Jewitt etc

[Mike Cleven]

At 05:08 PM 1/16/99 -0800, R K Henderson wrote:
>>Again, with the critical exception of the period from 1796 to 1820.
>
>Ah. I get it. At some point I got the impression you were insinuating
>that the Oregon Country fell to the US by default, because "no-one else
>was using it." This is the party line in the States, but far from the
>truth. As you know, Canadian/British authorities saw to it that the Yukon
>was very visibly "occupied" by the Crown during the Klondike gold rush,
>to avoid having the same thing happen again.

Sam Steele's gatling guns stationed at the top of the White Pass (or was it
the Chilkoot) were pretty damned convincing....

What I'd meant was that the British absence from the Coast in the period in
question forestalled the settlement colonization plans envisioned by Capt.
Vancouver and others, and allowed the US a strong presence in the fur trade
that otherwise might have been forcibly dominated by British interests.  If
the British had actively pursued exploitation and development in Puget
Sound and the Columbia Basin, the lands south of 49 could never reasonably
have been transferred to the US. Also, any American pretense of having cut
a deal with the Spanish would never have been tolerated by the British, who
already had an agreement with the Spanish (the Nootka Conventions)
establishing the demarcation between British and Spanish interests at what
is now the California-Oregon boundary.  The Spanish apparently decided to
overlook this at the time the treaties with the US concerning 'Oregon' were
signed (actually, it strikes me as probable that it was the Napoleonic
regime in Spain who cut the deal with the US, not the legitimate dynasty
that had come to terms with the British over the region).

A committed British presence, including naval bases, settlers, and a formal
colony, all established by 1810, would have precluded any American claim on
the region, and would have inspired more dedicated British interests in the
region than were supported later (London's backing-down over the 49th
Parallel vs. the line of the Columbia being an example of British
pragmatism in this area).

>To avoid long explanations, I often refer to historical British/Canadian
>interests as "Canadian." Partly this is because it is very hard to tell
>where British interests become purely Canadian ones, given our hazy
>political history, particularly in military matters. Partly it's to avoid
>refering to individual colonies, which confuses Americans, and even some
>Canadians. And partly it's to assert Canada's national interest, since we
>are ultimately talking about Canada and not England. To an instance where
>this point is frequently lost, every American account of the 1812 War
>I've seen refers to the competitors as "American" and "British." Yet much
>of the war was fought by Canadians in Canada, for Canadian reasons.
>Somehow, foreign accounts neglect to mention that the Americans tried to
>overthrow Canada, not England, during that period. It's just too handy to
>obscure the facts in colonial techicalities.

There's thirty-one years between 1846 and 1867, enough to warrant the
distinction that should be made.  East-of-the-Rockies Canadians remained
derisive concerning British Columbia until well after the railway was
completed in the 1880s; in fact, they still are.  If Canadians are confused
by the previously separate existence of the British colonies on the
Pacific, then they should educate themselves and not wallow in the same
misconceptions as our estimable Yankee neighbours....

>
>So yes, during the Napleonic Wars, British military presence in unsettled
>corners of the world, including here, was much reduced.
>
>On a related point, it's interesting to note that Jargon not only
>distinguishes between British subjects and Americans, but also between
>English and French Canadians. It also identifies Sandwich Islanders and
>black people, yet it doesn't seem to have a word meaning "other whites,"
>though there were many on the coast at various times. Nor is there a word
>for "Eastern Native," or "Metis," though both were well-represented among
>the traders.

The word for "other whites" is "Dutchman", which would have included
everything from Portuguese to Swedish to Russian......

As for the word for "Eastern Native" or "Metis", this is the same as for
"Frenchman", i.e. Pasiooks.  The French in the early years of the region
were not French-from-France, or even French-from-Quebec, but almost
entirely Metis in the employ of the fur companies.  The exceptions include
Capt. La Perouse, but his ship only briefly touched down on the Coast in
the years before the modern Jargon emerged; when the Oblates and other
French came later, the term used for the Metis was applied to them (when
"leplet" was not enough).  "Pasiooks" was a reference to (either or both)
the cloth that was a main trading staple brought by the Metis voyageurs, or
to the turban-and-sash apparel that is the trademark of their attire and
which became fashionable throughout North American native-dom......