The Selkirk Concession was a land grant issued by the
Hudson's Bay Company
The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC; french: Compagnie de la Baie d'Hudson) is a Canadian retail business group. A fur trading business for much of its existence, HBC now owns and operates retail stores in Canada. The company's namesake business div ...
(HBC) to
Thomas Douglas, 5th Earl of Selkirk
Thomas may refer to:
People
* List of people with given name Thomas
* Thomas (name)
* Thomas (surname)
* Saint Thomas (disambiguation)
* Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) Italian Dominican friar, philosopher, and Doctor of the Church
* Thomas the Ap ...
, in 1812. The Hudson's Bay Company held a commercial monopoly in
Rupert's Land
Rupert's Land (french: Terre de Rupert), or Prince Rupert's Land (french: Terre du Prince Rupert, link=no), was a territory in British North America which comprised the Hudson Bay drainage basin; this was further extended from Rupert's Land t ...
, consisting of the entire
Hudson Bay drainage basin
The Hudson Bay drainage basin is the drainage basin in northern North America where surface water empties into Hudson Bay and adjoining waters. Spanning an area of about , the basin is almost totally in Canada (spanning parts of the Prairies, ce ...
. The Selkirk Concession, also known as Selkirk's Grant, included a large section of the southwest area of Rupert's Land, bounded: on the north by the line of 52° N latitude roughly from the
Assiniboine River
The Assiniboine River (''; french: Rivière Assiniboine'') is a river that runs through the prairies of Western Canada in Saskatchewan and Manitoba. It is a tributary of the Red River of the North, Red River. The Assiniboine is a typical meand ...
east to
Lake Winnipegosis
Lake Winnipegosis is a large (5,370 km2) lake in central North America, in Manitoba, Canada, some 300 km northwest of Winnipeg. It is Canada's eleventh-largest lake. An alternate spelling, once common but now rare, is Lake Winipigoos or ...
, then by the line of 52° 30′ N latitude from
Lake Winnipegosis
Lake Winnipegosis is a large (5,370 km2) lake in central North America, in Manitoba, Canada, some 300 km northwest of Winnipeg. It is Canada's eleventh-largest lake. An alternate spelling, once common but now rare, is Lake Winipigoos or ...
to
Lake Winnipeg
Lake Winnipeg (french: Lac Winnipeg, oj, ᐑᓂᐸᑲᒥᐠᓴᑯ˙ᑯᐣ, italics=no, Weenipagamiksaguygun) is a very large, relatively shallow lake in North America, in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Manitoba, Canada. I ...
; on the east by the
Winnipeg River
The Winnipeg River is a Canadian river that flows roughly northwest from Lake of the Woods in the province of Ontario to Lake Winnipeg in Manitoba. This river is long from the Norman Dam in Kenora to its mouth at Lake Winnipeg. Its watershed ...
,
Lake of the Woods
Lake of the Woods (french: Lac des Bois, oj, Pikwedina Sagainan) is a lake occupying parts of the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Manitoba and the U.S. state of Minnesota. Lake of the Woods is over long and wide, containing more than 14,55 ...
and
Rainy River; on the west roughly by the current boundary between modern
Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada, western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on t ...
and
Manitoba
Manitoba ( ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada at the Centre of Canada, longitudinal centre of the country. It is Canada's Population of Canada by province and territory, fifth-most populous province, with a population o ...
; and on the south by the (mostly very slight) rise of land marking the extent of the Hudson Bay watershed. This covered portions of present-day southern Manitoba, northern
Minnesota
Minnesota () is a state in the upper midwestern region of the United States. It is the 12th largest U.S. state in area and the 22nd most populous, with over 5.75 million residents. Minnesota is home to western prairies, now given over to ...
and eastern
North Dakota
North Dakota () is a U.S. state in the Upper Midwest, named after the Native Americans in the United States, indigenous Dakota people, Dakota Sioux. North Dakota is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba to the north a ...
, in addition to small parts of eastern Saskatchewan, northwestern
Ontario
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...
and northeastern
South Dakota
South Dakota (; Sioux language, Sioux: , ) is a U.S. state in the West North Central states, North Central region of the United States. It is also part of the Great Plains. South Dakota is named after the Lakota people, Lakota and Dakota peo ...
.
Lord Selkirk referred to the area as the
District of Assiniboia
Assiniboia District refers to two historical districts of Canada's Northwest Territories. The name is taken from the Assiniboine First Nation.
Historical usage
''For more information on the history of the provisional districts, see also Distric ...
and planned to create an agricultural colony there. To do so he populated the territory with impoverished people from Scotland and Ireland. Lord Selkirk had been profoundly upset by the poverty his people faced and believed that emigration to Western Canada would be their salvation. In return he was to provide The Hudson's Bay Company with 200 employees per year, allow the company to set up trading posts in the colony and give land for company employees when they retired. In 1812 the first settlers arrived when
Miles MacDonell
Miles MacDonell ( – 28 June 1828) was the first governor of the Red River Colony (or, Assiniboia), a 19th-century Scottish settlement located in present-day Manitoba and North Dakota.
Miles Macdonell Collegiate, opened in 1952, in Winnipeg, ...
brought a small group of Scots to the colony.
While The Hudson's Bay Company held the commercial monopoly in Rupert's Land, numerous aboriginal groups lived in the same territory and disputed the sovereignty of the area. Furthermore, The Hudson's Bay Company was facing competition from the
North West Company
The North West Company was a fur trading business headquartered in Montreal from 1779 to 1821. It competed with increasing success against the Hudson's Bay Company in what is present-day Western Canada and Northwestern Ontario. With great weal ...
(NWC), which disputed The Hudson's Bay Company's commercial monopoly. In 1814, The Hudson's Bay Company
invoked its royal charter and ordered The North West Company to leave. Selkirk's settlement, commonly known as The
Red River Colony
The Red River Colony (or Selkirk Settlement), also known as Assiniboia, Assinboia, was a colonization project set up in 1811 by Thomas Douglas, 5th Earl of Selkirk, on of land in British North America. This land was granted to Douglas by the Hud ...
, was embroiled in these issues, meeting resistance from fur traders of The North West Company as well as from the local
Métis
The Métis ( ; Canadian ) are Indigenous peoples who inhabit Canada's three Prairie Provinces, as well as parts of British Columbia, the Northwest Territories, and the Northern United States. They have a shared history and culture which derives ...
population. In November 1815 the newly appointed governor of Red River Colony,
Robert Semple, arrived with around 160 new settlers. Tensions continued to rise, culminating in the
Battle of Seven Oaks
The Battle of Seven Oaks was a violent confrontation in the Pemmican War between the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) and the North West Company (NWC), rivals in the North American fur trade, fur trade, that took place on 19 June 1816, the climax of ...
in June 1816. This confrontation involved a force of local Métis and North West Company employees led by
Cuthbert Grant
Cuthbert James Grant (1793 – July 15, 1854) was a prominent Métis people (Canada), Métis leader of the early 19th century. His father was also called Cuthbert Grant.
Life
Cuthbert James Grant was born in 1793 at Fort Tremblant, a North We ...
against a force or Red River settlers and Hudson's Bay Company employees led by Governor Semple, with the battle claiming the lives of 1 North West Company-related and 21 Hudson's Bay Company-related men, including Semple. (see
Pemmican War
The Pemmican War was a series of armed confrontations during the North American fur trade between the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) and the North West Company (NWC) in the years following the establishment of the Red River Colony in 1812 by Lord ...
)
Selkirk Treaty.jpg,
Selkirk Treaty Map.jpg,
By the 1830s agricultural production of flour was over 50,000 pounds, with over 1,000 settlers residing at the colony.
[Gibson, James R. ''Farming the Frontier, The Agricultural Opening of the Oregon Country, 1786-1846.'' Vancouver, B.C.: University of British Columbia Press. 1985, pp. 10-13.] The promise of free land ensured there was no shortage of settlers arriving at the area. By the 1850s the Hudson's Bay Company lost interest in providing financial aid to the colony. In 1867, the United Kingdom had passed the
British North America Act
The British North America Acts 1867–1975 are a series of Acts of Parliament that were at the core of the constitution of Canada. Most were enacted by the Parliament of the United Kingdom and some by the Parliament of Canada. In Canada, some ...
, creating the
Dominion of Canada
While a variety of theories have been postulated for the name of Canada, its origin is now accepted as coming from the St. Lawrence Iroquoian word , meaning 'village' or 'settlement'. In 1535, indigenous inhabitants of the present-day Quebec C ...
from British holdings in the eastern portion of British North America. In 1869 the HBC "sold" Rupert's Land (received compensation for surrendering its trading monopoly back to the British Crown) to the expanding Canada. A lack of attention to concerns of the existing Red River settlers, Métis, and aboriginal groups caused Métis leader Louis Riel to establish a local provisional government to negotiate the political treatment of the local population in the handover to Canada, resulting in the
Red River Rebellion
The Red River Rebellion (french: Rébellion de la rivière Rouge), also known as the Red River Resistance, Red River uprising, or First Riel Rebellion, was the sequence of events that led up to the 1869 establishment of a provisional government by ...
of 1869-70 and Canada agreeing to
create the province of Manitoba – on land that had been part of the Selkirk Concession – in 1870.
References
{{reflist
Red River Colony