The Chronicles Blog

“The strangest funeral procession that ever passed on earth.”

So said Father Henry ‘Pat’ Irwin, Kootenay’s unofficial saint, of the 1885 avalanche that buried a 16-man train crew alive, and of the super-human efforts he and others made to recover their bodies for proper burial.

It was all in a day’s work for one of the most amazing pioneer men of God that British Columbia has ever seen. As you’ll see in next week’s Chronicles.

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PHOTO: A search for bodies from another avalanche, this one in Rogers Pass in 1910 which claimed 58 lives. —Revelstoke Museum

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As we saw in last week’s Chronicles, Robert Homfray’s friends had been right when they warned him that trying to find a route through the Cascade Mountains at the head of far-off and unexplored Bute Inlet in winter was little short of madness—even suicidal.

But he and seven others were determined to find a shortcut to the Cariboo gold fields and, in a single canoe with few supplies and only two muskets, they set out from Fort Victoria in November 1861.

When we left them last week, they’d been forced to turn back. By this time all but exhausted, too weak even to carry their tent, and down to little food, they began to fight their way over glaciers and mountain peaks.

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PHOTO: Today, despite its ominous name, Desolation Sound has become a Mecca for boaters and kayakers. In the summertime, in particular. But, in November 1861, Desolation Sound was almost off the map with unknown threats to life and limb. As surveyor-explorer Robert Homfray and his men soon found out, they faced a fight for their very lives. —BritishColumbia.com

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For more than 30 years, respected civil engineer Robert Homfray kept his promise not to publish his account of a dangerous surveying expedition to the Cariboo in 1861.

Finally, 1894, at the insistence of friends, he agreed to tell of his epic ‘winter journey of 1861’. That was when he and six others had suffered innumerable hardships during an attempt to survey a new, shorter route to the gold fields of the B.C Interior by way of Bute Inlet.

He’d agreed to take charge of the expedition despite the warnings of many who were convinced that he’d never return alive. His friends, in fact, had been quit explicit, arguing that it was “madness to attempt it in the middle of a severe winter”.

They were, as he found, much to his regret, right. Amazingly, he lived to tell the tale.

The Homfray saga is one of incredible courage yet, 162 years later, has been all but forgotten. We re-examine this fascinating tale in next week’s Chronicles.

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PHOTO: Robert Homfray and party’s assignment: find a shortcut through these mountains from the coast to the Cariboo in the middle of winter!. — https://vancouverisland.com/plan-your-trip/regions-and-towns/coastal-inlets/bute-inlet/

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For those of you who follow T.W. Paterson History Author on Facebook you’ll recognize the next few paragraphs as a recent post that gained numerous thoughtful comments. Today, I’m going to expand upon this theme with the stories behind several some of the photos I’ve ‘rescued’ over the years at garage sales and flea markets. Once, from a dumpster!

You see them from time to time at garage sales, flea markets, even antique sales: old family photos, some of them still mounted in their original albums.

Some have been removed to sell individually and are now separated from their captions so there’s no way of telling who, when or where.

Once they were someone’s prized family treasure; now they’re just a sales item without meaning or value other than as objects of mild curiosity.

I’ve rescued many (even war medals) over the years, sometimes buying them from a family member who just doesn’t give a damn about aunts and uncles, grandparents or—Give them a couple of bucks and it’s a deal.

If I sound cynical, so be it. It always bothers me to see photos that once had great meaning to someone treated so cavalierly, hence my sometimes buying them just to give them a home, even if it’s that of a stranger. At least, I can sometimes use them to illustrate my writings—like today’s Chronicle.

And, it can be fun to study the faces and wonder who they were, what happened to them.

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It's not a very big book: half an inch thick, yes, but only 4 1/2 inches wide by less than six inches deep, and the type covers only 3 1/2 x 4 3/4 inches. It really is a pocket book.

But, proving that good things can sometimes come in small packages, there's a lot of great content in Chinook Days' 200 pages, 1000 copies of which were published in 1926 by the Vancouver Sun as a souvenir for the opening of the Grouse Mountain Highway.

An online dealer describes it thus: “This book includes a variety of [MacInnes'] writings, such as historical recollections, legends, and poems, that relate to the cultures of British Columbia and Canada at the time of the Klondike Gold Rush.”

The last time I checked online, original copies were priced at $43.00 U.S. and $45.00 U.S. (shipping included) respectively. Let's say, $60.00 Canadian, delivered to your door.

I've wanted to write something about this author and give a sampling of his singular approach to B.C. history for quite some time. So, in next week’s Chronicles, I’m going to introduce you to Thomas Robert Edward McInnes. Note the 'Mc' not 'Mac,' the latter being an affectation he chose later in life.

While I’m at it, I’ll let MacInnes tell you, in his own words, the colourful story of once-legendary Vancouver Island woodsman Mike King.

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PHOTO: Among the many subjects that MacInnes chose to write about was bigger-then-life woodsman Mike King. —Chinook Days

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I can resist many things but never a good story.

Last week’s Part 1 of A Tale of Two Soldiers was to be a doubleheader, the stories of both Gunner Ratcliffe, the villain, and Private Michael James O’Rourke, VC, MM—war hero, labour activist and, by all measures, an outstanding man.

But, well, I just couldn’t resist going all the way in telling of how Ratcliffe, a career soldier, let his resentment of Corporal Bowlan’s reprimands—things so minor as cleaning up after himself in the kitchen—drive him to the ultimate act of murder.

A crime that appeared to all who knew and liked both men to have been totally out of character for Ratcliffe who’d been popular with his comrades, who loved animals and gardening, who had, in fact, not long before been a friend of the man he shot down in cold blood.

So be it, it’s done, story told. Next week, for sure, the amazing career of Private James O’Rourke.

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PHOTO: Pte. James O’Rourke, VC, MM. —vcgca.org› profile › 571

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They couldn’t have been more unalike.

About the only thing they had in common was that they both served in uniform.

One was a hero, winner of the Empire’s highest medal for gallantry, the Victoria Cross, and the Military Medal.

The other died in infamy, so despised, it’s said, that he was buried face-down—the ultimate indignity for a soldier who has disgraced his comrades.

The story of these pole opposites, Private James O’Rourke and Gunner Charles Ratcliffe, in next week’s Chronicle.

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PHOTO: Pte. James O’Rourke, VC, MM. —vcgca.org› profile › 571

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Build it and they will come.

It may have worked in a novel and in a movie but, sad to say, it seldom works in real life. If ever you wanted proof, take the sad story of George Turner and his church.

He poured heart and soul, every penny he had and years of his life into building the Church of Jesus Christ of Christian Brotherhood that, today, minus its tower and bell, is a sales and service shop.

George Turner’s sad story is next week’s Cowichan Chronicle.

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How times have changed. It wasn’t all that long ago that almost everybody smoked cigarettes, cigars and/or pipes.

But the latest statistics for Canada (2020) show that just one Canadian in 10 smokes cigarettes, down from 12% the previous year. More men (12%) smoke than women (9%). These statistics include those who smoke only occasionally.

What a far, far cry from when I was a lad. My parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles smoked, their friends smoked, and when we could sneak them and were playing out of sight in the bushes that lined the nearby CNR tracks, we kids smoked.

We called them coffin nails and someone said that each cigarette took a week off our lives. From the mouths of babes...

Next week on the Chronicles, a look back at the heyday of tobacco in British Columbia.

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PHOTO: One of the most popular brands in Canada was Players Navy Cut. Despite its obvious play on the Royal Navy, my father, who served 20 years in the RCN, smoked Export A.

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The demolition, several years ago, of the 1890 Officers’ Mess and Quarters at Work Point, Victoria, inspired a letter to the editor of the Times Colonist warning against disturbing its two resident ghosts.

The writer was referring to the spirits of a Major Steinberg and a four-year-old boy.

Indeed, the former Esquimalt army base should have been haunted–by the spirit of Captain Peter Elliston. The commanding officer of No. 5 Company, Royal Canadian Garrison Artillery met eternity at 9:25 on the morning of Monday, Aug 1, 1910, moments after he’d begun his daily rounds.

That’s when Gunner Thomas ‘Paddy’ Allan, who for weeks had nursed his hatred for this officer who’d given him 21 days’ detention for drunkenness, made good his vow, “I’ve a bullet for him and it will find its billet.”

As indeed it did.

This fascinating story in next week’s Cowichan Chronicles.

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PHOTO: Gunner Paddy Allan. —Author’s Collection

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The strike that locked down British Columbia ports for 13 days is, at least tentatively, over.

It goes without saying that the cost in lost revenues, inconvenience and hard feelings will continue to be felt for some time.

But nothing like the longshoremen’s dispute of June 1935 that was defused by armed police officers using weapons and tear gas. This was during the Great Depression, the Dirty ‘30’s, when many governments, Canada’s provincial and federal included, viewed labour unrest as Communist agitation and a threat to our capitalist society.

In other words, to strike was to commit treason and was to be dealt with by whatever means necessary.

Canadians have come a long way in labour relations over the past 90-odd years. But it hasn’t been an easy road as you’ll see in this week’s Cowichan Chronicles.

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PHOTO: Mounted police officers during the Battle of Ballantyne Pier. —Wikipedia

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As His Majesty’s Ship Nabob, this small aircraft carrier has gone down in naval history for surviving a torpedo in August 1944 during an attack on the German battleship Tirpitz.

To the amazement of many, and thanks to the heroism of her crew, she made it safely back to port. But her naval career was over. Sold for scrap, she was rebuilt as a freighter—often coming in to Vancouver—until 1977.

No stranger to B.C., she’d had a previous close call—right here in British Columbia waters, before she went overseas.

That’s next week’s fascinating story in the Chronicles.

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PHOTO: Dangerously down by the stern, HMS Nabob struggles to make it back to home port, —Wikipedia

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(Conclusion)

Finally!—we come to the end of the saga of the Leech River gold rush.

A gold ‘rush’ that continues to this day albeit on a smaller, much quieter and more recreational level than it was for the hopeful miners of 1864 and the Victoria merchants who desperately tried to profit from them.

There was—is—gold in the Leech River: gold as rich as 22 carats. But it came from afar, carried by glaciers and river flow until it became trapped in the Leech’s bed and boulders. Some could be panned, some could be sluiced and recovered with rockers—all brutally hard work and not for the faint of heart.

But it was exciting while it lasted!

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PHOTO: What was left of the “government office” (Gold Commissioner’s cabin) in the 1920’s. —BC Archives

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(Part 4)

In July 1864 Victoria had become a quiet backwater, a steamer stop on the way to or from the real action in the gold diggings of the B.C. mainland.

That changed dramatically with the news that members of the Vancouver Island Exploring Expedition had found paying quantities of ‘colour’ in the Sooke and Leech rivers.

Just 10 miles as the crow flies from ‘downtown’ Victoria!

For those who’d come to B.C. too late for the Fraser River or Cariboo riches, for Victoria merchants who’d been quiet and hungry since the great rush of 1858, this was a second chance to grab the golden ring.

That’s this week in the Cowichan Chronicles.

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PHOTO: Prospecting on the Leech River wasn’t for the faint of heart or weak of back. —B.C. Archives

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(Part 3)
The great gold rushes of the Fraser River and the Cariboo had passed Victoria by. From sleepy Hudson’s Bay Co. stockade to—overnight—a tent city of as many as 30,000 fortune seekers, it had drifted back into an economic slump.

‘Downtown’ buildings stood vacant, weeds grew in its main streets. The party, it seemed, was over.

All that changed—so it was fervently hoped—with news that members of the Vancouver Island Exploring Expedition had found paying quantities of ‘colour’ in the Sooke and Leech rivers.

Not on the Fraser and Thompson rivers. Not in the distant creeks of Cariboo, but just 10 miles, as the crow flies, from Victoria.

It was a whole new ball game.

Over the past two weeks we’ve seen how it slowly began. Next week in the Chronicles the rush begins!

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PHOTO: These headlines in the British Colonist came as a godsend to the merchants and unsuccessful miners biding their time in financially ailing Victoria.

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In last week’s Cowichan Chronicles I set the stage for Vancouver Island’s only real gold rush to the Leech River in July 1864.

Within 20 air miles of Victoria, it sparked a stampede to the Sooke hills, and the Leech River continues to be extensively placer mined to this day.

Part 2 of the Leech River gold rush saga in next week’s Cowichan Chronicles.

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PHOTO: As this photo clearly shows, the miners had to earn their pay because the gold was very fine and mostly trapped in fissures and crevices that required back-breaking labour. —British Columbia Archives

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Vancouver Island has only known one real gold rush.

Oh, there were moments of excitement over the years, but nothing like what occurred on the B.C. Mainland: the Fraser and Thompson Rivers, the Cariboo, the Omineca, Big Bend, Atlin and the like.

No, Vancouver Island has had to settle, for the most part, for copper and coal mining. The major exception was the Leech River stampede of 1864. It didn’t last long but it sure got people’s blood pumping for a time.

Next week, the Chronicles digs into 160-year-old reports from the Victoria British Colonist for a fascinating glimpse at what was, if only briefly, a true stampede.

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PHOTO: Leechtown never grew to prospectors’ hopes and expectations, as indicated by this humble hotel in the backwoods. —Author’s Collection

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There was a time in the age of wooden ships and iron men when a ship’s captain was God, answerable only to his conscience—if he had one.

Sure, international maritime law banned the physical and mental abuse of seamen—but just try proving that in court, after the fact, with terrorized witnesses and, often, in a foreign jurisdiction.

Sad to say, some ship masters got away with brutalizing their crews (and sometimes their passengers) again and again. One of the worst was Capt. William Henry ‘Bully’ Hayes who, alas, lived up to his nickname all too often and too well.

He could be charming enough when it suited him—as it often did when he was trying to outwit his creditors and the law.

Next week, we explore the infamous Bully Hayes’s connection to British Columbia maritime history in the Cowichan Chronicles.

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PHOTO: The only known photograph of Capt. W.H. ‘Bully’ Hayes, 1827 (or 1829)-1877. —Wikipedia

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Pioneer Cobble Hill historian Nathan P. Dougan concludes his tale of oxen and horse-logging; a two-part article that first was published in the Cowichan Leader in January 1950.

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PHOTO: Logging with oxen. Then came horses, steam donkeys, trains and trucks... —www.pinterest.com  

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This week, I introduced you to N.P. Nathan Dougan, Cobble Hill and area’s foremost historian, and his son, Bob, who carried the torch until his death in the 1990’s.

Both Dougans contributed greatly to the saving of Cowichan Valley history and, for a latecomer such as myself, it’s always a joy to acknowledge their contributions.

So, next week, a sample of Nathan’s writings from one of his many columns that appeared in the Cowichan Leader in the 1950’s and 1960’s.

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PHOTO: Nathan Dougan, looking distinguished in Sunday suit and tie. —Family photo

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