Rupert's Land

File:NorthAmerica-WaterDivides.png connects primarily to the Labrador Sea just south of Davis Strait as depicted on most atlases such as those of the National Geographic Society just north of the 60th parallel north and northeast of the Labrador Peninsula]]

Under the principles of the doctrine of discovery, after the English visited and "discovered" Hudson's Bay, they could claim any lands found that were not already owned or "possessed" by other European or Christian nations. England claimed ownership of the lands surrounding Hudson's Bay. After explorations in 1659, Prince Rupert took interest in the Hudson's Bay region. The 1668–1669 expedition of the Nonsuch to the Hudson's Bay area returned with {{GBP|1400|year=1669}} worth of furs.{{sfn|Spencer |2007 | p=342}} However, England was not ready to organize a government on those lands. Instead, a "Company of Adventurers of England" was formed to administer those lands for England, thereby taking possession.

In 1670, King Charles II of England granted a royal charter to create the Hudson's Bay Company, under the governorship of Prince Rupert, the king's cousin. According to the Charter, the HBC received rights to:

{{blockquote|The sole Trade and Commerce of all those Seas, {{not a typo|Streights}}, Bays, Rivers, Lakes, Creeks, and Sounds, in whatsoever Latitude they shall be, that lie within the entrance of the {{not a typo|Streights}} commonly called Hudson's {{not a typo|Streights}}, together with all the Lands, Countries and Territories, upon the Coasts and Confines of the Seas, {{not a typo|Streights}}, Bays, Lakes, Rivers, Creeks and Sounds, aforesaid, which are not now actually possessed by any of our Subjects, or by the Subjects of any other Christian Prince or State [...] and that the said Land be from henceforth reckoned and reputed as one of our Plantations or Colonies in America, called Rupert's Land.{{cite web|title=Royal Charter of the Hudson's Bay Company|url= http://www.hbcheritage.ca/hbcheritage/collections/archival/charter/charter.asp|website=Hudson's Bay Company|access-date=3 January 2017}}}}

The Charter applied to all lands within the drainage basin of Hudson's Bay. It spanned an area of about {{convert|3861400|km2|sqmi}}, more than a third of all modern Canada.{{cite web |title= Canada Drainage Basins |year= 1985 |work= The National Atlas of Canada, 5th edition |publisher= Natural Resources Canada |url= http://atlas.nrcan.gc.ca/site/english/maps/archives/5thedition/environment/water/mcr4055 |access-date= 24 November 2010 |archive-date= 4 March 2011 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20110304184849/http://atlas.nrcan.gc.ca/site/english/maps/archives/5thedition/environment/water/mcr4055 |url-status= dead }}

The royal charter made the "Governor and Company ... and their Successors, the true and absolute Lords and Proprietors, of the same Territory...", and granted them the authority "...to erect and build such Castles, Fortifications, Forts, Garrisons, Colonies or Plantations, Towns or Villages, in any Parts or Places within the Limits and Bounds granted before in these Presents, unto the said Governor and Company, as they in their Discretion shall think fit and requisite...". In 1821, following the merger with the North West Company, the Hudson's Bay Company's monopoly privileges and licence were extended to trade over the North-Western Territory.{{cite web|title=Hudson's Bay Company, Struggle for Control of the Fur Trade: 18th Century|url=http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/hudsons-bay-company/|website=The Canadian Encyclopedia|access-date=3 January 2017}}

The Rupert's Land Act 1868, which was passed by the Parliament of the United Kingdom, authorized the sale of Rupert's Land to Canada with the understanding that "...'Rupert's Land' shall include the whole of the Lands and Territories held or claimed to be held by the..." Hudson's Bay Company.{{cite web|last1=Government of Canada|title=Rupert's Land Act, 1868 – Enactment No.1|url=http://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/rp-pr/csj-sjc/constitution/lawreg-loireg/p2t11.html|website=Department of Justice| date=3 November 1999 |access-date=3 January 2017}} The prevailing attitude of the time was that Rupert's Land was owned by the Hudson's Bay Company because "...From the beginning to the end, the [Hudson's Bay Company] had always claimed up to the parallel 49...", and argued that the royal charter and various acts of Parliament granted them "...all the regions under British dominion watered by streams flowing into Hudson Bay...".{{cite web|last1=Government of Canada|title=Sessional Papers of the Parliament of the Dominion of Canada|date=1886|volume=19|issue=12|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kZA-AAAAYAAJ|access-date=3 January 2017}} Rupert's Land had been essentially a private continental estate covering 3.9 million km² in the heart of North America that stretched from the Atlantic to the Rocky Mountains, and from the prairies to the Arctic Circle.{{cite web|title=Rupert's Land, Massive Land Transfer|url=http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/ruperts-land/|website=The Canadian Encyclopedia|access-date=3 January 2017}} Even John A. Macdonald, the then Prime Minister of Canada, saw the land as being sold to Canada: "...No explanation has been made of the arrangement by which the country (Rupert's Land) is handed over to the Queen, and that it is her Majesty who transfers the country to Canada with the same rights to settlers as existed before. All these poor people know is that Canada has bought the Country from the Hudson's Bay Company, and that they are handed over like a flock of sheep to us...".{{Sfn|Plamondon|2013}}

In 1927, the Supreme Court of Canada held that the terms of the Charter had granted ownership of all the land in the Hudson Bay drainage to the company, including all precious minerals.[https://scc-csc.lexum.com/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/9100/index.do Reference re Precious Metals in certain lands of the Hudson's Bay Co., [1927] SCR 458], at p. 466.[https://esask.uregina.ca/entry/real_property.jsp Marjorie L. Benson and Don Purich, "Real Property", Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan, Canadian Plains Research Centre, University of Regina, 2006.] However, this ruling did not settle the issue of aboriginal title over the land. At the time of the royal charter and the later Rupert's Land Act 1868, the Crown held the attitude that it already held sovereignty over the land from a people who only had a "...personal and usufructuary right, dependent upon the good will of the Sovereign...".{{cite CanLII|litigants=St. Catharines Milling and Lumber Co. v. R.|link=|year=1886|court=onca|num=30|format=canlii|pinpoint=|parallelcite=13 Ont. App. R. 148|date=1886-04-20|courtname=auto|juris=}} The Calder v British Columbia (AG) case in 1973 was the first case in Canadian law that acknowledged "...a declaration that the aboriginal title, otherwise known as the Indian title, of the plaintiffs to their ancient tribal territory hereinbefore described, has never been lawfully extinguished...".{{cite CanLII|litigants=Calder et al. v. Attorney-General of British Columbia|link=Calder v British Columbia (AG)|year=1973|court=scc|num=4|format=canlii|parallelcite=[1973] SCR 313|date=31 January 1973|courtname=auto|pinpoint=p. 423}}

{{See also|Timeline of Rupert's Land and North-Western Territory transfer}}

In 1869–1870, when the Hudson's Bay Company surrendered its charter to the British Crown, it received £300,000 in compensation. Control was originally planned to be transferred on 1 December 1869, but due to the premature action of the new lieutenant governor, William McDougall, the people of Red River formed a provisional government that took control until arrangements could be negotiated by leaders of what is known as the Red River Rebellion and the newly formed government of Canada. As a result of the negotiations, Canada asserted control on 15 July 1870.{{citation needed|date=July 2022}}

The transaction was three-cornered. On 19 November 1869, the company surrendered its charter under its letters patent to the British Crown, which was authorized to accept the surrender by the Rupert's Land Act. By order-in-council dated 23 June 1870,{{Cite web |title=Rupert's Land and North-Western Territory Order |url=https://www.solon.org/Constitutions/Canada/English/rlo_1870.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110720084637/http://www.solon.org/Constitutions/Canada/English/rlo_1870.html |archive-date=20 July 2011 |website=solon.org}} the British government admitted the territory to Canada, under s. 146 of the Constitution Act, 1867,{{cite web |date=18 October 2015 |title=Constitution Act, 1867 s. 146 |url=http://laws.justice.gc.ca/eng/Const/page-8.html |website=Justice Laws Website |publisher=Department of Justice}} effective 15 July 1870, subject to the making of treaties with the sovereign indigenous nations to provide their consent to the Imperial Crown to exercise its sovereignty pursuant to the limitations and conditions of the Rupert's Land documents and the treaties. Lastly, the Government of Canada compensated the Hudson's Bay Company £300,000 (£35,977,894 pound sterling in 2019 money, or $60,595,408 Canadian dollars) for the surrender of its charter on the terms set out in the order-in-council.

The company retained its most successful trading posts and one-twentieth of the lands surveyed for immigration and settlement.{{citation needed|date=July 2022}}

{{Further|North American fur trade|List of Hudson's Bay Company trading posts|List of French forts in North America}}File:Mixed blood Fur trader 1870.jpg fur trader, {{Circa|1870}}]]

The Hudson's Bay Company dominated trade in Rupert's Land during the 18th–19th centuries and drew on the local population for many of its employees. This necessarily meant the hiring of many First Nations and Métis workers. Fuchs (2002) discusses the activities of these workers and the changing attitudes that the company had toward them. While George Simpson, one of the most noted company administrators, held a particularly dim view of mixed-blood workers and kept them from attaining positions in the company higher than postmaster, later administrators, such as James Anderson and Donald Ross, sought avenues for the advancement of indigenous employees.{{cite journal |first=Denise |last=Fuchs |title=Embattled Notions: Constructions of Rupert's Land's Native Sons, 1760 To 1861 |journal=Manitoba History |publisher=Manitoba Historical Society |volume=2002–03 |number=44 |pages=10–17 |issn=0226-5036 |url=http://mhs.mb.ca/docs/mb_history/44/embattlednotions.shtml}}

Morton (1962) reviews the pressures at work on that part of Rupert's Land where Winnipeg now stands, a decade before its incorporation into Canada. It was a region completely given over to the fur trade, divided between the Hudson's Bay Company and private traders, with some incursions by the rival North West Company based in Montreal. There was strong business and political agitation in Upper Canada for annexing the territory; in London the company's trading license was due for review; in St. Paul there was a growing interest in the area as a field for U.S. expansion. The great commercial depression of 1857 dampened most of the outside interests in the territory, which itself remained comparatively prosperous.{{cite journal |first=W. L. |last=Morton |title=Red River on the Eve of Change, 1857 to 1859 |journal=The Beaver |date=Autumn 1962 |number=293 |pages=47–51 |issn=0005-7517}}

File:Oregoncountry2.png, also referred to as Oregon Country]]

Before 1835, the Hudson's Bay Company had no formal legal system in Rupert's Land, creating "courts" on an ad hoc basis.{{Sfn|Baker|1999|p=213}} The Hudson's Bay Company's "laws" in the 17th and 18th centuries had been the regulations setting out the rules governing the relationships between various employees in the company's posts in Rupert's Land and to interact with Indigenous peoples.{{Sfn|Baker|1999|p=214}} The 1670 charter granting the company control of Rupert's Land had said trials were to be conducted by the governor of Rupert's Land together with three of his councillors.{{Sfn|Baker|1999|p=215}} There were only three cases before the 19th century with the one with the most detailed notes being the trial of one Thomas Butler in 1715 at the York Factory who was convicted of theft, slander and fornication with a native woman.{{Sfn|Baker|1999|p=215}} In the early 19th century, the HBC had waged a violent struggle with the rival North West Company based in Montreal for the control of the fur trade culminating in the Battle of Seven Oaks of 1816, which led to an investigation by the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, and which in turn led to the Second Canada Jurisdiction Act 1821, ordering the Hudson's Bay Company to establish justice of the peace courts in Rupert's Land.{{Sfn|Baker|1999|p=213}} Instead of establishing courts, the company directed the governor and the council of Assiniboia to mediate disputes as they arose.{{Sfn|Baker|1999|p=214}}

In 1839, the Hudson's Bay Company were convinced of the need to dispense formal justice throughout Rupert's Land and established a court at the Red River Colony, in the "District of Assiniboia", south of Lake Winnipeg. A recorder and president of the court would act as legal organizer, adviser, magistrate, and councillor and be responsible for the rationalization and formalization of Rupert's Land's judicial system. The first recorder was Adam Thom, who held the post until 1854, although relieved of most of his duties by his deputy some years before.{{cite encyclopedia|url=http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/thom_adam_11E.html|title= THOM, ADAM|dictionary= Dictionary of Canadian Biography|access-date= 10 July 2017}} He was succeeded as President of the Court from 1862 to 1870 by John Black.{{cite encyclopedia|url=http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/black-john-3000|title=Black, John (1817–1879)|chapter=John Black (1817–1879) | publisher=National Centre of Biography, Australian National University |dictionary=Australian Dictionary of Biography|access-date=10 July 2017}}

Baker (1999) uses the Red River Colony, the only non-native settlement on the northwest prairies for most of the 19th century, as a site for critical exploration of the meaning of "law and order" on the Canadian frontier and for an investigation of the sources from which legal history might be rewritten as the history of legal culture. Previous historians have assumed that the Hudson's Bay Company's representatives designed and implemented a local legal system dedicated instrumentally to the protection of the company's fur trade monopoly and, more generally, to strict control of settlement life in the company's interests. But this view is not borne out by archival research. Examination of Assiniboia's juridical institutions in action reveals a history formed less through the imposition of authority from above than by obtaining support from below. Baker shows that the legal history of the Red River Colony – and, by extension, of the Canadian West in general – is based on English common law.{{Sfn|Baker|1999}}

Following the forced merger of the North West Company with the HBC in 1821, British Parliament applied the laws of Upper Canada to Rupert's Land and the Columbia District and gave enforcement power to the HBC.{{citation needed|date=July 2016}} The Hudson's Bay Company maintained peace in Rupert's Land for the benefit of the fur trade; the Plains Indians had achieved a rough balance of power among themselves; the organization of the Métis provided internal security and a degree of external protection. This stable order broke down in the 1860s with the decline of the Hudson's Bay Company,{{citation needed|date=July 2016}} smallpox epidemics and the arrival of American whisky traders on the Great Plains, and the disappearance of the bison. The rule of law was, after the transfer of Rupert's Land to Canada, enforced by the North-West Mounted Police.{{cite journal |first=Irene M. |last=Spry |title=The Transition from a Nomadic to a Settled Economy in Western Canada, 1856–1896 |journal=Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada |date=1968 |volume=6 |issue=4 |pages=187–201}}

Peake (1989) describes people, places, and activities that were involved in 19th-century Anglican missionary activities in the prairie areas of Rupert's Land, that huge portion of Canada controlled by the Hudson's Bay Company and inhabited by few Europeans. Early in the century, fur trade competition forced the company to expand into this interior region, and some officials saw advantages in allowing missionaries to accompany them. Officially they did not discriminate among denominations, but preference was often granted to the Anglicans of the Britain-based Church Missionary Society. The prairie missions extended from the area of 20th-century Winnipeg to the Mackenzie River delta in the north. Notable missionaries included Revd. John West, the first Protestant missionary to come to the area in 1820, David Anderson the first Bishop of Rupert's Land,{{cite web|author= Sarah Tucker |title= The Rainbow in the North A Short Account of the First Establishment of Christianity in Rupert's Land by the Church Missionary Society: Chapter XIII. Rev. R. and Mrs. Hunt—Summary of the Missions—Ordination of the Rev. H. Budd|date= 1851| url= http://anglicanhistory.org/canada/rainbow/13.html| publisher = London: James Nisbet | access-date=12 December 2015}} William Bompas and the Native American Anglican priests: Henry Budd, James Settee, and Robert McDonald.{{cite journal |first=Frank A. |last=Peake |title=From the Red River to the Arctic: Essays on Anglican Missionary Expansion in the Nineteenth Century |journal=Journal of the Canadian Church Historical Society |year=1989 |volume=31 |issue=2 |pages=1–171 |issn=0008-3208 }}

There were also Roman Catholic missions in Rupert's Land. One notable missionary was Alexandre-Antonin Taché, who both before and after his consecration as bishop worked as a missionary in Saint-Boniface, Île-à-la-Crosse, Fort Chipewyan, and Fort Smith.{{Cite CE1913 |wstitle=Alexandre-Antonin Taché |first=Adrian Gabriel |last=Morice |authorlink=Adrian Gabriel Morice |volume=14}}

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{{reflist|30em}}

• {{Cite journal |first=H. Robert |last=Baker |title=Creating Order In The Wilderness: Transplanting the English Law to Rupert's Land, 1835–51|journal=Law and History Review |publisher=American Society for Legal History |date=1999 |volume=17 |issue=2 |pages=209–246 |doi=10.2307/744011 |issn=1939-9022 |jstor=744011 |s2cid=145502145}}" Summer.
• {{cite book |last1=Plamondon |first1=Bob |title=Blue Thunder: The Truth about Conservatives from Macdonald to Harper |date=2013 |publisher=eBookIt.com |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pg8qAgAAQBAJ |chapter=Chapter 2: Forging a Nation |isbn=9781456620523}}
• {{cite book |author-link=Charles Spencer, 9th Earl Spencer |last=Spencer |first=Charles |year=2007 |title=Prince Rupert: The Last Cavalier |location=London, England |publisher=Phoenix |isbn=978-0-297-84610-9}}

{{refbegin}}

• {{cite book|first1=Gerhard John|last1=Ens|first2=R. C.|last2=Macleod|first3=Theodore|last3=Binnema|title=From Rupert's Land to Canada|url=https://archive.org/details/fromrupertslandt00ensg|url-access=registration|year=2001|publisher=University of Alberta|isbn=978-0-88864-363-6}}
• {{cite book|last=Grant|first=Cuthbert|title=The English River Book: A North West Company Journal and Account Book of 1786|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-EHrxcKoL1kC&pg=PP1|year=1990|publisher=McGill-Queen's University Press|isbn=978-0-7735-6213-4}}
• {{cite book|first=Richard Clarke|last=Davis|title=Rupert's Land: A Cultural Tapestry|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3krLZ1JPITQC&pg=PP1|year=1988|publisher=Wilfrid Laurier University Press|isbn=978-0-88920-976-3}}
• {{cite book|first=Greg|last=Gillespie|title=Hunting for Empire: Narratives of Sport in Rupert's Land, 1840-70|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4dRNymUaaXwC&pg=PP1|year=2007|publisher=UBC Press|isbn=978-0-7748-4038-5}}
• {{cite book|author=Hudson's Bay Company|title=An Ordinance for the More Effectual Administration of Justice, In the Colony of Rupertsland|location=London|publisher=J. Brettell}}
• {{cite book|last=Stubbs|first=Roy St. George|title=Four Recorders of Rupert's Land; A Brief Survey of the Hudson's Bay Company Courts of Rupert's Land|url=https://archive.org/details/fourrecordersofr0000stub|url-access=registration|location=Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada|publisher=Peguis Publishers|year=1967}}
• {{cite book|first=Sarah|last=Tucker|title=The Rainbow in the North: a Short Account of the First Establishment of Christianity in Rupert's Land by the Church Missionary Society|url=https://archive.org/details/cihm_41421|location=London|publisher=James Nisbet & Co|year=1851|isbn=9780665414213}}

{{refend}}

• [https://web.archive.org/web/20110706212244/http://uwwebpro.uwinnipeg.ca/academic/ic/rupert/index.html The Centre for Rupert's Land Studies] - The University of Winnipeg
• [http://www.cbc.ca/history/EPCONTENTSE1EP9CH1PA3LE.html "Canada Buys Rupert's Land"], CBC
• [https://archives-manuscripts.dartmouth.edu/repositories/2/resources/1092 Stout Hearts for Stey Braes: Life, People and Events in an outside Rupert's Land in the Closing Years of the Hudson's Bay Company and a Glance at the Group of Sturdy Men Who Labored to Hold the Fort for the Fur Trade Manuscript] at Dartmouth College Library

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Category:Former British colonies and protectorates in the Americas

Category:English colonization of the Americas

Category:Former English colonies

Category:British North America

Category:Fur trade

Rupert's

Category:Hudson's Bay Company

Category:States and territories established in 1670

Category:States and territories disestablished in 1870

Category:1670 establishments in the British Empire