Surveying in 1879
The decision had been made the previous year that the best route for the Canadian Pacific Railway was along the Burrard Inlet route but during the 1879, it was decided to confirm this decision by checking several northern routes across the province. Unless any of the northern routes were clearly better than the Burrard Inlet route, the decision would be made to start on construction. This was in fact done, the Canadian Government passed an Order-in-Council selecting the Burrard Inlet route on October 4, 1879 and contracts let to start construction in the Fraser Canyon by the end of the year (see the Onderdonk Sections).
Sandford Fleming, as Engineer-in-Chief of the CPR, directed several people, including Henry Cambie, the Engineer in charge of surveys in British Columbia to explore several routes starting from Port Simpson on the coast (near what is now Prince Report). The major routes being explored from Port Simpson were:
- The Pine River Pass
- The Peace River
- The Yellowhead Pass
Henry Cambie
Cambie started the season in Ottawa. He left on May 12, 1879 via the United States and arrived in Victoria on the 24th of May. He left with XXX on the Hudson's Bay Company steamer, the Princess Lousie on June 3rd. A couple of days later they arrived at Port Essington, near what is now Prince Rupert and explored Port Simpson and Wark Inlet. On June 7th, he left George Keefer to complete a trial survey up Wark Inlet from Port Simpson to the Skeena River valley and then up the Skeena as far as possible. Charles Horetzky was left in Port Essington to complete preparations for his explorations.
Cambie, Henry Macleod, George Dawson and Gordon left in two canoes up the Skeena River and reached the 'forks' on June 21st (known known as the confluence of the Skeena and Bulkley Rivers at Hazelton). From there, they went by trail to the large Babine Lake, the location of a Hudson's Bay company fort, Fort Babine. From there they crossed by cart trail to Stewart Lake and were met by a boat which took them along the lake to Fort St. James for July 4th.
At Fort St. James, a Walter Dewdney was left with a small pack trail to support Charles Horetzky as needed. The main party left Fort St. James on July 8th with a party consisting of 6 staff, 14 packers, 2 "men" and 5 Indians for packing, boating, etc., 72 mules and 23 riding animals. With this party, they reached Fort Mcleod (also known as Trout Lake Fort and now known as McLeod Lake (')) on the 14th after an 80 mile trip.
From from Fort McLeod on the 16th, Gordon, Cambie and McLeod headed south and east down the Park River to the Parsnip and then north down the Parsnip by boat. Dawson took the pack train overland and met up with Cambie and others on the Parsnip. The boat was used to ferry the pack train across the Parsnip River. Dawson continued east to explore the Pine River Pass.
Cambie and the others continued down the Parsnip River by boat on the 21st, passing the mouth of the Nation River before meeting up with the Finlay River to create the Peace River (this confluence is under Williston Lake created by the W.A.C. Bennett Dam in 1968). The party spent 3 days portaging around Rocky Mountain Canoe using horses borrowed from the HBC in Hudson's Hope.
From Hudson's Hope, the party continued down the Peace passed the Pine River mouth, reach Fort Dunvegan (north of Grande Praire, Alberta) on August 1st.
Charles Horetzky
George Keefer
George Dawson
Henry Macleod
M
(Gray)This survey party was working under E.W. Jarvis (more on E.W. Jarvis) and left Victoria on May 5, 1874 for the North Thompson. Their plan was to survey the route being explored by Joseph Hunter near Blue River or if that did not look promising, the headwaters of the Clearwater. If neither was promising, the party would survey down the Fraser River from Tete Jaune Cache. They met Hunter 40 miles north of the mouth of the Clearwater River on June 1st, 1874 and found Hunter's route impractical. Jarvis went along up the Clearwater drainage and met the crew at the mouth of the Albreda River. Since Jarvis's route was not practical either, they survey down the Fraser River.
Sometime in late summer they met N who was surveying up the Fraser from Fort George (now Prince George) and travelled overland along the route and arrving in Fort George on October 5th. From there they survey up the Nechako River to the mouth of the Chilako River and returned south, being in Quesnel on October 23rd and Victoria October 31st.
References
- Fleming (1880) - Report, especially,
- Appendix 2 - Report on an Exploration from Port Simpson via the River Skeena, Lakes Babine and Stewart and the Peace and Pine River Passes to Lower Slave Lake, in the Year 1879, conducted by Mr. H.J. Cambie
- Appendix 3 - Report on Explorations Made Between Port Simpson B.C., and Battleford N.W.T. Via the Valley of the Peace River, During the season of 1979, by Henry A.F. Macleod
- Appendix 4 - Report on the Trial Location Survey, From Head of Wark Inlet up the Skeena River, by Mr. George A. Keefer
- Appendix 5 - Report of Charles Horetzky Upon an Exploration Through The Northern Portion of British Columbia in the Season of 1979
