Fort Victoria, Alberta

Last updated

Fort Victoria
Fort Victoria clerks quarters and cairn.JPG
Alberta County Point Locator.svg
Red pog.svg
Location in Alberta
Location Smoky Lake, Alberta, Canada
Coordinates 54°00′14″N112°23′53″W / 54.00384°N 112.39810°W / 54.00384; -112.39810
Type National Historic Site, Cultural landscape
Website Victoria Settlement
Official nameVictoria District National Historic Site of Canada
Designated17 October 2001 (2001-10-17)

Fort Victoria, near present-day Smoky Lake, Alberta, was established by the Hudson's Bay Company in 1864 on the North Saskatchewan River as a trading post with the local Cree First Nations. [1] The site had previously been used starting in 1862 as a Methodist Missionary site, on the location of an aboriginal meeting place. It was named Victoria Settlement, after Queen Victoria. [2] [3] [4]

Contents

Today, it is a historical museum known as Victoria Settlement. The nearby rural residences make up Pakan, Alberta. Metis Crossing Cultural Heritage Gathering Centre is nearby. [5]

Location and setting

Fort Victoria (Victoria Settlement) is located on the north bank of the North Saskatchewan River, 100 kilometres downstream from Edmonton House. It was located along Victoria Trail/Carlton Trail between Edmonton and Fort Pitt and served as a stopping house on the overland route between the two as well as a waystation for travellers moving up or down the river. [6] The fur trading post at Victoria was minor compared to Edmonton but it gradually attracted a small agricultural settlement, as occurred near other Hudson's Bay Company posts in those pioneer days.

History

Established by colonists as a missionary site in 1862-63, Victoria was the home for the McDougall missionary family. This site was chosen because of its popularity as a Cree settlement [always 10 to 100 tents present - per Mcdougall] and hunting area [7]

Land in the area was used according to the customary French riverlot system, and a mixed community of First Nations, Métis, and Europeans developed. For several miles on each side of the present-day museum the riverlot system is still in use, the official survey reflecting the fact that farms and land usage predated the Dominion Land Survey of the 1880s. (The DLS in most cases carved up large, square tracts as per Dominion Lands Act ). [8] [9]

Fort Victoria was an example of a community that shifted from subsistence on wildlife—specifically bison—and trade in furs to agriculture (crops and livestock). [10]

In 1864 George Flett was given the job of opening a Hudson's Bay Company trading post at Fort Victoria. [11] Flett was of Orkney and Cree descent. [11] Flett and John Norris led the first brigade of Red River ox-carts from Winnipeg to Edmonton, taking three and a half months on the journey. They passed through Victoria Settlement [12] As clerk in charge of the post until 1866, Flett was responsible for arranging for construction of the buildings and for opening up trade with the local Indians. Flett quickly obtained a supply of good-quality furs, which Flett and his assistants took by horse and dog train to Fort Edmonton for shipment downriver to Hudsons Bay. [11] The oldest building in Alberta still on its original foundations is the clerk's quarters at Fort Victoria, which dates from 1865. [13]

The fort closed in 1883 but was re-opened in 1887. It operated until 1897-98. [14]

Later the site of the Fort became a hub for the early settlement of East-Central Alberta. It came to be called the Victoria Settlement and later, Pakan, after the Cree chief Pakannuk. [15] Chief Pakan's name was sometimes given as "Peccan or Seenum". [16]

Still later, the settlement served as a Methodist mission to Ukrainian Canadian settlers in the region. [13]

The post was also a vital stop on the trail from Winnipeg to Edmonton. The section of the trail currently within the eastern part of the city of Edmonton is a now a paved road called Victoria Trail in honour of the fort and of this route's historic past as an indigenous trail and trade route. [17]

The Fort lies within the larger Victoria District, as well as the Kalyna Country ecomuseum. It has been designated a national historic site of Canada, [2] a provincial historic site of Alberta, [1] as well as municipally designated by Smoky Lake County. [18]

Victoria Park Cemetery

Plaque at Victoria Cemetery, near Smoky Lake, Alberta. July 19 2015 at 1124PM.jpeg
Plaque at Victoria Cemetery, near Smoky Lake, Alberta.

The Victoria Park Cemetery was established circa 1896 by the Methodist church and is located on a hill overlooking the river. It is the second of six cemeteries established in the settlement. It contains approximately 100 recognizable graves from both Native and Settler communities, likely including victims of an 1870 smallpox epidemic. [19] It was restored and rededicated in 1999. [17]

Victoria District National Historic Site of Canada

Fort Victoria and the Victoria Park Cemetery is situated within the larger geographic space of the Victoria District, which itself is currently one of twenty-three national historic sites in Alberta; only three, including the Victoria District, are north of Edmonton. Of these sites, the Victoria District is the only rural national historic site in Alberta. [2] [20] [21]

See also

Affiliations

The Museum at Fort Victoria is affiliated with: CMA, CHIN, and Virtual Museum of Canada.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cree</span> First Nations peoples in Canada and northern United States

The Cree are a North American Indigenous people. They live primarily in Canada, where they form one of the country's largest First Nations. More than 350,000 Canadians are Cree or have Cree ancestry. The major proportion of Cree in Canada live north and west of Lake Superior, in Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, and the Northwest Territories. About 27,000 live in Quebec.

Fort Edmonton was the name of a series of trading posts of the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) from 1795 to 1914, all of which were located on the north banks of the North Saskatchewan River in what is now central Alberta, Canada. It was one of the last points on the Carlton Trail, the main overland route for Metis freighters between the Red River Colony and the points west and was an important stop on the York Factory Express route between London, via Hudson Bay, and Fort Vancouver in the Columbia District. It also was a connection to the Great Northland, as it was situated relatively close to the Athabasca River whose waters flow into the Mackenzie River and the Arctic Ocean. Located on the farthest north of the major rivers flowing to the Hudson Bay and the HBC's shipping posts there, Edmonton was for a time the southernmost of the HBC's forts.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Red River cart</span> Two-wheeled cart

The Red River cart is a large two-wheeled cart made entirely of non-metallic materials. Often drawn by oxen, though also by horses or mules, these carts were used throughout most of the 19th century in the fur trade and in westward expansion in Canada and the United States, in the area of the Red River and on the plains west of the Red River Colony. The cart is a simple conveyance developed by Métis for use in their settlement on the Red River in what later became Manitoba. With carts, the Metis were not restricted to river travel to hunt bison. The Red River cart was largely responsible for commercializing the buffalo hunt.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fort Edmonton Park</span>

Fort Edmonton Park is an attraction in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Named for the first enduring European post in the area of modern-day Edmonton, the park is the largest living history museum in Canada by area. It includes both original and rebuilt historical structures representing the history of Edmonton, and is staffed during the summer by costumed historical interpreters.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anglo-Métis</span> 19th century community of the Métis people of Canada

A 19th century community of the Métis people of Canada, the Anglo-Métis, more commonly known as Countryborn, were children of fur traders; they typically had Scots, or English fathers and Indigenous mothers, often Cree, Anishinaabekwe, Nakoda, amongst others. They were also known as "English halfbreeds." Some Anglo-Metis still identify by this name. Their first languages were generally those of their mothers: Cree, Saulteaux, Assiniboine, etc. and English. Some of their fathers spoke Gaelic or Scots, leading to the development of the creole language known as "Bungee". Some scholars have started spelling Métis as "Metis" to acknowledge the presence and contributions of the Anglo-Métis and the complex history of the Métis people overall.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fort Assiniboine</span> Hamlet in Alberta, Canada

Fort Assiniboine is a hamlet in northwest Alberta, Canada, within Woodlands County. It is located along the north shore of the Athabasca River at the junction of Highway 33 and Highway 661. It is approximately 39 kilometres (24 mi) northwest of Barrhead, 62 kilometres (39 mi) southeast of Swan Hills and 91 kilometres (57 mi) northeast of Whitecourt.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Métis in Alberta</span> Aboriginal group of peoples

Alberta's Métis people are descendants of mixed First Nations/Indigenous peoples and White/European families. The Métis are considered an aboriginal group under Canada's Constitution Act, 1982. They are separate and distinct from First Nations, though they live in the same regions and have cultural similarities, and have different legal rights.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dunvegan Provincial Park</span> Park and historic site in Alberta, Canada

Dunvegan Provincial Park and Historic Dunvegan are a provincial park and a provincial historic site of Alberta located together on one site. They are located in Dunvegan, at the crossing of Peace River and Highway 2, between Rycroft and Fairview.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Smoky Lake</span> Town in Alberta, Canada

Smoky Lake is a town in Central Alberta, Canada. It is located 116 km (72 mi) northeast of Edmonton at the junction of Highway 28 and Highway 855. It lies between the North Saskatchewan River, Smoky Creek, and White Earth Creek, in a mainly agricultural area. The provincial historic site of Victoria Settlement is nearby. Long Lake Provincial Park is located 60 km (37 mi) north of the town. The Woods Cree, a First Nations people, named "Smoking Lake" for the smoke from ceremonies performed on the shore; the name Smoky Lake may also be based on the mist that rose from the lake in great quantities at sundown. One of its churches, the St. Onuphrius Ukrainian-Catholic, built in 1907, has been moved to the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, Quebec. It is in Census Division No. 12 and is the municipal office for Smoky Lake County.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Carlton Trail</span> Historic trail in the Canadian Northwest

The Carlton Trail was the primary land transportation route in the Canadian Northwest for most of the 19th century, connecting Fort Carlton to Edmonton along a line of intermediate places. It was part of a trail network that stretched from the Red River Colony through Fort Ellice and today's Fort Qu'Appelle, Saskatchewan. From there the trail ran north and crossed the South Saskatchewan River near Batoche, Saskatchewan and reached Fort Carlton on the North Saskatchewan River. From there, it ran west on the north side of the river to Fort Edmonton at what is now Edmonton, Alberta.

The Kalyna Country ecomuseum is a heritage and eco-tourism district in East Central Alberta, Canada, named after the highbush cranberry plant, pronounced (Ka-lyn-na) in the Ukrainian language. The Ukrainian folklore states: "Without Kalyna, there is no Ukraina".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Provincial historic sites of Alberta</span>

Provincial historic sites of Alberta are museums and historic sites run by the Government of Alberta.

Lac la Nonne is a lake in northern Alberta, Canada. It is located between Lac Ste. Anne County and the County of Barrhead No. 11, 85 km north-west from Edmonton, east of the Grizzly Trail.

Grouard, also known as Grouard Mission, is a hamlet in northern Alberta within Big Lakes County. It was previously an incorporated municipality between 1909 and 1944.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fishing Lake Metis Settlement</span> Métis settlement in Alberta, Canada

Fishing Lake Métis Settlement is a Métis settlement in northern Alberta, Canada within the Municipal District of Bonnyville No. 87 and Treaty Six lands. Fishing Lake Métis Settlement was settled by inhabitants of the dissolved St. Paul des Métis settlement and served as a historic Fishing camp to Métis in the region for centuries. It is home to many historical events such as the Frog Lake Resistance and is home to the beginning of the 20th century Métis movement as led by Charles Delorme, Jack Desjarlais and J.F Dion. It is located approximately 15 km (9.3 mi) east of Highway 897 and 52 km (32 mi) south of Cold Lake.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">George Flett</span> Canadian Presbyterian missionary (1817-1897)

George Flett was a Presbyterian missionary in what is now Manitoba, Canada. Flett was of Orkney and Cree descent. As a young man he farmed on the White Horse Plains, led a gold exploration party to Edmonton and then became the first post master for the Hudson's Bay Company at Fort Victoria, Alberta. Flett was an interpreter to the first Presbyterian mission to the northwest between 1866 and 1867. After serving as a delegate in the provisional government of Louis Riel during the Red River Rebellion, he became a missionary among the Ojibwa of Okanese Reserve, serving from 1873 to 1895.

The Papaschase are a group of Cree people descended from Chief Papaschase's Band of the 19th century, who were a party to Treaty 6 with Canada. A modern-day group of Papaschase descendants are working to advance their treaty rights and reclaim their reserve's land or get compensation for its loss. They claim the reserve was surrendered unlawfully in 1888, but they have not been recognized yet by the Canadian Government Alexander First Nation #134 #134a #134b #143

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Beaver Lake Cree Nation</span> Canadian First Nation

The Beaver Lake Cree Nation is a First Nations band government located 105 kilometres (65 mi) northeast of Edmonton, Alberta, representing people of the Cree ethno-linguistic group in the area around Lac La Biche, Alberta, where the band office is currently located. Their treaty area is Treaty 6. The Intergovernmental Affairs office consults with persons on the Government treaty contacts list. There are two parcels of land reserved for the band by the Canadian Crown, Beaver Lake Indian Reserve No. 131 and Blue Quills First Nation Indian Reserve. The latter reserve is shared by six bands; Beaver Lake Cree Nations, Cold Lake First Nations, Frog Lake First Nation, Heart Lake First Nation, Kehewin Cree Nation, Saddle Lake Cree Nation.

The Iron Confederacy or Iron Confederation was a political and military alliance of Plains Indians of what is now Western Canada and the northern United States. This confederacy included various individual bands that formed political, hunting and military alliances in defense against common enemies. The ethnic groups that made up the Confederacy were the branches of the Cree that moved onto the Great Plains around 1740, the Saulteaux, the Nakoda or Stoney people also called Pwat or Assiniboine, and the Métis and Haudenosaunee. The Confederacy rose to predominance on the northern Plains during the height of the North American fur trade when they operated as middlemen controlling the flow of European goods, particularly guns and ammunition, to other Indigenous nations, and the flow of furs to the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) and North West Company (NWC) trading posts. Its peoples later also played a major part in the bison (buffalo) hunt, and the pemmican trade. The decline of the fur trade and the collapse of the bison herds sapped the power of the Confederacy after the 1860s, and it could no longer act as a barrier to U.S. and Canadian expansion.

Saddle Lake Cree Nation is a Plains Cree, First Nations community, located in the Amiskwacīwiyiniwak region of central Alberta, Canada. The Nation is a signatory to Treaty 6, and their traditional language is Plains Cree.

References

  1. 1 2 "Alberta Register of Historic Places". hermis.alberta.ca. Archived from the original on 2021-10-21. Retrieved 2021-10-21.
  2. 1 2 3 "Victoria District National Historic Site of Canada". www.pc.gc.ca. Archived from the original on 2021-02-27. Retrieved 2019-05-07.
  3. ↑ Losey, Timothy C.; Prager, Gabriella (1975). "A Consideration of the Effects of the Demise of Bison on the Subsistence Economy of Fort Victoria: A Late 19Th Century Hudson's Bay Company Post". Bulletin (Canadian Archaeological Association) (7): 162–182. ISSN   0315-761X. JSTOR   41242402. Archived from the original on 2021-10-21. Retrieved 2021-10-21.
  4. ↑ Sutherland, Paul. "Fort Pitt to Edmonton: the other route." Alberta History 60, no. 4 (2012): 17+. Gale Academic OneFile (accessed October 21, 2021). https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A307917996/AONE?u=nysl_oweb&sid=googleScholar&xid=f1dcaf22.
  5. ↑ "Métis Crossing Cultural Heritage Gathering Centre in Smoky Lake, AB". Metis Crossing. Archived from the original on 2023-01-09. Retrieved 2023-01-09.
  6. ↑ Pyszczyk, Heinz (1978). The Fort Victoria Faunal Analysis: Considerations of Subsistence Change of the Fur Trade Era in North Central Alberta (Master's thesis). University of Manitoba. p. 1. hdl:1993/14332 . Retrieved 2024-01-18.
  7. ↑ Ironside, R.G.; Tomasky, E. (1976). "Agriculture and River Settlement in Western Canada: The Case of Pakan (Victoria), Alberta". Prairie Forum. 1 (1): 3–18. hdl:10294/128 . Retrieved 16 January 2024.
  8. ↑ Jared (2021-08-06). "Métis Crossing and the historic Victoria Trail". RETROactive. Archived from the original on 2021-10-21. Retrieved 2021-10-21.
  9. ↑ Ironside, R.G.; Tomasky, E. (1976). "Agriculture and River Settlement in Western Canada: The Case of Pakan (Victoria), Alberta". Prairie Forum. 1 (1): 3–18. hdl:10294/128 . Retrieved 16 January 2024.
  10. ↑ Pyszczyk, Heinz (1978). The Fort Victoria Faunal Analysis: Considerations of Subsistence Change of the Fur Trade Era in North Central Alberta (Master's thesis). University of Manitoba. p. 6. hdl:1993/14332 . Retrieved 2024-01-18.
  11. 1 2 3 Block, Alvina (Spring–Summer 1999). "George Flett, Presbyterian Missionary to the Ojibwa at Okanase". Manitoba History. 37. Winnipeg. Archived from the original on 2018-09-23. Retrieved 2011-10-22.
  12. ↑ Goyette, Linda; Roemmich, Carolina Jakeway (2005). Edmonton in Our Own Words. University of Alberta. p. 58. ISBN   0-88864-449-3.
  13. 1 2 Historical Walking and Driving Tours: Victoria Trail. Alberta Community Development: Alberta Recreation and Parks, 2003. P. 13. Accessed 21 October 2021 at https://open.alberta.ca/dataset/119929f7-9429-418d-8b88-24acb1ffc9b9/resource/fdd4bdd7-4ec0-40d0-a39e-1730392e2c41/download/tour-kalyna-victoria-trail.pdf Archived 2021-10-21 at the Wayback Machine
  14. ↑ Victoria Post historic site plaque Archived 2023-07-27 at the Wayback Machine
  15. ↑ Historical Walking and Driving Tours: Victoria Trail. Alberta Community Development: Alberta Recreation and Parks, 2003. P. 7. Accessed 21 October 2021 at https://open.alberta.ca/dataset/119929f7-9429-418d-8b88-24acb1ffc9b9/resource/fdd4bdd7-4ec0-40d0-a39e-1730392e2c41/download/tour-kalyna-victoria-trail.pdf Archived 2021-10-21 at the Wayback Machine
  16. ↑ Edmonton Bulletin, Feb. 9, 1884
  17. 1 2 "Victoria Trail". Kalyna Country. 12 August 2016. Archived from the original on 2021-10-19. Retrieved 2021-10-21.
  18. ↑ "Victoria Settlement". Smoky Lake. Archived from the original on 2021-10-21. Retrieved 2021-10-21.
  19. ↑ Historical Walking and Driving Tours: Victoria Trail. Alberta Community Development: Alberta Recreation and Parks, 2003. P. 26. Accessed 21 October 2021 at https://open.alberta.ca/dataset/119929f7-9429-418d-8b88-24acb1ffc9b9/resource/fdd4bdd7-4ec0-40d0-a39e-1730392e2c41/download/tour-kalyna-victoria-trail.pdf Archived 2021-10-21 at the Wayback Machine
  20. ↑ "Victoria Settlement Provincial Historic Site". victoriasettlement.ca. May 20, 2023.
  21. ↑ "Smoky Lake County Victoria District Area Structure Plan" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-11-15. Retrieved 2019-05-07.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.