Page 6: 1850-1905

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1850: Smallpox

    A Smallpox epidemic struck in the Porcupine and upper Yukon River areas, killing more than half of the Native population. All of the people of Fort Yukon and Gwichyaa Zhee died (approximately 800 Gwich'in and twelve HBC operatives perished at this one place).

1850: Lt. Barnard to Nulato

    HMS Enterprise, commanded by Captain Richard Collinson, landed at the Russian redoubt of St. Michaels. Captain Collinson had been directed by the Admiralty to investigate rumors of white men having been seen along the lower Yukon River. It was thought to be possible that these were some of the crew of Sir Franklin's lost ships. Captain Collinson dropped off a Lt. Barnard with twelve men to explore that possibility. Lt. Barnard and his men went up river with the Russian Captain Darabin, who happened to be at St. Michaels at the time. Captain Darabin was the commander of the Russian post at Nulato, 300 miles up river.

1851: The Nulato Incident

    A band of Koyukons headed by a Yataalii spiritual leader attacked the Russians at Nulato. They struck with a precise plan. Burning bundles of grass was stuffed down the smoke vents of the barracks. When the fire and smoke inside forced the Russians out of the barracks they were shot with arrows. Also caught in the fray and killed were Lt. Barnard and a crew of 12 British marines of the HMS Enterprise. The Russian Captain Darabin and 57 others were killed. The Koyukons, upon knowing that they had killed the Russian leader (Captain Darabin), withdrew and allowed the remainder of the Russians to escape down river. The Yataalii leader killed during the fray was the only Indian casualty.

1854: Reciprocity agreement between Canada and the United States

    This agreement provided for unrestricted free trade across the border between the two nations.

1854-1856: The Crimean War

    Russia attempted to conquer the old Ottoman Empire. Russia's opponents were; Britain, Turkey, and France. While having far reaching consequences in that area, the main effects of the Crimean War in North America was the diversion of attention of Russia from its interests in Alaska.

1857: Ottawa chosen as Capital

    On Decemeber 31, Ottawa (Bytown) was selected by Queen Victoria to be the capitol of Canada.

1858: Crown Colony of British Columbia established

    The statute had received Royal assent on August 2, and the Crown Colony was proclaimed at Fort Langley on November 19.

1859: Reassessment

    British Parliament began to re-assess its North American holdings. Wary that westward expansion by the United States would result in the annexation of parts of British territory, the British Parliament decided to merge HBC territories (Rupert's Land) with its colony in Ontario. Proceedings begin in Britain to grant more powers of self government to the Colony.

1861-1865: The U.S. Civil War

    Southern States banded together and seceded from the United States. The Confederates States of America was formed. A bloody war that pitted North against South and relatives fighting on opposite sides continued for five years.

1862: The Homestead Act

    U.S. Congress passed the Homestead Act which allowed persons to claim up to 65 hectares of land. Upon building a dwelling and tending the land for five years the homesteader would be given title to the land.

    This act in effect violated the Treaty of Paris and the U.S. Constitution and its agreement to respect the rights to lands by the original users, the Native American people. The Act also spawned the great western expansion of settlers and spelled the doom of Indian Tribes.

1862: Railroad Expansion

    The U.S. Congress Chartered the Union Pacific Railroad and the Central Pacific Railroad. The Union Pacific was to push westward from Iowa. The Central Pacific was to push Eastward from San Francisco. The goal was to establish a trans-continental railroad that would extend from the Atlantic to the Pacific. The railroads would be given "Land Grant" on each side of the tracks. In the East, the railroad company would own five miles on either side of the tracks. The distance of the land grant would increase to 50 miles on either side in such sparsely populated regions as Arizona, Utah, and New Mexico. These lands granted to the railroads were, of course, Indian lands. The coast to coast railroad was completed in 1869 with the two railways connecting at Promontory Point in Utah. A railroad dynasty began with their controlling commerce for many years to come.

1865: Civil War Ends

    The U.S. war between the States ended upon General Robert E. Lee surrendering the Confederate Army at Appomattox. Almost immediately, the U.S. Army was dispatched Westward in great force on the newly built railroad on a campaign to exterminate the Indians. Most of the Civil War Generals were given commands of the forces. Such new weapons as gatling guns, artillery, and repeating rifles made the outcome certain. Indian nations such as the Sioux, Apache, Ute, and Nez Pierce fought valiantly and skillfully to save their home lands, but they were doomed. Even so, the organized Indian tribes were difficult to exterminate. It would take until 1876 to complete the genocide to the extent that there were no organized tribes, just indigents remaining. During this time the U.S. Army encouraged buffalo hunters to exterminate the Buffalo on the plains.

1865: Russian American Telegraph Company

    On May 17, the first crews left San Francisco to begin construction of a joint American-Russian telegraph line between the United States and Russia via Alaska. This was the dream of Perry McDonough Collins, who was able to convince the Western Union Telegraph Company of the commercial possiblities of the 16,000-mile line. Although three millions dollars was spent and a massive amount of scientific information was gathered, only a few miles of line were strung before the successful laying of a trans-Atlantic cable (on July 22, 1866) ended Collins' dream.

1866: The new British Columbia

    On November 19, the Crown Colonies of Vancouver Island and British Columbia were united, as British Columbia, with the capital at New Westminster. It became Canada's sixth province in 1871.

1867 (March 30): Alaska Purchase

    U.S. purchased Alaska from Russia for $7.2 Million. The boundaries were set as those agreed to by Russia and Great Britain in 1825. President Johnson did not proclaim the purchase in public until June 20, and the formal transfer occurred at Sitka on October 18. The week before the transfer, a new company, Hutchinson, Kohl & Company, had been formed to purchase all of the assets of the Russian American Company, thus completing the Russian departure from Alaska.

1867: The British North America Act

    The BNA Act received Queen Victoria's consent on March 29, and came in effect on July 1. This act confederated Upper Canada (Ontario), Lower Canada (Quebec), Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, thus creating the Dominion of Canada. The first Dominion Parliament met on November 6. Canada's first Prime Minister was John A. Macdonald, a Scot.

1870: The Deed of Surrender

    This act by the British Parliament effectively amended the BNA Act by transferring the HBC land holdings to Canada. Rupert's Land then became Canadian territory. The Hudson's Bay Company was given license to continue operation as an independent, but a private, commercial company, no longer an instrument of British government.

1870-1885: Metis Rebellion

    The Metis people of Canada are mixed-blood Indian, French and British; both Catholic and Protestant denominations are represented. Many French and British trappers and traders had married Indian women, and their descendants formed the Metis ethnic culture. Complicating the Metis uprising was the situation that some of the British and French did not align themselves with the independence movement, though a majority did.

    When word spread that the HBC land holdings, which the Metis believed to be theirs by heritage, was being transferred to Canada, they organized to resist the transfer of title of their lands to the new Canadian government. In 1870 the Metis, under the leadership of Louis Riel, declared a provisional Government. Over a period of time the funds of HBC was confiscated and several pitched battles were fought with police, most of which resulted in victories by the Metis. Manitoba was created and it joined the Metis Provisional Government.

    In 1870 negotiations were started at Toronto between the Metis and the (new) Canadian Government in Ottawa. Conflicts continued for five years without resolution. Eventually Canadian federal troops defeated the Metis in 1885.

    Louis Riel was tried and convicted of treason and hung on Nov 16, 1885, thus ending the revolution and the Metis Provisional Government.

1876: Battle of Little Big Horn

    General George Armstrong Custer led a sizeable force against a large Indian village with intent to destroy them. He attacked the village, but his regiment was overwhelmed; Custer and 268 soldiers were killed. There were few Indian casualties.

    Nevertheless, this great victory by the Indians meant nothing to their plight. Within the year, they were chased and destroyed, and by 1878 all Indian survivors in the lower United States were imprisoned in camps called Indian Reservations. But the Native American saga in Alaska was yet to play out.

1881-1889: Canadian Pacific Railroad

    Work began in 1881 to build transcontinental railroad across Canada. In 1889 the link was completed to Vancouver, connecting the west coast of Canada to the population centers of eastern Canada.

    During the Metis uprising a segment of the railroad had been completed to allow fast deliverance of Canadian forces to defeat the Metis. Some believe that, without the railroad, the Metis would have been successful and the western half of Canada would be a separate country today.

1896: Gold in the Klondike and Alaska

    Although gold had been discovered in many places in the Yukon and Alaska prior to 1896, it was the discovery of rich deposits of placer gold along the Klondike River that brought an influx of tens of thousands of miners into the country. The Gold Rush extended quickly from the area around present Dawson City into Alaska. Many books have been published about the Gold Rush, and there is a great deal of information available on the Net.

1898: Spanish-American War

    Fought on three fronts, in Cuba, the Philippines, and at sea, the U.S. prevailed everywhere. The war culminated with the 1898 Treaty of Paris. Spain relinquished its claim to Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Guam, thus ending all of Spain's colonial empire that began with the 1492 voyage of Christopher Columbus to the Islands of the Bahamas, and the following spread of Spanish control throughout South, Central and much of North America.

1898: Yukon Territory created

    The complete text of the Yukon Act, as assented to on June 13, 1898, is online here.

1905: Provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan created

    In 1896 the government of Canada decided to encourage settlement of the Western prairies. There had been a slow but steady stream of earlier settlers and the groundwork had been laid for further growth. The earlier settlements had taken place mostly from Ontario and the western United States. After the turn of the century a flood of new settlers came from Europe. Settlements of Poles, Ukrainians, Mennonites, Russians, Doukhobors, Hungarians, Germans, and Icelanders developed on the prairie. The Government helped to pay their passage and gave them free land. The population of the prairies increased dramatically.

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