Talk:James Douglas (governor)

message: Ok seems that this guy, Howcheng has screwed up the pictures on this article. However perhaps this is an opportunity to throw some more diverse pictures into this article. Keep your eyes peeled.
Kilter 19:42, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: New Pictures

message: Got rid of some of the high-school simplifications and introduced some details/accuracy; this article/bio needs a lot of work yet, though.Skookum1 21:57, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  New edits 

message: Never really liked using those cat names for people in pre-provincial BC history anyway; but I note that he hasn't been given an "ethnic sort" category of any kind.  Should he even?  Pretty much he defined what it was to be "British Columbian" (even before that term existed) and he's neither Caribbean nor Scots by culture; only by inheritance and part-upbringing.  The country here is what made him what he was; can't really consider him a Scot, nor a West Indian, at least not in cultural/ethnic-identification terms, only by family line....interesting question re a lot of these early guys, in fact; even marking the Orcadians as Scots isn't quite right.Skookum1 02:45, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, I'm wondering that, myself.  My inclination would be Scots-Canadian, given his paternity and extended education in Scotland.  Strictly speaking, he was a British subject all his life.  Fishhead64 06:42, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Scots Canadian cat?  Barbadian cat? African-Canadian cat? 

message: I changed the wording for Douglas' birthplace to the above because Demerara was a separate colony at the time.  Not till 1814 was it joined into "Demerara-Essequibo", and not till 1815 was Berbice added to create "British Guiana", the immediate colonial forerunner of Guyana.-- Lonewolf BC 20:40, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  "...born in Demerara (now part of Guyana)..." 

message: I looked up the ref accompanying this quote:
:The treaty-making was halted after the Colony ran out of money to pursue its expansion policy.
partly because that's a "pat" explanation for why the treaty-making process wasn't continued; more to the facts, Douglas' relatively generous treatment and political support of the First Nations was one of the reasons he got turfed from office; www.canadiana.org is a poorly-written site, and only pullls on goevrnment sources and the extremely-poorly-written/researched Canadian Encyclopedia Online (whose gold rush material was so bad I had to send them off a lengthy criticism of all their many errors earlier tonoight).  Also, the transformation of even the www.canadiana.org content somehow got changed from "The Aboriginals gave up nearly 570 square kilometers of land in exchange for cash, clothing and blankets. They were able to retain existing village lands and fields for their use, and also were allowed to hunt and fish on the surrendered lands." to "some blankets and a few shillings" in an obviously POV pastiche-rendering all too reminiscent of the cliches about the sale of Manhattan.  In actuality, the Peninsula and Cowichan-area chiefs were, like Maquinna before them, very astute businessmen and wouldn't have settled for a cheap buyout; nor, given Douglas' long and continuing business relationship with them, he can't afford to have been seen (by them) as swindling them; they got what THEY saw as far barter at the time; and if it was only a few shillings that they got, how was it the Colony ran out of money?  I can't remember the dollar, or rather sterling, figures at the moment but they weren't cheap; and farther up-island the Kwakiutl were in no mood to negotiate.... I'd have expected these numbers to be present at canadiana.org, since they are used as the cite.  Knee-jerk cliches like this are rife in a lot of BC historical writing; but they should always be examined especially when they turn up in government-funded/backed sites, or in eastern-written sites like the Canadian Encyclopedia.  I actually stopped by here to see what this article had on the Douglas Treaties, but since there's only what's been culled from Canadiana.org, which itself is a cut-and-paste from other sites, it looks like I'm on my own and will have to dig into the Akriggs and whatever else I have around here; Hauka's great, the Square Toes book was a crashing boor and way too p.c., and the other one I haven't read.....Skookum1 06:59, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The "few shillings" note was referenced in Bob Reid's article in British Columbia:  A Brief History in Colony of Vancouver Island.  I'll let you be the judge of the accuracy of his claim and the appropriateness of the citation tag. Fishhead64 01:38, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Tried to look for it, but it's gone.Skookum1 11:39, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: By the way, the Akriggs quote one of the Douglas Treaties, which as you can tell by the redlnk doesn't have an article yet.  I'm wondering if the full text of such a treaty should go in the article, or if I should put it in Wikisource as it's a source document?  Thoughts?  Similarly there's Declaration of the Lillooet Tribe, which I created a long time ago but now realize probably should have been put in Wikisource.Skookum1 11:41, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Canadiana.org citation invalid and POV

message: Not a necessity, but has to do with James Douglas disambugiation page; see Talk:James DouglasSkookum1 08:33, 21 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Sir James Douglas (disambiguation)]]

message: Found this whiel reading up on another topic, in Alexander Begg's British Columbia: From the Earliest Times to the Present, pp 141-142.
A NOBLK ACT. An incident occurred, as the party were fording 
the Nisqually River, which was then swollen (April, 1840). It is 
narrated by Bancroft, and illustrates the character of Douglas. He 
introduces the occurrence by the remark: "There is something sub- 
lime in that quality inherent in noble natures which cannot overlook 
a duty, even though its performance leads to death." It appears that 
Lassertes, the man foremost in crossing the river, was by some mishap 
swept from his horse, and carried some distance down the river. Just 
before reaching a drift of logs and debris, under and through which 
the furious water was surging, threatening instant destruction to any 
on whom it might once lay its grasp, he caught the end of a fallen 
tree and held to it as his only hope of life. Even to those accustomed 
to daily dangers, and to prompt, unflinching action whenever a 
comrade needed help, the position of Lassertes was so perilous, the 
destruction of whomsoever should attempt his rescue so probable, that 
the bravest of these brave men drew back appalled. The air and water 
were so icy cold that the limbs would be quickly benumbed, and prob- 
ably render effort powerless. " Fear fell upon the company," says 
Douglas in his journal " Lassertes was every moment growing weaker- 
He was apparently a doomed man. The contagion weighed upon my 
own mind, and I confess with shame that I felt not that cheerful 
alacrity in rushing to the rescue as at other times." Douglas saw that 
if he did not make the attempt no one would. It were easy enough 
to hold back ; to dally ; to seek for means less venturesome than such 
extreme personal peril; that man's life was not worth half as much as 
his own ; no blame could by any possibility ever be attached to him 
let him go. 
<P>
DOUGLAS RESCUES LASSERTES. Douglas could not do it. His 
nature was not formed that way. " Even then," he writes in his 
journal, "I could not allow a fellow-creature to perish without an 
effort to save him, while the inactivity of all present was an additional 
incentive to redouble my own exertions. With a sensation of dread, 
and almost hopeless of success, I pushed my horse with spur and whip 
nearly across the river, sprung into the water, and rushed towards 
the spot where the nearly exhausted sufferer was clinging, with his 
head above water, to a tree that had fallen into the river. Upon 
its trunk I dragged myself out on all fours, and great was our mutual 
joy when I seized him firmly by the collar, and with the aid of a 
canoe that arrived soon after, landed him safely on the bank, where a 
blazing tire soon restored, warmth to both. And to my latest breath 
may I cherish the remembrance of Lassertes' providential rescue from 
a watery grave, as I could never otherwise have enjoyed tranquillity 
of mind " 
Seems to great to not try to fit in the article, if in condensed form; this was during Vancouver's northward journey to establish Ft Victoria, then from there proceeding to found Fort Taku....Skookum1 (talk) 23:41, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Character vignette

message: I'm just moving a comment by an anon misplaced on its own page
The term Sir James Douglas was not knighted by Saint James Court in Great Britain, this is propaganda, for the Queen could be the only one to acquire the lands of the Province and was to legitimize these treaties. The proclamation of 1763 states that the Queen could only acquire Indian land.this hasn't been done.154.20.123.98 (talk) 04:27, 5 March 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Not sure what the request is about as the statement above is not clear, one thing for sure James Douglas Governor and Commander-in-Chief in and over Vancouver's Island and the colony of British Columbia was appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath on 11 August 1863 by Queen Victoria. (London Gazette 22762). So from 1863 he was Sir James Douglas KCB. MilborneOne (talk) 00:11, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Knighthood

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thread_title:  A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion