The once proud and famous Hudson’s Bay Comany Fort Edmonton V (c.1830 – 1915), one of the largest fur trade establishments in the Canadian Northwest, sits dwarfed by the New Alberta Legislature building, as Alberta moves onto a new era, c.1912. 1
When I took my first trowel strokes, as a field school student at the historic Hudson’s Bay Company Fort Victoria (c.1864 – 1898), Alberta in 1974, I knew immediately I could get to like this work. Nearly fifty years later that feeling remains.
Removing the sod layer at the Hudson’s Bay Company Fort Victoria in 1974. Beneath the sod, we found the archaeological remains of the fort trading store, which after over a hundred years, still contained the foundation logs and well-preserved cellar remains.
Canada has a long, colourful, and often tumultuous fur trade history. The fur trade, in beaver pelts, was the prime economic driver of early Canada for over three centuries. However, the trade was often viewed with either disdain or opportunity by Canada’s First Nations people who participated in it.
“Of what use to us are the skins of beavers, wolves, and foxes? Yet it is for these we get guns and axes.” (First Nations leader, Kootenae Appee, c.1808, recorded by David Thompson)
What the people of the Canadian fur trade did and how they lived is preserved in the thousands of documents left behind by Company officers, clerks, explorers, and first missionaries. It was occasionally captured in paintings by frontier artists such as Paul Kane.
A painting of the Hudson’s Bay Company Fort Edmonton V (c.1830 – 1915) by artist Paul Kane, 1849-56. 2
But fur trade history is also preserved in the remains of many fur trade forts constructed across Canada as it expanded westward in search of new fur-rich lands. Often those fur trade forts left behind a rich archaeological record.
Alberta is no exception. In fact, the then AthapuskowCountry in today’s northern Alberta, was among the richest fur districts in North America. When American fur trader Peter Pond first discovered it in 1778, he acquired so many furs that he had to cache some because he couldn’t take them all back to Montreal.
Trader Colin Fraser, in his warehouse, examining his lot of furs worth an estimated $35,000 – a huge sum of money in the 19th century. As the Hudson’s Bay Company 1826 fur returns show, both the Athabasca and Saskatchewan Districts, mostly located in today’s Alberta, had among the highest numbers of beaver pelts in the entire Canadian Northwest. 3
I am often asked, how many fur trade establishments were there in Alberta? According to our Alberta inventories, that number is over 300. We are probably missing a few forts that were never recorded in the sometimes ‘sketchy’ historic documents. And as Alexander Ross’s description of Fort Assiniboine suggests, some of these places hardly deserved the name ‘fort’.
“…a petty post erected on the north bank of the river, and so completely embosomed in the woods, that we did not catch a glimpse of it until we were among huts, and surrounded by howling dogs and screeching children. At this sylvan retreat there were but three rude houses….and there was not a picket or palisade to guard them from either savage or bear. This mean abode was dignified with the name of fort.” (HBC Fort Assiniboine, 1825, described by Alexander Ross)
The majority of fur trade posts were located in central and northern Alberta, built by the various fur trade Companies operating from eastern Canada or England. The ‘Whiskey’ posts listed here are a later nineteenth-century addition to the trade, located mainly in southern Alberta and operated primarily by American pedlars.
Many of these forts have not been found. Often their locations were poorly documented. The physical evidence they left behind is difficult to see in the dense bush when traipsing through Alberta’s densely forested river valleys.
Graph showing the number of fur trade posts whose location is known and those that have not been found. Only approximately seven percent of these forts have been excavated.
In the dense bush of the Peace River floodplain, there are only a few hints suggesting a fur trade post once existed there – mounds representing collapsed building fireplaces and depressions representing cellars or some other type of pit. Occasionally faint depressions marking the ditches dug to place in the palisade pickets for the fort walls, still appear on the surface of the ground.
But even these features are often hard to see. Despite having found the Boyer River fort site thirty years earlier, it took over an hour to relocate a few depressions and mounds in the dense undergrowth of the Peace River floodplain.
Students from the University of Lethbridge searched through the dense bush for evidence of the 1788 North West Company’s Boyer’s Post in 2018. Only a vague description of the location of the post existed – it was built near the confluence of the Boyer and Peace Rivers.With new technologies, we are now able to find archaeological sites hidden in the dense boreal forest more easily. LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) imagery strips the vegetation from the surface and then maps the surface contours with a high degree of accuracy. Above is an example of LIDAR imagery, an optical remote sensing technology that can measure the distance, or other properties of a target by illuminating the target with light often using pulses from a laser. Not only did LIDAR reveal the large cellar depressions at Fort Vermilion I (c.1798 – 1830) marked by the upper two circles, but a large depression of an unknown site marked by the lower circle.
The fur trade documentary record leaves many things to be desired. It is often a biased, one-sided description of the trade and the more important members operating in it. Company workers and Indigenous people have little or no voice in those documents.
Despite being an incomplete testimony of human history, the archaeological remains we find reflect not only the lives of a literate few but also those of the many Company servants and Indigenous peoples living at the posts who left no written record behind. Their lives are reflected in the dwellings they lived in, the possessions they made or bought, and the food they ate.
Fur trade society was stratified, primarily by one’s occupation, ethnicity, and gender. The fur trade archaeological and documentary records reveal that those individuals in the highest positions had access to the best resources. Officers’ quarters were bigger, and better constructed than those of the servants 4.
“…while the exterior is fair enough with its winter porch, protected doors, the inside was somewhat of a maze and more like a rabbit warren is supposed to be, both in excess of occupants…” (George Simpson McTavish describing the servants’ quarters at an inland fort)
The schematic drawing of the buildings at the North West Company Fort George (c.1792 – 1800) is a case in point. This drawing was completed primarily from archaeological remains since no map of the fort existed. The men’s quarters on the left housed the Company workers and their families, sometimes holding up to 10 – 12 people in tiny, confined single rooms. These dwellings were dwarfed by Chief Trader, Angus Shaw’s two-storey Big House, where he and his family resided.
The layout of Fort George is based on archaeological evidence. There are only five references to fort construction in clerk, Duncan McGillivray’s 1794-95 journal, the only surviving document from this late 18th century Fortes des Prairie.
The personal possessions of the Fort population inform us about their gender, beliefs, and cultural affiliations. For example, early in the fur trade when metals were new to Indigenous people, old, leaky copper pots and larger pieces of silver were repurposed and made into jewelry.
Copper and silver tinkling cones and tags, likely made by the Indigenous wives of Company men, were highly prized objects often replacing or incorporated with traditional shell and bone adornment. They also remind us of the importance of women in the trade and everyday operation of the forts.
Artifacts from Fort Vermilion I (c.1798-1830) were repurposed from metal and made into ornaments to suit the needs of Indigenous people living at the fur trade posts: A. Copper Tinkling cones to adorn jingle dresses; B and C. Silver tags (to adorn dress as in illustration D) cut from a larger piece of trade silver; D. A leather Dene dress adorned with metal tags made from scrap metal 5
The inequality existing among fur trade ranks is also reflected in their diet. During the early years of the western fur trade, wild game made up most of the food fort personnel ate. Often our fur trade posts contain an abundant, rich array of faunal remains.
Those animal bones, along with the surviving documents, show the large quantities of meat eaten by fort personnel. Meat and fat were rationed differently, depending on employees’ rank and position at the fort. Officers and their families often had more and better cuts of meat and were given more of the highly prized fat.
“…we have finished a Glaciere containing 500 thighs & shoulders for the consumption of April & May…” (Clerk, Duncan McGillivray, Fort George, 1794-95, describing the amount of meat required to feed the fort inhabitants.)
That amount of meat, representing 500 animals (likely bison), consumed over approximately sixty-one days, averages out to about most of eight bison a day required to feed the 160 hungry mouths at Fort George.
Faunal remains from the North West Company Fort George, Alberta. This fort, while primarily there to acquire furs, was essentially a meat factory, processing tens of thousands of pounds of meat necessary to supply the fur trade brigades on the journeys from the east into the Canadian interior. The photograph on the left shows butchered bone remains thrown up against the south palisade of the fort. Bone debris fills an old building cellar in the photograph on the right.
Category
Fresh Meat
Dried Meat
Pounded Meat
Grease
Officers Mess(2 persons)
2250 lbs
57 lbs
57 lbs
105 lbs
Officers Families (6 adults)
4283
159
6
108
Engages (8 persons)
7752
576
576
18
Engages Families (3 adults)
2612
148
148
4
Meat rations at Fort Vermilion II, 1832-33. While the Engages and their families are getting less fresh, dried, and pounded meat than the officers, they received far less fat per individual than the Officers and their families. 6
Despite the Northwest’s seemingly endless supply of resources, the fur trade’s impact on game animal populations soon showed, often in ugly ways.
“…we learn from Mr. McTavish that they are in a starving condition at Lac Verd, there being forced to pick up the fish Bones which they threw out last fall to prolong their miserable existence.” (Journal of Duncan McGillivray, 1794-95)
Alberta’s fur trade era, and that of the rest of Canada, has left a rich and varied historic footprint. It represents not only how an elite, literate portion of the population of the fur trade lived, but also how the rest of the many employees, representing a diverse number of ethnic groups, fared. While considered a darker side of Canadian colonialism, it nevertheless is part of Canadian history and cannot be ignored.
Pyszczyk, Heinz. 1992. The Architecture of the Western Canadian Fur Trade: A Cultural-Historical Perspective. Society for the Study of Architecture in Canada, Bulletin 17(2):32-41[↩]
D from Kate Duncan. 1989. Northern Athapaskan Beadwork. A Beadwork Tradition. Douglas and McIntyre, Vancouver.[↩]
In a former blog I talked about Historical Fiction as a possible genre to personalize historical facts. I continue in that vein with another short story. What happened at a remote late eighteenth century Canadian, Saskatchewan River fur trade post when the brandy supplies kept disappearing? The story is based on North West Company’s clerk Duncan M’Gillvray’s Fort George journals, John McDonald of Garth’s memoirs, and archaeological investigations at the fort site in the 1970s. Our main man, chief trader Angus Shaw, faces a problem. Pilfering. By his men. How does he deal with it? Read on and find out.
The Story
Fort George, Alberta, 1793
One of the fort Engages rushed into chief trader Angus Shaw’s rather spacious private quarters in the Big House, sitting on the high banks of the North Saskatchewan River. Before Shaw could ask what the man wanted, the words came tumbling out.
“They’re here Sir. And there must be a least two-hundred of them.”
“Who’s ‘they’ LaFrance? The King of England and his court? Quit talking in riddles man. Speak English.”
“Blackfoot, Sir. Wanting to talk and trade. They insist on a meeting and gifts first.”
“What the hell are they doing here this late in the fall?” Shaw stood up from his chair, walked around a bit, considering what to do.
“Well, they’re here. Can’t just turn them away. Break out the tobacco and brandy, LaFrance, and invite their principal men into Indian Hall. Keep the others out.” Shaw knew he had to accommodate them or lose the trade to his neighbors at Buckingham House.
“Buckingham House,” he snorted. “Where does the HBC come up with those damned names?” Then he considered his fort’s name, ‘Fort George’. ‘Not exactly fitting for the Canadian wilderness either,’ he thought. He waited for his men to finish preparations and LaFrance to return. He was still deep in thought when the door opened letting in the drafty cool fall air. And a little more.
“Close the door LaFrance. You’re letting in that awful stench. What is that anyway?”
LaFrance answered dutifully. “It’s from the butchering sir. We’re starting to fill the ice pits with meat for the winter, to make pemmican for the spring brigades.”
“Well, it smells God-awful. I’m glad winter will soon be here so that stench won’t be as bad. Are we ready for the meeting LaFrance? You look a little pale.”
LaFrance was standing there, trembling. “Sir the high wines are almost all gone, and what’s left tastes more like water than brandy.” LaFrance quickly looked at the door, as if getting ready for a rapid escape. He knew Shaw was going to blow his lid.
And LaFrance was right. Shaw lost it. Completely! He hurled his clay tobacco pipe at the mud wall, breaking it into little pieces. He kicked a chair, sending it flying LaFrance’s way. His Cree country wife, Marguerite, came running into the room to see what was wrong. She took one look at the scene, then quickly left.
“How in the hell can that be? The brigades just got back from Montreal two months ago and we’re already low on liquor? This is a disaster LaFrance. I’ll have to borrow more from our neighbors at an exorbitant price, of course. But not now, let’s give the Blackfoot what we have and hope it’s enough.”
After Shaw partially regained his composure, LaFrance tentatively ventured some more information. “Well Sir, about what happened. The lock on the storage cellar was tampered with again. It seems someone broke in and helped themselves to some drink.” LaFrance was stammering now, looking quite guilty, as if he might somehow have been involved.
“Some drink? The lock was tampered with? How so, LaFrance?”
“Well, smashed into little pieces, Sir.” Again the Engage looked quickly away, steadily backing toward the door. “I think Sir, we’re ready. The principal men are gathered in the Indian Hall and await you.” He turned and hurried out the door.
As Shaw walked toward the Indian room to meet the Blackfoot principal men, he thought about his not so little dilemma. He knew without alcohol, he would lose the trade to his competitors. ‘This is happening to often. Those god-damned French Canadians. They drink and party endlessly and could cost me a small fortune if this keeps up.’
Then in a more sober moment of thinking, he reluctantly admitted: ‘Well, even though they are some of the worst scoundrels around, they’re the best canoe men, carpenters, and labourers in the Canadian west. And, maybe it wasn’t them. Some of my officers aren’t exactly angles either. I’ll just have to build something to keep everyone out of the Company stores, and hide the liquor.’ He left and walked into the Indian Hall, cordially greeting the Blackfoot principal men.
…………………….
“Early this morning ten young Blackfoot came in for tobacco for a band who were to arrive later; sent, as usual, six inches to each principal man. They arrived at noon and pitched their tents, each party near the gates of their own trader. Gave them liquor as usual, one pint of Indian rum to each principal man, and they began to drink.” (from the journals of Alexander the Younger, Fort Vermilion (on the Saskatchewan near Fort George, November 12, 1809; Coues 1897:571)
They all sat and smoked, and prayed. Then one of the Blackfoot men took a sip of his brandy, blanched, and spit it all over the wood hall floor. He looked at Shaw in disgust, a deep scowl forming on his face. He spoke to Shaw’s translator, who turned a lighter shade of red.
“So, what did he say, Blanchet?” Shaw already knew but listened anyway.
Blanchet reluctantly told Shaw, while the principal men were fidgeting, as if preparing to leave. “He says this stuff tastes like horse piss, and not brandy. Next spring he’s taking all his furs to the Hudson’s Bay Company. They have good brandy there. And, he asks what that terrible smell is outside? Smells worse than a buffalo jump in the summer.”
“Tell him we had an accident with the brandy. It fell into the river on the journey up the Saskatchewan. Got a little watered down. Tell him I’ll compensate him with extra tobacco and more brandy next spring if he brings his furs to us. As to the stench. Tell him not to trade us bad meat anymore.” Blanchet translated, and the Blackfoot reluctantly sat down again, still grumbling among themselves and giving Shaw nasty stares.
Shaw stared back, thinking. ‘They will go next door anyway, to see if the HBC has a better offer, as soon as they are done here.’
The next day, the Blackfoot traded a few wolf skins and left. LaFrance came rushing up to Shaw. “Sir, the good news; they left. The bad news; with half our horses.” This time LaFrance was already out the door before the litany of curses came rushing out of Shaw’s mouth.
Shaw looked through the open door into the fort courtyard. ‘Jesus, can it get any worse than this? I’m stuck in this shithole with these drunkards for the rest of the winter. And now I have to deal with a bunch of very belligerent Natives next spring. Who keep stealing my horses, then trading them back. And this stinking meat. I’m going to get sick.’
As the events of the day went through his mind, Shaw noticed a large black plume of smoke across the river in the southwest. ‘Great! And to top it all off, they set the prairie on fire as a farewell.’ It was before noon. He was about to pour himself a stiff brandy anyway. He stopped short, realizing they didn’t have any left.
…………………..
“They [Hudson’s Bay Company] allowed us the free use of the well for some time, but at last, apprehensive of its drying up also….from the quantity taken from it by so many for all purposes, Mr. Tomison, a powerful man, refused to allow us further supplies….Mr. Tomison would not listen to any reason, indeed I had little to give him — but that if he would not give us our wants that either of us must pay a visit to the bottom of the well.” (from the memoirs of John McDonald of Garth, c.1795, Fort George, Alberta, in Morton 1929:lxii)
A few days later John McDonald of Garth was brought into Shaw’s quarters, barely standing. Kind of wobbling. “So, what the hell happened to you McDonald? Christ, you look like shit.”
McDonald, scarcely able to speak, finally got a few words out. “Well, Shhiir, I met with that scoundrel Tomison and his men at the well and I beat them up pretty badly.” Garth burped, then wobbled, having trouble keeping his feet.
Shaw looked on incredulously. They were already indebted to their neighbors for the liquor and now this man got into a fight with the HBC – about what? Water? There was a whole bloody river flowing before his eyes and John fought over the spring water supply closer by?
“Well, by the look of your face McDonald, you really put a scare into them.” Shaw remained stoic, reluctantly waiting for John to speak. He occasionally exaggerated when he told his stories. Especially when drunk.
“I did my best sir. Shhoowed them who is boss of the water, I did. They didn’t want to share the well, but I thought otherwise.”
“And, where exactly did you manage to get a hold of so much liquor, man?”
“Private stocks,” mumbled McDonald, before nearly tipping over.
Shaw just stared at his soon-to-fall-down officer in astonishment. ‘God, please help me. I’m surrounded by idiots.’ He eyed McDonald disparagingly, thinking: ‘Well maybe he’ll suit my purposes. He owes me after this little incident.’
…………………
Next spring, after all the engages and voyageurs left for Montreal, Shaw took McDonald aside and explained his plan for a new cellar for the liquor. John nodded, fully realizing that if he failed Shaw, he was done with the Company. So, he and a few trusted men worked for months to build it.
That fall, after examining the large, fresh mound of earth beside the big house, Shaw eyed McDonald. “I hope you got it right, John. If you so much as mutter a word how this here was built, you’ll be buried in it. And worse, no more brandy.” McDonald nodded solemnly. ‘What could be worse than no more brandy,’ he thought.
“One more thing John. If my stocks start disappearing, I’ll be coming after you.” McDonald visibly grew paler at those last words, but said nothing.
Soon after, the men arrived from Montreal, their canoes laden with supplies and trade goods. Including lots of brandy and rum. Joseph was grunting and cursing, shouting out to Francois behind him, two ninety-pound bales on his back. “So, we paddle for two-thousand miles to get this stuff here and then we have to haul it up to the highest bank on the river. Why not build down along the river?” Francois said nothing, only grunted in return, trying to balance his equally heavy load. He was too busy thinking about all the brandy they would drink this winter.
Once inside their fort, the men looked around. Something was different. They looked toward the Big House. Beside it, a new building, of sorts. Just a large low mound of earth.
Pierre leaned over to Louis. “Is that a new cellar? Look how close it is to the trader’s quarters. Hard to pilfer the brandy stores when it’s that close.” They put the brandy barrels near the newly built mound and looked at the mound again. Strange though, no door.
Shaw came out of his house. He looked at his somewhat confused men. “Leave the liquor here, take the rest of the provisions to the stores.” His men nodded, looking back somewhat forlornly at the brandy and rum kegs.
Once they finished, Shaw gathered them again. Now they had tired-looking puzzled faces. His men knew something was up. But what? “Gabriel, break out a barrel for the men. Let’s celebrate after the long journey.” Shaw turned, leaving them to their revelry. And soon they were falling down drunk, having already forgotten about the new mound beside the trader’s house.
Next morning the brandy barrels in front of Shaw’s House were gone. The men walked around the compound, still a little drunk and perplexed. Thinking, barely. Now focused on only one thing. ‘Where did the brandy barrels go?’ They looked at the strange mound by Shaw’s house again. No entrance. Anywhere.
Shaw sat in front of his house, smoking his pipe, watching his men. There was a look of satisfaction on his usually stoic face. He took a sip of his brandy and toasted those closest to him. “To your health Pierre, men.” Pierre only spat in return. The rest, including McDonald, only glared. Shaw only smiled in return, relishing his private stock of liquor. Not even the smell was that bad when your private stock was safe.
……………………….
Fort George, Alberta, 1978.
Harry Reed and his crew were excavating parts of the Big House at Fort George, probably the residence of Angus Shaw and his country wife. And a large subterranean structure beside the Big House. Even though it was a hot Alberta afternoon along the river, everyone was happy. This was a great fort site. As he would later learn, maybe one of the best, and most complex, he would ever excavate.
“Jay, what did you find in that big storage cellar?”
“Well, all pretty normal. It’s a wood cribbed subterranean structure with the roof coming down to the ground. Poles, with bark and sod roof. Kind of a root cellar with a roof, probably all covered with sod.” Harry looked at the sketch Jay gave him, then at Jay, and the somewhat concerned look on his assistant’s face.
“And, what else, Jay?”
“It doesn’t have an outside entrance. We’re missing something Harry.”
Harry stared at Jay. Maybe a little too long. He hated these situations. Because you kept digging until you found out why the building did not have a door. Even if it took all summer. Chasing one little fact for countless hours. Was it worth it? Who really cared if you added that fact to the historic record. He did.
Harry looked at Jay again, wondering if he was getting too much sun. “A building without an entrance. Ridiculous, Jay.” Jay looked at Harry and knew immediately what he was thinking. ‘Find the damned entrance. Even if if takes the rest of the summer.’ So, they went to work.
A few weeks later, the project now almost over, the two men sat talking, drinking their beers, overlooking the large excavated storage cellar and parts of the Big House. “So, why would he do that, Harry? Did he want all the brandy for himself?”
Harry thought for a moment, took another swig of his beer before answering. “He didn’t trust his men I guess. Not with the liquor. That was the only way he could control the supplies. And those brass spigots for casks we found down there certainly hint to liquor storage.” They sat in silence pondering their somewhat unusual find.
Fort George, 2015
The little boy, holding his father’s hand, read the interpretive sign overlooking an enormous hole in the ground at the Fort George site. “Why would the trader have a secret passageway from his house into this cellar dad?”
“Maybe he didn’t trust his men, son.”
“But what if the archaeologists hadn’t found this passageway?”
“Then, son, I guess we might not know as much about the relationship between the boss and his men.”
“But what if it doesn’t mean that at all dad? Maybe the trader was too lazy to go out in the minus forty degree winter night and get some brandy? So, he had the men build a passageway to the cellar from his quarters.”
The father looked thoughtfully at his boy. “I agree. Except for one thing. There was no other entrance, except through his quarters. I don’t think he wanted his men traipsing through his private quarters all the time. And he didn’t want them in that cellar. Looks a little suspicious to me, son.” They walked off, still a little puzzled, to read another interpretive panel at the site.
Author’s Note
For many years I thought about the peculiar storage cellar and its even stranger entrance at Fort George. Although we looked for an outside entrance, the evidence was sketchy. The concealed tunnel from Angus Shaw’s Big House to the storage cellar was real enough. Below is a sketch of the fort showing the location of the cellar and the entrance into the Big House. The cellar excavation was incredible. The roof had collapsed into it and was almost completely intact. Poles, bark and all. For me it was one of those rare archaeological moments.
This is a revised version of Robert Kidd’s (1970) layout of Fort George, based on our later excavations at the fort. The final story about this fort, and who occupied it, has not yet been told. The layout of this fort, in a short eight year period of occupation, changed several times. In fact, in one of those versions, the south palisade ran through former buildings. And, many of the building cellars were packed with rubbish. This has also puzzled me for many years. I have been toying with the idea that after the North West Company abandoned this fort, someone else (i.e., independent peddlers, Metis freemen, etc.) re-occupied it. Presently, the archaeological facts just don’t fit with a single occupation.
Interpreting what we found, however, was the most difficult part of all. Obviously Shaw wanted a private entrance into his stores. But why? Was the little boy right? Simply for convenience? Or, because of the social distance and distrust between North West Company Scottish traders and their mostly French Canadian/Metis labourers? Other differences, including clothing, housing and food, and type of labor, also separated the Company officers from their men.
As is often the case, there is no definitive proof or one answer here. All too common when dealing with either the historic documentary or archaeological records. This story represents one of those possibilities.
References
Coues, Elliot (editor). 1897. New Light on the Early History of the Greater Northwest: The Manuscript Journals of Alexander Henry, Fur Trader of the Northwest Company, and David Thompson, Official Geographer and Explorer of the Same Company, 1799-1814. Volume 2. Ross and Haines, Minneapolis.
Kidd, Robert S. 1970. Fort George and the Early Fur Trade in Alberta. Provincial Museum and Archives of Alberta, Publication No. 2.
Masson, L. R. (editor). 1890. John McDonald of Garth Autobiographical Notes, 1791-1816. In Les Bourgeois de la Compagnie du Nord-ouest: Recits de voyages, lettres et rapports inedits relatifs au nord-ouest Canadien. Volume 2. De l’imprimerie generala. cote et cie, Quebec.
Morton, Arthur S. (editor). 1929. The Journal of Duncan M’Gillivray of the North West Company at Fort George on the Saskatchewan, 1794-5. MacMillan, Toronto.
Canadians, for the most part, used wood as the material of choice to build their homes. For hundreds of years. The construction methods however, have changed over that period of time. And when we go back to the 17th and 18th centuries, some of the methods seem foreign to us today. Here is a brief chronological rundown (starting with the most recent) of those building construction methods, ending with some very unique ones I have seen in Alberta.
I’ll quickly summarize the modern techniques which are elaborated on elsewhere. Also, J. Gottfred has extensively covered log building construction techniques, and I (Pyszczyk, 1992) have also written extensively on western Canadian log construction techniques (more from an archaeological perspective).
Depending on where you live, current stud frame house construction started sometime in the early 20th century. Here uniformly cut 2″ x 4″ or 2″ x 6″ ‘studs’, 8′ – 10′ long were used to build the building frame. The studs for walls only extended one storey, and then the entire process was repeated at the 2nd and 3rd stories. Wall infill consisted of various materials to insulate the building. The interior and exterior was then clad with a variety of materials. This construction technique uses large quantities of nails or screws to join everything together.
Balloon Frame Building Construction
Said to date from the 1830’s – 1930s in the US, the balloon frame house shown in this photograph differs mainly from the stud frame house by the length of the studs which extend all the way to the roof line in the former (even in a second or third storey building). As with modern stud framing, infill and cladding consisted of various materials, and everything hung together with nails. Some people think the ‘balloon’ description for this building method originated from its skeptics believing it would blow away in a severe wind, like a balloon. (Courtesy of Scott Sidler)
The Old Bay House, Fort Vermilion, Alberta, shown on the front page of my web site, constructed in c.1908, is a balloon frame building. One of the oldest in Alberta. I’d be guessing if I tried dating this method in various parts of Canada (if any of you have more information on this method in Canada, I’d love to hear from you). It likely first appears in areas having access to standardized milled lumber.
Inside of the Old Bay House, Fort Vermilion, Alberta, showing wood interior wall and ceiling cladding.
Massed Log Building Construction
This technique consists of laying a series of horizontal logs on top of one another and connecting them with various types of notching on the corners of the building. It has various names and origins, and appears at different times in different parts of Canada. The French called it “pièce sur pièce” (piece on piece) construction. The cracks between the logs were chinked and the interior walls were sometimes mudded (more on that later). The technique is ‘wood heavy’, requiring large, long, straight logs, which are left rounded or squared. Few nails are used in this technique; logs are joined by wooden dowels at intervals along the wall.
The dovetail corner notching method is one of the most elaborate techniques found in western Canada (shown below). The angled joints in this method don’t require overhang (as in a saddle notched corner) and prevent the corners from coming apart. There are many good examples in Alberta, but some of the best I have seen come from the central and northern parts of the province.
This somewhat unique log building, at Carcajou, Alberta, has dovetail corner notching and logs only squared near the corners; the rest are left round. Carcajou was one of the earliest Metis settlements in Alberta, already shown on David Thompson’s 1826 map, as ‘Wolverine Point‘. In this community, this technique might have had a French Canadian influence. This building dates to the late 19th – early 20th century.This log building, constructed in 1987 by the Hudson’s Bay Company, at Carcajou, Alberta, also has dovetail corner notching. The ethnic origins of its builder are unknown. The Company at this time hired people with different ethnic backgrounds, including French Canadians.Close up view of the Carcajou HBC log building showing a series of round auger marks in the logs. The marks were used to number the logs, suggesting that this building had been dismantled and repaired, or dismantled and moved.
Massed log corner notching construction technique, probably the most familiar to many people, is also difficult to date in Canada. In some parts of the country it likely goes back as far as the beginnings of basic log construction, with a simple saddle notched log cabin at the lake or woods. And being built as recently as the last decade. In Alberta, the earliest dated example of dovetail notching is the clerk’s quarters at Dunvegan (c.1878 – present-day). The first Ukrainian immigrants (late 19th century) in Alberta used the dovetail notching method as well. Here are a few more examples of this technique. Assigning any definitive ethnic affiliation to these methods is problematic. There are likely many.
Top Left Photograph: The clerk’s quarter, Hudson’s Bay Company, Dunvegan, Alberta (c.1878 – present).
Bottom Right Photograph: A close-up view of the clerk’s quarters building corner showing the elaborate dovetail corner notching.Old cabin, near Buck Lake, Alberta. Massed log saddle notching construction technique. Date unknown.
Red River Frame/Post-and-Plank
Also referred to as poteaux et pièce coulissante (posts and sliding piece), Gottfred suggests this method was adapted in New France from the French method of plankwall framing. In the much colder Canadian winter, logs replaced planks. In this method upright logs were grooved (mortised) and set along the building walls and corners at intervals, and then horizontal logs filled in the rest of the wall by carving tenons on the ends which fit into the uprights (Tongue and groove, mortise and tenon). The technique uses shorter (than massed log construction) infill logs between the vertical uprights. It uses few nails. Instead wood dowels along the walls and corners kept everything together.
I have seen two types of log wall framing methods in western Canada: 1) Post-on-sill; and, 2) Post-in-ground (see schematic diagram below). Post-on-sill was used after c.1830 by the Hudson’s Bay Company at many of its inland forts. Post-in-ground is an earlier form of framed log construction, going back to the 1780s in Alberta, and probably much earlier at the Saskatchewan and Manitoba fur trade posts. With this method the vertical posts are set in pits in the ground. At the turn of the 19th century we also see combinations of the two methods, such as at the HBC Nottingham House in northern Alberta. However this method should not be confused with the true post-in-ground (Poteaux-en-terre) method used earlier in French Canada (discussed later).
Pretend you are looking at a vertical wall and a cut-away of the ground in this image. These were the two most common log framed construction techniques for the various fur trade companies in western Canada. Archaeologically, the post-in-ground method is easy to identify because of the large pits dug to place the posts in, up to a metre deep in the ground. For some reason this method was abandoned in favor of the post-on-sill method, which eventually gave way to the massed dovetail log construction method. All of the excavated buildings at the North West Company Fort George (c1792-1800), Alberta, were constructed using the post-in-ground method. In this photograph we exposed a vertical wood post in a pit with horizontal wood sills (foundation logs) butting up to it (likely tenoned into it). This scaled drawing of a building wall found at the North West Company, Boyer’s Fort (c.1788-1792) shows a vertical post in a pit with the building sills (base logs) butting up to it Excavations of the main house, at the HBC Buckingham House site, northern Alberta, showing some post pits holding the vertical posts of building walls, and the corner posts sitting on sills. Courtesy Karlis Karklins, Parks Canada. One of the large warehouses at the c.1830 – 1915 HBC Fort Edmonton, Alberta being dismantled. A good example of post-on-sill-construction where the squared horizontal infill logs were inserted into the grooved vertical logs along the wall of the building. A large vertical timber is laying in the foreground of this c.1915 photograph. With this method the entire building could be taken apart and repaired, or moved and built elsewhere with relative ease. This particular fort building was built in the c.1860s when the fort expanded. When traveling, I’m always on the lookout for log buildings. A large barn structure, New South Wales, Australia. A kind of post-in-ground framed log construction technique without the bottom logs. Adapted for either better ventilation, or flooding, for which parts of Australia are notorious.
Original Post-in-Ground (Poteaux-en-terre) and Post-on-Sill (Poteaux-sur-sol) Construction
Unfortunately, there is some confusion with all these similar architectural terms. The original 17th century French versions of Post-in-Ground and Post-on-sill log construction refer to entirely different log construction method. In this method the logs for the entire wall are all placed vertically, either in a trench in the ground, or sat on a horizontal foundation log (sill), or stones. The spaces between them were filled with stone, bricks and mud. As the images below show, they have a very distinct archaeological imprint making them readily recognizable.
Post-on-sill vertical log wall construction. An early French Canadian method where cracks between the vertical walls are filled with stones, bricks, plaster or mud. Courtesy: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Drawing_of_Poteaux-en-Terre_in_the_Beauvais_House_in_Ste_Genevieve_MO.pngImage of a rowhouse, Fort Michilimackinac (c.1715 -30). Vertical wood wall posts would either sit on a sill or in a trench in the ground. (from Stone, 1974) French House (c.1720-30), Fort Michilimackinac (from Stone, 1974). This small French house at the fort was definitely French post-in-ground construction. The archaeological evidence would reveal vertical post remains standing side-by-side in a trench. We searched for this building construction method in western Canada, but to no avail. Even though many of the early forts were likely constructed by French Canadians. I thought I had found a vertical building wall at the 1798 NWC LaFleur’s post in the Peace River Region. Later I realized that a new building had been constructed over a former old palisade wall which would have had similar vertical posts sitting in a trench.
The post-in-ground method originated in France, possibly the Normandy area. Here vertical posts for the wall were placed in the ground, and filled in between with either brick or stones. In the much colder climates of Canada the entire wall was made of vertical wood and covered by mud or plaster to prevent drafts and heat loss (from Russell Versaci, 2008)
Mud, the Plaster of Yesterday
Whenever I lecture on log construction techniques, I emphasize the importance of mud, or some mud/clay mixture, during construction. Many of the 18th – 19th century framed log buildings we excavated in Alberta used a mixture of mud/clay/straw to chink the outside walls. Sometimes entire the interior building walls were completely mudded. Also stone fireplaces and chimneys were covered with mud as well. I think the mud was not only used to prevent drafts from coming through the cracks between the logs, but when the interior walls or fireplace was mudded (as much as two inches thick) the mud worked as a heat sink absorbing the heat from the fire and retaining it in the mud walls.
Mud outer wall chinking on this building from Carcajou, Alberta. A branch or sapling was inserted into the crack (because it was large) and then the entire area filled with mud.
The importance of good mud or clay for this type of log building construction cannot be overstated: “I arrived at the entrance of Riviere Original…I brought the goods,however, to a large point on the south-east of the lake, and wrought two or three days at felling trees, but, to my great mortification we then discovered there was no clay to be found within five leagues of us.” (Angus Shaw, NWC, 1789, near Moose Lake, Alberta)
Top Left Photograph: A schematic drawing of the willow lathe framework placed diagonally over the log inside walls of Angus Shaw’s big house at the NWC Fort George (c.1792-1800).
Lower Right Photograph: Fired mud chinking and wall suggesting that the building burned down. And by doing so the mud became fired and hard as brick. The impressions in the fired mud told us whether the wall logs were squared or rounded and if lathing had been placed on them. I have seen cut lathing on the inside walls of early 20th century Ukrainian houses in Alberta, to keep the mud in place. (Images from Kidd, 1970)Top Left Photograph: Still standing (at least in the early 20th century) stone and mud fireplace, Fort Reliance, NWT. Similar fireplaces were built at other 18th-19th century fur trade posts. The chimney is made of logs and sticks, covered in mud. A similar fireplace chimney was noted in some fur trade journals: “…fixed Poles to the chimney of Mr. McLeod’s upper Room in order to heighten it.” (Daily Transactions, Fort Dunvegan, Alberta).
Bottom Right Photograph: A single stone fireplace at the NWC Fort George, Alberta (now on display at the Royal Alberta Museum). After being abandoned the mud from the fireplace and chimney oozed over the charred floor remains, preserving them perfectly.
Not Everything was Wood
I’ll end this post with one of the most unusual houses I have ever set my eyes on in Alberta. ‘Soddies’ were a common form of building construction on the Canadian prairies where wood was rare. But in central Alberta? Below is a still-standing (I hope) sod and wood framed house in east central Alberta. A truly unique and rather unorthodox home.
This wood framed house, with sod infill for walls, was built in east-central Alberta. Perhaps one of the most unique houses I have ever seen. According to Government of Alberta files: 1907 – Homestead filed and smaller sod house built; 1910 – House built; 1911 – Exterior plastered with lime and sand, and interior finished with Beaverboard; 1950 – last occupied. (Photographs and information Courtesy of Historic Sites Service, Government of Alberta) A close-up view of the sod infill used to fashion the walls of this house. The sod was then covered with plaster and beaverboard. Unfortunately, this exposed part of the wall now makes for a great nesting area for barn swallows. As with straw bale wall construction, the trick here is to completely seal the wall to prevent rodents or other critters from getting in. (Photographs and information Courtesy of Historic Sites Service, Government of Alberta)
What is ‘Canadian‘?
As Canadians we have a long tradition of building our homes with wood. And we continue to do so. For example, in 2019 there were a total of 187,177 houses built in Canada, and I would think most of them were wood framed structures.
Some of the Canadian wood building methods used over the centuries occur in other places in North America and the world. Assigning specific dates, or origin, or builder ethnic affiliation, is risky and cannot always be generalized. The examples I give here are mostly from western Canada, and dates, ethnic affiliation or construction methods, will vary elsewhere in the country and continent.
But, there are some Canadian wood building methods that were adapted from Europe to deal with our often harsh Canadian environment, peoples’ specific needs, or their economies. They are truly our own. They are Canadian.
References
Kidd, Robert, 1970. Archeological Excavations at the Probable Site of the First Fort Edmonton or Fort Augustus, 1795 to Early 1800’s”. Provincial Museum of Alberta Human History Occasional Paper No. 3. Alberta Culture and Multiculturalism Historical Resources Division, 1987.
Pyszczyk, Heinz, 1992. The Architecture of the Western Canadian Fur Trade: A Cultural-Historical Perspective. Society for the Study of Architecture in Canada, 17(2):32-41.
Stone, Lyle M., 1974. Fort Michilimackinac, 1715-1781. An Archaeological Perspective on the Revolutionary Frontier. Publications of the Museum Michigan State University.
Versaci, Russell, 2008. Roots of Home. Our Journey to a New Old House. The Taunton Press.
Tobacco was an integral part of the Canadian fur trade. It was smoked, chewed and snuffed. It was traded and gifted to Indigenous peoples, and consumed by both men and women. One of the most common ways of smoking tobacco was with a clay tobacco pipe. However, not all pipes were made of clay. This is a story of one of the most interesting and unusual types of tobacco pipes I have run across – a stone tobacco pipe.
Metis dog driver, Lac La Biche, Alberta, smoking a clay tobacco pipe. (Arthur Heming sketch, courtesy of Glenbow Archives)
Clay Tobacco Pipes
Whenever we excavate at the inland fur trade posts in Canada, one of the most common artifacts we recover are clay tobacco pipe fragments. These pipes are the remnants of smoking activities at these posts. They come in a variety of shapes and sizes. At the end of the 18th century the stem on some of these pipes, known as Churchwardens, was nearly three feet long. Only the upper classes smoked them while the laborers smoked the shorter stemmed cuttie.
Man smoking the excessively long-stemmed churchwarden tobacco pipe.
These two clay tobacco pipes were recovered from the c.1830 – 1917 Hudson’s Bay Company Fort Edmonton. Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. The pipes were made from ball clay and mostly manufactured in Europe. While they were relatively cheap, they were also quite fragile.
Many of the 18th and 19th century clay tobacco pipes shipped to the inland posts, were made in Europe. The Hudson’s Bay Company imported most of their pipes from England. Many of the pipe bowls and stems were stamped sometimes with the maker’s name or initials. It wasn’t until the latter half of the 19th century that a Canadian clay pipe industry took hold in eastern Canada. Bannerman of Montreal clay pipes were shipped to the Alberta fur trade posts.
These tobacco pipe fragments came from the Northwest/Hudson’s Bay Company Fort Vermilion (c.1798-1830) site. This pipe bowl has the letters ‘TD’ stamped on it. It refers to Thomas Dormer, a pipe maker in England during the late 18th – early 19th centuries.
Ornate clay tobacco pipe stem fragments with floral designs. In the second half of the 19th century many pipes had very elaborate decorations on them. Some of the bowls even had faces on them. The bottom stem has ‘Baltic’ (origins unknown) stamped on it, probably referring to the manufacturer. These fragments were recovered from the HBC Fort Edmonton (c.1830-1917), Alberta.Hudson’s Bay Company men smoking outside of Fort Edmonton (1871), on what are now the Alberta legislature grounds. The Company inventories list thousands of pounds of tobacco shipped to these inland posts. These men might have been smoking one of the pipes above. (Photograph by Charles Horetzky, Library and Archives of Canada/c-7534)
The Somewhat Puzzling History of Western Canadian Stone Tobacco Pipes
But not all pipes were made of clay. When we excavated the North West Company Fort George (c.1792-1800) site in east-central Alberta we found platform (a type) tobacco pipes made from soapstone, pipestone or local mudstone. They were found in domestic household refuse along with many other common fur trade artifacts (beads, buttons, etc.). These pipes are poorly documented.
This rare, complete mudstone tobacco pipe was found at Fort George, Alberta. The mudstone occurs in round nodules found in the North Saskatchewan Sands and Gravels. We found the mud balls and partially finished pipes in the household refuse at the site.
We often speculated who made and smoked these pipes. They certainly were not European. Or, so we initially thought. And, what were they doing in Alberta, Canada?
Peter Rindisbacher painting, 1821, Red River, showing a First Nations family smoking. The man is smoking a stone elbow pipe. And the woman is smoking what looks like a stone platform pipe similar to the one found at Fort George.
Initially we thought these pipes were made by local Indigenous men or women working at the western Canadian fur trade forts. But there is no record of this kind of pipe being used prior to White contact in Alberta. Only recently I realized that these pipes were similar to Iroquois platform pipes. Iroquois? In Alberta? Well, yes. The Northwest Company brought Iroquois hunters out west to trap furs in the late 18th – early 19th centuries. (The community of ‘Calahoo’, Alberta is named after an Alberta Iroquoian family.)
This image of an Iroquois man smoking tobacco from what looks like a platform stone pipe. Many stone pipe fragments, similar to the Alberta pipes, have been found at St. Lawrence Iroquoian archaeological sites. (photo image courtesy of Marie-Helene Daviau, 2008)
I thought at this point at least we now knew the possible origins of this pipe style. Quite possibly brought west by the Iroquois hunters who lived at the forts. But then, after seeing the image below, I wasn’t so sure anymore.
In this image, taken from the cover of Daviau’s monograph, shows a French Canadian farmer smoking what looks like a stone platform pipe. (Frederick von Germann, 1778) In 1749, Peter Kalm noted the French Canadian woodsmen borrowed this style from the Iroquois of the St. Lawrence River Valley (Daviau 2008:189).
The North West Company hired many French Canadians to work at their inland western Canadian posts. These men made up the famous canoe brigades and worked mostly as laborers at the posts when not paddling. So, it is entirely possible that they brought their stone pipes with them, or fashioned them out of local material at the forts.
We found similar stone pipe fragments at the remote northern Alberta fur trade posts, such as Fort Vermilion, Peace River region. But the peculiar markings on these pipes add a bit of a twist to the story.
This stone tobacco pipe base (the bowl on the top is missing), found at Fort Vermilion, Alberta, is of the platform variety, but with some unusual circle-and-dot markings on it. We are still trying to figure out how these perfectly symmetrical circles were incised into the stone. Possibly by a small auger bit.
Over the years I have noticed artifacts with similar circle-and-dot markings on them in other western Canadian fur trade assemblages. The circle-and-dot motif is an Athabaskan symbol that has a geographical distribution ranging from central Alberta to northwestern Alaska. Was this tobacco pipe style adopted by Athabaskan-speaking people who then put their markings on it? Quite possibly. Interestingly, in Alberta the style seems to disappear by the 1840s.
Bone artifacts from Rocky Mountain House, Jasper House and Dunvegan, showing the circle-and-dot motif. Left to right: Quill smoother; bone fragment; bone flesher.
A Few Final Thoughts
Occasionally archaeologists recover artifacts from a documented period of Canadian history whose origins and uses are puzzling. Not all material culture is well documented. Especially when it belongs to people who aren’t doing any of the documenting. These objects were likely made and used by Indigenous people and/or French Canadian voyageurs (who were mostly illiterate) – a people without a written history. In the case of the stone tobacco pipes, careful dating and geographic location are extremely important to figure out their possible origins and uses.
References
Daviau, Marie-Helen. 2008. La Pipe de pierre dans la societe conadienne des XVII et XIX siecles. Centre interuniversitaire d’etudes sur les letters, les arts et les traditions (CELAT), Quebec.
Heinz W. Pyszczyk. 2015. The Last Fort Standing: Fort Vermilion and the Peace River Fur Trade, 1798-1830. Occasional Papers of the Archaeological Society of Alberta. Number 14.
Note: In my next post, I’ll tell you about another unusual tobacco pipe in the fur trade. However, before I reveal more about this artifact, I will write a short story about it first.
