Chapter V: Radisson and the Great North West

“If he had not had his faults, if he had not been as impulsive,
as daring, as reckless, as inconstant, as improvident of the
morrow as a savage or a child, he would not have accomplished
the exploration of half a continent. Men who weigh consequences
are not of the stuff to win empires. He went ahead and when the
way did not open he went around, or crawled over, or carved his
way through.

“Memorial tablets commemorate other discoverers. Radisson needs
none. The Great Northwest is his monument for all time.”

—AGNES C. LAUT.

RADISSON AND THE GREAT NORTH WEST

Before Joliet, Marquette, or La Salle had made their memorable expeditions in search of the Western Sea, a man unattached to any religious order, and under the protection of no government, had traversed these unknown wilds for the sheer joy of exploration and excitement. The hair-breadth escapes of the hero of modern fiction cannot compare in thrills to the marvellous adventures of this man to whom the country from Quebec to the prairies of the great North West were alike his hunting and his playground.

This was Pierre Radisson, who left his native St. Malo about a century after the great Cartier, and settled at Three Rivers, which then was a comparatively large place, having a population of about 200 souls.

With the enthusiasm and recklessness of youth he disregarded the warnings of his friends and went duck shooting with a couple of equally reckless and youthful companions. They were but boys and were at the age when Indians had no terrors for them. Separated in the chase, Radisson had splendid luck, and returning to where they had agreed to meet, he found his two companions dead among the rushes. When he looked about, the heads of Indians appeared everywhere. They set upon him, and after a game struggle he was disarmed, stripped, tied around the waist with a rope and brought to the camp fire.

The very recklessness of the youth compelled the admiration of the Indians, who spared his life, gave him his clothes, dressed his hair and daubed his face as of an Indian brave. Though but a boy he showed the coolness in the face of danger which was to characterize him throughout his adventurous life. We are told that he slept that night between two warriors under a common blanket and so soundly that he was with difficulty awakened at the break of day.

Taking no chances, they tied him to the cross bar of a canoe when the party set off for the Indian village many miles distant. On the fourth day he was released from the cross bar, and being given a paddle, entered with zest into the work of helping onward the canoe. He was a cheerful lad, and the Indians, instead of allowing him to work himself out in his awkward manner, taught him how to give the light feather strokes of the true canoe man. He, in turn, took his share of the burdens, and was always eager to help. Their village was near Lake George in what is now New York State, and there they prepared to make merry with their captives and their plunder. He had to run the gauntlet of the braves, and was so successful that he was sought for adoption by a captive Huron squaw who had been adopted by the tribe. She pleaded for his life before the Great Council and was allowed to take him as her son. He was now a Mohawk of the Iroquois nation.

Watching his opportunity, and with an Algonquin captive, they made their escape, after killing three of the Mohawks; and after wandering many days, they were within sight of Three Rivers when the Iroquois overtook them, killed the Algonquin, and Radisson was again a prisoner. He was recognized and subjected to tortures, his thumb being thrust into a pipe of live coals, and the soles of both feet burned. Still worse was in store for him, but his adopted father, a chief among them, and his adopted mother, purchased his freedom by a recital of their own deeds of valour and by gifts of wampum.

This seventeen year old lad seemingly had won the hearts of all. He accompanied them on their expeditions and visited the lodges of the Oneidas, Onondagas, Senecas, and Cayugas in their wanderings about what is now known as the Niagara district. Indeed, he won the confidence of his Mohawk friends to such an extent that they took him with them when they visited the white man’s village of Orange (Albany), and he justified their confidence by returning with them, even though the Dutch offered to pay a great ransom to free him.

He wanted to make himself free and was ever on the alert for the suitable moment. It came in 1653, and alone he made his way back to Orange after many hair-breadth escapes. Here he was befriended—indeed he seemed always and everywhere to make friends—by a Jesuit priest who gave him enough money to enable him to sail down the Hudson to New York, whence he took boat for Amsterdam, which he reached in 1654, and thence he made his way home to France.

This adventure I have dwelt upon in some detail, because it is an illustration in miniature of his eventful life. One would think there had been enough crowded into these months to suffice for a life time, but the lure of the West was upon him, and his relatives, like himself, had gone overseas.

Therefore he joined the fishing fleet that was sailing for the Banks of Newfoundland, and made his way back to Three Rivers in May of 1654, just two years after he had disappeared.

His sister, Marguerite, had lost her husband in a fight with the Mohawks, and had married Chouart, a famous fur trader. This man was a widower, his wife having been a daughter of Abraham Martin, whose farm near Quebec City was in another century to become famous as the scene of the battle of the Plains of Abraham.

These two men, Radisson and Chouart, became not only fast friends, but inseparable companions in a life of adventure. The traders coming East to dispose of their furs told of a great country beyond the Great Lakes, and these two lovers of the wild set off up the Ottawa across Lake Huron and Michigan, over what is now Wisconsin, and came to a “mighty river, great, rushing, profound, and comparable to the St. Lawrence.” This undoubtedly was the Upper Mississippi, and these two white men were the first to see it and the “farflung, fenceless prairie, where the quick cloud-shadows trail,” which make up what we call the Great North West.

The Indians told them of a great river to the south which divided itself in two, the Forked River, the junction of Missouri and Mississippi, but the adventurers decided to make their way back again, and crossing through what is now Nebraska, North Dakota, and Minnesota, they came to Lake Superior and the Sault. Here the Crees told Radisson of a great sea to the north, Hudsons Bay, where there were quantities of furs. So alluring was the description that he set off on snow shoes, but the season was too late and he returned and made his way east. At the rapids of the Long Sault his large party came upon the Iroquois who had massacred Dollard and his noble band of Frenchmen. These they put to flight and as deliverers they made a triumphant journey to Montreal, Three Rivers and Quebec.

Their one thought was when could they resume their explorations in the North, and as they could not come to terms with the Governor, who wanted all the profits without assuming any of the risks, they stole away and in October reached Lake Superior. Pressing on they came to where Duluth now stands, and there they established a fur trading post, the first between the Missouri River and the North Pole. This marks the opening of the Great West as truly as when the railway passing through unknown portions of our Great West established a station as a centre of influence and trade.

In the spring they set off with their hosts of the winter, the Crees, to find the Great Sea, and it is possible that they were successful, but after great hardships. However, we know that they returned in 1663 with costly furs, and instead of the welcome which might reasonably be looked for, they were heavily fined by the French governor for trading without a license, and most of their furs were confiscated. They tried to get redress in France, but utterly failed, and so with no support in either Old France or New France they sought out new friends and joined the English in an expedition against Port Royal. This was unsuccessful, and being taken prisoners by the Dutch they were landed in Spain, whence they made their way to England. This was in 1666, when the great plague was raging in London, and Charles II. and his court were at Oxford.

They met at the court a man who was greatly impressed with their stories, and whose name was to be intimately associated with the great Northland. This was Prince Rupert, the dashing cavalry leader of the Stuarts, who became their patron, outfitted them for exploration, and they set off for Hudsons Bay. Chouart was successful, but Radisson, shipwrecked, returned to England where, in 1670, on the return of Chouart, a “company of adventurers trading with Hudsons Bay” was formed through the influence of Prince Rupert, who became the first governor of the Hudsons Bay Company, to whom was given an empire.

In the following spring ships were sent out, posts established, and so successful was their venture that the French not only sent expeditions and exploring parties northward, but the great gathering of the Indian tribes at the Sault Ste. Marie, which Perrot organized, was to strengthen the French against the English traders who were trying to divert trade from the posts of the French.

But negotiations in England fell through and Radisson made more satisfactory terms with his old allies, the French, and sailed under that flag to Hudsons Bay, outwitted both the officials of the Hudsons Bay Company and the free traders from New England and France became supreme in the Bay. But again the government of New France threw away the prize, for when Radisson and Chouart arrived at Montreal they were prosecuted for trading without a license. They were summoned to France to explain the circumstances to the Home Government, but when they arrived they found that Colbert, the minister who summoned them, was dead. Chouart, thoroughly discouraged, retired to end his days in quietness, for the outlook was anything but encouraging.

However, Radisson, looking with eagerness still for the life of adventure, and having a family to support, played French against English offers until at last he went across to England and in 1684 he sailed for Hudsons Bay under the flag of the Company. Here he found young Chouart, the son, who had been holding the Bay for France, who, when he heard of the treatment given his father and Radisson, surrendered the fort and the furs to Radisson, who thereupon gathered the Indian tribes and made a treaty with them and the Hudsons Bay Company, which in essence lasts unto this day. Returning to England they received a great welcome, and for five years Radisson made annual visits to the Bay and the Company flourished.

The Turtle Clan chiefs of the Onondagas are discussing some important tribal subject within the private bark lodge of their fire-keeper. The presiding chief must give the decision. The chief woman of the clan feels that the council’s action is adverse to her interests and requests her secretary, a young man, to register her protest.

The bark cabin is a typical Iroquois lodge of the individual type.

All the furnishings of the council lodge are of genuine Indian make and typical of prehistoric times in an Onondaga village. The figures are cast from living Onondaga models.

The purpose of this group is to illustrate (1) one of the political units of the Iroquois Confederacy, which had a stable government and a definite code of law, (2) the interior of a bark cabin (many of which were more than 100 feet in length), (3) the four Turtle clan sachems in council, (4) the method of recording by wampum the transactions of a council, (5) the privilege of the Iroquois woman to voice her opinions in the highest or lowest councils of the nation, (6) typical Onondaga Indians and a scene in the Onondaga country.]

The great Seven Years’ War between France and England broke out in 1688 with the accession of William and Mary, and the Bay was invaded by the French, the fur trade badly disorganized, and the profits of the Company greatly decreased.

As is too often the case with corporations, gratitude for what had been accomplished was wiped out by the disappointment of the present, and Radisson, who had done so much for the company, was ignored; too old to be of aggressive service to them, he drops out of sight, and is forgotten except for the record of the payment of a small pension up to the year 1710.

His was a wonderful life. Impulsive, yet cool-headed at critical times, daring, reckless and inconstant, but generous and brave, he was the true adventurer who, with no thought of himself, braved danger for the very love of it, and whose memory is preserved among the Indians as one who was untainted by the vices of the white man, who never was cruel and who was admired for his sheer bravery.