Lord Selkirk
Posted by Tom Cervo on June 13, 1998 at 00:35:42:
In response to The 5th Earl of Selkirk, written by Marie-Bernadette on June 09, 1998 at 14:59:16
"Astonishing", indeed
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Manitoba. Selkirk was a Lowlander, and had no ties (other than sympathy)
to the Highlanders displaced by the Clearances, nor obligations of any kind.
He obtained a grant of land along the Red River and established (through
his agents) a colony. The Northwest Company, a major fur trading company,
saw the colony as a threat to their domination of the fur trade, and
provoked the native peoples to destroy the colony. Selkirk, now in Canada,
hired a small army to go to Manitoba and restore the colony. He visited it
himself not long afterwards. The hazards of the journey and the later
lawsuits in Montreal brought by the Northwest Company ruined his fortune
and his health and he died in 1820. The Red River Colony is now Winnipeg.
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