Report on the Exploration of the Country Between Lake Superior and the Red River Settlement
Author: Simon James "S J" Dawson (1818-1902)
Year: 1859
Publisher: John Lovell
Place: Toronto
Description:
[1-3]+4-45 pages with charts and three folding maps. Folio (13 4" x 10") bound in half leather over original publisher's boards with label to cover. Published in 1859 as Appendix 4 to the Seventeenth Volume of the Journals of The Legislative Assembly of the Province of Canada. It had previously been published by Dawson in 1858. (Sabin 18958)
Includes a letter by Bishop Tache (the bishop of St. Boniface) on the Red River settlement and the 'half-breeds' in the settlement. The maps Route by Road & Navigation for Connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans' is colored, two very long folding maps; one showing the 'Profile of Route by the Grand Portage and Pigeon River from Lake Superior to Rainy Lake', and the other being a 'Plan Shewing the Region Explored by S. J. Dawson and his party between Fort William and the great Saskatchewan River'.
The seeds for the idea of what became the Dawson Route connecting East to West were planted by the 1850s as the gaze of politicians and business people in the East turned West for its riches beyond the fur trade which was already on the decline. They sent several exploring expeditions to the region between Lake Superior and Red River in this period, such as the Palliser (1857) and Hind & Dawson Expeditions (1858-59) to ascertain both what those riches were and how they could be accessed with the development of infrastructure.
Their idea had long been to construct a railroad straight West through British Territory (it wasn't Sir John A. McDonald's idea though he did make it the hallmark of his political campaign) but the rock, water, swamp and muskeg terrain in between made for a formidable obstacle. As more reports came back to share information on the bounty that laid beyond, survey parties and settlers increasingly made their way west. There were several disputes during this period between the political regimes of the north (which was British territory) and the USA about where the international boundary would lie in this complex geo-political zone.
Simon James Dawson was a Canadian civil engineer and politician. In 1857, as a member of a Canadian government expedition, he surveyed a line of road from Prince Arthur's Landing (later Port Arthur, now part of Thunder Bay, Ontario) to Fort Garry and further explored that area in 1858 and 1859. His report greatly stimulated Canadian interest in the West. In 1868, he was placed in charge of construction of a wagon and water route following his earlier survey by the newly formed federal Department of Public Works. The Dawson road was traversed in 1870 by the Wolseley Expedition under the command of Colonel Garnet Wolseley sent to preserve order during the first Riel uprising, the Red River Rebellion.
Condition:
Rebacked to style, corners bumped, front end paper toned, maps over folded else very good.
