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Indiana University 
advisable until truth and correction have revived the unhappy prej- 
udices which have so long prevailed in the colonies on this subject.” 
In spite of Dartmouth’s threats, the Canadians obtained 
the support of their governors. Regardless of British ordi- 
nances, they went where they could obtain furs. With their 
greater capital and their better supply of trading goods, the 
French and British merchants in Montreal were finally able 
to drive out of the Maumee- Wabash country the French from 
New Orleans. All the furs of this region then went to De- 
troit, and the supply was constantly increasing. The value 
each year of the furs shipped from Vincennes was probably 
$25,000, while from the neighborhood of old Fort Ouiatanon, 
Detroit annually received some $40,000 worth of furs.^® And 
this was not all. From the Maumee, the St. Joseph, the 
White River, and other streams the traders brought in their 
collections of skins. 
The Quebec Act of 1774 was in part the result of colonial 
inability to regulate the Indian trade, and in part the result 
of the efforts of French and British merchants at Montreal 
to get exclusive control of this trade. The outstanding leaders 
of this group were Alexander Henry, Peter Pond, and Thomas 
and Joseph Frobisher.^® These men were mostly of Scotch 
ancestry, but they were soon joined by Frenchmen who knew 
the Indians well, and the combination was irresistible. The 
Quebec Act put this region under the control of the military 
governor of Quebec and gave to these merchants a practical 
monopoly of the fur trade. To make this monopoly secure 
here and in other fur lands the merchants of Montreal began 
to form partnerships that finally grew into the Northwest 
Company.^2 
During the American Revolution the fur trade in the Mau- 
mee-Wabash country languished. The French and Spaniards 
from St. Louis invaded the region once more, but no statistics 
O’Callaghan (ed.), Documents reLating to the Colonial History of New York, VIII, 
348, 349. 
Ernest A. Cruikshank, “Early Traders and Trade Routes in Ontario”, in Royal 
Canadian Institute Transactions (Toronto, 1893), III, 266. 
Charles B. Lasselle, “The Old Indian Traders^ of Indiana”, in the Indiana Magazine 
of History, II, 4, 5 (March, 1906), gives some information about these early traders. 
2® Alexander Henry, Travels and Adventures in Canada and the Indian TerritoHes, 
1760-1766 (New York, 1809), p. 253 for Henry and p. 252 for Pond; Origin and Prog- 
ress of the Northwest Company (London, 1811), an anonymous pamphlet which also 
describes Pond. 
Victor Coffin, “The Quebec Act and the American Revolution”, in American His- 
torical Association Annual Report for 1894, p. 279, declares that the fur trade had 
nothing to do with this act. 
The standard account of this company is Davidson, op. cit. 
