Paddling, Portaging and Working in Forts

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Clara Goodman
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1 Would you want a job in the fur trade? Read the following cards to see what it might have been like to work and live during the early days of the fur trade. 1

2 There were many different kinds of jobs in the fur trade in Canada. Some jobs were quite different depending on which fur trade company you worked with. For quite a long time the Hudson s Bay Company built forts on Hudson Bay and encouraged Aboriginal groups to bring furs to them. ( You come to us! approach). The North West Company paddled from Montréal into the interior of Canada and traded with Aboriginal groups where they found them. ( We ll come to you! approach). As a result there were different kinds of jobs with the different fur trade companies. As we learn about the kinds of jobs people did, we can imagine what their lives might have been like in the early days of the fur trade. Working for the North West Company The North West Company (NWC) got its furs by paddling west from Montréal (eventually they came all the way to the NWT). Jobs in these trading canoes were some of the most important ones in the company. The NWC had several different positions or ranks of workers. Because this company was based in Montréal, many of these positions had French names. How much you got paid was based on the kind of work you did. 2

3 Voyageurs were the men who paddled the canoes. Because these birch bark canoes traveled through country inhabited by many different Aboriginal groups, there was often also a translator or interpreter aboard. These were very important positions, and paid better than any of the canoeing jobs. Here is a description of a North West Company trip from someone who participated in it: "The voyageur's daily routine was a killing one: for the six- to-eight weeks he was on the road, he was roused as early as two or three am, and he set off without breakfast. Before eight o'clock a breakfast stop was made. A midday lunch was "served" - though often lunch was no more than an opportunity to hack off a piece of pemmican to chew on the way. However, fairly regularly, a stop was made for a few minutes each hour to allow the men to smoke a pipe. This event was so important that distances came to be measured in "pipes"; "trois pipes" might be 15 to 20 miles, depending on wind and current. Between eight and ten in the evening, depending on the light, camp was made. Supper, which might have been precooked the night before, was warmed up and served. The men then dropped down on turf, moss, or beach, with their heads under the overturned canoe (whose high end lent itself to this purpose). A tarpaulin would be stretched from the canoe to give shelter from rain and dew. There was no provision ordinarily made for protection against insects, except the voyageurs' own grease and dirt, assisted sometimes by a smudge, lit up-wind." 3

4 Other jobs in the North West Company Because they had so far to travel by canoe, some employees of the North West Company wintered over in the area where furs were being traded. These were often called bourgeois, and were actual owners or partners in the business. The commis were a different category of worker, like a clerk, and responsible for keeping good records of who owed money, how many furs had been traded, etc. This drawing shows some of the work involved in the fur trade. You see some people carrying bundles of furs and you can also see some trade goods. It looks like there is a trading fort at this portage as well. Maybe the canoe is being repaired for the next part of its voyage! At the Portage 4

5 Working for the Hudson s Bay Company For well over 100 years the Hudson's Bay Company stuck to its approach of building forts on the shores of Hudson s Bay, and having Aboriginal people bring furs to them. As a result, jobs with the HBC centred around the fort. Employees at the major fur trading forts were divided into three categories: officers, tradesmen and labourers. The officers included the Governor (who was in charge of everything that happened in the fort), surgeon, sloop master (in charge of boat building and repairs), deputy governor and the clerk writer. These positions had the benefits of higher pay and better food. They also had more leisure time and private rooms. Most people were not in these positions, however. The second type of workers were the tradesmen - stone masons, carpenters, the blacksmith, armourers, coopers, tailors and other skilled employees. The third group of workers was both the biggest group, and the least well-paid. These were the labourers, and they carried out much of the dayto-day unskilled work at the post, such as loading and unloading ships, hunting game, hauling water and chopping wood. It wasn t an easy life. Chopping wood occupied much of the labourers time, as it could take up to four carts of wood a day in winter to warm the living quarters. As one post governor reported in 1741, the fort's living quarters were "... very cold, freezing everything in the cabin, though a fire kept in from five in the morning till nine at night; and when the fire is out, a red hot shot (a cannon ball), twenty-four pounds in weight, was hung up at the window to thaw it; on the outside there are shutters to every window, six inches thick; four large fires made in the stoves every day - a cartload of wood for each; yet all this will not keep things from freezing within doors." 5

Fry Phrases Set 1. TeacherHelpForParents.com help for all areas of your child s education

Fry Phrases Set 1. TeacherHelpForParents.com help for all areas of your child s education Set 1 The people Write it down By the water Who will make it? You and I What will they do? He called me. We had their dog. What did they say? When would you go? No way A number of people One or two How