Carruthers and Co.

***Carruthers and Co.*** is a fur trading business based in Montreal that was founded by Peter Carruthers. It is one of the larger scale operations in the fur industry in North America and a recognizable brand in all of Montreal that rivals that of Samuel Grant's.

## Information

Although *Carruthers and Co.* was doing somewhat better than its arch-nemesis, the Brown Brothers' *Low River Company*, the company gained enough attention for Samuel Grant to realize that both companies would stand to benefit in a partnership with the American businessman, as it would especially do for his enterprises. But after a failed meeting resulted in a furious Grant, Peter Carruthers would meet his end after Grant's right hand man Cobbs Pond had murdered him. Soon after the death of Peter Carruthers, Grant had attempted to seize the company's assets through his widow Elizabeth Carruthers, who he assumed would be powerless in running her husbands' estates. This proved to be a serious mistake for Grant, as Elizabeth was much more ambitious than her late husband and just as ruthless as Grant was capable of. This would spark an intense rivalry between the two fur giants of Montreal and to the point in which both commit tit-for-tat sabotage and violence against one another.

But after discovering truth to Grant's advice on how women were not suited for the fur industry, Elizabeth Carruthers would eventually bail out Malcolm Brown from debtor's prison but at the cost of his hand in marriage, serving as a figurehead and relinquishing the brothers' company to *Carruthers and Co.* The plan would work briefly until Malcolm, in a drunken stupor, would leave for Fort James in an failed attempt to kill Jonathan Chesterfield, resulting Elizabeth to remarry to Douglas Brown.

The company, however, would face a catastrophe when Elizabeth Carruthers would be murdered by Grant himself, after the latter had been taunted for losing his partner Cobbs Pond and had failed to sway the Marquis de Beaumont. In result of her death, the company would be split; the company's estate would be managed by the Carruthers' trust Pickersgill, the company operated by Elizabeth's aide Josephette DaCosta, and the company represented by her "husband" Douglas Brown. Despite DaCosta having knowledge of the Carruthers' business, she admits she cannot run the business herself and insisted Douglas to help her. Her attempt to implore Douglas was in vain, as Douglas continued to grieve Elizabeth and had became a heavy alcoholic while making very ruinous decisions that would endanger the company. Realizing what was happening, Malcolm, after failing to sober Douglas, had agreed to work with DaCosta and help represent the company's interests by acting in his brother's stead.

The company's greatest test would come when the Hudson Bay Company (HBC) would begin cracking down on its rivals and would requisition any inventory acquired after their stores were raided at Fort James, further endangering all independent companies operating in the region and Montreal. Realizing the gravity of the situation, DaCosta and Malcolm would attempt to form a partnership with Michael Smyth despite Douglas' opposition to doing so. But after having already agreed to work with Samuel Grant, who was absent at the time, Smyth would help bring both Grant's enterprise and *Carruthers and Co.* to the negotiating table by convincing Malcolm and Cobbs, who was acting in Grant's place, that divisions were not going to solve the HBC's ruthlessness on all companies operating. Although both had expressed doubts and their inherent hatred of each other, Cobbs and Malcolm would see reasoning how big of a threat the HBC had become and would agree to work together to help take over Fort James with the Black Wolf Company and evict HBC from Hudson Bay. After the death of Fort James garrison's commander Vanstone, the partnership had been secured, in which Cobbs, Malcolm and Smyth would all toast to a new period of prosperity free from the HBC's stranglehold on Hudson Bay.