page_title: Murtle River
section_title: Discovery and naming
hierarchical_section_title: Murtle River / Discovery and naming
caption_attribution_description: English: Photo taken by Roland Neave, contributor to Murtle River article, from personal image collection.
context_page_description: The Murtle River is a river in east-central British Columbia, Canada. It rises from a large unnamed glacier in the Cariboo Mountains at an elevation of 2,300 metres and flows southwest for 18 kilometres to the head of gigantic Murtle Lake. The river also drains Murtle Lake then flows southwest for 36 kilometres into the Clearwater River. The Murtle River is the longest and largest tributary to the Clearwater.
  The Murtle River is known for having many waterfalls along its course. Between Murtle Lake and the Clearwater River, the Murtle drops over seven named waterfalls: McDougall, Meadow, Horseshoe, Majerus, Dawson, The Mushbowl and Helmcken Falls.
context_section_description: There are no records about the Murtle River being known by First Nations. The river was discovered by Joseph Hunter, a surveyor working for the future Canadian Pacific Railway, on May 25, 1874. Hunter's expedition rafted across the Clearwater River near The Horseshoe, headed east for about 13 kilometres (8 mi), and reached the Murtle River upstream from Majerus Falls. He  named the river and, a few days later, Murtle Lake for his birthplace in Scotland, Milton of Murtle, near Aberdeen. Between 1872 and 1881, about 20 survey parties fanned out across British Columbia trying to find the best route for the new railway between Yellowhead Pass in the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Coast. Three survey parties visited what is now Wells Gray Park. When the more southern Kicking Horse Pass was chosen instead in 1881, all of these meticulously examined routes across the Canadian Cordilleran, including Hunter's, were abandoned. Only three place names in the park recognize those 10 wasted years of surveys: Murtle River and Lake, Mahood River and Lake, and Marcus Falls. The latter two refer to James Adam Mahood and Marcus Smith, leaders of two other railway surveys during the 1870s.
  It was 40 years before the Murtle River area came under professional scrutiny again, this time by land surveyor Robert Lee. In 1913, he laid out 65-hectare (160-acre) lots beside the Murtle River and discovered Helmcken Falls. He was so impressed with the waterfall that he wrote a letter from his remote camp to Sir Richard McBride, British Columbia's premier, asking "may I name the river the McBride River and the falls the McBride Falls in honor of the distinguished Premier of British Columbia?" This ignored the prior naming of the Murtle River by Joseph Hunter. Three weeks later, Lee received a reply of one sentence from the Premier which stated that the waterfall was to be called Helmcken Falls. The McBride River was not mentioned, so Lee thereafter put Murtle River on his maps.
caption: The Mushbowl near Dawson Falls
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