Modern Times

Hudson's Bay Company and the Nor'Waast

Hudson’s Bay was discovered by Henry Hudson in 1610 whilst trying to find the Northwest Passage. After a winter stuck in the ice his crew mutinied and Hudson, his son and some of his men were cast adrift in a small boat after which he was never seen again. The Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) was formed in 1670 when Prince Rupert, a cousin of Charles II, and partners, “The Company of Adventurers”, received a royal charter, which gave them a monopoly of the fur trade on all the lands whose rivers drained into the Hudson Bay" Rupert’s Land as it came to be called.

During the 17th and 18th centuries Beaver hats were very fashionable. The species had been hunted to extinction in most of Western Europe and so a new source of supply was to prove highly lucrative. During the first 100 years or so there was competition from the French, which of course stopped when France lost the fight for Canada.

Stromness in 1821 by William Daniell

and much more...