Appendix I

Oral and written history of incidents involving Kwah’s Dagger and James Douglas

In 1845, Alexander Simpson quoted a letter written by Douglas about the incident with Kwah, but fur trader John McLean wrote the first published story of the incident involving Kwah's dagger in 1849 (McLean 1849). Father Morice indicates that McLean 's information was furnished “long after the event by Waccan, the interpreter”. This was Jean Batiste Boucher [described as a ‘half breed'] who was away at the time of the event. John Tod, who once was in charge of James Douglas when Douglas was at Fort McLeod , wrote about the incident in his memoirs (Tod, 1878; Sproat 1905; Wolfenden 1954)

Morice presents his version of the story which he claims “is a careful digest of all the accounts of the affair by disinterested native and surviving Hudson's Bay Company parties, and, the writer has no doubt as to its perfect correctness” (1904:137-140).

Another sensationalized account was written by Matthew Macfie in 1865. Father Adrian Morice‘s versions of the Kwah's dagger story were influenced by Macfie who is listed by Morice as one of the “Authorities Quoted or consulted” (Morice 1904:341-42). On pages 465 – 468, Macfie relates:

“An exciting passage in the experience of Sir James Douglas, …when he served in the capacity of chief trader [clerk] of the Hudson 's Bay Company at one of their posts near Stuart's Lake . The circumstance was told me by a retired officer of the company, who lived nine years in the country now known as British Columbia…[This would be John Tod, who was stationed for nine years at Fort McLeod in the 1820s – see Belyk 1995] …Two employees of the company had been wantonly killed at a fort, two Indians having been concerned in the deed. One of the perpetrators was caught and shot soon after the crime had been committed. The other escaped detection for six years. There was an Indian encampment in the neighborhood of the fort, commanded by Mr. Douglas, whence came a native one-day, and assured him that the criminal who had been so long at large was secreted in the native lodge. Mr. Douglas with his men armed themselves and hastened to the spot. …All the apartments of the lodge were found vacated, with one exception. The chief of the tribe was giving a potlatch (feast) to friendly tribes who had come from a distance, and the inhabitants of the village had followed him to the place – some way off – where the festivities were being conducted. The only person Mr. Douglas found at home was a woman with a child in arms… After having examined the other divisions of the lodge, their suspicions prompted them to look once more in that room where the squaw was, and they found her still in the same posture. They ventured this time to pull her from the place where she stood. …down fell a bundle of clothes and mats, and out rushed the murderer; the Hudson's Bay Company's employees blazed him, but with the nimbleness of an eel he zig-zagged his way out of the house: their shots missed him, and he was about to escape when one of Mr. Douglas's men leveled the butt end of his gun at him and felled him to the ground. …In the course of the day the chief and his retainers returned to the camp, and in consternation beheld the dead body of the man stretched on the threshold. The squaw informed her Tillicum's of what had occurred. They instantly covered their faces with black paint, expressive of their belligerent intentions. The war-whoop was raised, and all the male inmates of the lodge, armed to the teeth, ran helter-skelter to the fort. The gates were open as usual. Mr. Douglas, reposing in the security afforded by the consciousness of having done his duty, and made no extraordinary preparation for repelling hostilities. The insensate mob, amidst threatening yells, forced their way into the apartment where the chief trader was, and, without allowing him time for parley, invested his commanding and portly person, threw him on his back, fastened his hands and feet, and bore him in struggling condition to the mess-room of the fort, laying him on a long table, where I suppose, he expected to be put to death, with torture exquisite and protracted. Other servants were bound after the same fashion, but a few took refuge in the bastion, which they declared to the Indians was stored with powder. They also swore that if the Siwashes should venture to follow them, they would blow up the powder magazine about their ears. This menace had its desired effect. The old chief guarded Mr. Douglas. The former insisted on knowing the meaning of the strange and deadly assault that had been committed upon one of his guests. The dignified chief trader affected to treat the enquiry with scorn, and while rolling about on the table attempting to burst his bonds, threatened the venerable Tyhee with the most withering pains and penalties of the company. But the old savage, knowing that he had Mr. Douglas in his power, coolly replied that he was in no hurry, and would wait patiently till the chief trader should reason with him. When Mr. Douglas consented to listen to his statement, he sagely remarked: ‘I didn't know that any murder had smuggled himself under my roof with the tribes who came to the potlatch. If I had known …I should have refused him shelter – I believe he ought to die. But you know that by the laws of hospitality existing among us Indians, any one who entrusts himself to our protection is sacred while under it, whoever he may be, and that we regard it a desecration to touch him while he is our guest'. Mr. Douglas proposed to atone for his proceeding by a present of blankets; and the word of a Hudson's Bay Company's servant with the Indians being ‘as good as his bond', directly the promise was given the chief trader was set at liberty and an end put to pending troubles.”

Shortly after the first part of the above event, on August 3, 1828, James Douglas wrote to William Connolly at Fort Vancouver . Connolly, Douglas 's father-in-law, was in-charge of Fort St. James, but was absent during the incident. Douglas told him that “Zulth-nolly”, one of the persons who killed the Hudson's Bay men at Fort George in 1823, had been caught and “dispatched on the 1 st of this month in the Indian Village …without confusion or any accident happening to any other individual” (Rich 1944:311).

After William Connolly returned to Fort St. James, he wrote the following in the Fort journal on September 17:

“Some days after that affair [the death of Zulth-nolly] had taken place this old Rogue Qua, with as many members of his Tribe as he could muster, entered the Fort and made their way into the House all armed. Mr. Douglas suspecting that they had come with some evil intention immediately seized his arms, as also his men, but neither of them were able, from the crowd which surrounded them, to use them in turning these intruders out of the Fort. It is true that the Indians on their part used no other violence than to endeavour to preserve themselves from injury, and declared that they had no other view in this than to enter into an explanation with Mr. Douglas. But as that could have been done without such a display, the most favourable construction which can be put upon their conduct is that their intentions were by intimidation to extort what they might think proper in compensation for the death of their relation, and nothing but the determination of Mr. Douglas evinced of defending himself to the last, saved him from being pillaged, and perhaps from being killed” (Rich 1944:311-312).

The version told much later by Bancroft in his History of the Northwest, (1884(2):475) was also based on discussions one of his writers had with John Tod. Alexander Begg's account (1894:135-37) is from reading John McLean and Bancroft.

Madge Wolfenden, of the Provincial Archives, wrote about the John Tod version of the story in her 1954 article: John Tod: ‘Career of a Scotch Boy'. She was influenced at this time by an article written by journalist/historian Bruce McKelvie in his 1949 book: Tales of Conflict. [An edited version of this was published in 1985, by Heritage House publishers that included a drawing of RBCM dagger #13345]. McKelvie produced another version entitled “Quaw Spares Douglas” in his 1955 publication: Pageant of B.C. McKelvie first wrote about the dagger in a Newspaper Magazine story in 1938 entitled: Chief Quaw's Historic Dagger. McKelvie's knowledge of the dagger stories come from reading Morice and from his association with John Munro, the B.C. Deputy Minister of Agriculture, who was considered a friend of Kwah's grandson, Chief Louis Billie. John Munro discussed Kwah and the dagger in his 1945 Doctoral thesis: Language, Legends and Lore of the Carrier Indians. Much of the information in the thesis paraphrased Morice but some was material obtained directly from Chief Louis Billy.

An article entitled: Chief Kwah's Revenge, in the Beaver Magazine in 1943, by W. P. Johnson told by Chief Louis Billie and claimed to be “given practically as it was told”. In this earlier history of the Kwah's dagger Johnson noted: “When I mentioned that some of Louis Billie's story did not agree with Father Morice's accounts, the old man was highly indignant and claimed that his were the authentic stories handed down by father to son and therefore bound to be correct.”

KWAH’S DAGGER                          
Table of Contents       Next