My Town Monday - Samuel B. Steele - Kicking Horse Pass

[1 - Kicking Horse Pass - click to enlarge]













In 1885, the work on the Canadian Pacific Railroad was being made to reach the first crossing of the Columbia River, about 70 miles west of Laggan (Lake Louise)



[2 - Lake Louise train station today]


[3 - Laggan train station - 1889] link to photohere

to a place now known as Donald (named after Lord Strathcona. Donald is in the Rocky Mountain Trench near Marl Creek Provincial Park, B.C.).


[4 - Road in Kicking Horse Pass in 1920s - click to enlarge]


Samuel Steele was to ensure that the Mounted Police were in detachments along the CPR line during its construction. The railroad had constructed a Tote road to assist those working for the CPR to transport their supplies carried by horse and mule teams. Storage areas had been made at convenient distances which were overseen by a CPR employee. From these stores the contractors obtained what they needed for their contracts.


[5 - Tote Road (Eagle Pass Wagon Road 1885)]

The Tote road was cut out of solid rock near the Columbia River several hundred feet above. An exception to this was the Kicking Horse Flats near the Beaverfoot Pass.


[6 - Kicking Horse River Flats - click to enlarge]

The Kicking Horse Pass was named by Dr. James Hector, who had accompanied Captain Palliser during the exploration of western Canada in the 1850s. Hector explored the pass accompanied by a party of First Nations. At one of his camps he was kicked by a horse he had been trying to put a pack saddle on, breaking several of his ribs and knocking him unconscious. The natives thought he was dead, dug a grave and placed him in it. When they saw signs of life they removed him from the grave.

The Tote road near Golden was dangerous at any given point, especially at the highest being more than a thousand feet above the raging torrent of Kicking Horse River. Any horse that tended to shy or is too excitable in nature was considered not suitable for such a trip. Steele found that horses were unafraid of the precipice, but those horses that shied regularly would keep themselves well away from the rocky wall. On one trip Steele took one of the horses sent to the NWMP to Laggan from Calgary. At the most dangerous part of the Tote road Steele “met an Italian navvy with his bundle of blankets, and he, as was then the custom, instead of going to the right, planted himself against the wall of rock furthest from the precipice. At the sight of the extraordinary object, my horse, crazed with fright, whirled about, and I just saved myself and the horse by hurling myself on to the road.”

Steele, known for his strength, managed to keep hold of reins and bridle of the horse, whose hindquarters were over the precipice and its body resting on the edge. Steele's companion on a steady horse assisted in getting the horse back on the road. Steele sent the horse back to Calgary with a letter to the O.C. to send only horses accustomed to working in the mountains and not horses raised on the plains.

For other participants for My Town Monday go here.


TO BE CONTINUED

For previous posts on this series: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9.



Sources: Forty Years in Canada (1914) by Col. S.B. Steele, pp. 188-190

Photo Credits: [1]-Matthew Klassen CC=nc-nd-flickr, [2]-Rachelw123 CC=nc-nd-flickr, [3]-Glenbow Archives, [4]=Sherlock77 (James) CC=nc-nd-flickr, [5]-Wikipedia, [6]-babyonborg CC=nc-nd-flickr.

My Town Monday - Samuel B Steele - Twenty Miles For A Drink

[Yoho National Park - Cathedral Peak with CPR locomotive above Kicking Horse River ca. 1920 - click to enlarge]


By the end of 1883, the Canadian Pacific Railway had reached the Rocky Mountains, just eight km (5 miles) east of Kicking Horse Pass.

In April 1884, Samuel Steele of the NWMP was assigned to maintain the law during the construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway in British Columbia. Their jurisdiction was along the surveyed line of the railroad which consisted of an area 20 miles wide. This area was proclaimed on May 6, 1884 by the Parliament of the Dominion of Canada under the Preservation of Peace on Public Works Act. The Public Works Peace Preservation Act was amended on 2nd of June 1884 to the original ten miles on either side of the CPR railroad construction line to encompass one hundred and thirty miles.

In 1884 the sale of intoxicating liquor was prohibited. The only location where liquor could be sold was if there was a bar in a tent or cabin. Any person caught in the act of selling, were liable to a fine of $40.00 for the first and second offences; for the third they could be imprisoned. As the Public Works Peace Preservation Act covered a narrow strip of land, the CPR labourers (“navvies”) were able to leave that specified area at any time after they received their month’s wages to spend the entire amount if desired on a prolonged spree. This delayed the progress of the construction to the railroad line.

The Government of British Columbia determined they should not be deprived of internal revenue and issued licences to sell “spirituous and fermented liquors” within the land proclaimed under the Act. The NWMP were given the right to ensure that the building of the CPR would not be delayed. Steele enforced the laws to the limit, dealing with those under the influence in public places as to set an example to deter others. He recommended to the government to increase the width of the railroad belt to 40 miles and the NWMP’s powers to enable the magistrates to punish with imprisonment for the second offence of selling intoxicating liquor. The suggestions were approved and to good effect. The wholesale and retail stores on the edge of the 20 mile area had to move, and the “navvies” found the distance too long to walk for a drinking spree.

Sources: Forty Years in Canada (1914) by Col. S.B. Steele, pp. 186-187
Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online

Photo Credit: Sherlock77 (James) CC=nc-nd-flickr.


For other participants for My Town Monday go here.


TO BE CONTINUED

For previous posts on this series: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8.

When I prepared this post it came as a surprise that the Preservation of Peace on Public Works Act was the first one passed in Parliament for the Dominion of Canada in 1884. In the previous MTM post about the protests during the G20 Summit in Toronto I had been only aware of the Public Works Protection Act of 1939 with current amendments.

My Town Monday - Samuel B Steele - Occurrences

[Ranch just off highway 3 in southern Alberta - click to enlarge]




[Samuel Steele]

Samuel Steele in his memoir of his days on the North-West Mounted Police in what is now western Canada recounted an interesting story about a pet goose that had been caught by one of the men on the Force. During the winter the goose was fed in the barracks, and in the summer, grazed on the parade ground. There it was seen, winter and summer, until the reveille sounded. The beat of the sentry included the occasional visit to the stables, at which time the goose would squawk until he returned. On very cold nights the bird would tap on the guard room window with its beak until admitted to be warmed by the stove, and when comfortable would leave whenever someone entered or left, and resumed its watch on the flat stone by the sentry’s beat. During the day, the goose was inside the fort keeping an eye out for strange dogs, and whenever one appeared the goose immediately attacked with fierce flapping of wings until the intruder departed through the gate.[1]



In the 1880s it was common for gentlemen living in the United Kingdom to send their young men to Canada to learn farming. An absurd practice as instructors, hired to teach, did not care if the men worked or not as they were paid for board and lodging. Or they were sent out without any farming experience to begin a farm or ranch on the prairies.

While at Fort Macleod, Samuel Steele knew of a “famous, professional man” who had sent his son west with sufficient money to begin cattle ranching. A stockman was hired to build a log house and spacious corrals on the banks of stream, while the young man enjoyed himself in a neighbouring town with others of his ilk spending his financial support. To encourage his parents for more money he would send letters to them of his successful cattle ventures, which resulted in them coming for a visit the following summer to his ranch. With no cattle, despite his report as having many, he wondered what he should do. Being a resourceful sort, when his parents arrived at the log house at the ranch in sight of the snow-capped Rockies, they were given a tour of the corrals, in which were a large number of fine cattle with different brands. Nothing was suspect as brands were not used in the old land, and his father pleased with his son’s success with cattle increased his allowance and invited him home for a Christmas visit. When he stayed with his parents that winter he related that the winter had been so severe the cattle had died. Thus began a new venture in an orange grove.[2]


My Town Mondays were started by Travis Erwin in Amarillo, Texas who has handed the reins over to Clair Dickson. For other participants please visit the new location here.


TO BE CONTINUED

For previous posts on this series: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7.

Sources:
Forty Years In Canada by Col. Samuel B. Steele (1915) [1-p. 139, 2-p. 171]

Photo Credit: [1]Calyspo Orchid CC=nc-nd-flickr, [2]-wikipedia.

My Town Monday - Samuel B. Steele - Fort Walsh

[1-Cypress Hills]

Fort Walsh became the headquarters of the North-West Mounted Police in 1878, with its beginnings as a fur trading post in 1873. The fort is named after Superintendent James Walsh . The fort was later moved to Maple Creek, Saskatchewan where the railroad was. The fort was used in 1948 to 1962 for the RCMP to breed horses for the musical ride and the force.


[2- Historic Site - Fort Walsh at Cypress Hills Provincial Park]




[3 - Fort Walsh bunk house]



[4 -Fort Walsh Officer's Quarters]



[5 -Fort Walsh bunk house]


In 1875, Inspector James Morrow Walsh with about 30 men were sent to the Cypress Hills region where they built Fort Walsh, not far from where the Cypress Hills Massacre occurred. The NWMP investigation revealed that American “wolfers” (poisoned wolves for their pelts) and horse thieves had instigated the massacre. Although the NWMP were unable to convict any of the participants, the First Nations appreciated the efforts resulting in a good relationship. This resulted in the eventual signing of Treaty 4 in 1877, and Treaty 6 in 1879 and 1882.


[6 - click to enlarge]



[7 - Fort Walsh old book]



[8 - Fort Walsh - Photo of Queen Victoria]





[9 -Sitting Bull]


The country near Fort Walsh was the location where Sitting Bull, Medicine Man, and 5,000 Lakota Sioux followers took refuge from the US Army after the battle of the Little Big Horn in 1876. Walsh was instrumental in ensuring Canadian law was enforced, and peace maintained between the Canadian and American First Nations. When Sitting Bull continued to refuse to leave Canada for the US, Walsh was accused of neglecting his duties to get the Sioux to leave. To separate Walsh from Sitting Bull, whom he had become close friends with, Walsh had been sent to Ontario and later forced to resign from the NWMP due to his “too friendly association” with Sitting Bull and the Sioux. A letter Colonel James Macleod wrote to his wife, Mary, on July 29, 1878 sums up his opinion of Walsh’s association with the Sioux. Sitting Bull and the majority of Sioux refugees returned to the US in 1881 when the federal government refused to provide supplies and food when the buffalo had declined in numbers, almost to extinction.


[10 -Cypress Hills wildflower]




[11 - Cypress Hills is known for star gazing - Aurora]



My Town Mondays were started by Travis Erwin in Amarillo, Texas who has handed the reins over to Clair Dickson. For other participants please visit the new location here.


TO BE CONTINUED

For previous posts on this series: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6.

Sources:
Forty Years In Canada by Col. Samuel B. Steele (1915) [pp. 160, 161]
Glenbow Museum Archives
ParksCanada – National Historic Site

Photo Credits: [1][2][3][5][7][8]-Space Ritual CC=nd-flickr, [4][6]-bribriTO CC=sa-flickr, [9]-wikipedia, [10]-kiwehowin CC=nd-sa-flickr, [11]-Kevin Satt CC=sa-flickr.

My Town Monday - Samuel B Steele - Fort Edmonton

[1-Slough near Smoky Lake (Victoria Settlement)-click to enlarge]

In July 1874, Samuel Steele began his trip west in service with the North West Mounted Police with the rank of sergeant-major from Fort Garry, Manitoba. The cavalcade that left Manitoba had assorted wagons, Red River carts, oxen, cattle, farming equipment, provisions and horses.

During the NWMP's stay at Fort Victoria, arrangements were made to leave the cows, calves and weak oxen for the winter months with a contract of $15 a head for the oxen and cows, and $10 each for the calves.

Once they left the Victoria Settlement, their progress to Edmonton was slow over difficult terrain and their horses had to be helped along whenever they fell. The problem with the horses pulling the wagons was that they were overloaded, there was insufficient grain to feed the horses and they were not acclimatized to the weather or area.

[2-Swampy marsh, typical of the parklands - click to enlarge]


When a messenger arrived with instructions to bring the division into Fort Edmonton that same day, a distance of twelve miles, they were unable to comply as some of the horses could not go on. Two men were left to pitch a tent where the horses could be sheltered from the elements, while Steele and the other horse teams continued on.

The trail was the worst they had encountered: “knee-deep in black mud, sloughs crossed it every few hundred yards, and the waggons had to be unloaded and dragged through them by hand….The poor animals, crazed with thirst and feverish because of their privations, would rush to the ponds to drink, often falling and having to be dragged out with ropes from where they fell. One of the men would hold up their heads while I placed the hitch. It mattered not how often they were watered, the same performance had to be gone through time after time.”[1]

Determined to carry out his orders, Steele and the men kept going even during the night with some wagons veering off the road into extensive marshes only to have to return. At 5:00 a.m. the next morning, they reached Rat Creek (just south of where Norwood Public School is at 9520-111 Avenue, Edmonton, the rat in the name refers to muskrats)[2], a small stream about four miles from Fort Edmonton. Steele informed the oxen driver, Gagnon, that the men and horses would not be able to go on as they were exhausted from being on the move for the last 21 hours. Steele set up camp while Gagnon proceeded on to Fort Edmonton.

Later that day they continued, and once they reached the first dry piece of trail were able to reach the fort (at that time located where the Alberta Legislature is now).

Fort Edmonton , also known as Edmonton House, was one of the many Hudson Bay Company’s trading posts and located at the end of the Carlton Trail. In 1915 it was dismantled after the new Alberta Legislative Building was erected.

[3- Alberta Legislature and Fort Edmonton in 1914. The train tracks are on top of the High Level Bridge crossing the North Saskatchewan River]


In 1969 a reconstruction of Fort Edmonton was begun five km upstream from its original location and Fort Edmonton Park was born.



[4-Fort Edmonton]

[5]


[6]

[7]



[8- Rowand House was a three storey house built by John Rowand, administrator for the Hudson’s Bay Company, for the sole use of himself and his family]

[9- Note this barn has fitted log corners, quite the engineering feat]


TO BE CONTINUED

For previous posts on this series: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4.

Sources:
Forty Years In Canada by Col. Samuel B. Steele (1915) [1-pp. 73]
Illustrated History of Canada, Edited by Craig Brown (2007)
Alberta Online Encyclopedia - Historic Trails [2]

Photo Credits: [1] benjicarson CC=nc-sa-flickr, [2]-Wendy Cooper CC=nc-sa-flickr, [3][8]-wikipedia, [4][7]-CanadaGood CC=nc-nd-flickr, [5][6][9]-Evan CC=nc-nd-flickr.

My Town Mondays were founded by Travis Erwin in Amarillo, Texas who has handed the reins over to Clair Dickson. For other participants please visit the new location here.

My Town Monday - Conditions in the West in 1872

In July 1874, Samuel Steele began his trip west in service with the North West Mounted Police with the rank of sergeant-major from Manitoba. The NWMP was formed due to the state of lawlessness that pervaded from the territories of the United States to the south into the North-West Territories of the Dominion of Canada (recently acquired from the Hudson’s Bay Company). Large numbers of reckless men made their way north and did what they pleased. No restraint had been made against them with the result the Indians were in possession of weapons and “fire water” in exchange for buffalo hides and furs. The interlopers from the south moved into Canada setting up stockades as protection from the Indians.

Although the Indians’ numbers had been reduced from the effects of smallpox, they were still powerful and capable of inciting wars.

The province of Manitoba in 1873 was small, not extending more than 100 miles west of Winnipeg. The land west into the North West Territories did not have any justice of the peace. Any travel across the prairies was fraught with danger.

[Fort Edmonton c. 1856 by Paul Kane]

Close to Edmonton and the east slope of the Rocky Mountains the Indians were friendly. The Rev. George McDougall, a Methodist minister, had established a mission in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. Any person traveling from the Calgary area through the country now occupied by Medicine Hat, Lethbridge, Fort Macleod, and across southern Saskatchewan needed an escort of armed men.

Prior to the formation of the NWMP the Hudson’s Bay Company posts had difficulty maintaining their trading posts south of the Red Deer River. There was continuous warfare between the tribes, enhanced by the abundance of whisky brought in by traders south of the Red Deer and South Saskatchewan rivers. When the Indians burnt down the Old Bow Fort on the Bow River, the Hudson’s Bay Company built Mountain Fort (Rocky Mountain House) to pacify the Blackfeet who were determined to keep white and red intruders off their hunting grounds. Whenever the natives met at Fort Edmonton for trade, the Crees and Blackfeet would fight, causing the occupants of the fort to close the gates until the fight was over. There were many massacres at Forts Carlton, Pitt, Edmonton, and Mountain. Any Indian who boasted of his ability to take horses and scalps was considered virtuous by members of his tribe. Wherever there was plentiful hunting, the Indians would massacre any intruder found in those locations. The Metis hunters and others of the Red River settlement never ventured west of Moose Jaw, except in well-organized armed bands.

One of the stockade posts in the west (southern Alberta) was Fort Hamilton or more commonly known as “Fort Whoop-Up” at the fork of the Belly and St. Mary’s rivers. It was well fortified with braced heavy logs with log partitions, heavy log roofs, iron bars across chimneys to prevent Indians’ access, a thick gate of oak with a small opening to trade through. Inside, the trader stood at the wicket with a tubful of whiskey next to him, and when an Indian pushed in a buffalo robe to him, he would hand out a tin cupful of the ‘whiskey’. A quart bought a horse. When spring arrived, wagonloads of the hides and furs were escorted to Fort Benton, Montana, about 200 miles south.

'Whiskey' and 'firewater' are terms to be used loosely as it was made up of the following ingredients: alcohol spiked with ginger, molasses, red pepper, coloured with black chewing tobacco, watered down and boiled.

Photos of Fort Whoop-Up here.

TO BE CONTINUED

Part 1

Sources:
Forty Years In Canada by Col. Samuel B. Steele, 1915, Herbert Jenkins Limited

Photos: wikipedia

Travis Erwin from Amarillo, Texas is the founder of My Town Monday. For other locations to visit please go to Travis' site here.

My Town Monday - Samuel B. Steele

[1 - Samuel Benfield Steele]


Samuel Benfield Steele (5 January 1849 to 30 January 1919) was a famous member of the North-West Mounted Police and in later years a distinguished soldier. (This post and the next cover only his early life in the military and the NWMP as it relates to Canada.) He was the fourth son born to Elmes and Anne Steele (2nd marriage) in Medonte Township in Upper Canada. His family had military connections and in 1866 he joined the militia at the time of the Fenian Raids.


[2-The Red River Expedition below Kakabeka Falls by Frances Anne Hopkins circa 1877]

In 1870 he participated in the Red River Expedition that had been authorized by Sir John A. MacDonald to confront Louis Riel and the Métis at the Red River Settlement (near current Winnipeg, Manitoba). The expedition was headed by Colonel Garnet Wolseley (later Field Marshall Viscount) when he joined them at the Sault. The military crossed through a Canadian route as the U.S. government refused them access over U.S. soil.

The troops were required to transport all their provisions, weapons including cannons over hundreds of miles of wilderness. In each of the boats the loads weighed about 4,000 pounds made up of: barrels of biscuits, flour, pork, sugar; tea chests, sacks of beans. cases of potatoes, ammunition boxes, arm chests, ball pouches, tents, soap cases, candles, boat nails, and one bottle of mosquito oil. At numerous portages special roads were required to be built with logs over muskeg (swampy areas). The one place they did not portage was the Winnipeg River, where the rapids and cataracts had to be navigated. This trip was undertaken during two months in summer heat combined with swarms of blackflies and mosquitoes.


[3- Voyageur Canoe Passing Waterfall by Frances Anne Hopkins 1869]

Steele made note in his biography of a voyageur carrying two barrels of pork and 1,000 rounds of ammunition with a combined weight of 528 pounds without showing any distress.

When the troops arrived at Fort Garry, they found Riel had abandoned it.


[4-Upper Fort Garry - early 1870s]

At that time, Winnipeg, was located half a mile north of Fort Garry with about forty houses, lining the Stone Fort trail (now the main street of Winnipeg). There were: nine stores, three chemist shops, one saddlery, one hardware store, several saloons named “Hell’s Gates”, “The Red Saloon”, etc.


[5-Three Piegan Chiefs by Edward Curtis 1900]

Shortly before Steele had arrived with the military contingent at Fort Garry, smallpox had been spreading in the far west from the Missouri River to the North Saskatchewan River. The disease had been brought into Montana by a merchant who had left a blanket on a Missouri steamboat from St. Louis, the blanket in turn being stolen by an Indian. He caught the disease and spread it through his tribe which killed them. A war party of Bloods who had gone to steal horses, found no one alive, took the horses and as many buffalo robes as they could, not realizing their mistake. The disease spread throughout all the Indian tribes: Peigans, Blackfeet, Crees and Stonies, and then to the plains hunters, the employees of the Hudson’s Bay Company and missionary families. The chiefs of the Blackfeet nation were gone, leaving few capable of leading their people. One tribe whose lodges had numbered 2,000 in their main camp, with each lodge containing eight persons, was reduced to one-tenth of its number.

For the whisky trader who had brought in the contagion to the North West Territory (as the Canadian prairies were then known), a member of the military, Lieutenant Butler, undertook the duty to prevail upon him “that British law was supreme”. Butler travelled there and back on horseback and by dog train over 2,700 miles to perform his task. [What Butler did to the whisky trader is not revealed in Steele’s narrative, though a book The Great Lone Land is mentioned.]

TO BE CONTINUED

Sources:
Wikipedia -
Forty Years In Canada by Col. Samuel B. Steele, 1915, Herbert Jenkins Limited

Photo Credits: [1][2][3][4][5]-wikipedia.

Travis Erwin from Amarillo, Texas is the founder of My Town Monday. For other locations to visit please go to Travis' site here.