 gave a baby to a chief. As it was unwell, the latter “spoke” to it in shamanic language with “exclamations, declarations, and questions,” to which an adult audience at times replied. A separate snowhouse was then built so the child would have quiet.161 Three years later the couple was among many baptized and married by Anglican rite at Kittigazuit, 162 and a few summers thereafter they were among a group that were photographed [see picture] as they volunteered to take the gospel to the mouth of the Coppermine, though weather stopped them from getting there. Another child arrived the next year and was named after the apostle Mark. Tiktik had by then learned to write and in the 1914-15 winter exchanged worried letters with other Inuit about a shaman who still practiced his skills.163 It would be nice for this story if it could be shown that this protector of the Christian faith had at his birth (1872 by notoriously vague church estimate) been given the name of the one who half a century earlier had seen Fort Simpson, and thereby become that person. But given what we know at present, that is stretching a point. 164 After visiting Fort Simpson in 1859, the first Tiktik of this story promised to send his own boy the next summer, but there is no record of that having happened. The HBC did not succeed for years to have a youngster come south from the coast, and the first documented case involved the Catholic Church. In xxxx Oblate Father Emile Petitot, who showed throughout his Mackenzie career an inability to control his homosexual drives, brought [name?] a boy, a Kukpugmiuk, south from Peel’s River to Fort Good Hope to assist in compiling a dictionary of his language.[ref?] As a married adult at Peel’s River in the early 1890s (where he had a Loucheux wife and worked for the HBC) that same person, then known as George Greenland, served as translator to Reverend Stringer and accompanied him on his first visit to the “Eskimo Village” (Kittigazuit). [xxxx] Simultaneously he also secretly also helped the minister’s Oblate competitors. [xxxx] One of his sons in 1918 opened the first HBC post in the Delta.165 Another young Kukpugmiuk, dubbed David Copperfield by whites, along with his parents and siblings at some point stayed at several Hudson’s Bay Company posts, possibly as far south as Fort

Simpson and Fort Rae. During that sojourn he developed a loving relationship with Anglican cleric William Spendlove (a married man), whose image he wore in a medal suspended from the neck. He was trained to translate, and may have served the HBC, as he became close friend with a trader at Peel’s River.166 Missionaries counted on his help to make inroads among the people of the Delta. David’s passion for women was evident early on, and cut short his life.167 In the 1897 while working at Herschel Island for a whaler he was involved with a native girl (probably from Alaska) whose charms he shared with one of the crew. When conflict erupted and he was barred from the ship, he put a bullet through his own heart.[citation?] Stringer, who had just moved there, might have intervened, but felt ill at the time. He had recently broken a rule concerning isolation of post-partum women and did not want natives to think that spirits were taking revenge. So his wife pretended he had gone away, when in fact he was hiding in the bedroom. To some extent they expiated their guilt by making David’s mother housekeeper at the mission. A difficult woman prone to violent explosions, she left in a huff two years later for the Eastern Delta. There she played no role in hastening conversion, and was one of the few who a dozen years later did not turn Christian like almost everyone else. As for translation at Herschel Island during the rest of Stringer’s time (he left in 1901), a Loucheux who worked at the mission filled some of the gap. Governor Simpson’s lapses of memory and errors during the parliamentary hearings suggest heavy drinking, excessive medication, or the early stages of a debilitating cerebral disorder (or all three). [citation] In 1859 he said he would soon retire. The next year he died after a series of convulsions and a stroke, or perhaps status epilepticus (with a so-called Todd’s, or post-ictal paralysis). He had had seizures for close to two decades.168 Hunter’s Mackenzie journey did not raise his chance of being named the next bishop of Rupert’s Land.169 In 1862 at the Red River Settlement it fell to him to deal with a scandal involving the Reverend Corbett (the medical missionary who testified against the HBC at the hearings in London). After making a servant girl pregnant he had repeatedly tried to abort the foetus. The nastiness that followed contributed to Hunter being brushed aside for the episcopal chair. He and his family moved to London, where he became a preacher of renown. Father Grollier continued to make enemies wherever he went. His zeal remained so excessive that members of his own order expressed reservations. That he could no longer give it full reign followed from failing health. Shortness of breath felled him in 1863 at age 35. [Get the correct figures] Catholic histories mention how he had realized his ideal, which was “to take the cross all the way to the Pole.”(Champagne 121)170 That claim parallels the wording on his grave at Good Hope: “Je meurs content, O Jésus, votre étendard est élevé jusqua’aux extrémités de la terre.” (“I die content, Oh Jesus, for your standard has been raised even unto the ends of the earth.”)(Choquette photograph, 58)

Bernard Rogan Ross, who presided over the 1859 theater at Fort Simpson, was a boy when first employed as HBC apprentice at Norway House. It was there he witnessed the Rev. Evans’ unsettling effect on Indians, the fur trade, and the local chief factor (Donald Ross, wife of Maria Ross) whose daughter he later married. In 1998 a Canadian minister wrote for his doctoral degree in religious studies a play which Bernard plays the central role. It is meant to counteract works (the “gospel of vindication”) that damn Evans’ accusers, and redeem those hurt by his sins. The piece functions by having both “young” Bernard (as an apprentice) and “old” Bernard after his death speak with Evans, who has also passed away. Though based on primary data [citation?], the play makes one aware of how emotion triumphs fact. What is said may be true or not, but few in the audience will doubt. As The Frozen Deep did so effectively in setting the audience against Rae, Cloven Hoof sets it against Evans. Knowing that truth and invention are interweaved, one leaves the piece with unease. The mind has been touched in a way no amount of study can fully erase. The Frozen Deep proved so popular after the Queen had seen it that Dickens staged it at Manchester’s New Free Trade Hall, whose name was itself a blow against the monopoly of the HBC. Instead of using his family as actors, as he had done till then, he hired professionals, including an eighteen year old for the role of Clara. They became lovers at once and remained so the next twelve years. When rumor spread, he tried to crush it in Household Words, as with the story by Rae. But the effort failed as a letter in which he faulted his wife turned public.171 Still, the world forgave and forgot. When he died in 1870, Carlyle, the famed British historian, called him “The good, the gentle, high-gifted, ever-friendly, noble Dickens—every inch of him an honest man.” (Merriman) Rae left the HBC in 18xx, and for several decades thereafter continued to show his prowess in travel, both in Scotland and Canada, where he had a sister who lived near Hamilton. That was close to the homes of McLean and Kennedy, but one doubts he ever made an effort to meet them. Scientific societies increasingly recognized the immense value of his northern work and the caliber of his observations. But in government circles the rancour surrounding the story of cannibalism amongst Franklin’s men remained. Besides, there was jealousy among naval men over Rae’s accomplishing more by traveling alone and living off the land with just a few helpers than finely equipped ships with numerous sailors, giant sleds, and years’ worth of goods. So despite his discoveries in the Far North, and his showing how that part of the word could best be brought to light, he was never knighted. In public he never showed bitterness, though naval men who had accomplished far less received the honor. John McLean in Guelph, Ontario, opened a bank and lost all its cash, perhaps through an assistant (a former HBC employee who had worked with him in Ungava). The next quarter century he was clerk of the court at a nearby town. His wife bore six children, and when she died in 1863 her mother, the widow

of Reverend Evans, joined him. (DCBO, 2007, url)He passed away in 1890, just as Anglicans and Oblates prepared again to battle for the Inuit of the Mackenzie Delta.172 Gaudet in 1863 was stationed at Good Hope, where he stayed for many years. His three white companions were all at the Oblate mission, two of them of the most affable kind. A third was Father Henri Petitot, whose paranoid thoughts, violent outbursts, and vivid hallucinations increased over time, and may not have been present when in early 1865 he and Gaudet traveled to Fort Anderson. In describing the trip to his superior-general in Europe the father told how Gaudet had already in secret returned to Rome.173 He waited a decade to openly show it. (Payment 5) When during the lead-up to Canada’s confederation (made formal in 1867), delegates at the founding meetings wanted the new country labeled a kingdom, the United States objected. But a solution was found by one of the leaders.174 A devout Christian, he saw the nation’s title and motto in a text from the bible: “He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river until the ends of the ends of the earth.” 175 Alexander Isbister, William Kennedy, and John McLean got their wish. Whites from Ontario moved into southern portions of Hudson’s Bay Company terrain as in 1870 it gave up its charter. But in the process the rights of Indians and people of mixed blood were largely ignored. Canada ruled their land and catered to colonists with little regard for those who had been there before. The dreadful conditions that Isbister claimed the HBC imposed on Indians now came true as by government fiat they were confined to reservations. Poverty, hunger, disease, loss of control of their own destiny, endless rules, incompetent staff, and blocking of native ways caused hunger, disease, social stress, and great decline in numbers.176 The Métis (people of mixed blood whose language evolved from a blend of French and native words, and who were not included in the Indian Act) lost most of their land. Their role in building the fur trade and their own unique culture was entirely put aside. That led in time to armed revolt and the hanging of one of their leaders. All this might have been avoided if Isbister had been a different kind of person and had led a more civil campaign. Had his hatred of the Company been less intense, and his tactics less ugly, Sir George might have listened to complaints, and arranged to alter rights such that people with both white and native forebears could retain control of their world. In the 1840s already his friend Donald Ross at Norway House advised him that monopoly would have to end and that the Company’s role must change. [ ] At the time Isbister testified before the parliamentary committee he had already worked himself into a position of power at a London children’s school owned by the Stationers’ Society, which linked all employs having to do with publishing and related fields. So it is no surprise that he put out, overtly and silently, an astounding number of works. As well, he became editor of the journal of the Royal College of

Preceptors, an affiliation of private-school teachers still short of status after a shaky start ten years before. Back then, as Isbister had done, anyone for a fee and without review of credentials could become a member and put MRCP behind his name.177 By the late 1850’s the College set school examinations in numerous subjects, for many of which Isbister over time wrote a book to help students pass. He also, for reasons still unclear, and by means that have not been traced, obtained the qualifications of a lawyer. That added to the stature he gained by becoming principal of the Stationers’ School, which in turn helped to raise the sale of his books. The nature of these was largely that of rote repetition, and those concerned with elocution show an excessively disciplined approach demanding exact posture and movements of the mouth. He never married (one begins to think he was homosexual and had a private bent for bondage and sadism) but had his mother and a sister come from the Northwest to stay with him. Should that be true, it raises the issue of his partners: where they consenting adults or children at the school? In the part of his world visible to others, Isbister lived in a most respectable way, for he resided in a house of prestige178owned by the Stationers that had once belonged to Samuel Johnson. He was now a member of the upper middle class, for he held a monopoly on a link between teaching and publishing that earned him a good deal of money. Yet he never used it to travel back home to see the Northwest. And that seems strange, given his relentless campaign to save its people from the rule of the HBC, his long presentation of himself as a person constantly linked to that world, and the ease with which far parts of North America could now be reached. Perhaps this suggests he did not want to be seen or to encounter certain persons. But it may have had less to do with hidden events from the past than with guarding his status as hero. He could only remain a prophet while staying in another country. Besides, by not visiting his former the land of his youth he avoided seeing see the pain his work had wrought. Instead of going to the Red River Settlement himself, Isbister sent his money. To give shine to his name in perpetuity he set up a scholarship at the school he had twice attended (in 1835-1838 and 18411842), and which by now had evolved into the beginnings of the University of Manitoba. He also in his will accorded it his library and notes. But fate seemed determined to put an end to his indirect presence. In xxxx the library burned along with the rest of the building, and a few decades later the university’s treasurer stole all its funds. Somehow means were later found to keep thought of the former student alive, and to this day the Isbister prize is accorded each year to the best young writer in Manitoba. Given the nature of much he wrote and said about the HBC, it may not be an irony that it is for fiction. Though it is still the expected thing to praise Isbister for making HBC rule end, there is need to rethink that fawning line. But that his outraged lines, vast exaggerations, and camouflaged lies helped spawn a courteous piece of theater at Fort Simpson in 1859 shows once again that study of missions in the North makes for constant surprise.

When Isaac Stringer (after becoming bishop of the Yukon) in 1909 visited the Delta coast and performed the first baptisms and weddings, he walked home cross-country and nearly died. What saved him was eating his animal-skin footwear, which brought fame as “the bishop who ate his boots.” News of it spread through the empire and reached the king, with whom he later dined. In 1966 Frank Peake, a Doctor of Divinity, via the Anglican Church published a biography under that title.(Peake -190) The author of this article lives on the shore not of the Mackenzie, but of St. Lawrence, the big river at the country’s other end. Across the water is Lachine, whence Sir George, John McLean, and a host of others made their way to posts in the Far Northwest. Next door is the Kahnawake reserve belonging to the Mohawks, a tribe to whom Thomas Dease’s mother (whose daughter married Bell, and whose granddaughter married Peers) belonged. Next to that is La Prairie where the Dease family had its farm. In nearby Montreal is the cemetery where Dease lies, and the street where Charles Clark (chased from the Delta by the Kukpugmiut in 1809) after leaving the North led a tumultuous social life. Cinematographer Richard Stringer, grandson of Bishop Stringer, came to this location in 2005 as part of his project to make a documentary film and reconcile in his mind all he had heard that was nasty about missions and good about his forebear. He searched far and wide for early images of Inuit from tribes the bishop had met, and with wife and son (who looks so much like his great-grandfather one thinks it is him) visited and filmed people whose studies touched the Mackenzie Delta people. All along Richard fought cancer, and when he passed away friends and colleagues finished the project for him. In August 2009 they and the family met in Toronto to watch a first screening. The title was “The Bishop Who Ate His Boots.” All sat there in tears watching Richard (alive on screen) tell of his forebear, interview people like Peake, and see early pictures of the people he tried to convert, who were the forebears of Tiktik and others of this story, who were the forebears of the people who met Franklin, the first European to gain fame (though Inuit and G’Wichin had long done so) by eating his boots. What goes around comes around. But where is Attingarek, and who carries her spirit now? xyz Reference List Aborigines Protection Society. Canada West and the Hudson's Bay Company: A Political and Humane Question of Vital Importance to the Honour of Great Britain, to the Prosperity of Canada, and to the Existence of the Native Tribes, being an Address to the Right Honorable Henry Labouchere, Her Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for the Colonies. 1856. London, William Tweedie (2007 Canadiana.org). Ref Type: Pamphlet

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Payment, Diane. "Marie Fisher Gaudet (1813-1914): "la Providence du fort Good Hope"." Ecclectica.2 (2003): 1-14. Peake, Frank A. The Bishop Who Ate His Boots: A Biography of Isaac O. Stringer. Toronto: Anglican Church of Canada, 1966, -190. Richardson, John. "Dr. Richardson's Narrative of the Proceedings of the Eastern Detachment of the Expedition." Narrative of a Second Expedition to the Shores of the Polar Sea in the Years 1825, 1826, and 1827. 1971 reprint, M. G. Hurtig, Edmonton ed. London: J. Murray, 1828. 193-202. Richardson, Sir John. Arctic Searching Expedition: A Journal of a Boat-Voyage Through Rupert's Land and the Arctic Sea in Search of the Discovery Ships Under Command of Sir John Franklin. London: Longman (Greenman Press, New York, 1969), 1851, 212. Shirritt-Beaumont, Raymond Morris. "The Rossville Scandal, 1846: James Evans, the Cree, and a Mission on Trial." Diss. Universities of Manitoba and Winnipeg (UMI Dissertation # MQ 57579), 2001. Simpson, Alexander. The Life and Travels of Thomas Simpson the Arctic Discoverer. London: Richard Bentley, 1845. Smith, Edward Nelson. "The School Teachers in the Novels of Charles Dickens: Their Significance and Their Prototypes." Diss. University of Virginia, 1939. Toynbee, Arnold J. "The Meaning of History for the Soul." Civilization on Trial. New York: Oxford University Press, 1948. 235. Trodd, Anthea. "Collaborating in Open Boat, Dickens, Collins, Franklin, and Bligh." Victorian Studies 42.2 (2009): 201-25. Van Kirk, Sylvia. Many Tender Ties. University of Oklahoma Press, 1983.

Vanast, Walter. Hold the Fort for I Am Coming. 2007. Ref Type: Unpublished Work ---. "The Bad Side to The Good Story: Vilhjalmur Stefansson and Christian Conversion in the Mackenzie Delta 1906-1925. " Religious Study and Theology 26.1 (2007): 77-116. Wilfong-Pritchard, Geoffrey. "Cloven Hoof: Historical Drama and the Construction of Narrative Theology." Diss. St. Stephens, University of Alberta, 2003.

1 Adults as a result addressed youngsters as mother, uncle, or some other form of family relation. 2 Whites at that time used the term Eskimos, a term at times employed here. For the purpose of this article, Delta Inuit means those who lived in winter in the Eastern Channel. The Western Channel was unoccupied most of the year; the Central and Eastern were traversed on the Inuit’s spring journey south. There is no evidence until late in the nineteenth century of people from the northwest edge of the Delta and the Yukon coast making such a journey, but some did in the 1850s come south on routes west of the mountains to La Pierre’s House, and were referred to as the La Pierre’s House Eskimos. Confusingly, mid-19th Century HBC letters often use the term “Western Eskimo,” to distinguish the Eastern Delta people from tribes further east such as those at Cape Bathurst. In later usage the term was applied to tribes from west of the Delta, or to those who had moved to the Delta from Alaska. . 3 Upper and Lower Canada, and smaller ones on the Atlantic. 4 Psalms 72:8, King James Version; in the Vulgate the numbering is 77:11. The idea for this line came from Martha McCarthy’s From the Great River to the Ends of the Earth, (McCarthy), a superbly researched, highly readable account of Mackenzie missions south of the treeline. In quoting the bible on the frontispiece page, McCarthy makes a perhaps intentional change in the biblical text. It is true, as she points out, that natives along the Mackenzie’s more southerly reaches referred to it as the Great River (Decho), but neither the King James nor other English bibles include the adjective “great”, and simply say “from the river to the ends of the earth.” It was John Franklin who was responsible for changing the river’s name to one honoring a white male: “In justice to the memory of Mackenzie, I hope the custom of calling this the Great River, which is in general use among the traders and voyagers, will be discontinued, and that the name of its eminent discoverer may be universally adopted.” (Franklin 39-40) The term “Mackenzie River” rules throughout the public account of his 1825-27 expedition, and whites thereafter followed his suggestion. What primarily motivated missions, of course, was the Great Commission from Jesus in Matthew 28:18-20, which in the KJV also used phrasing that could be interpreted in a geographic sense: “All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I

have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.” More recent translations such as the New Century Version translate the last words as “the end of this age." For British fascination with the Arctic see the somewhat turgid, overly academic, and difficult-to-read volume by David (David). 5 In 1826 (Richardson), 1848 (Richardson and Rae) , and 1850 (Capt. McClintock and the crew of the Investigator). In 1836 Dease and Simpson did not go through the Eastern Delta, nor in 1850 did Hooper and Pullen. Capt. Richard Collinson of the Enterprise on his way east through the Beaufort Sea in 1850 did not stop at the Delta but on his way out in 1854 saw natives on the Yukon coast. 6 To know what they did the rest of the year, one must seek archeologists’s help. What can also be tapped (as is sometimes done here, on the the assumption it is valid to apply the information backward) are accounts by people who lived with them later that century and early the next. Sources such as Anglican missionary Isaac Stringer, ethnologist Vilhjalmur Stefansson, (whose respective diaries date from 1892-1901 and 1905-1916), and Nuligak, a member of the tribe born around 1896 (whose autobiography, edited by a Catholic priest, appeared in 1966).

7 Kittigazuit became known to nineteenth century whites as the Eskimo Village. Belugahunting sites in early to mid-ninetieth century included Kopuk and Kangnirak, and when these were sanded in new sites where started at Tununiak and Kittigazuit. From Roxy, a Kukpugmiuk, as told to Stefansson around 1906 (see appendix). McGhee offers a superb archeologic reconstruction of Kittigazuit’s beluga-hunting culture. (McGhee) 8 Some stayed in the colder months, while others moved northeast to sites like Tuktoyuktok and Kugaluk, closer to winter fishing grounds and the frozen expanse of the Arctic Ocean. From there at times they ventured close to the treeline, along the chain of so-called Eskimo Lakes, connected to the sea. These had a strong current at their shallow connections, which did not freeze over and allowed for easy fishing. Nearby they hunted caribou. For winter movement of Kokhlik, a Kukpugmiuk chief, in the late 1890s see Vanast’s transcriptions of Isaac Stringer’s diary; in the next decade, see Stefansson. For archeologic details about Kugaluk see Morrison’s informative book, which surprised with its suggestion about the prominence of some men (as opposed to whites’ egalitarian concepts of that world).(Morrison)

9 Kukpugmiut means People of the Large Water. Their number declined over the years, but in the 1850s may have been as high as six to eight hundred. By 1905 one hundred and twenty Kukpugmiut remained, and they with two hundred native immigrants from Alaska (then referred to as Nunatagmiut) as well as descendants of white whalers and traders became what are today the Inuvialuit (Alunik, Kolausok, and Morrison;Anonymous), a thriving first nation (as Canada terms regional aboriginal groups with common roots and goals). 10 A long extension of the Arctic Ocean that runs just south and parallel to the Eastern Delta; because of the tides, water rushes back and forth, which keeps the ice thin in places and makes for easy fishing. 11 Taking, for example, birch for tent-poles and other ends. 12 The first two lines of this paragraph are based on descriptions of such journeys from 1892 through 1901 in the diaries of Anglican missionary Isaac Stringer, on the assumption the pattern then was much like that of a century earlier. 13 In the most extant version of the story(Anonymous 77-81), all but three on the doomed clerk’s boat were killed when Livingstone while on a trading trip entered the Delta. Head between an elder’s knees, the only white man to survive vainly sought mercy: his lack of wounds betrayed a spell, so he was drowned with a weight round the neck. Two Indians (who were from the South and worked for the NWC) escaped to the bush and later told what they had seen. Loucheux heard the rest from Kukpugmiut and passed it on to traders. Keith (Keith xix, 14-15, 20-2,120-1, 127, 157-8, 354, 372-5, 383, 433, 470-1) details Livingstone’s NWC career, the prelude to his death, and all five versions of how it was said he died. At least one of these blamed Indians rather than Inuit. 14 Its initial name was xxxx. It was also known as Fort de Nancy, presumably after the daughter of trader Peter Dease. Its Dene (North Slavey) name is

Radili Ko (rapids).

15 Anon. “Notice of the Attempts to reach the Sea by Mackenzie’s River, since the Expedition of Sir Alexander Mackenzie,” (reprinted from the 4th volume of Memoirs of the

Wernerian Natural History Society), Edinburgh Philosophical Journal 8: 15 (Jan. 1823): 7781. 16 17 Not until the 1840’s did traders see Loucheux threats turned toward themselves. 18 To be fair, Indian tribes other than the Loucheux also feared coastal people. Of the Hares Richardson wrote in 1851: “They are, like the rest of the nation, a timid race, and live in continual dread of the Eskimos, whom they suppose not only to be very warlike and ferocious, but also endowed with great conjuring powers, by which they can compass the death of an enemy at a distance. The possession of fire-arms does not embolden the Tinnè to risk an open encounter with the Eskimo bowmen.” (Richardson Vol. 1, 211-12) 19Then called Loucheux, this group of Dene Indians are now referred to as G’Wichin. 20 W. F. Wentzel to Roderick Mackenzie from Mackenzie River, Feb. 28, 1814. Wentzel, p. 110. 21 To this purpose Dease twice at Good Hope (in 1817 and 1819) gave them presents. (Simpson 102) 22 Charles Brisebois, previously a NWC employee. (HBCAPF) 23 The Eskimo camp was “in a N.E. direction from the House [the HBC Good Hope post, then still in its more northerly location], stationed in a large river that falls into the Ocean —the distance overland being short, five or six days.” 24 Charles Brisebois, GHJ, Oct. 16, 1822. B\80\a. Tape HBC IM 58, at NAC. 25 The original note by Brisebois was is in poorly spelled French: “Monsieur McLeod m’avait dit de leur donner parole pour aller voir les Esquimaux ce printemps. Je leurs ait dit et ils paraissent past trop content de cela car ils disent qu’ils ne voudrait pas que les Esquimaux vient à instances que nous somme ici, par support qu’ils pouvait detournè le

fort. Vous alle etre bien tot ici et vous saurre vous meme ce quil dise à ce sujet.” [sic] Charles Brisebois to Edouard Smith, Jan. 7, 1825, HBCA B200/b/1 (Brisebois) 26 Franklin took none with him even though several had been engaged to that purpose by the Good Hope trader, Charles Dease (brother of Peter Dease) who had been in charge there the previous trade year. John Bell was in charge starting the 1826 summer. (Franklin 91) 27 Franklin’s encounter occurred at the Delta’s northwest edge ; Richardson’s in the outer portion of the Eastern Channel. 28 Travel literature had a circular effect, and that held true on the Mackenzie. The HBC bought books each year, and Franklin’s likely made its way to major posts, such as York Factory, Norway House and Fort Chipewyan, along the route to the Far Northwest. It made the point, especially visually(Franklin opposite 105, by Capt. Back ), that contact with the Delta’s tribes held utmost danger. 29 Like Dease, Smith had been a NWC trader, but prior to his xxxx appointment had spent no time in the district. What he knew of Inuit was second-hand. 30 Franklin to Edward Smith, Sept. 7, 1825, HBCA B200/b/2. 31 Smith to Governor etc. 1826, 11, 29, HBCA B200/b3 32 It was Dease himself , by then a chief trader, who counseled against founding the post. Letters from Fort Simpson concerning this are reproduced by W. Barr (Dease 10-11), for which I am most grateful. Barr says Peter Dease was in charge at Good Hope in 1827, but this I have not been able to confirm. His brother Thomas Dease was there in 1825-26, and Bell was in charge from 1827 on. 33 The location was between the Red and the Peel. The Peel skirts the Mackenzie Mountains before turning east to join the southern edge of the Delta. Running parallel and somewhat to the south of it is the Red, which creates a landstrip between the two. Eskimos and Indians met briefly (or sometimes camped together for weeks) where that abuts the Mackenzie.

34 Bell had married Dease’s daughter, 35 Bell, GHJ, June 20, 1829. B80/a/8. 36 Bell, GHJ, July 21, 1829, B80/a/8 and Jun. 22 1830, B80/a/9. Bell to Smith and P. W. Dease, Aug. 10, 1829, HBCA B200/b/5. 37 Bell, GHJ, June 26, 1830, HBCA B80/a/9; Bell to Smith, B200/b/6. 38 Bell, GHJ, June 28, 1831, HBCA B80/a/9. 39 Bell was told to re-install peace , but lacked means to bring it about. Even could he meet with Kukpugmiut nothing would change, for they were “always the aggressor.” The G’Wichin by contrast were entirely mild. Only defense made them take up arms. Smith to Bell, n.d., Oct. 1830, HBCA B200/b/6. Bell to Smith, Jan. 31, 1831, HBCA B200/b/6. 40 Bell to Smith, Jan. 31, 1831, HBCA B200/b/6. 41 Bell to Smith, Aug. 9, 1831, HBCA B200/b/7 42 The post’s new site was on Hare Indian land. 43 On arriving at Good Hope Dease rejoiced in seeing his daughter Nancy (married to Bell) and her children. 44 He was in charge of the New Caledonia District—now the central-northern part of British Columbia. 45 Despite dire warnings from Loucheux, they took none along, and easily dealt with natives at the northwest edge of the Delta. 46 Simpson in reaching xxxx went much further than Franklin, who had failed in attaining that goal.

47While exploring for a week on his own (i.e. without Dease) Thomas Simpson wrote that: “The morning of the 25th of August was devoted to the determination of our position, and the erection of a pillar of stones . . . I took possession of the country, with the usual ceremony, in the name of the Honourable Company, and for the Queen of Britain. In the pillar I deposited a brief sketch of our proceedings.” (Simpson 297)Dease wrote a few comments on Simpson’s return(Dease 190) 48 The point comes from W. Coates,(Coates 8-10) whose elegant wording is reproduced with further context in W. Barr’s book on Dease.(Dease 6-7) 49 A senior HBC figure in London. 50 In the prior decade, efforts to build posts from Fort Simpson to Alaska had repeatedly been frustrated. Men had been killed by starvation, sites destroyed by Indians, and competition faced from Russians. But recent reports described a large river west of the Rockies (which later turned out to be the Yukon). Governor Simpson incorrectly agreed with Dease that it and the Colville were the same. 51 Parl. Hearing Q+A 2397: “What induced you to leave the service of the Hudson’s Bay Company? I wished to come to England to complete my education; I was desirous of obtaining a university education, and of qualifying myself for a profession.“ 52 Murdoch McPherson 53 Hector A. [Aeneas] McKenzie at GH to R. McLeod, 1840, 07, 28. HBCA B200/b/13 54 Referred to at the time simply as Peel’s River post, and most often as Peels’ River, later Fort McPherson. Its official G’Wichin name is now Teet'lit Zhen (at the head of the waters) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_McPherson,_Northwest_Territories 55 GHJ, Sept. 8, 1838, Aug. 3, 1839, HBCA B80/a/16; June 11 and Sept. 2, 1840, HBCA B80/a/17.

56 “Such [illegible] are thank God of rare occurrence in any country, but they have been known to take place even in civilized society, under circumstances so [illegible] and distressing as in a certain degree to justify the measure however revolting to humanity and of which no legal cognizance could be taken.” 1843, 06, 05. George Simpson to Lewes. HBCA B200/b/17. For Lewes original report see Lewes to Simpson, 1842, 11, 17, HBCA B200/b/ 15. 57 Now the cities of Winnipeg and St. Boniface and a surrounding area in southern Manitoba at the junction of the Red and Assiniboine Rivers. The settlement was owned until 1870 by the HBC, which controlled oversight of the residents. Most were most of them former HBC employees and their families. The Red River there should not be confused with the (Arctic) Red River, now the xxxx, near the Mackenzie Delta. 58 The school had been founded with HBC help for officers’ offspring and was linked to the Anglican Church. It is often referred to as “Rev. Jones’ school,” after the minister in charge until 1838. His wife ran the girl’s part of the established. After she died he left in 1838. The HBC bought the property from the church and put Jones’ assistant Macallum in charge. Isbister was at the school from 1834 to 1838. On returning for the 1841-42 year, he may have taught. 59 John Macallum 60 Isbister’s grandmother was a full-blood Cree, his mother of mixed blood. His father was from Scotland, as was his maternal grandfather, long a prominent HBC trader. 61 “II singled him out from the mass of his countrymen as a fit instrument to proclaim the glad tidings of salvation to the children of the desert. He cordially embraced my views, devoted himself to the ministry of the altar, and proceeded to England to complete his studies and obtain ordination.” Rev. Macallum, quoted by Cooper. (Cooper 138) 62 The quote is from L. Hargrave (Hargrave 181). J. H. Lefroy, who arrived at Fort Simpson in March 1844, detailed the treatment in his Autobiography,(Lefroy), of which few copies are extant. Editor F.G. Branley in Magnetic North quotes it in full (Lefroy 98n34), but provides no page for the original: “It was a terrible accident to happen far

from surgical aid, but he had as an assistant a young fellow of nerve and decision, named, I think, Pears, who tried to dress the stump. To stop the bleeding he tied up every vein and artery he could get at; he then bathed the wound with a decoction of epinette, which is much used in the country for external applications; and although much reduced by loss of blood, Lewis’s strength of constitution enabled him to gradually recover. His chief suffering at this time was from cold, to guard against which he wore a sheath of warm furs up to the elbow. On the other hand, he entirely lost his neuralgia, from which he had suffered much before the accident.” 63 Fort Resolution, whose oversight had with his support just been moved from the Athabasca to the Mackenzie.”Mr. Lewes proposes in his last dispatch that the post of Ft. Resolution be withdrawn from the Athabasca District and joined to his own. His remarks on the subject it is unnecessary here to repeat. I would beg merely to observe that we all in this quarter feel confident the post could be placed in a satisfactory state supplying our wants if it were subject to the authority of the person in charge of Mack. River while it would make no difference to the Company whether the fur returns came out to Ln. marked A or B.” John McLean to Sir George Simpson, 844, 04, 27. B200/b/19 and b/17 64 John Lefroy on returning from York Factory to Norway House in August 1843 saw father and daughter together, “Mrs. Evans...has a fine handsome daughter whom I met with her father near the Painted Stone portage on their way with a brigade of boats to York Factory. They had pitched their little tent near the ice of a great rock, sparingly covered with small pines.” (Lefroy 51) It is not clear whether this or before Evans had killed Hassall on the way to Isle à la Crosse. Wilfong-Pritchard(Wilfong-Pritchard) [get page number]found copies of Evans’ love poems (the content longing, the poetry dreadful) to his daughter written after she left the North. [ ] 65 Pannekoek tells that Evans had planned with Governor Simpson’s consent to extend his mission to the Mackenzie and that Evans’ trip from Norway House to Ile à la Crosse was the first step. [get citations]. Lefroy while at Fort Chipewyan in the 1843-4 winter was told of Evans’ 1842 visit to the HBC’s Athabasca District, and reported this in a xxx letter : “The Wesleyan Supert in 1847 [a transcription error; these words were written in 1844 and it should read 1841 or 1842 ] made a circuit from Edmonton, by Lesser Slave L. and Peace river, preaching through an interpreter. . . He made a short stay at some of the Forts and returned by Isle à la Crosse. He engaged at that time to visit them again this

summer, and they were very anxious for the fulfillment of his promise, the Indians from more northern tribes came down to hear him” (Lefroy 151). Lefroy gave details of this movement in another letter: “A missionary stationed in this district would probably station himself upon Peace River. Only a day ago I heard of some Indians to the number of 20 families who travelled there last winter [1842-3] from McKenzie’s river, having heard of the promise made by Mr. Evans that a missionary should be sent there.” (Lefroy 74) Evans never followed up, but started out to do so when a priest left for the region: “However he never went until the month of August last [i.e. 1844]. When hearing that the R.C. priest, M. Thibault, was talking of doing so, off he started, to get there before him, with two or three half-instructed halfbreeds whom he meant to set down in convenient situations to act as preachers. I thus missed seeing him. I believe he intends visiting McKenzie’s river before his return.”(Lefroy 151) 66 A rumor claimed Evans had in the meantime tried to enmesh Clarissa in a secret affair with another HBC man. As Letitia put it, “She is very pretty, but there are awkward stories about her artfulness and Mrs. Finlayson from liking her very much has changed till I shudder almost at the way in witch she writes. Mr. F[inlayson] writes that Evans has encouraged his nephew John F. to enter into a clandestine engagement with his daughter and has extorted a promise not to acquaint him with it.” (Hargrave 173) It may be true, since a housekeeper in prior years told of her sleeping nightly with him in her room. “When she was a serving woman in the house of the Revd Mr. Evans, a young man who was a clerk here in former days, Mr John Finlayson, was making love to Miss Evans, and passed whole nights in her bedroom with her, and many more such stuff.” (ShirrittBeaumont 131, 131n54) 67 The newlyweds left on a brigade whose month-long trail to Montreal was described in detail by Robert Ballantyne. Because of his health and failure at work (he could not keep track of figures) he had been reassigned and was headed in the same direction. He and McLean spent much time together. 68 Some told of his traveling with a young female and camping in a single tent, others of his sledding women to lonely spots. Carriole: a light sled drawn by three dogs in which a passenger sat or lay under a cover. It tapered at the end “like a coffin.” The comment is from Lefroy, who gives a detailed description and illustration: “Few conveyances can be more comfortable than a cariole, and when wrapped up in robes or blankets, with a hood

over one’s head, it is warm in any weather. It is…just large enough for one person to sit or lie down, the sides high where he sits, like an armchair, and inclosed with parchment. Some people add a cover.” (Lefroy) Evans deflected charges by exposing their loose morals, giving as example that one had relations with Bernard Ross, then a Norway House HBC apprentice.(Shirritt-Beaumont 85, 85n40) But it was not enough to dampen accounts. No matter how finely one parses what was penned at the time (as was done in a recent thesis)(Shirritt-Beaumont),the fact remains the charges were overwhelming. 69 Evans ‘recall had already been arranged by Governor Simpson because of conflicts with the HBC. Wesleyan leaders doubted the accusasions--to them Mrs. Evans’ presence in a nearby bed meant the deeds could not have been done. While Evans was in Britain the HBC determined that prior to his accidental shooting of an assistant the year before, he had seduced the victim’s wife. 70 The minister’s sudden death (found deceased in an adjoining room by his wife, according to one account) and its attribution to cardiac disease leaves questions. One wonders if the change in conduct others saw him and the presence of heart disease at such a young age meant he had an illness such as syphilis. Then, too, one wonders if killed himself, and the suicide was covered up. Namier singled out a “historical sense” as the “crowning achievement of long study in that field, and defined it as “an intuitive understanding of how things do not happen.” (Clive 196) Even to part-time dabblers, Evans’ story as pictured by his supporters repeatedly brings that sense to the fore. 71 James Hargrave at York Factory wrote “he is looked upon by the Wesleyan Connection as the victim of a conspiracy to destroy his character, but whether this has been contributed to our Concern [i.e. the HBC] or to his own brethren I am quite ignorant. – Truly, in the minds of all those who are conversant with details—both are held to be alike innocent.—I have not had an opportunity to meet with Mr. Mason [the minister who had conducted the ecclesiastic trial at Norway House] this winter. Please present my best regards to him accompanied with my kindest wishes.” James Hargrave to Donald Ross, LHL appendix, p. 291. 72 He was “matriculated” to study literature (whatever that meant) [reference?]

73Besides David’s initial school, Salem House, and its owner-instructor, Mr. Creakle (in David Copperfield , published in 1850) E. N. Smith details Dickens’ treatment of other incompetent teachers and their establishments. These include Wackford Squeers and Dothe-Boys Hall ( Nicholas Nickleby, published in serialized form in 1838-39), Dr. Blimber’s Forcing Establishment and Old Lady Pinchin, the child-queller (both in Dombey and Son) , the fact-storing methods of the Grandgrind-McChoakum child-factory (Hard Times), and school-principal Seth Pecksniff (Martin Chuzzlewit). On p. 15 he lists fifteen abuses addressed in Nickolas Nickleby alone. (Smith) 74 75 APS at times hereafter. Founded after slavery had been abolished, it sought to ban other ills of colonization. Non-denominational but closely linked to Quakers, it sometimes coordinated its appeals concerning Upper Canada with the Wesleyan Mission Society. 76 The removal to the top of the Bruce Peninsula was from what are now Western Ontario counties such as Kincardine and xxxx). 77 Located at the junction of the Porcupine and Yukon rivers, on what later turned out to be Alaskan terrain. In subsequent decades it was twice moved east until at last it was properly on British terrain. 78 The result for Fort Yukon and Peel’s River combined was no better than when the latter had been there alone. 79 Quartermaster was John Bell, formerly at Peel’s River. 80 Richardson went home after the first year’s search, but Rae overwintered at Great Bear Lake and the next year failed in another attempt to find Franklin on the coast. In the 1849 fall he arrived at Fort Simpson. By then he had been made trader-in-charge of the Mackenzie District, a position he held until summer, when he was sent off on yet another arctic expedition. That was short enough so that, despite his harsh view of the Kukpugmiut, he had no effect on Peers’ attempts to draw them in. But it was long enough for him to meet naval officers Hooper and Pullen. Pullen spent the 1849-50 winter at Fort

Simpson, Hooper at Great Bear Lake; the next winter both men were at Fort Simpson. Bell was there both years. 81 The man was a hunter for the Peel’s River post. 82 To make sure things went well Peers planned to bring a respected intermediary, the chief of the Mackenzie Loucheux. 83 We can only guess why it did not happen, but that it had something to do with the Loucheux seems likely. 84 Each spring as soon as the ice left the Mackenzie, a boat with supplies left Good Hope for Peel’s River. 85 See p. 140. B.239/g/30, fo. 33, outfit 1850-1, lists Jean Hebert dit Manuel as a steersman in the Mackenzie River District. He came from Three Rivers, Quebec, was thirty-seven years of age and had served the Company for twenty-one years. [Rae Correspondence, 171n1]Jean is the first name, Hebert the last. Manuel is a way of avoiding confusion when there are a number of Hebert families—it designates a particular one—and is part of the last name. Still, most authors refer to the man as Manuel, a pattern for the sake of continuity followed here. His motives are hard to know, except that he was likely terrified at meeting people about whom he had been fed dreadful stories (his woman at the time was probably a Loucheux). And Peers himself, though not present, may have played a contributing role. The year before, when Kukpugmiut had promised to meet his boat, the words he used made his staff aware that despite his efforts at making peace he still feared them. If they came, he wanted them kept “at a respectable distance.” Should there be mischief, “It would be “proper and fit to fire.” [citation?] 86 This sentence relies on both primary and secondary date. In the Peel’s River journal of July 4, 1849, Peers describes Ghendong’s role in drawing the Eskimos to him: “Ghendong etc. returned from their visit to the Esquimaux of the Mackenzie River. They found a party of six at the mouth of the Peel (the remainder being encamped at the usual rendez-vous on opposite shore of McKR). Although the Esquimaux are not on such unfriendly terms

with the McKR Indians as with those of the Peel, they did not, however, choose to come too close, exchanging their ideas out of arrow range. Knowing Ghendong's intention I gave him on starting a few trifles to present to the Esquimaux in the name of the whites-these were given and accepted but the feelings of those rascals towards us are I fear anything but friendly. They still allege that we furnish the Loucheux with firearms and ammunition on purpose to kill them. Ghendong tells me that it is the intention of the Esquimaux to come in great force in the fall (about the time of the return of the boat from Simpson) to Red River, but with what motive he does not know. If they muster strong enough they may put off to visit us en passant by the assistance of Nuyey (leader of McK Indians) whom I will pick up on my return.” [HBC, Peel R. journal, NAC reel H2341, MG19, D12] Sheppard Krech II, who has read Peers’ official report (which I have not), tells of Ghendong’s primary role in the killings the next year. (Krech III 52-59) 87 PRJ, HBCA B157/Z/1. Tape IM 890 at NAC. 88 The Investigator. 89 The sighting of people on the coast took place at lat. 69° 43'; long. 131° 57’, which according to Neatby is Tuktoyaktuk.(Neatby 53n1) That village in its present location is at lat 69’27’; long. 133’ 02’. Perhaps the coordinates refer to the ship’s position in early morning as it sailed along the coast eastward, and not to coordinates for events told here. 90 “Order and cleanliness” reigned, and waiting for trade to tribes to the west lay furs that included bear, wolf, and wolverine. The latter do not live north of the treeline, so had probably been obtained via barter with Loucheux. (Neatby 52-53) A long description of this same encounter in a book by ship’s surgeon Alexander Armstrong describes the Inuit’s terror on seeing the ship and their attempts through hostile conduct to make whites leave, but makes no mention of Miertsching’s shot. The page numbering in the original is incorrect, as it begins with 158-160 and continues with 145-156. (Armstrong Ch. 6) The coast in outer portions of the Delta’s Eastern Branch is shallow for a long distance off shore, and as the tide goes out, a ship can easily ground. Near Tuktoyuktok itself the waters are deep and today ocean-going vessels can come into port without hazard.

91 The encounter was at “a camp of seven at the foot of the lowest mountains, ” probably the southern tip of the Caribou Hills. PRJ, HBCA B157/Z/1, Nov. 11, 13, 19, 1851 and Aug. 2, 1852. 92 George Simpson to James Anderson, Dec. 1, 1854, HBCA B200/b/32. 93 Alexander Mackenzie, who had been promoted from labourer to postmaster some time before. He was stationed at nearby La Pierre’s House for several years. Peers to J. A. Anderson, 1852, 07, 28, HBCA B200/b/29 94 Anthropophagy had been abhorred since Christianity’s early days not only because of the loss of life, but because the consumed became part of the consumer. It was feared difficulty would arise on judgment day, when the body of both was to rise. 95 Ken McGoogan’s recent award-winning book about her (McGoogan), with the subtitle “A True Story of Ambition, Obsession, and the Remaking of History,” gives a fine account of her machinations in starting and sustaining the Franklin theater. It is easier to follow if one skips the detailed coverage of her travels outside England. 96 A mother and child brought there without the husband, who had been killed during their capture. 97 The wording ended by thanking God for his enlightenment of whites, and hoping he would do the same for the arctic’s people. Oswalt provides both the illustration and its text.(Oswalt 166-67, figure 7-3) 98 The story rotates around three British females whose men are missing in the Arctic. The nurse, who has been with the youngest, Clara, since her birth, early in the play has a bloody vision that reveals their demise. The older women then worry about the depressing effect of the nurse on her pining mistress. All four go to Newfoundland ( where they are seen in a cave) to meet a rescue ship returning from the ice. The lost party have been found, except for two officers, including Frank, the one dear to Clara. Then it turns out they have made their way to this very shore alone in a boat. Back in Britain, we learn, the other man had secretly sworn to kill the admirer who had stolen Clara from him. At

the time, he did not know who it was, but while stranded in the arctic he identifies Frank through a carving on the latter’s bed. Unknown to each other, both had joined the crew. After arranging to have the fragile and unsuspecting Frank be the only one with him on a search for help, the jilted lover could easily have killed (and presumably eaten) his rival. Instead, being a honorable Briton, he ensures his survival. As the curtain falls Clara and Frank are united as he breathes his last. (Brannan;Nayder 1-24) 99 The In 1852 already the HBC given the tactic a try by sending Chief Factor [xxx] Anderson, then trader-in-chief in charge of the Mackenzie, on a coastal exploration journey. In his charge to Anderson, Governor Simpson made it clear how much the Company depended on his finding evidence of Franklin: [ ]. But the trip brought no new information. 100 . That they themselves were aggressors was evident in what Bell had told him of the murder of Kukpugmiut ascending the Peel in 1844, likely on their way to the HBC fort. The episode showed they were willing to meet with whites. Without directly saying so, Richardson dismissed Eskimo violence as a block to contact. Fierce postures and intrusive acts were mainly show and could easily be stopped. In 1826 a word from him had instantly stopped plunder, and in 1848 there was no ill will when sailors’ oars hit hands that grasped the boats. All acknowledged that breaking a rule brought pain, and soon returned to barter with a smile. 101 When a “large body” of Esquimaux entered the Peel, three were shot by Loucheux. (Richardson 214-15). Bell also told of an occasion when men from both sides danced and Eskimos suddenly killed three Indians; others died in the subsequent “melee.”(Richardson 216) [Richardson, 216] 102 Indians might be forgiven, for in their world revenge was a duty “sweet” to their nature. But for HBC men no excuse would do. “Innate wantonness and reckless bloodthirstiness” had driven Manuel, “the fiendish miscreant who shared their hellish plot.” White skin, Hooper blushed to say, was “eternally dishonored in his person.” (Hooper 366-72) 103 More likely than not, they were also printed by someone to whom he was connected.

104 He would today be called a minister, i.e. a member of the cabinet. 105 Kennedy practiced a fierce evangelical Christianity in which daily prayers, total abstinence from alcohol, frequent quoting of scriptures, and strict Sabbath observance played a central role. To some that seemed a virtue, while to others, such as Governor Simpson, it was tiring “religious cant.” (Cooper 242) 106 Though without experience of the sea, he led two expeditions for Lady Franklin to look for her husband (one never reached the arctic). Returning home, he fiercely decried the HBC, urging whites to seize its lands. 107 They never travelled for “worthless stuff,” and only sought what was “good and useful to them.” 108 As had Isbister, Armstrong called the HBC charter invalid because of “nonfulfillment of the conditions on which it was originally granted.” And that referred to failure to foster conversion. 109 Isbister’s 1986 hagiographer Barry Cooke was apparently so blinded by the desire to make data go his way, he explicitly made the point that the bishop had not been asked. 110 On the Saskatchewan, upstream from the northern edge of Lake Winnipeg. An Anglican teacher, Henry Budd, trained at the same school as Isbister, had been there since 1840 and Lefroy describes him as follows: “A part also [of the Liturgy has been translated] into pure Maskegon, an impure Cree, by Henry Boud [Budd] (a pure Indian) the schoolmaster at the Pas, for the use of that station. I should greatly mistrust his competence, although he speaks English perfectly. He was educated at a sort of mission school at the Red River. . . which has turned out some very well instructed and civilized men. “ (Lefroy 152) The Hunters arrived in the Northwest just as James Evans’ world was beginning to falling apart. By then, too, Protestants of other faiths resented his frenetic travels and his placement at several sites of mixed-blood staff, none of whom spoke the local native language. The Wesleyan leader was “excessively active.”(Lefroy 150) 111 An HBC trader had left an endowment for local Christian instruction.

112 Unlike girls born to other traders, she had been removed from the Red River school and sent to classes in England. Their first children were named her parents; Donald Ross was born early 1852, Mary Arabella, who lived just half a decade, the next year. Hunter’s boy by his first wife was in Sept. 1851 sent to England for education. (Hargrave) [page number?] 113 Anderson 114 Robert Choquette’ s recent history of their work, The Oblates’ Assault on Canada’s Northwest, uses military terms of this sort throughout: “the duty of true Catholics was to become Christ’s soldiers—troops dedicated to conquering a world being driven to Hell.”[p.2] Thus, an entire section on “Training the Catholic Soldiers,” [p. 11-15] and the explanation that “This book will be couched in a military analogy of conquest.” [p. 21] The chapter entitled “Deployment in Athabasca-Mackenzie” begins with the following line: “Having established their beachheads in each of the four regions of the greater Northwest, the Oblate conquerors id not so much as pause before proceeding to deploy their main forces throughout each of these regions.” [p. 51] (Choquette) 115 Hunter to CMS, Nov. 4, 1857, Feb. 11 and May 11, [see also two refs below; check] 1858, CMS reel A91, NAC. 116 Hunter to CMS, 1857, 11, 04, CMS reel A91, NAC. 117 Hunter to CMS, 1858, 02, 11, CMS reel A91, , NAC. 118 Hunter to CMS, April 9, 1858, CMS reel A91, NAC. 119 Hunter journal to CMS, 1858, 06, 08, CMS reel A91, NAC. 120 Bishops Taché and Grandin. Hunter did not learn of the promotion of the second one until he reached Fort Resolution: “One of the priests at Isle á la Crosse, Grandon, leaves next year to be consecrated Bishop to the North, and Bishop Taché comes up to replace him for the time. This I learned today from the priests.” Hunter to CMS 1858, 08, 12.

121 Hunter journal for CMS, 1858, 08, 11, CMS Reel A91, NAC. While telling him this over supper at the HBC post, he also revealed (without truth at the time) having received Sir George’s nod to start a mission at Good Hope, near the edge of the Arctic Circle. 122 Hunter journal for CMS, 1858, 08, 11, CMS Reel A91, NAC. 123 Fort Liard 124 “Mr. Gaudet was last year admitted into the Church of England by Archdn Hunter.” W.W. Kirkby to CMS 1859, 08, 20. I am not sure of the exact date of this rite, and when the mother knew of it, so linking it to the mother-in-law’s behavior may be unjust. 125 Ross had long been at Resolution, the southernmost post in the Mackenzie, where the Oblates reached first. 126 Hunter journal for CMS, Nov. 30, 1858, CMS reel A91, NAC. 127 James Lockhart. 128 B. R. Ross to Simpson, 1858, 11, 29. HBCA B200/b/33 129 Lockhart’s report is not included with the transcript of the B.R. Ross letter in the HBC correspondence book. I have not yet searched for it elsewhere. . 130 Ross to Simpson, 1858, 11, 29. HBCA B200/b/33. The letter also advised that people from Cape Bathurst (“very friendly”) would shield from damage by those from the Delta. 131 The problem had to do with Indians in his party. In future, as MacFarlane reported, they must be entirely “dispensed with.” 132 B. R. Ross to Simpson, 1859, 03, 26. [file number?] 133 Simpson to Ross, 1859, 06, 15. B200/b/34.

134 Kirkby brought a mixed- blood teacher trained at the school at the Red River Settlement (the same one Isbister had attended). 135 La Pierre’s House, a small post subsidiary to Peel’s River, on the west side of the mountains, used to hunt deer for food supply, and as a transfer point for men and goods on the route to Fort Yukon. 136 Kirkby journal for CMS. CMS reel A93, NAC. The girl’s age is from Sept. 8, 1859. The man’s name is from a letter from Gaudet brought to Fort Simpson on March 19, 1860, when Kirkby partially repeated its content in his journal. The rest of the paragraph is from Aug. 15, 1859. 137 Kirkby journal, Aug. 15, 1859. 138 Kirkby to CMS, Nov. 10, 1859, CMS microfilm A80, p. 469-70, NAC. 139 Kirkby journal, Aug. 20, 1859. 140 Gaudet’s Loucheux translator probably helped the Eskimos throughout the service and instructed them what to do. While closing the service, Gaudet addressed HBC personnel on behalf of the CMS, thanking them for their “noble efforts” to erect a church. 141 Kirkby journal, Aug. 22, 1859. 142 Kirkby journal, Aug. 23, 1859. 143 Gaudet to Kirkby, letter that reached Ft. Simpson Mar. 19, 1860. 144 Kirkby journal, 27 Aug. 1859. 145 Kirkby journal, 8 Sept. 1859. 146 Kirkby journal, Sept. 9, 1859.

147 Gaudet to Bernard Rogan Ross, Feb. 2, 1861, HBCA B200/b/34. 148 Ross to Gaudet, Mar. 26, 1861, HBCA B200/b/33. 149 Gaudet to Ross, Feb. 9, 1862, B200/b/34. 150 Gaudet did not say why he did not want the chief go to Simpson, but the proscription did not apply to others, for in his letter to Ross he added “if I can get some good Esquimaux voyagers I will bring 2 or 3 of them up in the boats.” To date I have seen no confirmation that he did. 151 Quoted by Van Kirk(Van Kirk 101). 152 Fort Halkett, on the Liard. 153 Kirkby to CMS, 1862, 11, 29. CMS reel A93, NAC. 154 Brass had a number of offspring, but it is not as yet clear by whom. In 1878 while in charge of Fort Nelson (on the Liard in the northeast corner of what is now British Columbia) he sought someone to give them school. For that reason, as an internal Oblate history tells it, [ref?] he agreed with local Indians’ demand for an Anglican cleric. But when that same year he stopped downriver at another post, a priest offered to send a colleague capable of teaching both English and French. Brass assented, and no Protestant was invited. 155 Bernard Rogan Ross to HBC Governor etc, 1861, 03, 20, HBCA B200/b/33. 156 A. G. Dallas to W. L. Hardisty, 1863, 05, 22, HBCA 200/b/34. 157 Peel River HBCJ 1873, 06, 05. 158 IOS 1899, 07, 01. VS typed diary transcript, DCL, Stef. MSS 98 (5):V-9. 159 Peel River HBCJ 1885, 11. 04.

160 Stringer saw Tiktik in the Eastern Delta and during the latter’s visits to Herschel Island. 161 In 1909, when Stringer had become Bishop of the Yukon and returned to the Delta for a visit, [ ] he saw Tiktik shoot an oogzyook, which sank, and native author Nuligak refers to him about that time. (Nuligak 91). 162 For references to Tiktik #2 see IOSD 1898, 11, 20; 1899, 01, 30; 1899, 02, 01; 1899, 02, 02; 1900, 07, 20. 163 See appendix 1 164 One might argue that the 1885 Peel’s River reference was to Tiktik’s wife, and not to the man himself, and that perhaps he had died prior to that time (or during that same illness, but elsewhere). Similarly, one might argue that church estimations of the date of birth of its first converts were a matter of guess, and that the Kukpugmiut did not know Europeans’ ways of tracking such matters. But until further work shows otherwise, the gap in time between the birth of one and the death of the other seems too long. Then, too, it was not unusual for the tribe to have several Tiktiks at the same time, as sometimes more than one child took the name of someone just deceased—a practice that gave Stefansson cause for outlandish religious sarcasm. During his time, for example, five women cannot be kept apart unless one gathers all records. 165 At Aklavik, a new community in the heart of the Delta, on the Western Branch. Because of repeated flooding, Inuvik was later built further east in the Delta and serves as the Delta’s main business and administrative center. 166Joseph Hodgson. Like some other traders in the Mackenzie , Hodgson was a graduate of the Red River Settlement school (the same one Isbister attended in earlier years). Brought north by the Anglican church to teach, he left and joined the HBC. Ordained a deacon, he never lost that status. 167 As a youth, engaged by sportsmen on a hunt from Great Slave Lake, he fell in love with a nearby “Indian princess.” [ref?] In the early 1890s he had a wife from among his

own tribe. 168 169 Anonymous, July 14, 2007. 170(Champagne 121), 171 Dickens’ financial need (as he now had several households to maintain) and desire for adulation from then on drove a bizarre career of exhausting recitations and solo performances on several continents of scenes of his own works. The depictions (in which he played all the characters) were so intense that women often fainted. After his death his collection of art (mostly of scenes from his work), including paintings of the Frozen Deep by the famous painter who had done the sets, were sold. From time to time they turned up at Sotheby auctions. The manuscript and related items were also auctioned off (other versions went on sale in 1890 when Wilkie Collins, his collaborator and co-author of the play, died in 1890. Francesco Berger, who as a young man did the music for the play, continued to tell of the experience (as in his 1931 London Times article “The midVictorian entertainers, a nonagerian’s memories”) (Berger 12) 172 DCBO 2007, url. 173 “[Dans ma dernière lettre du 30 Septembre 1864] je pense vous avoir annoncé mon départ pour le fort Anderson, dit des Esquimaux, comme prochain. Il eût lieu , en effet le samedi 4 mars courant, sous les auspices de la bonne vierge. Je partis en traineau avec Mr. G…, officier traiteur du fort Good Hope et catholique en secret. Nous franchîmes en cinq jours d’une course continuelle les 85 à 90 lieux qui séparent les deux forts et arrivâmes le 9 au soir au fort Anderson, toujours escortés de 43 à 45 centigrades de froid.” Grollier to Fabre, 1865, 03, 21, OAR. 174 Leonard Tilley, government leader in New Brunswick. 175 Moorman describes thirteenth-century English monk John Wycliffe’s interpretation of the word dominion, i.e. the god-given birth-right of a lord to rule over common men, and

the biblical basis for its loss in cases of abuse. This led Wycliffe to question the authority of Rome and to translate the bible into English so that it would be accessible to even the lowest strata of society. (Moorman 118-21) Morton tells how the term dominion came to be applied to Canada. (Morton 97-98) 176 For details see Dickason, 257-318. The Indian Act, responsible for much of this, was as Gerald Friesen put it, “an example of the Victorian mind at work in a ‘missionary field’”(Friesen 158)

177 MRCP had nothing to do with Royal College of Physicians, for which at that time no such title existed. Founded in 1846, the Royal College of Preceptors represented teachers at private schools, i.e. “liable to no public supervision” it evoked “considerable distrust.” Observers deplored “use of the title MRCP in ads by unqualified persons ” and claimed the College’s effect on the quality of teaching “nugatory,” i.e. trifling or worthless. In 1867 the School Masters Association pointed out that it tested no teacher, and let “anyone of `not notoriously bad character” join. All that was required was recommendation by three people of “known respectability.” Some teachers gave up their membership because of anger at the failure to exclude unqualified persons. However, exams to higher levels of membership, such as Fellow, Licentiate, and Associate were to some extent applied. Eventually the College reached mainstream status, and in 1998 changed its name to College of Teachers. 178 Formerly owned by Samuel Johnson, it was assigned by the Stationers to the principal of their school. (Nichols)