The Niagara Falls Review, February 16, 2010
by Kathleen Powell, City of Niagara Falls Museums
With the Olympics starting this week in Vancouver, it is fitting to highlight a War of 1812 connection to that part of North America.
Generally, the extreme western coast of North America is not the first thing that comes to mind when considering the War of 1812, but there is a connection -a place called Fort Astoria.
It was a fur trading post in modern day Astoria, Ore. The fort was built by the Pacific Fur Trading Co., which was established in 1810 with the majority shareholder and general financier being New York's John Jacob Astor.
The vision for the Pacific Fur Trading Co. was to establish a permanent American settlement at the mouth of the Columbia River and create a trading ring that encompassed New York, the Oregon Territory, Russian Alaska, Hawaii and China.
To that end, Fort Astoria was established in 1811 about seven kilometres from the mouth of the Columbia River. The Fort was manned largely by Canadians who had formerly been
employed by the North West Company.
At the outset of the War of 1812, British fur trade interests were concerned their interests might suffer with the conflict. They had some reason to be concerned, as they felt they had already suffered at the end of the American Revolutionary War from what they saw as a sellout treaty where they lost some of their position on the continent.
With the British and Americans again at war, they saw a chance to try and regain some of their losses and a chance to possibly gain a foothold in the western part of the continent.
It took seven months for news of the declaration of the War of 1812 to reach Fort Astoria. When news arrived in January 1813, the Canadians at the post were astonished, but due to the weather and difficulty in travelling at that time of the year were not able to leave the territory.
There wasn't much they could do, and they decided to continue with their usual trading activities.
Business stly as usual for the next nine months. In September 1813, when a group of North West Company men arrived with a letter from the firm's partners indicating the imminent arrival of the British ship Isaac Todd, with letters of marque and orders to seize Fort Astoria as "an important colony founded by the American government."
Even though the fort was relatively well fortified, the threat of a British warship was enough to scare the Astorians into action. When North West Company officers suggested they buy the fort rather than have it seized by British sailors, the Astorians agreed.
The British took possession and renamed it Fort George. The handover was peaceful and the North West Company agreed to pay all the back wages of those employed at the fort and to provide free passage to those who wished to return to Canada.
The fort remained in the possession of the British even after the end of the War of 1812, and was used on and off by the North West Company and later the Hudson's Bay Company until 1848.
Source: The Niagara Falls Review