Introduction
The trapping of beavers for their fur in Canada played an important role in shaping of the native and subsequent cultures. The introduction of the fur trade brought about notable drastic changes in our native ways of life. In the end, these changes ultimately led to the erosion of a greater part of the native customs and culture and eventually led to the formation of a completely new hybrid culture with new and distinct customs. During the early periods of the European traders’ settlement in Canada, there was very little interaction between the fur traders and us. During these periods of little interactions, we initially maintained our customs as they enjoyed before colonization and allowed very little of the European culture into our society.
With the introduction of the fur trade in the 17th century, this harmonious situation was doomed. The Europeans involved in the fur trade started settling in our country and soon it became their permanent residence. The native customs and cultures treated nature as a means of survival and all the native groups highly respected nature. We believed that there was nothing to be taken from nature except the things that were essentially required by the human beings. Nevertheless, with the introduction of capitalism by the European traders and settlers, they undermined the fundamental principles of nature and encouraged the exploitation of nature for profit.
The most important and notable change in the customs of the natives was brought about by their women. My fellow Indian women were also involved in the fur trade in different ways. They trapped smaller fur bearing animals as well as served other purposes to the European traders. However, it should be noted that the first European expeditions that came to Canada to engage in the fur trade did not include women. Therefore, the Europeans entered into marriage with native women à la façon du pays. We served as a link between the fur traders and the natives, taught these fur traders the Indian ways of conflict resolution, and taught them our way of life that conformed to the native customs. The white fur traders also taught the native women about their culture, which they translated to their fellow natives. This mix of culture brought about the mixed color race that dominated after the trade. In this paper, I will assume the position of a Cree wife of a fur trader, a former wintering partner of the North West Company and currently an officer of the Hudson’s Bay Company. Taking that the year to be 1830, I will describe the changes that I have seen in the position of native women since the time of my marriage according to the customs of the country some thirty years ago.
Discussion
In the past, there were no foreign settlers in Canada. The native women married the native men and there was a universal culture, however, with the introduction of the fur trade, which brought the European settlers into the Canadian society, intermarriages occurred bringing about a completely different culture. The Canadian women performed professional tasks that the European fur traders could not perform. We gathered firewood, cooked meals, made leather, dressed furs, set up camps, netted snowshoes, made moccasins, and several other things unfamiliar to the European traders. When the traders married our native women, they also secured their trade links with their wives tribes and learned from their survival skills, customs and language. Additionally, these women acted as translators for the companies.
During the French reign, especially the time that I was married, young marriageable women were married and their dowry paid. Widows were also remarried; they bore and raised children for the colonies as well as took care of the homes, garden, cook and sew. From the early records of the French Canadian records, it is evident that the women did not have the right to own property or manage family property. However, with the introduction of the fur trade and intermarriages, some of our women helped their husbands in managing the business, sometimes went out to look for fur, and generally engaged in the trade. We were guides to the European traders and assisted them in penetrating the societies.
The fur trade did not involve the exchange of goods between the trading partners; it also involved several other transactions that led to exchange of cultures. The roles we played in this trade differed from those played by the men even though both of these roles were important to the development of the trade. During my stay at the North West Company, men were majorly trappers and hunters, participated in trade ceremonies as well as received trade credits from the European traders. They also served as guides, scouts, and interpreters. However, at the Hudson’s Bay Company, the roles were generally shared between the men and women. There was no dominant party in this company among the native men and women. In both cases, women processed, prepared and cleaned the furs. The women also traded the fur.
Marriage at the Hudson’s Bay Company
There were different policies between the North West Company and the Hudson’s Bay Company regarding women. These differences in policies led to the differences in the organizational structural differences. The committee of shareholders of the Hudson’s Bay Company in London feared that carrying their wives and children to Canada could cost them unnecessary expenses. They initially prevented the men working with the company from marrying. However, this policy never worked and the senior officers were the first to take wives and their workers followed suit. Some officers married up to six wives at the Hudson’s Bay Company. When they started marrying native women, the weddings began taking European forms. The married couples would go and take vows before witnesses and the wedding dances carried out. The merger between the Hudson’s Bay Company and the North West Company in 1821 resulted into the development of the marriage contract policy, which ensured the bride and the groom signed before witnesses validating the contract. In the ancient Canada, marriages were sometimes done before an audience and sometimes done in privacy, nevertheless, the signing of the marriage contract was not present and people did not celebrate with the wedding dance.
PART 2: SEMINAR ESSAY
In this section, I will analyze seminar reading seven, which was written by Sylvia Van Kirk from the University of Toronto. The article titled “Women in Between”: Indian Women in the Fur Trade Society in Western Canada. I will also provide an analysis of seminar reading five as I bring out some comparisons and contrast between these two seminar readings.
The title of Van Kirk’s article, “women in between” refers to the Indian (native) women. According to this article, the native Indians (the Cree, the Ojibwa and the Chipewyan) were the hosts of the fur trading Europeans, who were considered the visiting group (Van Kirk p. 31). These Europeans constituted majority males. The native women served as the women between the native hosts and the visiting Europeans. Both groups married these native women.
This article additionally appreciates that because of their sex, women participated in the fur trade performing roles that their male counterparts could not perform. They served as wives and bore children for the fur traders, which the Indian men could not do (Van Kirk p. 32). Additionally, the article recognizes that the native women helped stimulate the development of the relationship between the visiting whites and the hosting Indians. These women also used their positions as the women in between to take advantage and increase their status and influence. They also took advantage of the economic advantages that the fur traders brought to them.
The article additionally indicates that as country wives of the white fur traders, the native Indian women lived substantially different lives when they moved within the forts (Van Kirk p. 33). The native women who became friendly to the white fur traders gained higher and influential positions and often acted as social brokers between the trading groups. The article additionally points out that the European fur traders had both economic and social reasons for marrying the Indian women. According to the article, the Indian women not only satisfied the white men sexually due to the absence of their white women, they also performed valuable economic duties that the white traders could not do. The officers in both the North West and the Hudson’s Bay Companies married the daughters of chiefs or trading captains in order to strengthen the trade ties.
According to the native Indians, the article considers they viewed the intermarriages to create a reciprocal bond that consolidated their economic relationship with the fur traders. The article found out that the Indian society realized that the exchange of marital rights could lead to respect, protection and assistance from both parties. The Henley House Massacre was as a result of retaliation by the Indians for the violation of their sensibilities and concepts of the alliances that the white traders failed to understand.
The article additionally found out that most of the past literature on the fur trade supported that women actively participated in the fur trade. For the Cree women, marriage to voyageurs was considered an honor and the women condemned any man who refused to give away his wife to the whites. Women on the Pacific Coast also preferred living with the white men. If their husbands deserted these women, they considered themselves widows and awaited remarriage by other fur traders. The articles goes ahead to provide examples of native women and white who got married and how the women enjoyed their marriages.
According to seminar reading five that is titled the Maritime Fur Trade, the European traders that the article considers unprincipled exploited the Indians. Unlike the former article, this one indicates that the Indian labor was forced to work using force or open threats. The article gives an example of a history student of the trade who describe the trade as a “mere looting of the coast”. The article appreciated the Indians as peaceful people and made further explains that the European fur traders used this characteristic of the Indians to exploit them. Finally, the article explains that the Europeans enticed the Indians with goods that were unfamiliar to them and the gullible Indians fall for their tricks. Consequently, they took control of the native until the latter realized after several years of the trade, which resulted in conflicts and wars of rebellion.
The article explains that the fur trade took place in the fur country, but the Europeans dominated and controlled the flow and put regulations that favored they interests. Out of the twenty one vessels in the first season of 1778, which was double the number of the vessels present at the coast in the previous year, more than half of them were British, others French and Italian while just a few were American. Nevertheless, in the early 1800s, the American vessels had outnumbered the British vessels since the native had started understanding the oppression that the fur traders imposed on them. By mid 1800s, the introduction of the Hudson’s Bay Company outfaced the maritime fur trade. The European traders made considerable profits from the efforts of the native Indians who acquired the pelts and trapped fur-bearing animals.
The European traders realized that the native Indians were curious about the vessels and introducing them into the trade at the early stages of their arrival in the fur country was not an easy task. However, after some time, they had satisfied their curiosity and settled to begin the trade. Dixon, one of the earliest fur traders induced the natives with clothes and obtained fur from them since the goods that they were given in return were new to them. Nevertheless, other literature on the fur trade have established that during the early stages of the arrival of the British in the fur country, they did not begin the trade immediately. They first started by giving the natives gifts as the latter gave them fur as appreciation. This article also points out the role of women in the fur trade. These women have been presented in both seminar reading 5 and 7 as acting as ‘middle-wives’ between the two trading groups. They helped the natives and traders to integrate into a common understanding.
Bibliography:
Sylvia Van Kirk. “Women in Between”: Indian Women in Fur Trade Society in Western Canada. (University of Toronto). Pp. 30 – 33.
Meares John & Ryerson Stanley, Voyages Made in the years 1788 and 89 from Europe to Canadian west. (London: Logographic Press, 1770)
