Everything about Colony Of British Columbia totally explained
The Colony of British Columbia was a
crown colony of
British North America from
1858 until
1871. It was largely coterminous with the present day
Canadian province of
British Columbia. It was united in
1866 with the
Colony of Vancouver Island to form a further colonial entity named British Columbia, but unofficially known as the
United Colonies of Vancouver Island and British Columbia to avoid confusion.
Background
Main Article: History of British Columbia
The explorations of
James Cook and
George Vancouver, and the
concessions of
Spain in 1794 established British jurisdiction over the coastal area north of
California. Similar jurisdiction was established inland via the explorations of such men as
John Finlay,
Sir Alexander Mackenzie,
Simon Fraser,
Samuel Black, and
David Thompson, and by the subsequent establishment of
fur trading posts by the
North West Company and the
Hudson's Bay Company (HBC). However, until 1858, the region which now comprises the
mainland of the Province of British Columbia was an unorganised area of British North America comprising two
fur trading districts:
New Caledonia, north of the
Thompson River drainage; and the
Columbia District, located south of the Thompson and throughout the basin of the
Columbia River.
With the signing of the
Treaty of Washington in 1846, which established the US border along the
49th parallel, the HBC moved the headquarters of its western operations from
Fort Vancouver on the Columbia River (present day
Vancouver, Washington) to the newly-established
Fort Victoria, on the southern tip of
Vancouver Island. Vancouver Island and the surrounding
Gulf Islands in the
Strait of Georgia were organised as a crown colony in 1849. Meanwhile, the mainland continued to function under the de facto administration of the HBC, whose chief executive,
James Douglas, also happened to be governor of Vancouver Island. The non-aboriginal mainland population during this time never exceeded about 150, mostly HBC employees and their families.
By 1857, Americans and British were beginning to respond to rumours of gold in the
Thompson River area. Almost overnight, some ten to twenty thousand men moved into the region around present-day
Yale, British Columbia, sparking the
Fraser Canyon Gold Rush. Governor Douglas and the
colonial office were suddenly faced with having to exert British authority over a largely alien population. Douglas — who had no legal authority over New Caledonia — stationed a gunboat at the entrance of the
Fraser River in order to exert such authority by collecting licenses from
prospectors attempting to make their way upstream. In order to normalise its jurisdiction, and undercut any HBC claims to the resource wealth of the mainland, the district was converted to a crown colony on
August 2 1858 by the Parliament of the United Kingdom, and given the name British Columbia. Douglas was offered the governorship of the new colony by the colonial secretary,
Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton, on condition that he sever his relationship with the HBC. Douglas accepted these conditions, and a knighthood. British Columbia was given its own capital —
New Westminster — in 1859, but James Douglas would govern both colonies from Victoria for the next six years.
Governorship of Sir James Douglas
The influx of people into the new colony required Douglas to act quickly in drawing up regulations and creating infrastructure.
Magistrates and
constables were hired, mining regulations drawn up, and townsites surveyed at Yale,
Hope and
Fort Langley in order to discourage
squatting on
crown land. In addition, roads were constructed into the areas of greatest mining exploration around
Lillooet and
Lytton. The colony, however, wasn't immediately granted a
representative colonial assembly, because of uncertainty as to whether the gold rush would yield a stable, settled population. Douglas, who had endured unhappy conflicts with the assembly on Vancouver Island, was relieved.
The rush indeed was short lived, and the exodus of miners, speculators, and merchants was already underway by the time the
Royal Engineers had laid out the colony's new capital at
New Westminster. Prospecting continued, however, and additional finds farther inland in the
Cariboo region in 1860 signalled an impending second gold rush. Provisioning was already proving to be an acute problem, and with more distant finds it became clear that
wagon trains would have to replace pack horses, necessitating new infrastructure. By 1862, the
Cariboo Gold Rush, attracting an additional 5000 miners, was underway, and Douglas hastened construction of the Great North Road (commonly known now as the
Cariboo Wagon Road) up the
Fraser Canyon to the prospecting region around
Barkerville.
By the time of this second gold rush, the character of the colony was changing, as a more stable population of British colonists settled in the region, establishing businesses, opening
sawmills, and engaging in
fishing and
agriculture. With this increased stability, objections to the colony's absentee governor and the lack of
responsible government began to be vocalised, led by the influential editor of the New Westminister
British Columbian and future
premier,
John Robson. A series of petitions requesting an assembly were ignored by Douglas and the colonial office until Douglas was eased out of office in 1864. Finally the colony would have both an assembly and a resident governor.
Governorship of Frederick Seymour
Douglas's successor was
Frederick Seymour, who came to the colony with twenty years of colonial experience in
Van Diemen's Land, the
British West Indies, and
British Honduras. The creation of an assembly and Seymour's appointment in April, 1864 signalled a new era for the colony, now out of the shadow of Vancouver Island and free of a governor suspicious of sharing power with elected representatives. Douglas's wagon road project was still underway, presenting huge engineering challenges, as it made its way up the narrow Fraser Canyon. Successive loans authorised by Seymour's predecessor, largely for the purpose of completing the road, had put the colony £200,000 in debt; and a
First Nations uprising at
Bute Inlet cost an additional £18,000 to suppress. Seymour himself made the difficult journey through the
Chilcotin Ranges to help in the arrest of the insurgents.
On Seymour's return overland, he made a tour of the Cariboo minefields, and along the Fraser Canyon, which made him increasingly convinced of the colony's future prosperity. On returning to the capital, however, fiscal reality set in as it became clear that British Columbia's indebtedness was getting worse. Even as the colonial administration took drastic measures to augment revenues and improve the road system to attract prospectors and settlers, the economic situation grew increasingly dire, and agitation grew for an almagamation of the two colonies. Seymour opposed this proposal, but with pressure from various quarters of the colonial government, he eventually relented, recommending that British Columbia be the dominant partner, and (unsuccessfully) that the capital be located at New Westminster. And so it was that the two colonies were united by an Act of the British Parliament, and proclaimed on August 6,
1866 (see
United Colonies of Vancouver Island and British Columbia).
Governors of British Columbia
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