Winter in the Village at Fort Vancouver

*The village was home for the workers of the Hudson\'s Bay Company
stationed at Fort Vancouver. During peak seasons, its population
exceeded 600 people. All helped Fort Vancouver become a successful and
expansive post, the headquarters and supply depot for a region of
700,000 square miles. The workers of the village were trappers,
blacksmiths, coopers, carpenters, tinsmiths, dairymen, millwrights, and
farm laborers. Their wives and children were integral to the operation
as well. Many accompanied their husbands or fathers on brigade, spending
most of the year cleaning skins, cooking, making clothing, and other
essential activities. Others stayed in the village, and worked in the
fields or salted and packed salmon. The village was a place of
astounding diversity. There were French-Canadians, English, Scots,
Irish, Hawaiians, and people from over 30 different Native American
groups whose homelands spanned the continent. This multicultural
settlement had a profound influence on the development of the Pacific
Northwest region.*

Winter was a season of mixed blessings for those families that stayed in
the village and did not go out with the brigades. Doubtless many of them
were grateful to escape the frigid work of setting traps in icy streams
and traveling over rough terrain, but some likely missed the freedom
this work offered. It was accepted knowledge that many *voyageurs* loved
their lifestyle, and were discontent with a more settled life.

The population of the village shrunk to 200 or so during the cold part
of the year. Tradesmen remained, as did those employees who worked at
the mills and dairies. Perhaps they stretched and looked around their
homes with satisfaction, for any guests forced on them during the
housing shortages of the summer would be long gone. However, winters
were rough on homes hastily built from lumber scraps and hand-hewn
timbers. Though most houses were only 400 square feet or less, and
warmed quickly with a fire on the hearth, there were drafts that snuck
in through countless holes and gaps in the chinking. Blacksmiths
probably cursed their forges in the heat of the summer, but they were
the lucky ones now, hurrying each morning to the fires in their shop.

Short, dim days would have made the village a grim place at times during
the winter. Warm and bright, wool Hudson's Bay Company blankets were a
popular and essential trade item. Women, even though they had adopted
European clothing styles for the most part, retained the use of leggings
and mocassins, assuredly most welcome in the cold. Men bundled into
"Guernsey frocks", knitted sweaters from the British Isles, or
*capotes*, coats made from felted, blanket-like wool. Workers who had
followed the fur routes from Eastern Canada may have judged the climate
of the Oregon Country mild compared to the snows of the east or the dry
winds of the central prairies. Overall, a winter of mud. Those who came
from the Hawaiian Islands must have been startled, experiencing their
first winter in the village. Despite inescapable cold, though, hopefully
they were awed by the beauty of a surprise snowfall on the landscape of
fir forest.

There were other compensations. Communal fire pits for cooking suppers
were gathering spots after the long work day, scenes of laughter,
singing, and talk in a jumbled mix of jargon and gestures. These must
have achieved a sense of comraderie during the winter, as everyone
pulled in tighter to warm themselves. On rare occasions, the villagers
would be invited inside the fort to a dance. Everyone attended these
popular events, and socialized until early the next morning. The
Christmas holiday was a rest from work, a time to attend church services
and exchange small gifts or greetings with friends. Other free days
might be spent hunting to supplement Company rations, or competing in
games of skill. During the winter of 1845, the sailors of HMS *Modeste*,
a British sloop-of-war stationed at Fort Vancouver, organized a game of
soccer on the frozen Columbia River.

As winter thawed and the first green spread over the open plains,
families in the village must have had contradictory feelings about the
approaching spring. The weather would warm and friends on brigade would
return. The village would be overcrowded, lively, and smelly. Fresh food
would be more plentiful and easier to gather. The fever would come again
and herald months of sickness. Grueling work in the agricultural fields
would be the daily assignment. Perhaps for some of the same reasons we
relish winter now, they looked back with longing to the cold, dark
season.