The following are excerpts from J.R. Anderson’s memoirs Notes and Comments on Early Days and Events in B.C. Washington and Oregon from the B.C. Archives. As a child Anderson attended the Fort school under Rev’d and Mrs. Staines.

What funny looking guys we must have been in our odd make-shift of costumes. When my sister appeared on the scene, she was costumed in a print gown which, as nearly as I can remember, was made like a bag with holes for the head and arms and tied round the waist; moccasins and a poke bonnet like a coal scuttle. These were all pronounced by the Douglas girls as being quite out of fashion and a gown, or as we were told to call it, a dress, was made with a point in front and small straw bonnet obtained form the Sale Shop. My suit of leather shirt and trouser, cloth cap with a peak and moccasins were not considered so unfashionable but the shirt was changed for a moleskin blouse belted below the waist and decorated with enormous white buttons like saucers. This was the costume which was considered de rigueur for the boys.

Sunday at the Staines school is to this day a day of terror to me. After morning prayers we had breakfast such as it was, bread and treacle and tea without milk. Church at 11 in the mess hall to which we were summoned by the ringing of the Fort bell, then dinner, potatoes and meat, sometimes fish, then a dreary afternoon learning the Collects; how I hated them. Frequently in spite of the hard wooden benches, I used to fall asleep and woe betide me if I were caught; one could not help it on a hot drowsy summer afternoon or perhaps lying at full length thinking of the beautiful country my hands hanging listlessly down and my fingers beating the devil’s tattoo, I would suddenly be brought to time by an imperious order "Jimmy, stop that devil’s drum." Then afternoon service, then tea, a duplicate of breakfast. The only redeeming feature of Sunday was the evening spent by invitation in the Staines’ private apartment when we would be regaled with one sweet each after prayer and then after singing "Lord, dismiss us" we were dismissed to bed. And what beds. The hard boards, an Indian mat, a Hudson’s Bay blanket and over ourselves another blanket.

The garret we occupied was not lined, simply the bare logs; the interstices, where the roof joined the wall, was a veritable runway for the numerous rats which infested the building and through which the fresh air had unimpeded access even in the coldest weather; perhaps it was better for us, but the trouble was that in cold weather our scanty supply of water would freeze and then we did not trouble to wash and there being no one to superintend, we simply continued so until the weather abated. We did not bathe because we had no facilities for doing so. I may qualify this however, by stating that when opportunity offered and the weather was favourable we would bathe in the Harbour; our favourite place being the little bay where the water from the ravine at the foot of the present Johnson Street discharged into the harbour. There a short stone wall had been erected, for what purpose I do not know, but it afforded us a good jumping off place.

I suppose I was really a lazy little beggar but I really do not think I deserved the strictures that Mrs. Staines thought fit to bestow on me in a letter to my father which she read to me and in which she said "James is incorrigibly idle". She asked me if I knew what she meant, I confessed my ignorance of the term and she then proceeded to explain embellishing her explanations with many adjectives to my utter humiliation. The fact was that I was probably somewhat slow to absorb all the instruction that was suddenly attempted to be forced into my little brain. For instance, I was set to learn Latin and my first lesson was to decline ‘hic’. I was not told what ‘hic’ meant so when like a parrot I could repeat "Hic, haec, hoc’ etc. I was no nearer the goal then before. Then I confess I was slow in learning and repeating my lessons by rote.

A holiday, so across country about the line of the present Stadacona Park, Jubilee Hospital and the Exhibition grounds, we found our way to Mr. John Tod’s farm, filling ourselves en route with wild fruits, strawberries, etc. and by way of amusement, painting our faces with the juices. Mr. Tod entertained us hospitably, gave us milk and played the violin for our amusement. Mr. Tod had a habit of keeping time with his foot when playing so as may be imagined we were not long in imitating him in our imaginary concerts. Mr. Tod, however, played it rather low down on that memorable occasion; at least so thought some of the boys.

In order to test our proficiency in calligraphy and orthography, he got each boy separately to write down the words, "My face is painted". These slips were duly sent to Mrs. Staines accompanied by some interesting and as we thought, rude remarks on our proficiency and by inference on the efficiency of our teachers. Then we had a mauvais quart d’houre; we were held up to ridicule and severely reprimanded, our spelling and our writing criticised and our personal appearance unmercifully held up to the derision of the girls. Personally, whilst my writing was somewhat inferior, in fact, bad, my spelling was good which I took occasion to point out. By way of compensation for our day’s enjoyment we were each given the task of writing out the sentence as stated several hundred times and kept in. One other occasion in which we suffered similar punishment, one of many, was when one of the men attached to the Fort was flogged, for what reason, I do not know. It took place on the Company’s jetty. The man was stripped, bound to a post and the cat o’nine tails applied to his back. Being a novel sight and not for a moment thinking it cruel, accustomed as we were to the cruel castigation inflicted by Mr. Staines on some of the boys, we viewed the performance with equanimity. Rather to our astonishment the account of the affair has preceded us and on our return to the school we were all marshalled before Mr. Staines and given a homily on cruelty, after which we were ordered tolearn and repeat a number of verses on the same subject and kept in. Although I was never unmercifully chastised as were some of the boys, I had my share of impositions, being sent to bed during the day was one of the most trying punishments; latterly for some reason, the whole school was deprived of liberty so that we were not allowed out at all. This naturally led to discontent and many were the threats of revolt which were made.

The bright particular spots in our existence were the occasions of the arrival of the ‘Mary Dare’ from Honolulu when Captain McNeill with his never to be forgotten thoughtfulness and good nature presented the boys with oranges, sugar cane, fire crackers, etc. The flavour of the first orange still lingers in my memory, could there be anything more delicious I thought. Our amusements consisted of marbles, cricket, rounders, shinny, horse riding, fighting Indian boys, worrying Indian dogs, some surreptitious shooting with our antiquated flint lock muskets, besides any occasional mischief as boys alone are capable of conceiving. Marbles we had to make of clay and bake in a fire and many were the expedient resorted to keep them from cracking whilst baking, to make them sufficiently hard to withstand wear and tear, such as the addition of soap or other equally useless ingredient. Can the boy of the present day imagine a state when no marbles were to be had for love or money and that he had to use his ingenuity to construct them. Captain Grant, late of the Scots Greys, God bless him, was our patron as regards cricket, having presented us with a full set, which enabled us to indulge in the game which was usually played on the ground just where the Burns Memorial now stands. Balls for rounders, the game now called baseball, and for shinny we constructed of hair covered with dressed deer hide.

A favourite amusement was catching dog fish and after fastening a billet of wood with about a foot of line to the tail, letting him go. It afforded us great joy to witness his futile attempts to dive.

Two horses were owned in the school, one by Johnny Work and the other by myself; the former was a dark bay and mine a strawberry roan. Our course was straight away from Clover Point to the point where Douglas Street comes out at the coast line. After many disputations as to the speed of our respective beasts and many heart burnings we decided at length tosettle the question for good and all, so a match was arranged on which we betted all our available articles of clothing, pocket handkerchiefs, knives, marbles, etc. and the great event took place resulting in a victory for my horse. We often had boxing matches arranged with Indian boys with bare fists; bloody noses being consequently the result and usually ending by the flight of the savage pursued by his adversary. Our knowledge of the noble art of self-defence was limited. The Indian boy had not the slightest knowledge in the art of boxing and was therefore at a great disadvantage. The Indian dogs would swim over from the Indians village opposite the Fort and get after Mrs. Finlayson’s fowls, so of course, we naturally hailed the chance of exercising our cruelty of chasing and stoning the dogs, sometimes being lucky enough to corner one and kill him. To this day I look with regret on the horrid cruelty we were guilty of regarding these poor dumb animals. The dogs I refer to were handsome white animals resembling a Pomeranian but large with long woolly hair which was regularly shorn and woven into blankets and articles of clothing, so that the dogs were of economic value to the natives and we were therefore doubly blameable.

The making of a medicine man at the Stamish village was a frequent occurrence and we whiled many an hour watching the necessary ceremonies in connection with the acquirement of the coveted diploma. The candidate after absenting himself from home for many days frequenting places of sepulture, starving himself and probably eating unwholesome food or plants, tending possible to produce intoxication, returned to the village in a state of real or simulated delirium, when, dressed in a kind of waistcoat, a stout rope round his waist, by which two men restrained him from presumably committing too many acts of violence, he ran amuck through the village brandishing a dagger in each hand and making the most diabolical howlings, the whole population, men, women and children fleeing for their lives. If by chance some unlucky dog were caught he was at once borne into the water and there torn to pieces by the doctor’s teeth. The howls of the unfortunate victim mingled with the pandemonium at the village were appalling. After the return of the candidate for medical honours and before he made his appearance in public whilst being prepared, a concert of several hours duration took place, this was a sort of subdued humming noise with occasional loud hootings, all accompanied by the usual beating of time on dry cedar boards used for the purpose. Naturally we very soon took to ridiculing the ceremonies by grotesque imitations and, as may be supposed, to the horror and disgust of the natives. Indeed, I now think that we possible ran some risk in thus ridiculing some of the most cherished and venerated customs of the Indians, and we were often warned to abstain from the foolish practice(;)

Gambling was always a favourite amusement amongst the natives and we often watched the games with great interest. The prevailing idea which exists amongst the later arrivals and present populations as to the character of the Indian tribes in those early days, is not, in my experience, borne out by facts. I have heard such terms as treacherous, vindictive, revengeful and murderous applied to them; possibly some may have deserved the epthets; but taken as a whole, I submit that, with the opportunities they had, we may consider them fairly entitled to a more lenient verdict. The use of poisoned arrows in warfare also has not be substantiated by facts. Only a short time ago a statement appeared in the public press from a man who averred that he came to the Province in 1858 and during the succeeding year in company with some others, he proceeded up the Thompson, where they were attached by Indians and he was wounded in several places by poisoned arrows. The story bears its own condemnation inasmuch as one wound from a poisoned arrow is sufficient to cause death; long before 1858, arrows had been discarded in favour of guns; years before the Hudson’s Bay Company’s people had travelled through the country and as was the case with my father and his family, there was absolutely no reason, if the natives had felt so disposed to have annihilated us lock, stock and barrel. As children, we wandered far afield without the slightest molestation. hence I take the wonderful stories which are related for the delectation of the credulous with very many grains of salt. It may be argued that it was only a wholesome fear of ultimate retribution that prevented them from committing acts of violence; the same may be said of the criminally inclined amongst all peoples. We, the boys of the school, in ridiculing customs which were probably held in great veneration as those of Christmas, certainly invited the deserved anger and revenge of the untutored savage.

The Chief of the Stamis tribe at this time and for many years after was nicknamed ‘Freezy’ in adaptation of the French work ‘frizer’ to curl, in reference to his mop of closely frizzled hair, an inheritance from his Kanaka progenitor, His proper name was Chee-ah-thluk. He was a peaceable old chap and ever lived in amity with the whites during his somewhat lengthy reign. Some sensational writers have credited him with fictitious attributes; not the least is that of his possessing and killing off many wives; this is pure fiction as I can vouch from personal knowledge. He died in 1864. Like all natives he loved rum and led the simple life. If he wanted a salmon he had to catch it like any other of his subjects and as for clams it was the duty of the Queen to dig them up. A lady newly arrived and unaccustomed to the peculiarities of the savage, on asking to be informed of the sex of a child in arms was answered by ocular demonstration.

A man named Fish - I think his Christian name was William - who arrived at Fort Victoria in 1850 by the ‘Norman Morison’, had his arm blown off, which caused his death, on the occasion of a salute being fired from the south-west bastion of the Fort in honour of the arrival of the ‘Tory’ in 1851. Fish was buried in the little cemetery on the edge of the ravine at or near the junction of Johnson and Douglas Streets - I attended the funeral. On my return to Victoria in 1858 I found that amongst the remains that were exhumed and transferred to the cemetery on Quadra Street, were those of Fish, which were interred at the north-west corner, the pathway now runs over the spot.

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