50 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Jan. ii, 1908. 
remain which are devoted to their original pur¬ 
pose. About the sites of some of them, towns 
and cities have grown up, and have taken the 
names of the old forts. Such a city is Fort 
Pierre on the Missouri, while Fort Benton, well 
toward its head, is a considerable town, but for 
the most part these forts and their sites and 
their histories have been forgotten, except by 
the student of the history of the early West. 
In the North, in the territory occupied for 
centuries by the Hudson’s Bay Company, these 
forts still exist, but even there the influx of 
population is lessening their importance, and be¬ 
fore long in any region suited for the support 
of a large white population will cause them to 
be forgotten. Even Fort Garry, once the most 
Garry, too, was Fort Gibraltar, built in 1807 by 
John McDonald, of Garth, about which there 
was fighting in the early days of the Red River 
settlement. It was destroyed by Governor 
Semple during the troubles about Lord Selkirk s 
Kildonian settlement in the year 1816. 
In 1812, Miles McDonnell had built Fort 
Douglas below the present Fort Garry. Then 
came Fort Garry built in 1835-36, yet this was 
not the first Fort Garry, since Keating in his 
accounts of Long’s expedition to the source of 
the St. Peter’s River says that at the lower 
settlement there are two forts, one called Fort 
Garry, belonging to the Hudson’s Bay Com¬ 
pany, the other called Fort Douglas, the prop¬ 
erty of the colony. Keating’s map shows Fort 
Fort Garry, as written of by Alexander Ros: 
about the year 1850, is said to have covered a: 
much ground as St. Paul’s Cathedral in Lon 
don. It was square, built on a rock foundatioi 
surrounded by a stone wall and protected b; 
four round towers or bastions. It was two hun 
dred and eighty feet from east to west and tw( 
hundred and forty feet from north to south. It 
stone wall was fifteen feet high, with gates 01 
the north and south sides, and its towers wen 
provided with port and loop holes for cannoi 
and musketry. The principal dwelling house oc 
cupied the center of the square and the store 
house and accommodations for officers and mei 
belonging to the fort were within the walls. • 
We are fortunate in being able to present 
j /• ' 1 • 
K ' 
FORT GARRY. 
From a drawing made June 12, 1845, by Alexander H. Murray. 
important of the old-time Hudson’s Bay forts, 
is now little more than a memory. Though 
built to withstand the ravages of time—a massive 
edifice of stone—of all its substantial walls only 
the back gateway is now standing. Less than 
forty years ago it was as great and as strong 
as ever, but nothing now remains of it save that 
gateway and a series of hollows which show 
where the cellars and foundation walls used to 
stand. 
About Fort Garry has grown up the great city 
of Winnipeg, with more than a hundred thou¬ 
sand population, and nothing is known of the 
old fort standing toward the outskirts of the 
city to most of its inhabitants. Situated on the 
Red River near the point where the Assiniboine 
enters it, Fort Garry occupied ground that is 
historic. Along the bank of the Red River 
passed the trail north and south traveled by the 
Chippewas and by their bitter enemies, the 
Sioux. Not far from here, as far back as 1734 . 
Verendrye, first of white men to travel upon 
the great plains and to see the Rocky Moun¬ 
tains, built his Fort Rouge. It was abandoned 
a few years later and as early as 175° > s spoken of 
merely as an “old fort.” Near the site of Fort 
Douglas about a mile below Fort Garry, and 
Keating’s volume was published in 1825, nearly 
ten years before the building of the Fort Garry 
that we have known. Dr. Coues in a note to 
his Plenry & Thompson volumes, says, “The 
earliest H. B. Co. post is said to have been 
built about 1799.” 
It would be interesting to go into the history 
of those early days when hot competition and 
even actual war was carried on between the 
Hudson’s Bay Company and the old Northwest; 
to tell something about the Selkirk settlement 
and the quarrels which took place over that 
noble lord’s efforts to establish in the Red 
River country a colony of Scottish Highlanders, 
to tell something about Miles McDonnell, the 
“grasshopper governor,” and what he did, and 
to give also the story of his opponent, Alex¬ 
ander McDonell; the story of the side of 
the Northwest Company as against Miles Mc¬ 
Donnell and the murdered Governor Semple. 
All these things are matters of history, but can¬ 
not be entered into here. It is enough to say 
that in 1821 the Hudson’s Bay Company and 
the Northwest Company, after years of fighting, 
settled their differences and consolidated, 
picture of Fort Garry as it looked in 1845 fra; 
the pen sketch of one of the old fur traders wlj 
visited it in that year. For comparison we gi ! 
also a picture of the fort as it appeared 
Alexander Ross’ Red River Settlement, print 
in 1856. 
January. 
The world seems dead— 
So still it is and cold; 
The sun sets gorgeous in a yellow glow, 
And in the east the mountains fade 
From rosy pink to steely blue and gray. 
A fox barks as he runs through frozen swale, 
Else, all is silent—not even a breath of wind 
mar the beauty of the passing day. 
A Veteran’s Opinion. 
Syracuse, Dec. 18 .—Editor Forest and Stream: My 1 
for Forest and Stream is very strong, and grows » 
years. I have read every number of it from its initial! 
under another name, and once was a somewhat regt 
correspondent. Many pools and trails have been clo 
to me by age, but they are still a delight to rememl 
and a thousand incidents related to them are a joy 
recall. With the years Forest and Stream has growr 
both strength and interest, until it has become the li| 
ing journal of its kind in this country, if not in 
world. Dwight H. Bruc 
