19
The Surrender of Fort William

Returning from Red River, the Nor’ Westers arrived at Fort William to find the rendezvous already in full swing. With news of the Battle of Seven Oaks preceding them, they found the other partners all atwitter at Robert Semple’s folly in provoking the Métis to attack. Everyone agreed that the poor fellow had brought about his own death and the destruction of the colony through his rash and overbearing actions; none dared to suggest that they themselves were the least bit culpable.

William McGillivray, meanwhile, fulminated against the opposition. He declared that the war with the Hudson’s Bay Company must now be pushed to the hilt. He wanted McLeod to go to Athabaska and face off against the turncoat Colin Robertson. Meanwhile, he would return to Montreal and keep an eye on their biggest enemy, Lord Selkirk.¹

Selkirk had crossed the Atlantic the previous fall and had passed the winter in Montreal. That spring, he was reported to be hiring a combined force of voyageurs and Swiss mercenaries—the latter recently discharged from the British army—for an expedition to Red River. Now, as July turned to August at Fort William, the Nor’ Westers speculated about what their adversary might do next. Had Selkirk’s expedition set out? Had Selkirk yet learned of the Battle of Seven Oaks and the destruction of the colony? What would he do when he got to Fort William? The partners had all heard Selkirk’s name cursed and reviled for so many years that it was now hard to imagine confronting the devilish British lord in the flesh. McLoughlin shared in the general feeling of suspense. Unlike the other partners, however, he had more at stake than his financial fortune. As the proprietor of Fort William, his own post and family’s home lay smack in Selkirk’s path.

The anticipation grew when Selkirk’s scouts were observed in birchbark canoes paddling up the Kaministiquia River. Brazenly, these men passed in front of the fort, landed about a half mile above the gate on the other side of the river, and right there, in plain view of the Nor’ Westers’ rendezvous, began to clear ground for Selkirk’s military-style encampment.

On August 12, a cry from the watchtower signaled that the rest of Selkirk’s expedition was arriving. First appeared Selkirk in a Montreal canoe with a bodyguard of seven soldiers and a crew of sixteen Iroquois canoemen. Following him were a dozen canoes strung out in a line, carrying 100 soldiers with muskets and bayonets, four light six-pounder guns and two nine-pounders, more than a ton of gunpowder, over 100 barrels of salted pork and lard, 500 gallons of high wine, and numerous packs of flour and other supplies. Most of the soldiers were Swiss mercenaries of the De Meuron Regiment—veterans of the Napoleonic Wars who had fought in Wellington’s army in Spain before being redeployed to North America in 1813. Another contingent included men of the Glengarry Fencibles and De Watteville Regiment, who had joined the expedition at Kingston. All these soldiers, mustered out of service in the spring, had responded to Selkirk’s offer of soldier’s pay and a tract of land when the expedition reached the Red River valley. Among Selkirk’s recruits were four officers, with Captain P. d’Orsonnens in overall command. Also with the expedition was Miles Macdonell, now free on bail for a few months pending a trial before the King’s Bench in Montreal. Selkirk also tried to enlist two justices of the peace to provide his expedition with legal counsel and the important weapon of arrest warrants, but when both men backed out he assumed those powers himself.²

The Nor’ Westers watched the long line of canoes glide past the fort and nose up to the beach one by one upstream on the opposite bank, where the expedition’s scouts had already cleared ground for a sizeable encampment. As soon as the cargoes were unloaded and the tents erected, Selkirk sent a canoe across the river with a message for William McGillivray: release all of the colonists and employees of the Hudson’s Bay Company whom you are holding prisoner. McGillivray replied with a note that there were just four men of that description and they were not prisoners, but he would send them over forthwith. Despite McGillivray’s claim that they were not being held prisoner, however, two of the men reported to Selkirk that they had been kept in close confinement and another claimed that he had been kept in irons. And all were eyewitnesses to the destruction of the Red River colony.³

The next morning an officer of the Glengarry Fencibles by the name of John McNabb appeared at the gate with a guard of nine soldiers, claiming to have a message for McGillivray. McLoughlin, as the fort’s proprietor, allowed the man to enter. In company with his friend Kenneth McKenzie, he escorted McNabb to their chief’s private quarters, which occupied a corner room in the Great Hall. The instant they entered the room, McNabb pulled an arrest warrant from his jacket and thrust it toward McGillivray. McGillivray, who was sitting at his desk writing a letter, remained calm; he had expected as much. He assured McNabb that he would cooperate as a gentleman. Turning to McLoughlin and McKenzie, he requested that they accompany him to the enemy camp. If necessary, he explained, the two partners would offer themselves as “bail” (hostages) so that he could return to Fort William. McLoughlin must have bristled at this conceit—the idea that he should make himself Lord Selkirk’s prisoner in place of the precious McGillivray! Nonetheless, he consented to the plan. McGillivray, imperious to the last, then insisted that McNabb stand by while he finished writing his letter.⁴

As soon as the three Nor’ Westers landed on the opposite bank of the river, McNabb coolly placed them all under guard and reported to Selkirk alone. Shortly, he returned from Selkirk’s tent with warrants for McLoughlin and the other partner as well. Whatever qualms McLoughlin had about giving up his own freedom to secure his leader’s release, now he saw with perfect clarity what a foolish idea it was. McGillivray’s ploy had simply gotten all three of them put in chains.

Selkirk then sent a force of fifty men in two big canoes back across the river to Fort William. From where McLoughlin sat in chains in the enemy camp, he could only wait and wonder. By and by he heard a bugle call, then nothing—just the thrum of crickets and the murmur of the river flowing past—until finally, late in the day, back came Selkirk’s men with the remaining North West partners all under arrest. To the partners’ shame and amazement, they had allowed Selkirk to take Fort William without giving him any resistance. Captain d’Orsonnens, with a squad of soldiers, went through the company offices placing seals on all desks and crates containing documents. The two hundred or so voyageurs were made to retire outside the stockade, and a handful of De Meurons were left behind to stand guard over the cannons, powder magazine, and armory.⁵

And after all that, McLoughlin and the other partners had not yet laid eyes on Selkirk himself. All they had seen was his slanting signature scratched across each of their arrest warrants and his officers’ soldierly bows as they went in and out of his Lordship’s tent. Finally, late in the day, Selkirk sent for them. When McLoughlin stooped inside the tent and faced him, he saw a man who was visibly unwell, with a sallow complexion and sunken eyes. When he spoke, he paused between sentences to cough into a handkerchief.⁶

The partners’ collective interview with Selkirk must have struck them as a farce, for here was their archenemy posing as an impartial magistrate. The British lord addressed each of them in turn, asking if the accused understood the charges laid against him. The most serious charge was accessory to murder, on the grounds that the Nor’ Westers had aided and abetted the Métis in the “massacre” at Seven Oaks. As captives of their enemy, the partners had little choice but to say they understood the charge. With Selkirk fussing over his absurd attempt at due process, each partner in turn agreed to his terms of parole. Each gave his word of honor not to resist the soldiers occupying the fort nor disturb anything that had been sealed for evidence. Then all the partners were allowed to return to their sleeping quarters in Fort William.⁷

That night, the partners made a last-ditch attempt to control the damage. Scurrying about in the dark so as not to alert the De Meurons, and quietly breaking seals (as well as their oaths) they carried armloads of letterpress books and other documents to the kitchen basement, where the potentially incriminating material was fed into the ovens as fast as it would burn.

When Selkirk arrived in the morning, all that remained of a large part of the North West Company’s records were so many piles of warm ashes.⁸

Selkirk immediately ordered a search of the premises. His men found that the partners had also busied themselves stashing arms and ammunition. Forty fowling pieces, all loaded and primed, were uncovered in a hayloft, and eight barrels of gunpowder were discovered in a nearby stand of willows. In addition, a few dozen packs of furs marked with the Hudson’s Bay Company stamp were discovered in the fur store. Although each pack also bore the North West Company insignia, the original stamp identified them as the very same packs that had been seized from Hudson’s Bay men by a Métis captain on the Qu’Appelle River in May. Most damning of all, in Selkirk’s eyes, were thirteen bales of clothing found in the equipment office that were tagged for Red River. With them was an account book that had escaped incineration. Inscribed therein was a list of Métis who had received gifts of clothing from Archibald McLeod following the Battle of Seven Oaks. Beside each name was a check mark. At the bottom of the list were the names of thirteen Métis who had not yet received their reward. The numbers lined up: thirteen names and thirteen undelivered bales of clothes. That clinched it. The Nor’ Westers were a pack of “robbers and murderers,” Selkirk wrote to the governor general of the Canadas a few days later.⁹

The De Meurons were called in, and the partners were once more placed under guard. Little by little, Selkirk revealed his intentions. The partners would be taken down to Lower Canada to stand trial for conspiracy in the destruction of the Red River colony. Selkirk and his mercenaries would occupy Fort William through the coming winter. In the spring Selkirk’s expedition would continue on to Red River, where Selkirk would further investigate the North West Company’s crimes and personally oversee the restoration of the colony.

But the partners sensed that Selkirk’s designs did not end there; with Fort William in his hands and a mercenary army at his back, their archenemy had it in his power to take every North West Company post from Fort William to Red River and completely sever their supply line. Fortunately for the Nor’ Westers, most of the inbound brigades had set off in the days just preceding Selkirk’s arrival, so the interior posts would not lack for supplies through the coming winter. The outbound traffic was another matter. The fur stores at Fort William held £100,000 worth of peltries awaiting shipment to Montreal. Without those shipments, and the sales in England that would follow, the North West Company would face a critical shortage of capital in the coming year.¹⁰

On August 18, 1816, McLoughlin bid farewell to his wife and children. No account of their parting exists, but it can be imagined how distressing it must have been for the trader and his wife and probably their children as well. Not only was McLoughlin being taken away with criminal charges laid against him, but it was also likely that Marguerite and the children would be turned out of their home now that Fort William was to serve as winter quarters for Selkirk and his men. The young family would be hard-pressed to survive. There were now six children: Marguerite’s three daughters and McLoughlin’s one son by previous marriages plus a four-year-old son and two-year-old daughter. And another child was growing in Marguerite’s womb. Great must have been McLoughlin’s anguish as he and the other partners were marched out of Fort William under guard and forced to take seats in three of the company’s own Montreal canoes. In each canoe, two pairs of Selkirk’s soldiers sat fore and aft with muskets at the ready, while a dozen voyageurs sat port and starboard, their paddles raised over the gunwales, awaiting the signal from their new masters to set off down the Kaministiquia River.¹¹