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SIR JAMES DOUGLAS Born: 1803 Died: 1877 "Douglas was a cold brave man. . .There was something grand and majestic about Douglas - in the first place he was broad and powerful and had a wooden hard face when necessary, which said very plainly 'I am not afraid but noli me tangere.' When in this state he had the shape of a horseshoe on his forehead unmistakably and we all new then to be cautious, for there was something wrong, something to be put to rights, whether with the officers or others." John Helmcken (BCARS: ADD.MSS 505, v.12) |
The "Father of BC", James Douglas will long be remembered for the prominent role he played in sculpting the province of British Columbia out of a remote Hudson's Bay Company fur post on Vancouver Island.
James's father John Douglas, was a merchant from Glasgow, Scotland, who managed the family sugar plantations in Guiana. His mother, Martha Ritchie, was a Creole born in Barbados. His mother and father were never legally married, and in 1809, his father was married to a women in Scotland, and started a second family. Despite this, James's father never rejected his West Indies family, and provided financial support for his three children. When he was nine years old, James and his brothers was sent to school in Lanark, Scotland, then to Chester, England. There Douglas learned a life time habit of hard work and attention to details, earning the nickname "Old Square Toes" from one of his civil servants.(1)
In May of 1819, at the age of 16, Douglas came to Canada upon signing a six year contract as an apprentice to the North West Company. It was at Lachine, Quebec where he joined the Fort William Brigade, and embarked on his career with the
trading posts that helped build Canada. Douglas found himself thrust into positions of great responsibility, being accountable for the actions of himself and his subordinates, as well as keeping the natives outside the fort. Douglas worked at Lachine until 1821, when he was transferred over to work for the Hudson's Bay Company when it took over the North West Company. He was posted at Fort St. James under William Connolly, who had just been appointed Chief Factor. Connolly wrote of Douglas:"Mr Douglas's salary I consider as inadequate to his merit. . .He has served six years of apprenticeship under able masters, during which period he acquired a good knowledge of the trade, of the general character of Indians and the method observed in conducting the business - which added to a good education, sound sense, and a frame of body and mind able to carry him through any difficulty, qualify him in a high degree for the service in which he is engaged.(2)
On April 27, 1828, Douglas married Connoly's daughter
Amelia by custom of the country. Douglas, while in charge of the Fort during one of Connolys absences, ran into some trouble with the Carrier Indians. Because of tensions from the incident, Connoly sought Douglas's transfer in 1830 to Fort Vancouver, where he then served under John McLoughlin, superintendent of the Columbia district.It was around this time that a boundry dispute was occurring between British interests in the area where Fort Vancouver was located. The Americans were looking to further expand their territory north. In 1840 Douglas was made junior chief factor, then Chief Factor for Fort Vancouver. However, the British Government was concerned that the territory at Fort Vancouver would be lost. They decided to establish a Crown Colony on Vancouver Island under the auspice of the Hudson's Bay Company. When the final boundary was drawn at the 49th parallel, the company had created the new trading depot named "Fort Victoria" for the new queen of England. In 1849, James Douglas moved his family to Fort Victoria to assume the position of Chief Agent for the Hudson's Bay company in the Western Division (the new name for the old Columbia division).
"At mess each one talked freely and much more freely among each other of course. Mr Douglas usually sat at the head of the mess table and Mr. Finlayson at the foot. . .and nothing frivolous was spoken there. Mr. Douglas was not humorous, never joked - always staid and decorous and often had some subject to talk about which he often picked up in a review or newspaper, but personal experiences were not much talked about, excepting when the Chief Factors and Chief Traders happened to collect in Victoria or strangers often asked questions." John Sebastian Helmcken (BCARS: ADD.MSS.505.v.12)
In 1851, Douglas became the second governor of Vancouver Island after Governor Richard Blanshard left the position in little over a year. Just before the gold rush of 1858, Douglas moved his family out of Fort Victoria, and into a house on property he had bought from the Company, South of James Bay.
The 1858 gold rush saw thousands of miners, many of them American, surging into the Fraser river and mainland. Douglas was determined that the American settlement would not cause Britain to loose land again, like it had in Oregon. While he could do little to stop the area from becoming a boom town, he managed to maintain law and order with the help of the Royal Engineers, a few ships from the Royal Navy, some magistrates, and Judge Mathew Bailie Begbie. With the swell in Victoria's population, the affairs of running the colony became to complicated to be handled by Douglas in his role as the company's chief agent, so he resigned his position with the HBC, and in 1858 became governor of two crown colonies - the Vancouver Island Colony and the Mainland Colony (known as the "Gold Colony").
Douglas was sympathetic to the harrowing tales of the gold rush prospectors attempts to cross the narrow gorges, Indian trials, rapids and whirlpools in the steep canyons around Fort Yale. Many lives and fortunes had been lost. Under the guidance of Douglas, the Cariboo Road was built. When completed in 1865, it ran form Fort Yale to the gold fields of Barkerville. As early as 1862, Douglas was one of the first politicians to advocate the building of a trans-Canada highway.
Douglas' term of office for Vancouver Island ended in 1863, and he retired as Governor for Vancouver Island in 1864. At his retirement, James Douglas was given the rank of Knight Commander of the Bath. His wife Amelia was given the title Lady Amelia. James took advantage of retirement to embark on a tour of Europe. Then he settled back to his house and garden in James Bay, Victoria, now one of the wealthiest men in the colony.
Soon after Douglas passed away, the province erected a monument (obelisk) in his memory on the grounds of the "The Birdcages" the old parliament buildings he had built in 1859. On the outside of today's parliament buildings, there are two statues in his honor.
Amelia Douglas
