Chapter VIII

The Victoria Settlement, 1864 - 1900

I saw, too, a number of garden patches that the Indians had fenced in, hoed and planted with ... seeds ... In short, I saw that those at home had been at work, and that things were beginning  to look like permanent occupancy. 235

The speaker was John McDougall, the place Victoria, and the time the summer of 1864. The Victoria mission had been operational for 1 and 1/2 years, but already a small community had begun to form around the mission centre. Indeed, the McDougall's missionary work was considered a resounding success, and the attempts both to evangelize and civilize (i.e., persuading  the natives to farm the land) distant tribes were looked upon with equal favour. Apart from the zeal of the Methodist missionaries, however, there were several additional attractions to the Victoria settlement. Some have been alluded to in previous chapters, but they bear repeating now.

McDougall was first attracted to the area because of its location vis-a-vis the Wood and Plain Crees. These natives were thought to be the most receptive to Christian teachings and it was hoped that a mission within easy reach of both tribes would produce some positive results. Secondly, the site was ideally situated to provide its residents with the necessities of life. It was within the aspen parkland belt, but sufficiently close to the coniferous forest to obtain fur and game. In addition, the prairie and the buffalo to the south could be reached within three or four days. 236 Thirdly, there were the attractions of the various transportation routes. Not only was the site on the banks of the North Saskatchewan River, but it was also on the Edmonton-Winnipeg trail. Fourthly, surrounding lakes and rivers abounded in fish and wild fowl. In the unlikelihood that the buffalo hunt proved fruitless, the community was still assured of a supply of food. And finally, the soil was capable of producing, at the very least, both the vegetable and cereal crops necessary for survival. Reverend Steinhauer's experience at the Whitefish Lake mission attested to that fact. The native missionary noted that as early as 1857, potatoes, turnips and barley had been sowed and reaped by the Whitefish Lake Indians. 237

Although there is very little information about Victoria's early

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history, permanent settlers are known to have been attracted to the area soon after the Hudson's Bay Company's arrival. Peter Erasmus recounted that in 1864 the only white residents of the community were the McDougalls, the Fletts, and the Conors, and that neither natives nor half-breeds, with the exception of himself and his wife Charlotte, had as yet taken up permanent residence. 238. The following year, however, the settlement was augmented by twenty-five to thirty half-breed families, including Samuel Whitford, Joseph Turner and Adam House, which had emigrated from the Red River settlement. In addition, the Hudson's Bay Company had hired two assistants, Philip Tait and Revard Rose Norn. The Metis settled to the east of the H.B.C. fort, while Norn was reported to have selected a piece of land three miles west of the mission upon which to build a home. 239

If it was the pre-existing mission and Hudson's Bay Company post which attracted the settlers, it was the occupants of the former who did the most to encourage immigration. George McDougall was particularly alive to the benefits of an effective publicity campaign and touted the advantages of Victoria settlement whenever and wherever he felt it would do some good. In the summer of 1867 he undertook a trip to the Red River settlement and eastern Canada with just such a purpose in mind. The trip resulted in only limited financial assistance for the mission, but his boasting and prodding were clearly contributing factors in the subsequent settlement of Victoria. Exhortations on the part of missionaries like McDougall were made doubly effective in the late 1860s when there arose in the Red River district discontent with Lois Riel and his Catholic supporters. Increasingly, Protestants of both white and Metis extraction found the Methodist communities of the northwest attractive places to settle. By 1870 "upwards of one hundred and thirty English mixed bloods" 240 had taken up residence near the Victoria Methodist mission, and in the following year John McDougall noted that "At Victoria we had good congregations, with country work up and down the settlement and out north some ten miles." 231 The smallpox epidemic which began in the fall of 1870 was but a temporary setback for the community; most of its permanent residents returned to their homes once the disease had abated.

The most detailed descriptions of the early settlement at Victoria is contained in G. M. Grant's account of Sandford Fleming's expedition through Canada in 1872. The Engineer-in-Chief of the Canadian Pacific and Intercolonial

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Railways made copious notes on the layout of the settlement and not infrequently jotted down the exact number of people who attended church and school functions. On the morning of August 25th, he attended Reverend Campbell's church service and noted that: 242

The church, (which is also used as a school-room) the Mission House, and Fort are all at the west end of the settlement. The log-houses of the half-breeds, (English and Scotch) intermingled with the tents of the Crees, extend in a line from this west end along the banks of the river, each man having a frontage on the river, and his grain planted in a little hollow that runs behind the houses, beneath the main rise of the ridge. Most of their hay they cut in the valley, on the other side of the ridge where we had camped....

The settlement is seven years old, and consists now of between twenty and thirty families of half-breeds and from ten to a hundred tents of Crees, according to the time of year, each tent housing on an average seven or eight souls...

At Victoria wheat has been sowed for seven successive years, and was a failure only once, the cause being an extreme local drought.

Fleming's description of Victoria compares favourably with the one given by William S. Gore, Deputy Surveyor, who surveyed the Hudson's Bay Company Fort Victoria reserve in December 1872. Gore, too noted that the settlement was composed of twenty-five houses and had a population of some 150 souls, "Chiefly English Halfbreeds." Furthermore, he observed that the cultivation of cereal and vegetable crops had advanced to a respectable state and that no longer were the Metis freemen totally dependent upon the hunt for their provision. 243

The agricultural economy which developed due to this initial settlement, however, was definitely marginal. At Victoria, wheat may have "been sowed for seven successive years," but the acreage under cultivation and the bushel returns were both small. For example, Reverend Peter Campbell noted in 1868 that George McDougall had but one acre of wheat at Victoria. 244 When Reverend Doctor Taylor, Secretary of the Wesleyan Missionary Society, visited the settlement in 1872 - 1873, the size of the mission lot had increased only to ten acres. 245 Admittedly, these observations do not mean that this was the sole cultivated acreage at the time, but it seems unlikely that the English Metis would have broken and cleared more land than did the missionaries.

While most of the early settlers at Victoria preferred to take up land east of the Hudson's Bay Company post, a noticeable shift to the west occurred in the mid-1870s. After the Hudson's Bay Company's three thousand acre reserve had been surveyed in 1872, newcomers were forced to take up

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land beyond these limits. In 1873 Peter Erasmus noted that the number of people settled along the river had increased considerably and that their homesteads extended as far as twelve miles upstream to what was later known as the Lobstick settlement (Township 58, Range 18, west of the fourth Meridian). He failed to mention the exact locations of the farmsteads, although he did recall the names of a few of the settlers: Norn, Whitford, Turner, McGillivary, House, Anderson, Favol and Thompson. 246. Settlement surveys undertaken during the course of the next two decades confirm that small areas of improved land were opened on both sides of the mission/fort complex.

Prior to 1890, the Victoria settlement was one of several communities in Alberta which had been surveyed on the river lot system, some others being Edmonton, Fort Saskatchewan and St. Albert. This system of surveying had been imported from the Red River district by Metis of French, English and Scottish descent and consisted of lots located at right angles to a river bank or lake shore. Hindsight allows us to note that it was not a particularly efficient method of distributing the land, but at the time it conformed to the time-honoured practices and allowed for the application of familiar farming techniques. The first settlement survey at Victoria was undertaken by Tom Kains in 1884. It was extended by J. E. Woods in 1896.

Basically, the 1884 survey gave legal recognition to a system of land holding in use for nearly twenty years.  A topographical traverse prepared by W. King in 1878 (Figure 9) confirmed that river lots were the preferred form of land tenure at that time, 247 and evidence indicates that the system had been initiated by the first Metis immigrants who had arrived in 1865. In fact, Kains' instructions from Captain E. Deville, Chief Inspector of Surveys, noted this prior development. The survey was "... to embrace all the lands taken up before the transfer of the North West to the Dominion and also such other lands as in your estimation you may think to include without giving too much extention to the survey." The planned dimensions of the river lots were also given in the letter of instruction: 248

The lots should be about two miles deep and you will adopt as your line, section or quarter section lines. The side lines shall run due north and south and road allowances one chain wide shall be left on all meridian section lines and on the new line, but the latter shall not in any case to be taken out of the area of the adjoining quarter sections.

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The completed report on the Victoria settlement was submitted to the Chief Inspector in February 1885. As per his instructions, Kains had surveyed the area east of the Hudson's Bay Company reserves into nine river lots and noted all improvements. Since the eastern boundary of the reserve served as the rear boundary of the river lots, those lots located closest to the reserve were necessarily smaller and shorter than those located further east. His Field Notes suggest that lots three through seven were the most developed areas of the settlement, with all service enterprises, the H.B.C fort and the Methodist Church, concentrated on lots six through eight. There were approximately fifty buildings located on the entire nine lots, most of which appear to have been farmhouses and associated outbuildings. Kains also indicated that a rather large transfer of property had taken place just prior to the survey. G. Abrey, D.L.S., was reported to have purchased four claims to the west of the H.B.C. reserve, while William Scott, Esq. Registrar of Battleford, had purchased three. A number of those who sold, specifically J.A. Mitchell, Samuel Whitford, John Turner and Mrs. Andrew Spence, were said to have resettled up river, thus extending the limits of the settlement to the western boundary of the township. 249.

In 1896 the area west of the Hudson's Bay Company reserve was surveyed by J. E. Woods, D.L.S.. Although he originally intended to subdivide the land into quarter sections, local opposition, backed by the federal M.P. Frank Oliver, necessitated a redrafting of policy and he was subsequently informed to continue with the river lot system. He began his survey on October 19, 1896 and completed both it and a survey of the Lobstick settlement, by the 7th of November. His final report, dated December 1, 1896, confirmed that the Victoria settlement had grown considerably. Lots ten through twenty were largely fenced, at least for the first half mile back from the river, and a number of buildings had been erected to accommodate both the settlers and their livestock. There appeared to have been at least twenty such structures along the course of the river. Woods failed to mention who owned or claimed to own all the lots, although Samuel Whitford was shown to have settled river lot sixteen, while William Norn and Magnus Cromarty occupied lots fourteen and twelve respectively. 250 Woods' only other comments regarding the settlement were that "A great deal of work has been done in making a new grade down the valley of the Saskatchewan

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to the ferry landing opposite Victoria" and that "... a good building used for a church and school house" was located on river lot ten (see Figure 14) 251 It is interesting to note that the ferry he referred to operated from 1892 to 1872. It was replaced at least four times during its initial years of operation, 1892 to 1922, and its first operator, Simon McGillivray, was a long-time resident of the Victoria settlement. 252

The settlement surveys mentioned above, however, were not implemented without difficulties. As early as 1883 the federal government indicated that it was opposed to the surveys largely because of their excessive cost. A. M. Burgess, Deputy Minister of the Interior, estimated that the average cost of river surveys was nine times that of the rectangular survey. 253 In addition, officials in Ottawa were ignorant of conditions in the northwest and were puzzled by occasional requests for river lot surveys. The Half-Breed Commission sittings of 1885 - 1886 attempted to clarify the situation, at least to the extent of settling the squatters' claims. Unfortunately, in the Victoria area, little was accomplished. Of the twenty-six cases heard by the commissioners, all but one was settled by issuing a money rather than a land scrip. 245 The 1896 survey of the settlement was initiated because of similar problems, namely, uncertainty as to the official ownership of property. Once the initial dispute concerning the sectional versus the river lot system was resolved, however, these difficulties disappeared. The survey legally recognized the boundaries for the river lots, thus ensuring that the land could be developed securely once title had been obtained.

There is little doubt that the type of land available in terms of fertility and access to the river was largely responsible for the selection taken up prior to 1900. Admittedly, George McDougall may not have chosen the site primarily because of its agricultural suitability, but for those who came later it was a different story. The seventy mile trek to Edmonton, the nearest supply centre, forced the new settler to consider factors such as the cultivability of the soil, access to water, growing season, etc.. It has already been mentioned that the agricultural economy of the Victoria area prior to 1870 was of a marginal nature, and to a large extent this situation continued for the next thirty years. Settlement was concentrated on the southern portion of the river lots where access to the river was most convenient and where clearing the overgrowth presented no real problem. 255 By 1884 the amount of land fenced totaled at most 165 acres although

(page 13: Figure 14: Plan of Victoria Settlement, J. E. Woods, 1896. (Alberta Transportation, Surveys and Mapping Branch.) page 14, and 15 contain the pictures to follow.))

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 indications are that much of this land was sown with either grains (oats, wheat and barley) or vegetables. It was noted in the Saskatchewan Herald in February 1879 that the vegetable crop grew "most luxuriantly" and that the wheat of last season was "especially very fine." 257 Closer to home, an article in the Edmonton Bulletin dated December 17, 1881, stated that considerably more land had been broken in the Victoria area and that the crops over last season were fair to good. By 1896 the estimated field acreage per farm had risen to only fifteen acres, but it seems likely that the returns per acre were more than adequate to feed the limited population. 258

With the cultivation of more and more land came the demand for farm machinery and specific agricutlural services. The Hudson's Bay Company's grist mill which opened in 1873 partially satisfied the latter demand, while threshers owned and operated by Magnus Cromarty and Thomas Smith went a long way towards easing the former. Cromarty apparently owned the first horse-powered thresher in the area while Smith toured the country in the early 1880s with a steam-driven machine and charged a fee of every twelfth bushel for its use. 259 Unfortunately, the grist mill appears to have ceased operation in 1883, due to in the most part the lack of an operator. Victoria residents were henceforth required to ship their grain to Edmonton or to mill them by hand. As for cattle, horses and other farm livestock, there are no exact figures. However, since stables and other outbuildings appear in all surveyors' drawings, it is safe to assume that the settlers were adequately provisioned. Milk cows were apparently quite plentiful by the late 1880s. The Hudson's Bay Company abandoned its diary operation circa 1888, and it hardly seems likely that it would have done so had not similar products been available from the area residents. From 1889 to 1891 Tweed and Ewart, general merchants, also maintained a small store at Victoria. According to Henderson's Gazetteer and Directory, George F. Tupper was the local agent for the firm.

As Victoria gradually became a predominantly agricultural community, its population began to level off. The daily and seasonal fluctuations characteristic of the pre-1879 era gave way to a more permanently based population, albeit somewhat smaller. George McDougall first made note of the settlement's population in 1867 when he reported to the Wesleyan Missionary Society that "At this mission there are one hundred half castes; a majority of these have professed conversion." 260 In 1870 he noted a slight 

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rise to "one hundred and thirty English mixed bloods and a number of Crees", 261 although the letter from which the statistics were taken was dated well before the outbreak of smallpox. Unfortunately, statistics for the 1870 epidemic are only revealing in that they prove that the losses at the Victoria mission were considerably less than at stations like St. Albert, St. Paul and Carlton. Hardisty assessed the casualties at Victoria at fifty-five, whereas the average for the northern regions of his district was ninety-three. 262

Figures for the remainder of the decade are equally difficult to interpret. Methodist Missionary Society Reports note only church and school attendance. In 1871-1872, attendance at Sunday services often totalled 250 and school attendance, 120, was noted the following year, whereas seventy scholars were reported to be enrolled in the day school. 264 In January 1874 the Hudson's Bay Company undertook the first census of the settlement. At that time the total recorded population was 147 people, sixty-six of whom were over the age of eighteen. There were also 203 Indian names registered in the Company's ledger, although it is clear that few, if any, actually resided near the post. 265 Near the end of the decade, in 1878, it was reported in the Saskatchewan Herald that the population of the settlement had risen to 156: thirty-three men, twenty-five women and ninety-eight children.

For the last two decades of the 19th century, the population at Victoria fluctuated very little. In the unofficial census of the Edmonton area conducted in December 1880, it was noted that the settlement numbered forty-six adults. 267 This compares favourably with the figures cited for 1878. Unfortunately, reliable statistics are unavailable for the next few years, but little would appear to have changed. Church memberships during the 1880s averaged between twenty and thirty, indicating at the very least that the population was relatively stable. 268 In 1889 and 1890 Henderson's Gazetteer and Directory confirmed that Victoria's population totalled 150. Coincidentally, membership in the Methodist congregation then averaged but four more than it did earlier in the decade.

For the last ten years of the century, the Annual Reports of the Methodist Missionary Society are our sole source of statistical information. Substantial increases in church membership were noted during the early

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years of the decade while there was a noticeable drop in 1896 - 1897. Unfortunately, it is almost impossible to infer anything concrete from these figures. Unlike the 1880s, for which there is some census data, none at all exists for this later period. The fluctuations in the church membership, therefore, could reflect either a shift in total population or the changing fortunes of the missionaries' attempt at conversion. However, the permanent population was probably somewhere near 150.

During the period from 1880 to 1900 the first elements of community services made their appearance in the Victoria area. The first of these was the telegraph office which opened on December 31, 1886. The decision to construct the Edmonton to Victoria line had been taken in 1884 269 and was part of the overall plan ot re-route the line between Battleford and Edmonton. This decision was based on the simple fact that there was but one settlement through which the original line passed, while Indian agencies at Onion Lake, Saddle Lake and alike, on the north side of the North Saskatchewan River, were without any communication lines. Therefore, the new line crossed the river at Fort Pitt and had stations at Pitt, Mooswa (Moose Creek), Saddle Lake, Victoria and Fort Saskatchewan. 270 The section of the line between Pitt and Edmonton was built under the direction of lineman McKay; G. H. Clouston of Battleford was the chief foreman. 271.

Initially, the telegraph office at Victoria was located in a repairman's shack one-half mile below the Hudson's Bay Company fort. W. C. Gillies was the first operator and he is reported to have worked out of these quarters for eight months 272 Then, in the fall of 1887, new premises were constructed. They were located to the east of the H.B.C. fort and served as the permanent quarters for the agency until 1905 when a new building was constructed at a cost of $1,570 (273 see Figure 15 for the limits of the property owned by the Department of Public Works and Figure 11 for the location of the first telegraph office). Agents for the Dominion telegraph included: W. C. Gillies, 1886 - 1898; J. C. Gordon, 1899-1903; and R. McAdam (nee Gordon), 1905 - 1924. 274. The line was eventually abandoned during the mid-1920s, owing to the fact that commercial telegraph companies began to take over the districts previously served by the government lines. 275

The 1880s also saw the extension of postal service to Victoria. On April 23, 1887, the Edmonton Bulletin reported that arrangements had been made by the Post Office Department to inaugurate a fortnightly mail run

(figure 15 occupies the whole of page 119, and plate 27 occupies page 120.)

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from Fort Saskatchewan starting the first of May. The inevitable delays associated with the introduction of a new government service deferred the opening for one month, but on June 1, 1887, the new facilities were operational with Reverend J. A. McLachlan as postmaster. In hour of the Cree Chief, James Seenum or "Pakannuk", who had remained loyal to the Crown during the 1885 Rebellion, the post office was named Pakan. 276 The Indian name was also chosen in order to prevent confusion between Victoria, British Columbia, and the Victoria Settlement. And from 1887 onwards, the small cluster of buildings surrounding the mission/fort complex was to be known as Pakan.

For the first sixteen years of its existence, the post office at Pakan received its mail from Fort Saskatchewan via the Victoria trail. Personal contracts were let for hauling the post between the two points and more often than not Pakan residents were chosen for the job. Peter Erasmus secured the first contract in 1887, whereas W. R. Brereton, one time Clerk at the Hudson's Bay Company post, undertook the job in 1892. 277 Once the fortnightly service from Fort Saskatchewan was discontinued in 1904, Lamont became the distribution point for the Pakan mail. From 1904 to 1907 service from Lamont was on a weekly basis, whereas from 1907 to 1918 the mail was brought to Pakan twice weekly. Finally, in 1918 Smoky Lake was chosen as the central dispatch point. Service from this small Ukrainian community was on a weekly basis and was regularly maintained until the Pakan post office was closed on September 30, 1960. An early pioneer of the Pakan area, Frank E. Mitchell, hauled the mail over the ten mile route between the two communities for thirty-six years. He recalled delivering the post "in all kinds of weather and road conditions" and using "several methods of transportation". 278

The exact placement of the post office during its initial years of operation remains a mystery. The Canada Post Office Postmaster General Lists locate the office on River Lot 6, Township 58, Range 17, west of the 4th Meridian, although no further details are given. Presumably, then, it operated out of either the Hudson's Bay Company fort or the telegraph office. This theory is substantiated by the fact that both H.B.C. Clerk, Francis D. Wilson, and telegraph operator, W. C. Gillies, also served as postmasters for varying periods during the late 1880s and early 1890s. By 1917, however, a separate post office had been erected. It was located directly south of the Hudson's Bay Company Clerk's residence on river lot six. 279

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Table 11 Postal Clerks at Pakan, 1887 - 1959

Source: Canadian Postal Museum, Ottawa

In terms of the availability of schools and churches, the early settlers at Victoria fared quite well. It has been noted that the first schoolhouse was built on river lot eight in the spring of 1865, although classes had been held in a hastily assembled log shanty since August 1864. Predictably, the first classes were relatively small as the Indians and Metis of the settlement followed the hunt. It has been estimated that during the 1860s native enrollment at the Victoria school did not exceed one-quarter of the student-aged population. Yet soon after the Victoria School District No. 75 was organized in 1886, 280 the number of registrants rose. The new schoolhouse/church built on river lot ten in 1887 was apparently well attended with enrollments estimated in the thirties. Instruction was still laced with hymn singing and recitation of biblical passages, but not excessively so. As early as 1872, William S. Gore noted that in matters of instruction the Victoria school compared favourably with the common schools in eastern Canada; and with the passage of time there is every reason to assume this trend continued. 281.

Local concern for educational welfare of the younger residents of Victoria manifested itself again in 1893 when J. A. Dean, teacher and lay minister, requested that the Methodist Church consider the possibility of constructing a boarding school at the settlement. Dean argued that only by means of such an institution could the Church reap the rewards of her thirty years of toil, or more importantly, could the people ever reach that level of moral and social advancement to which they had a 

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claim. 282 While sympathizing with Dean's intentions, the missionary board of the Methodist Church thought it best to reject the appeal, as the new institution scheduled for Red Deer would adequately serve the needs of the missionary district. 283

While the schools at Victoria provided a solid instruction to the three Rs, educational opportunities were still lacking, for two reasons. Firstly, the schools did not operate on a regular schedule. 284 More often than not the students were called out to assist with the harvest, hunt or general farm duties. This was particularly true during the 1860s and 1870s, when the natives and Metis still depended on the hunt, but the short and varied school term was characteristic of the following two decades as well. Secondly, Victoria during these early years was on the fringe of settlement; beyond it stretched the vast lake district of northeastern Alberta. Fringe areas characteristically lacked any secondary educational institutions and Victoria was no exception. Edmonton was the nearest metropolitan centre and if students wished to further their education it was usually the only place to go. This option, however, was open to few, for the income generated from marginal farming operation was hardly sufficient to support a student living away from home. The level of educational services at Victoria, then was similar to that of agriculture, strictly of a marginal nature.

A dearth of historical records has rendered impossible a complete listing of the teachers at Victoria during the period 1864-1900. The following, however, were known to have taught at the settlement for the years indicated:

The church facilities at Victoria were sufficient to service the needs of the settlement. Where and when the earliest churches were built has already been discussed in chapters two and three and need not be repeated here. What bears emphasis, however, is the fact that the religious needs of the community were administered to with unique regularity. Whereas the school operated only sporadically, church services were usually held every Sunday with prayer meetings scheduled regularly for the weekdays. Also, the church was seldom without a minister. For the period under consideration in this chapter, the pastorate was vacant but three times: 1878-1879, 1895-1896, and 1898-1899. The only drawback as far as the religious life of the community was concerned was the complete lack of alternative denominations. However, at that time, the population of the settlement was not sufficient to support another church, and what the people lacked in choice, the Methodists certainly made up for in zeal and availability of their own particular brand of Christianity.

While the Victoria settlement was primarily a marginal agricultural community, the early extractive industries provided some much needed ancillary revenue. Gold was the first mineral to be mined along the shores of the North Saskatchewan, although the returns were generally small and the time expended at digging and panning long. George McDougall reported that miners were coming into the Victoria area as early as 1866 and with them the associated problems of greed and crime. Later, when it was reported that the sand bars along the river contained rich deposits of ore, 285 the number of miners predictably increased. By August 1894, the men whose gold screens were located at or near Victoria were reported to be making five dollars per day. 286 The gold deposits, however, were not of sufficient quantity to encourage any large scale development, and by the early 20th century the average daily haul for each of the eight to ten miners had decreased to two dollars per day. 287

Coal, on the other hand, was mined in significantly larger quantities. Outcroppings of the combustible material were reported along the banks of

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the river in the early 1870s. In his report submitted to the Minister of the Interior on November 25, 1873, William S. Gore noted that "Coal is found here in small quantities cropping out in the banks of the River and those of its tributaries...." 288 In 1886 the Geological and Natural History Survey of Canada confirmed Gore's findings. Quantities of coal were found along the north and south shores of the Saskatchewan and along the banks of Egg Lake Creek. The latter was specifically mentioned for its sizable quantity of coal; a thirteen inch seam of lignite was found one mile south of the confluence of the creek and the North Saskatchewan River. 289 Confirmation of the deposits by a recognized scientific organization accounts for the first ventures into mining. In January 1888, the Edmonton Bulletin reported that several Victoria settlers were using coal in preference to wood to heat their homes and that the supply and quality were as good as that found at Edmonton. 290

Pit mining was the preferred form of coal extraction at the Victoria settlement. Not only was it less expensive, but the seams were such that one could expect to find the most abundant deposits within four feet of the surface. William Garred is reported to have pit mined some six hundred tons of coal from the banks of Egg Lake Creek. 291 Several mines were also worked by tunneling into the bank and bracing the ceiling with props. The previously mentioned site on Egg Lake Creek seems to have been the location of one such mine. Cheaply run and haphazardly financed, the mining operations at Victoria, however, were never economically viable. In the final analysis the lignite depots were of neither sufficient quality nor quantity to encourage large scale development.

Although unsuccessful in the end, the boring operation for oil and gas at Victoria was perhaps the most noteworthy attempt to extract the earth's minerals at the settlement. Begun when drilling was still in its infancy, the well was only the second to be drilled in northern Alberta. In addition, the unsuccessful nature of the venture did not detract from the fact that it, along with the other two experimental borings at Athabasca Landing and Pelican Rapids, demonstrated the uniformity and extent of oil and natural gas fields over large tracts of the northwest. Thus the Victoria borings helped lay the groundwork for later more successful wells.

The experimental drilling at Victoria was initiated in the spring of 1897 with the objective of finding a sufficient quantity of petroleum to 

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market commercially. The site was chosen not only because the indicators of the existence of oil were encouraging, 292 but also because it was near a settlement and means of communication. The latter element were thought to be essential to any commercially viable operation. Thus, when W. A. Fraser, the driller of Alberta's first oil well at Athabasca Landing, was awarded the contract for the Victoria boring in May, the powers that be within the Geological Survey were fairly certain that the well would produce. 293

The optimist of May 1897, however, was soon dissipated to the stark reality of failure. Initially, the project was plagued with delays in transporting the oil well outfit from Edmonton to Victoria. The hardware was loaded on the S. S. North-West of May 26, but the steamer was grounded twice on its way to the settlement and thus did not reach its destination until June 6th. 294 These difficulties were compounded by several instances of incompetence and mismanagement. In mid-July 1897, Fraser reported that the driller left in charge of the site had failed to carry out his orders and that as a consequence the well had been sunk to a depth of only six hundred feet. In addition, the Saskatchewan had flooded and several casing clamps were carried away along with other important items. 295 When Fraser himself assumed command of the operation, the boring proceeded in a more orderly fashion, but when work was suspended for the winter on October 20, only 705 feet had been drilled. 296

Fortunately, for the season of 1898 Fraser acquired the services of William Slack, a "master driller for at least thirty years." 297 Under the latter's careful supervision, the drilling progressed favourably, despite numerous cave-ins due to the "crumbling clay-shales to be penetrated." 298 When weather rendered it advisable to cease operations for the second season, the well had sunk to a depth of 1650 feet. 299 Similarly, the initial boring for 1899 proceeded without noticeable incident. Cave-ins were still encountered but they presented no insurmountable problems. However, at a depth of 1840 feet, the casing became stuck and could neither be driven deeper nor pulled up. Fraser chronicled that spruce logs eighteen inches in diameter were used to try and extract the casing and that large sinkers were employed to deepen the hole, but all to no avail. Thus, upon receiving instructions from Ottawa, Fraser abandoned the well and stock-piled all government-owned property in the 

(picture occupying page 127 not scanned in)

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Hudson's Bay Company warehouse in Edmonton. 300 His concluding remarks in the report submitted to the Geological Survey Department in 1899 summarized rather well Victoria's three year experience with the oil well: "The work for the season has been uneventful, with the exception of the sudden stoppage of progress, so there is little of any interest to chronicle." 301

It can be seen at this point that daily life at the Victoria settlement was fraught with the problems normally associated with life in a pioneer environment. Neither the marginal nature of the agricultural economy, nor the limited sporadic revenues garnered from the extractive industries, lent themselves to a carefree existence and the settlers were often forced to put in twelve to fifteen hour days just to make ends meet. Life was particularly hard for the early immigrants in the area. The land had to be cleared, shelters constructed and crops planted and reaped by hand. As more and more people were attracted to the settlement, the burdens of work generally lessened, but never to the extent that one's survival could be taken for granted. Once the arduous duties of building a home and clearing a small plot of land had been completed, farming the land thereafter occasioned a never ending battle with the elements. It is little wonder, then, that some of the settlers abandoned the enterprise shortly after arrival. Although records are far from complete, it appears that at least ten percent of those who laid claims to land in the Victoria settlement gave it up within three or four years. 302 It was never recorded why they chose to abandon their homesteads, but the reasons should be obvious - the high cost of clearing the land, the supposed unsuitability of the land for cultivation due to an excess of overgrowth, and most importantly, the sheer ineptitude on the part of some to deal with the problems of pioneer life.

If the encumbrances of a sedentary way of life in a pioneer environment proved to be unbearable for some Metis and whites, they were equally, if not more burdensome, for the natives whose lifestyle had been traditionally characterized by the nomadic hunt.  Most of the Indians in the vicinity of Victoria had signed Treaty Number Six in 1876 which meant removal of the tribe to a reservation and the forced acceptance of an alien lifestyle.  Generally speaking, they adapted rather well, but at times the elements and blind luck combined against them. On such occasions it was the responsibility of the Department of Indian Affairs in Ottawa to render the necessary assistance and as far as Victoria was concerned, the bureaucrats 

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did not renege on their obligations. In December 1880, a soup kitchen was established at Victoria to aid the underfed local Cree Indians. 303

When the Indian agency was first established, its primary responsibility revolved around feeding the destitute local Indians. 304 Flour, beef and related goods were regularly sent to the settlement where they were distributed, presumably according to need. In January 1881, the Edmonton Bulletin reported a slight altercation between agency officials and the natives, the latter maintaining that the quality of food received was hardly commensurate to the value of the water and wood they had furnished. 305 Edward McGillivray, agency clerk, reported that the soup kitchen was doing "good business." 306 There were no reported incidents of a similar nature for the remaining seven years the agency was in operation.

A second responsibility of the Indian agency was to educate the natives in the ways of sedentary farming. This particular duty was always viewed as the most important since failure to accustomize the natives to the ways of the whiteman would inevitably result in sizable withdrawals from the public purse for subsistence payments. It was with these financial constraints in mind that the Department of Indian Affairs engaged Mr. McCrae to aid and instruct the Indians in modern farming techniques. His appointment was effective the winter of 1881 and he was to instruct specifically the natives of the Victoria and Lac la Biche areas. 307

Unfortunately, McCrae's stay in the Victoria area was not marked by the revolutionary advances hoped for by some officials in Ottawa. The understandable desire on teh part of a number of natives to maintain their traditional lifestyle precluded any noticeable betterment of their lot, and bad weather and lack of adequate materials oftentimes compounded the problem. If, in 1884, W. Anderson, Indian Agent at Edmonton, was able to report a slight improvement in agricultural productivity, 308 by the following year it had been clear that, if anything, there had been a falling off in the domestic habits of the native population. The constant disturbances due to the 1885 Rebellion naturally had a detrimental effect on the agency's ability to fulfill its tasks, but once the troubles were over, the familiar pattern of poor crops and destitute natives emerged once again. In August 1887, three months after the agency had been moved to Saddle Lake, T. P. Wadsworth, Inspector of Indian Agencies and Reserves in the North-West 

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Territories, regrettably reported that the industrious and religious Indians at Victoria still could not support themselves in the present state. 309

If agency officials were not totally successful in their efforts to make their charges self-sufficient in terms of food, they more than compensated for this inability by maintaining the most cordial relations with the district natives. 

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