Fort William United Kingdom Historical Park

Great Hall Portraits

Fort William Historical Park features a substantial assortment of artwork related to the first nineteenth century together with Canadian fur trade era. Much of this artwork catches the images associated with creators of the North West Company and it is proudly presented regarding walls of this Great Hall. The portraits are numbered relating to their arrangement when you look at the hallway, beginning with the portrait of Lord Nelson left for the western hearth, and moving clockwise all over room.

• 1. Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson (1758-1805)

Admiral regarding the British fleet inside wars with Revolutionary and Napoleonic France, and a nationwide hero, winning important victories in the battles of Nile (1798) and Trafalgar (1805). By 1800 his scandalous connection with Lady Hamilton, partner for the Brit ambassador at Naples, had been much talked-of. Nelson had lost an eye and an arm during his military job (when you look at the portrait their sleeve is pinned to their coat). He passed away in 1805 on their flagship HMS Victory within Battle of Trafalgar. The McGillivrays alongside prominent Montrealers had a monument to Nelson erected in Montreal inside the honour (the Nelson Column) which is the earliest monument in Montreal, and pre-dates the memorial to Nelson in Trafalgar Square, London, The united kingdomt. William McGillivray had commissioned artist William Berczy in Montreal to decorate a life-sized portrait of Nelson before their demise in 1805. This is followed by a commission when it comes to Battle of Trafalgar in 1806. The 2 works hung inside Great Hall from 1807-1821.

Created in Scotland and informed at the cost of their uncle Simon McTavish, William McGillivray came to Canada in the summer of 1783, going into the solution for the north-west Company as a clerk. He became somebody in 1790, and joined up with the company company of McTavish, Frobisher & Co. within retirement of Joseph Frobisher in 1798. At loss of Simon McTavish in 1804, William became the chief manager of NWCo, plus 1806 the company became generally McTavish, McGillivrays & Co. He stayed the principle manager through to the merger with the Hudson's Bay business in 1821. William usually travelled to Fort William each summer time to chair the yearly meetings using the wintering partners, utilizing the south-east apartment in Great Hall as his summer time quarters. The Rendezvous of 1815, however, he was otherwise occupied with his responsibilities when you look at the Legislative Assembly of Quebec, so their bro Simon found Fort William in the stead.

In one of the definitive battles of the Napoleonic wars, the combined French and Spanish naval causes were defeated by Nelson's forces off the coast of Spain. The fight established Britain's supremacy on the large seas (that has been to last significantly more than a hundred years), and concluded French hopes of invading Britain.

Created in Scotland, McDonald came to Canada in 1791 and was apprenticed into NWCo. He was in charge of setting up Fort Augustus (1795) and Rocky Mountain home (1799), and ended up being made a complete companion around 1800. In 1799 he married Nancy Small, mixed-blood daughter of fur trader Patrick Small. He was called a pugnacious investor, constantly carrying with him a set of pistols and a sword. During rotation in 1803-04 he went to family members in London where he sat the portrait. In 1812 the NWCo delivered McDonald in the Isaac Todd to take Astoria through the Pacific Fur Company, although when he got here in 1813 it had been currently in the hands of this Nor'Westers. McDonald gone back to Fort William overland when it comes to 1814 Rendezvous, and retired the exact same year. Like many other retiring Nor'Westers he obtained land to develop a country property. He'd crafted a mansion close Cornwall, Upper Canada, called Garth, and moved present together with wife Nancy and 5 children within the fall of 1816. In 1823 he left Nancy and Garth and hitched a white lady, Amelia McGillis (niece of Hugh McGillis), making a new residence on her behalf at Williamstown. Nancy stayed at Garth until the woman death, plus Nor'Wester J.D. Campbell who had married their particular child Eliza. J.D. Campbell and his descendents stayed at Garth (renamed Inverarden into the 1870's) until 1965.

See: "Inverarden: a Nor'Wester's Country Estate" by Ian Bowering in Canadian Collector, May/June 1982.

Todd found Canada from Ireland shortly after the conquest, and joined many partnerships during the early fur trading ventures away from Montreal, including relationship with James McGill and Frobishers. These early partnerships presaged the synthesis of the NWCo. Later his cooperation in Todd & McGill concentrated from the Southwest trade (in other words. Michigan, Wisconsin, etc.), but he re-entered the northwest trade for a short time as a shareholder in the NWCo's 1792 agreement. In 1813 he retired through the fur company. He visited The united kingdomt in 1815, in which he died in 1819.

James McGill stumbled on the Brit colonies from Scotland sometime after 1756, and by 1766 had been wintering inside Indian nations engaged in the fur trade. Around 1794 he moved to Montreal and became mixed up in Canadian fur trade. He formed a partnership with Isaac Todd, called Todd, McGill & Co., which held stocks inside NWCo from 1792-1795, but had been typically active in the Southwest trade. McGill had been a part associated with Legislative installation of Lower Canada. He passed away in 1813, making an endowment and a large Montreal residential property the founding of a college - later on to-be generally McGill University. Their child Peter McGill was later on active in the creation of the financial institution of Montreal.

• 7. Sir Alexander Mackenzie (1764-1820)

Born in Scotland, Alexander arrived in ny in 1774. During the time of the American Revolution Alexander was provided for Canada and attended school in Montreal. In 1779 he entered the service of fur dealers Finlay, Gregory & Co. as a clerk - the firm was later soaked up in to the NWCo in 1787 at which time he became a wintering companion. In 1789 he travelled from Fort Chipewyan on Lake Athabaska towards the Arctic Ocean; in 1793 he then followed this together with historic trip toward Pacific. In 1799 he severed their connection with the NWCo and went to The united kingdomt, due to disagreements with McTavish and McGillivray. He published their Voyages in London in 1801, and ended up being made a knight in 1802. The same year he returned to Canada and entered the XY Company, which had been created by fur traders Forsyth, Richardson, and Ogilvy (and others) in 1798. When Mackenzie joined, the agency firm was rebranded Sir Alexander Mackenzie & Co. The XY Company joined with the NWCo in 1804, of which time Mackenzie formed the company firm Sir Alexander Mackenzie & Co. when you look at the new arrangement to provide for their interests. One agent with this company made the trip to Fort William yearly for summer time group meetings. In 1808 he gone back to Scotland, in which he spent their staying years.

• 8. David Thompson's Chart

Initially a clerk because of the HBCo, David Thompson joined the NWCo in 1797. As a surveyor with the business his first task would be to establish the area of this 49th parallel around Lake better and west in terms of the Assiniboine River. Later on he invested time in the Rocky Mountains, as well as in 1811 he explored the Columbia River from its origin into the Rockies to the Pacific, succeeding where Simon Fraser has actually unsuccessful. He started their map in 1812, starting semi-retirement, and delivered it into NWCo in 1814. In July of 1815 he's somewhere near Montreal, plus late 1815 Thompson bought Angus Bethune's dad's house in Williamstown U.C., where in actuality the family decided for a short while. He previously hitched Charlotte Small (girl of fur trade Patrick Small) in 1799, and by 1815 had had 7 young ones (5 lifestyle and 6 more were to follow). The map in Great Hall is a later type of the chart provided toward NWCo. In location it covers about 2 million square kilometers, from Lake better than the Pacific Ocean.