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Our guest
contribution this month has a Canadian theme. Hugh Lodge, in collaboration
with other members of the Stuttaford family, has spent 7 years
researching their history, following the family, not only back to
Dartmoor, but overseas to South Africa, New Zealand, the United States and
Canada.
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Patient research has teased out the stories of a brave man and a tough
woman, each of whom played their part in the taming of the
wilderness that was Western Canada in the latter part of the 19th
century. John Morehouse Stuttaford was one of the founding members of
the North West Mounted Police and he rode in the first contingent to man
Fort Macleod in 1874. That fact alone puts him into Canada's
history books and his death in 1927 at the age of 85 was headline
news because he became the last survivor of this historic expedition.
We'll be presenting Sarah Stuttaford's story in the next Issue. |
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The
Canadian Government set up the NWMP (North West Mounted Police) in 1873
in an attempt to bring an enormous area, now the Provinces of
Saskatchewan and Alberta, under some sort of control. As early as 1870,
the Government had talked about laying down a railway which would cross
Canada but rumours suggested that it would be far too dangerous to start
work in this wilderness in its untamed state. |
Map courtesy
www.expedia.co.uk |
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The
area was inhabited by Native Indians plus American fur traders who not only traded
with the Indians for alcohol but trapped the white wolf with poisoned
bait. Dogs were an essential part of Indian hunting culture but they often found the poisoned carcases
of the wolves and died after eating them.
This created mounting tension which the
Canadian Government was determined to
bring under control. Matters came to a head with the Cypress Hills
Massacre in 1873 when wolf hunters attacked an Indian camp, killing up to
200 people. When they returned home to American territory, they were
greeted as heroes for what they had done, leaving the Canadian Government
outraged.
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İRoyal Canadian Mounted
Police . |
Legislation
was forced through Parliament and soon the first contingent of police were
in training. The following summer, around 300 riders, including John
Stuttaford, set out on the long journey that would bring the rule of law
to the vast territories of the West.
Eventually
the NWMP were renamed the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and today, they
have a presence throughout Canada. The broad-brimmed hat and the
distinctive long spur came later but their determination to "always
get their man" was there from the very beginning and John Stuttaford
was part of that. |
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