The Great Company : $b being a history of the honourable company of merchants-adventurers trading into Hudson's BayWillson, Beckles
History
The Great Company : $b being a history of the honourable company of merchants-adventurers trading into Hudson's Bay
Willson, Beckles
Fur trade -- Canada; Hudson's Bay Company; Northwest, Canadian -- History
In 1730 Moose, a new fort, was erected on the site of Moose Factory.
About the same time Richmond Fort was built on Whale River, but it did
not continue a great many years. I find, under date of 21st December,
1758, that "the Governor represented to the Committee that Richmond
Fort did not give a sufficient return to pay the most moderate charge
of supporting it," and it was "resolved that the Company's servants
and effects be withdrawn from there as soon as conveniently may be and
replaced at such of the Company's other factories as shall be found
needful." Further, it was "resolved that a factory with accommodation
for twelve men, with all convenience for trading goods stores, and
provisions, be built as early as possible in the year 1760, in the
most convenient place for that purpose on the north side of Severn
River and as high up as may be."
At the same time it was ordered that the number of men for York Fort
and the new settlement to be made on the Severn River should be
forty-eight men.
[Sidenote: Clandestine trade.]
Clandestine trade was a constantly recurring feature of eighteenth
century life in the Bay. Charges were repeatedly preferred against the
Company's servants, and altogether scores were dismissed as a
punishment for this offence. It must be confessed that there was often
a temptation difficult to resist. Nothing seemed more natural for the
poor apprentice to trade his jack-knife, Jew's-harp or silk kerchief
with an Indian or Esquimau for a peltry; and the only reason, perhaps,
why private bartering was not indulged in more generally was the
certainty of detection. But with the Governors and traders and ship
captains, risk was reduced to a minimum.
One of the most unfortunate examples was the case of Captain Coats.
This able mariner had been in the employ of the Company for a period
of many years. None was superior to him in knowledge of the Bay and
straits. Captain Coats had been twice shipwrecked, once in 1727, "when
near the meridian of Cape Farewell, when running through the ice with
a small sail, when two pieces of ice shutt upon us and sank our ship";
and again in 1736, when he was entangled in the ice off Cape
Resolution, when his ship had her sides crushed in and sank in twenty
minutes. Coats drew up a journal for the use of his sons, containing
an elaborate description of the Bay and its approaches, together with
a great deal of relative matter; and this journal, which has received
the honour of publication by the Hakluyt Society, concludes by saying
that if these sons are neglected by the Hudson's Bay Company they are
at liberty, and "it is his will and command that every part be made
publick, for the use and benefit of mankind."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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