Everything about John Finlay totally explained
John Finlay (
1774 -
December 19,
1833) was a
fur trader and
explorer with the
North West Company. He is best remembered for establishing the first fur trading post in what is now
British Columbia,
Canada and for his exploration of the
Finlay River, one of the two major rivers forming the
Peace River.
Finlay was born in
Montreal, the son of
James Finlay, who himself was a significant player in the western Canadian
fur trade. Finlay was apprenticed as a clerk in the North West Company in
1789 at the age of 15. He accompanied
Alexander Mackenzie on his historic trip across the
Rocky Mountains to the
Pacific Ocean in
1792-
93 becoming, with him, the first European to traverse
North America. He was placed in charge of the North West Company's
Athabasca Department in
1794, and the same year established a trading post at present-day
Fort St. John, called Rocky Mountain Fort. This was the first European community established in present-day
British Columbia, and is the
province's oldest continuously inhabited European-founded settlement.
In
1797, Finlay revisited Mackenzie's excursion to the Pacific, with a view to taking the north branch of the
Peace rather than the southern branch (the
Parsnip River) taken by Mackenzie. This northern branch would come to be known as the
Finlay River. Finlay perhaps thought that this route might present a less complicated conduit to the Pacific. No record remains of the expedition except in the writings of
Samuel Black, who ascended to the source of the Finlay in
1824, noting that "he had studied Finlay’s chart." Nonetheless, it would appear from the information Black had that Finlay had only made it as far as the
Ingenika River, about 130 km north of the Finlay River's confluence with the Peace. Indeed, Black's journal makes clear that the northern branch, far from being less complicated, was all but impassable in many parts, perhaps explaining Finlay's reluctance to travel more than about one quarter of the river's actual length.
Finlay remained in the North West Company's Athabasca Department, becoming a partner of the company in
1799. He retired from the fur trade in
1804 and returned to Montreal. Little is known of his life there, except that he obtained an appointment as deputy commissary-general.
Further Information
Get more info on 'John Finlay'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://john_finlay.totallyexplained.com">John Finlay Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
