The Fathers of the North West Territories
Calgary Herald
13 Dec 1930
By Elizabeth Baily Price
Now that Alberta and Saskatchewan have come into the full management of their heritage their natural resources, their early political history becomes of current interest. Turning back the pages of the family album of these latest born children of the Canadian Confederation, on of the most interesting photographs is that of the North West Council of 1886 and 1887. It is interesting to the old-timers because it recalls many friends, and to the new comers because it is a picture of the men who made the country.
In the group are three of the five members of the first North West Council that functioned under the North West Territories Act of 1875. These are Col. Hugh Richardson of Regina, number one, in the front row reading from left to right; Col. James Macleod of Fort MacLeod and Ammedee Forget of Regina, numbers 6 and 13 respectfully are in the back row. All have been dead several years.
The first council of the North West territories was called together in 1876 by Hon. David Laird, who left the position of Minster of the interior of the MacKenzie administration of Manitoba, to accept the appointment as first governor of the North West Territories. His council included Col. Richarson, Matthew Ryan, Col. MacLeod, all appointed and all stipendiary magistrates and Amedee Forget, clerk of the council and secretary to the governor. Prior to this the territories had been administrated by the lieutenant governor of Manitoba at Winnipeg, but the new act moved the seat of government to Battleford.
Men of Abbility
The first statesmen of the North West Territories were men of high education and great ability; Invariably they were graduates of Canadian universities or of the finest Educational institution of the British Isles. With this, many combined the best military training in which they had arisen to the highest ranks.
In the vanguard of these is the name of Col. James MacLeod which is written indelibly on the pages of the early history of what today is Alberta. Educated at Upper Canada College and Queen’s University Kingston, where he obtained his B.A., he practiced law in Ontario for a while. He then became a member of the Wolsey expedition, which quelled the first Red River Rebellion in 1870. In 1873 he was appointed inspector of the First Division of the North West Mounted Police. As assistant commissioner, he was a member f their first famous match of ’74, and the next year succeeded to the commissionership. He founded Fort Macleod, which was his headquarters for many years. As magistrate his jurisdiction extended over both criminal and civil cases, and it was due to his wisdom and justice that law and order were established so successfully on the western prairies, and the treaty with the plains Indians concluded so satisfactorily.
First Judge
Col. Hugh Richardson has gone down to posterity as the first judge of the Regina district. He was an Englishman by birth, came to Upper Canada with his family in 1831, and settle in “Little York.” Where his father became the first manager of the Bank of Upper Canada. He served as senior major of the provincial battalion volunteer militia on active service at La Prairie during the winter of 1864-65. He was the first commanding officer at Sarna during the Fenian raid of 1866 following this he was chief clerk of the department of justice in Manitoba from 1872 to 1876 after which he was appointed stipendiary magistrate and legal adviser to Governor Laird.
Amedee Forget was also a lawyer and a native of Quebec. An appointment on the half-breed land commission for the province of Manitoba brought him west in 1875. The next year he accepted the position of clerk of the North West Council and moved to Battleford. After the rebellion of 1885 he was appointed again on the half-breed land commission. He was connected with the government of the territories for many years, this service being climaxed with the governorship for the term preceding the creation of the provinces in 1905.
Hon. Edgar Dewdney, number 2 in the front row, succeeded Governor Laird in 1881. Governor Dewdney, who was born in Devonshire in 1835, came to British Columbia in 1859. He was employed for a time as a civil engineer on the Canadian Pacific Railway survey. He was elected for the Kootenay district in the B.C. legislature in 1868 and re-elected in 1878. He retired in 1879 to accept the position of Indian commissioner for Manitoba and the North West Territories.
First Election
At this time (1881) a census of the territories was taken, and it showed a population of 56, 446. This year too marked the first election to the council under the N.W.T. Act. This took place in March, when Laurence Clark was returned for the district of Lorne, by a majority of 107 over his opponent Captain Moore. The total vote cast was 336.
In 1882, an order –in council was passed, this dividing the territories into four districts. Assiniboia, Saskatchewan, Alberta and Athabasca. The next year to seat of Government was moved from Battleford to Regina.
Election time came around again in 1883. More electoral divisions had been created and Governor Dewdney opened the North West Council session with the following members.
Ex-officio Members
Col Macleod
Col. Richardson
Col. A.G. Irvine – NWMP Commissioner
Pascal Breland, half-breed representative
Hayter Reed Assistant Indian Commissioner
Appointed Members of the crown
Frank Oliver – Edmonton
John C. Hamilton – Broadview
Thomas W.K. Jackson – Qu’Appelle
James Hamilton Ross (number 3 of the back row in picture) Moose Jaw
William White – Regina
Five elected members.
Two additional divisions were created in 1884 – Calgary, Alberta and Moose Mountain, Assiniboia, resulting in the election of James D. Geddes, rancher, representing Calgary, and J.G. Turriff (Number 4 in the picture, back row) representing Moose Mountain.
Famous Bill of Rights
The half breed agitation started early in 1884, and in the month of June a delegation of comprising James Isbister, Gabriel Dumont, Gabriel Dumont, Morise Ouilette and Michael Dumas, visited Montana to solicit the assistance of Louis Riel, who figured so prominently in the first Red Reiver Rebellion of 1870, Riel returned with them, and in September of the same year the famous Bill of Rights was formulated at St. Laurent.
The agitation seethed all winter and in the spring of 1885 it culminated in open rebellion. As provisional government was formed at Laurent on March 17, with Louis Riel as president and Gabriel Dumont as adjutant-general. The first engagement with the police took place at Duck Lake March 27, when the latter were defeated with heavy losses. Volunteers, commanded by General Middleton, were hurried to the scene of action. The Battle of Fish Creek was fought on April 24. The insurrection collapsed with the Battle of Batoche on May 12,. Three days later Riel was captured.
Chiefs Captured
The rebellion has spread to other parts of the west. The division under Col. Otter has a fight with the Indians led by Chief Poundmaker, May 2, at Cut Knee Creek, the police retiring to Battleford. At Frenchman’s Butte, May 28, General Strange’s division had an engagement with Big Bear’s Indians. Poundmaker and Gib Bear were subsequently captured. Riel was tried for treason felony was found guilty and hanged on November 16, 1885.
The territories settle down again A special census was taken and it was found that the population numbered only 48,362 a decline of 8,084 since the last census of 1881. The elections held in September, 1883, for Edmonton, Broadview, Lorne Macleod, Moose Jaw, Moosomin, Qu’Appelle, Regina and St. Albert. Regina and Qu’Appelle were each allowed two representatives. In the following July elections were held in Calgary and Moose Mountain, when the former elected two members and the later one. And this was the council of 1886-87 The last North West council the photograph of which accompanies this article.
Reading from left to right in the row sitting are Col. Richardson, Governor Dewdney, Judge Rouleau, J.G. Turriff and Dr. H. Wilson of Edmonton. The late Judge Charles Rouleau was born in Quebec where before coming west he was inspector of the Catholic schools for the counties of Ottawa and Pontiac. He was called to the bar in 1864, and for 12 years was magistrate, for the Ottawa district. He came west in 1883, when he was appointed on o f the stipendiary magistrates of the North West Territories with headquarters in Calgary.
John G. Turff, who died recently, was also a native of Quebec. He came to Manitoba in 1882 and settled in the Moose Mountain district as a merchant and notary public. He was first elected in 1884 and re-elected in 1886. During the last years of his life he was a member of the Senate.
Dr. Herbert Wilson number 5 represented Edmonton, having beaten Frank Oliver, the former member by nine votes, in an election where 231 votes were cast. Dr. Wilson was a graduate of Trinity College Toronto in 1881, and came to Edmonton the next year, where he practiced his profession and opened a drug store.
Reading from left to right in the row standing, the first person is Hugh S. Cayley, one of the Calgary members. Mr. Cayley was a graduate of Toronto University and came to Winnipeg in the early eighties. Two years later he came to the Northwest and for three years practiced law at Silver City, Rocky Mountains, until the collapse of the Embryo mining town. He then moved to Calgary and became one of the first editors of the Herald.
Number 2 is Robert Crawford if Indian Head, one of the members for Qu’Appelle. He was born in Scotland and came to Canada in 1849, working for a time in the service of the Hudson’s Bay, first as an apprentice clerk and later as a commissioned officer. He came to the northwest in 1882 and opened a general store in Indian Head.
Next to him is James Hamilton Ross, representing Moosjaw. He came to that town in 1882 taking up land in the vicinity. He was been closely identified with Moosjaw’s progress since its earliest days, and was one of the first mayors. In 1885 he began his second term on the North West Council.
Viscount Boyle (number 4) was elected from the Macleod district where he was engaged in the ranching business on a large scale. He was the son of Lord Shannon Cork County Ireland, and was educated at Eton. He came to the Canadian west in 1882.
David F. Jelly (number 5) was one of the two representatives from Regina. Born in Ontario, he completed his education at the Komoka Seminary, and the London Commercial College. He served as a volunteer in Col. Jarvis’ regiment at Windsor in the Fenian Raid of 1866. He came west before the C.P.R. arrived at “Pile of Bones” in 1882.
Six and seven are Col. James Macleod and John Secord of Regna. The latter, too was a lawyer a graduate of Toronto University. He practiced his profession in Tilsonburg, Ontario until 1882, when he moved to Regina where he was in addition to being one of the first lawyers in those days clerk of the city.
Colorful Career
John D. Lauder (number 8) who with Hurt? Cayley represented Calgary, was born in Ireland and received his higher education at Trinity College, Dublin, with a view to entering the medical profession. No old timer of the west has had more colorful pioneering experiences than he has. He was a member of the North West Mounted Police in 1876, was Indian agent on the Backfoot reserve, registered the second brand in the North West Territories and was a North West Mounted Police officer who saw active service in General Strange’s division in the rebellion of 1886. He resides in Innisfail today.
Next to him is the late Senator William Dell Perley, member for Qu’Appelle, a New Brunswicker by birth, who came west to take up a homestead near Wolsley. In 1882 he resigned his seat in the council and in 1886 was elected to the Dominion parliament.
Number 10 is Charles Marshall say, elected for Broadview. He too was highly educated his birthplace being England. He was a Queen’s scholar of Battersea College a graduate of Saltley College and the South Kensinton School of Art. He was also licensed as a lay reader of the Church of England and was clergyman at Whitwood. For a while he was a teacher in England, but resigned to enter Her Majesty’s civil service in the revenue department. In the early eighties he emigrated to Canada and was the first man to pitch his tent on a site that afterward became Whitewood. The School act of 1885 is principally of his compilation. The bridging of the Qu-Appelle and Pipestone Rivers in the Broadview district are due to his efforts.
O.G. Huges (number 11), was educated in England, France and Germany and was a clever linguist. He came to the northwest in 1872 in the employment of F.S. Kew the first English merchant who traded in this county. After remaining in Winnipeg some time Mr. Hughes took up the trading department of Stobart Sons and Co. He was one of the senior magistrates of Keewatin and the North West Territories and was an authority on Indian and half-breed matters. He represented Prince Albert.
Sam Cunningham (Number 12) member for St. Albert was an Irish half-breed born at Lac Ste. Anne. He was a man of good intellect and spoke English, French, Cree, Stoney and Blackfoot, with fluency. He was the only half-breed representative in the council and was elected by acclamation.