Fort La Jonquière
| Fort La Jonquière | |
|---|---|
| Somewhere on the Saskatchewan River. | |
| Site information | |
| Controlled by | New France |
| Site history | |
| Built | 1751 |
| In use | Abandoned 1760 |
Fort La Jonquière was one of the two French forts established on the Saskatchewan River in the 20 years between the end of La Vérendrye's push west from Lake Superior in 1731-1743 and the fall of New France in 1763. The other was Fort de la Corne built two years later. It was the westernmost French fort in Canada and was named after Jacques-Pierre de Taffanel de la Jonquière, Marquis de la Jonquière who was the Governor General of New France at the time.
The second of the four western commanders who followed La Vérendrye was Jacques Legardeur de Saint-Pierre (1750–53). At Fort Paskoya, Saint-Pierre ordered Joseph-Claude Boucher, Chevalier de Niverville, Canadian fur trader and explorer, to build a fort 300 leagues up the Saskatchewan, which was thought to be near the sources of the Missouri and to streams running west to the Pacific.
In the spring of 1751 ten Frenchmen in two canoes left Fort Paskoya to build the fort (Niverville was too ill to travel).
The following November Saint-Pierre left Fort La Reine to visit the new fort. Morton wrote that he was prevented from reaching it because of a war among the Indians. A less reliable source[1] states he was at the fort in February 1752 when 200 Assiniboins tried to plunder it. The source claims that drove them off by holding a fire brand over the power magazine and threatening to blow everyone up. If he did arrive at the fort and it was at Calgary or Edmonton or in the foothills of the Rockies, he was the first Euro-Canadian person, for whom we know the name, to enter Alberta, preceding Anthony Henday by a few years.
Whichever story is true, sources seem to be silent after these events.
The problem is where was it?
- Saskatchewan River Forks, near Prince Albert, Saskatchewan. This is the more prevalent belief.
- "At the Rocky Mountains". This phrase comes from a report by Saint-Pierre who may never have seen it.
- Calgary, Alberta NWMP Inspector E.A. Brisebois, when he first arrived to establish a police post at the Bow and Elbow in 1874, found remains of an old fort. [2]
- Edmonton. This is said to come from a guess made by a North-West Mounted Police officer based on the remains of an American Fur Company post of 1833 found when the police built a post there. J.B. Tyrrell of the Canadian Geological Survey, put it a few miles downriver from the centre of today's City of Edmonton.[3]
- Nipawin, Saskatchewan. east of the forks.[4]
- The Elbow of the South Saskatchewan River at most, and no further upstream. (Morton's guess)
- Remains of an unknown post 200 yards west of Fort de la Corne (also Morton)
References
Arthur Morton, A History of the Canadian West, page 237.
- ↑ Claiborne A Skinner, "The Upper Country",2008, page 153, citing Joseph L Peyser, "Jacques Legurdeur de Saint Pierre", page 186-187. The present writer has seen the same story about another fort, but can no longer find the source
- ↑ Calgary Herald, Sept. 3, 1953; Edmonton Journal, Oct. 17, 1953
- ↑ Edmonton Journal, Oct. 17, 1953
- ↑ Chaput, Donald (1974). "Legardeur de Saint-Pierre, Jacques". In Halpenny, Francess G. Dictionary of Canadian Biography. III (1741–1770) (online ed.). University of Toronto Press.
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