Evidence on the Adequacy of First Nations Consultation - BC Hydro ...

While Thompson’s Narrative is a very readable literary reminiscence of his days in the Columbia
Plateau, the Journals appear to offer more in the way of daily observation, including numerous
incidents of friendly interaction with the Ktunaxa. Belyea’s Columbia Journals provide
transcriptions with otherwise informative annotations of most of the Journals but unfortunately, she
has only provided transcriptions of his travelling journals which are inclined to geography rather than
ethnography. The journals covering the two winters of 1807-1808 and 1808-1809 in Ktunaxa
territory, when he may have used his plentiful spare time to describe it more thoroughly are not
included in her book. An added research problem has been the very poor quality encountered of
microfilmed copies of his Journals, which renders them indecipherable, and a famously missing
journal from the late summer of 1808. 39
John Work
A career man with the Hudson Bay Co. who rose from Clerk to Chief Trader, Work travelled
extensively in the Columbia Plateau area in the 1820s through the 1840s, based out of Company forts
at Vancouver [Washington], Colville, Spokane and Kamloops, and wrote a number of journals and
post reports detailing his observations, most of which can be found in the Hudson’s Bay Archives in
Winnipeg. 40
Although Work encountered Ktunaxa people in some of these travels, he has little in the way of
observations relating to the extent of their traditional territory. Work’s application of the term “Lakes
Indians” to the “Senacteht” [Sinixt] introduces some confusion into the historical record, in that
Thompson originated this term as a description of the Lower Ktunaxa. 41
Of these post journals and reports, the most interesting to us is the one for 1830, in which he answers
a long series of numbered questions sent to him and other Factors by the Company’s Committee.
Some relevant passages address territorial questions and read as follows, using local Spokan language
for some of the tribal and place names 42 :
The Kootenais [are] of two tribes the Silaquilosqui (by the whites called the Flat Bows) and the
Callesaulk. Their country lies on the Kootenay river from near its discharge to its source and on the
head of the Columbia river, [sic] To the Westward this country is mountainous but to the Eastward
there are fine plains with little wood.
In his second census [1830] Work gives the following numbers for the Ktunaxa.
Men Women Boys Girls
39 Personal communications with authorities such as William Moreau and Jack Nisbet have not provided further relevant
observations by Thompson on Ktunaxa use of the subject area.
40 These journals include: Journal of a voyage from a voyage from [York Factory to Spokane House], 1823; Journal of a
Voyage from Fort George to the Northward...1824; Journal of a Trip from Fort Vancouver to the Interior...1826; Journal
of a Trip fro Ft. Vancouver to O'Kanagan in May 1828; Diary of a Journey in 1830 [from Colvile to Spokane to Fort
Vancouver]; and Diary of Journey to the Missouri in 1831 - & Return [from Ft. Vancouver and return]
41 Modern ethnographers have tended to associate the term “Lakes” with the Sinixt and not the Lower Ktunaxa, and
review of their material in this report will show that these Salishan people occupied the mid-Columbia area from Arrow
Lakes to north of Kettle Falls in the US, apparently sharing much of this territory with the Lower Kootenay and, to a
lesser extent, Okanagan and Shuswap people.
42 HBCA B.45/e/3, fo.2
18
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