Prince of Wales Fort

Prince of Wales Fort National Historic Site of Canada near Churchill, Manitoba encompasses a massive fortification along with installations at Cape Merry and Sloop Cove. Here, you can experience the diverse history of the Hudson's Bay Company and the fur trade of the 1700s.

Once established at York Factory on the Hayes River, the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) looked north to increase its scope of trade and profit in Rupertsland. A trading post was built on the Churchill River by the HBC primarily to trade with the Dene (Chipewyan) peoples, Inuit from the northwest coast of Hudson Bay, and the Cree living north of the Nelson River. It was a base for northern exploration, whaling, and the search for precious metals.

Hudson's Bay Company employees at the fort were divided into three categories: officers, tradesmen and labourers. The officers were the governor, surgeon, sloop master, deputy governor and the clerk writer. Benefits of higher pay, a varied daily routine and diet, more leisure time and private accommodations reflected their status. Tradesmen were stone masons, carpenters, the blacksmith, armourers, coopers, tailors and other skilled employees. Labourers carried out much of the day to day unskilled work at the post, such as loading and unloading ships, hunting game, hauling water and chopping wood.

The conditions inside the fort were harsh; the extreme cold, the smoky quarters, incessant bugs and random violence that passed for discipline were day-to-day realities. Despite the discomfort, men would readily renew their contracts to stay on with the Company, because life at a Hudson's Bay post offered a chance for advancement, a place to live with fairly decent food, and a dependable wage which was much preferable to the uncertain future and hardship back home in Europe.

In the 1920s, the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada , recognized the fort as being of national significance. The Parks Branch of the Dept. of the Interior (now Parks Canada) took responsibility for its preservation, and, when a large workforce became available with the completion of the railroad into Churchill, the men and the heavy equipment began reconstruction of the fort in the 1930s. The fort still stands today as an important memorial of the French-English rivalry for control of Hudson Bay and its resources.

For more information on Prince of Wales Fort, visit:

http://www.pc.gc.ca/lhn-nhs/mb/prince/natcul/index_E.asp