Fort Vancouver Historic Structures Report

1. Frederick Merk, ed., Fur Trade and Empire; George Simpson's Journal. . .1824-1825 (Harvard Historical Studies, XXXI, Cambridge, Mass., 1931), 122-124.

2. These sketches are those found in Henry Eld, Journal, Statistics, &c., in Oregon and California, MS, Sketch Book No. 1, in Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University; and in Wilkes, Narrative, IV, 327. Because these pictures are similar in many respects, it is probable that the Eld view was the basis of the small illustration in the Wilkes volume, although it has been ascribed to Albert T. Agate. See OHQ, LXV (June 1964), 137. Another drawing perhaps based on the Wilkes view but with several independent features is found in Sartain's Union Magazine of Literature and Art, VII (September, 1850), 137. This latter picture, however, does not show the flagpole.

3. Lowe, Private Journal, MS, 4.

4. Ibid., 11.

5. See plate VI. There are several versions or copies of this plan, which was an inset on a larger map entitled "Sketch of Fort Vancouver and Adjacent Plains," dated 1845. The copy used as a basis for the calculations described in this section was one in the records of the British Foreign Office, a reproduction of which was furnished to the National Park Service about 1947 through the courtesy of Mr. Howard J. Burnham of Vancouver, Washington. It was reproduced in Caywood, Exploratory Excavations at Ft. Vancouver, plates 31 and 32.

6. See discussion above in Chapter I on the stockade. At the time this report was written, archeologists had not yet excavated in the part of the fort site where the flagpole was located.

7. Henry James Warre, Sketches in North America and the Oregon Territory, By Captain H. Warre, with an introduction by Archibald Hanna, Jr. (Barre, Massachusetts: Imprint Society, 1970), plate 40.

8. This view appears in Henry James Warre, Sketches in North America and the Oregon Territory [London, 1848].

9. For an example, see the picture of Norway House in Erwin N. Thompson, Grand Portage National Monument, Great Hall Historic Structures Report, History Data Section (multilithed, Washington, D. C.: National Park Service, May, 1970), plate 37.

10. Robert Michael Ballantyne, The Young Fur-Traders: Snowflakes and Sunbeams (London, Melbourne and Toronto: Ward, Lock & Co., Limited, n. d.]), 20-21.

11. Isaac Cowie, The Company of Adventurers: A Narrative of Seven Years in the Service of the Hudson's Bay Company during 1867-1874 on the Great Buffalo Plains . . . (Toronto: William Briggs, 1913), 213.

12. According to information in Company files, the "earliest specific reference" to the firm's red ensign was in 1818; its use was discontinued in 1970. Mrs. Shirlee A. Smith (Librarian, Hudson's Bay Company) to Mr. Robert E. S. Clark, Winnipeg, November 18, 1971, MS, in files, Fort Vancouver National Historic Site.

13. Emil Teichmann, A Journey to Alaska in the Year 1868. . . (New York: Argosy-Antiquarian Ltd., 1963), 105, 107.

14. The Archivist of the Hudson's Bay Company stated in 1963: "The earliest reference we have on file to the Company flag as it is in use to-day is dated 25 May 1818 when nine 'Ensigns 6 yds. red with the letters HB C sewed on ditto...'" were shipped from London to York Factory. Miss Alice M. Johnson to William R. Sampson, London, March 28, 1963, MS, in files, Fort Vancouver National Historical Site.

15. Henry J. Warre, Journal from Red River to the Columbia, 1845, MS, opp. p. 23, which is item 3 in the microfilm strip, Journals of Henry J. Warre, in The Public Archives of Canada.

16. H.B.C., York Factory Indent Books, 1823-1838, H.B.C.A., B.239/n/71, MS, fol. 134, from microfilm copy in The Public Archives of Canada.

17. H.B.C. Account Book, Fort Vancouver, 1844 [Inventories], H.B.C.A., B.223/d/155, MS, 126.

18. H.B.C., York Factory, Scheme Indents, 1832, H.B.C.A., B.239/m/2, MS, from microfilm copy in The Public Archives of Canada. It will be noted that the "H" and "B" are joined in these specifications for the initials "H.B.C." However, by 1832 "HBC" was the commonly used symbol for the Company name, employed in shipping marks and other places. Possibly the use of this symbol in an order did not necessarily mean that the initials appeared so on the flag.

19. See Hussey, History of Fort Vancouver, plate XXXIX, for a photograph of this flag; also Caywood, Final Report, frontispiece, for another version, probably a later copy. See also plate LIV of the present report for a picture of the first version.

20. C. H. French to Glen N. Rank, Victoria, B. C., June 7, 1920. MS, photocopy of the original in files of the Fort Vancouver Historical Society through the courtesy of Mr. Robert E. S. Clark, Chief Park Interpreter, Fort Vancouver National Historic Site.

21. Miss Alice M. Johnson to William R. Sampson, London, March 28, 1963, MS, in files, Fort Vancouver National Historic Site.

22. Thompson, op. cit., plate 37.

23. Miss Alice M. Johnson to William R. Sampson, London, March 28, 1963. The Company's librarian, in a more recent communication, says that the earliest representation of this flag was in 1779. Mrs. Shirlee A. Smith to R. E. S. Clark, Winnipeg, November 8, 1971, MS, in files, Fort Vancouver National Historic Site.

24. Mrs. Shirlee A. Smith to R. E. S. Clark, Winnipeg, November 8, 1971.