Lord Selkirk conceived the idea of putting
new life into the Hudson's Bay Company, reviving the monopolies of
trading granted in its old charter, and turning its vague rights to
land into the absolute ownership of the enormous area of North
America north and west of the Canadian provinces. No regard of course
was paid to any rights of the natives, who as a matter of fact were
dying out rapidly from the effects of bad alcohol and epidemic
diseases.
His motive was to establish large colonies of stalwart Highlanders as
the tenants of a Chartered Company. Alexander Mackenzie had already
called the north-west country "New Caledonia". Lord Selkirk wished to
make it so in its population.
Already he had been instrumental in establishing a Scottish colony on
Prince Edward's Island,[3] which, after some difficulties at the
beginning, had soon begun to prosper. Two or three years later he came
to Montreal, and there collected all the information he could obtain
from the partners in the North-west Company regarding the prospects of
trade and colonization in the far west. In the year 1811 he had
managed to acquire the greater part of the shares in the Hudson's Bay
Company, and, placing himself at its head, he sent out his first
hundred Highlanders and Irish to form a feudatory colony in the Red
River district (the modern Manitoba).
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