Volume 1

1
PEMBINA RIVER AND MOUNTAINS. 8
Grant some years ago ; this was the first estabhshment [of
the N. W. Co.] ever built on Red river.
Panbian river ^ takes its rise out of the Ribbone lakes or
140, 142, 144, 146, 155, 156, 175, 176, 180, 184, 189, 190, 191, 261. The interval
between Peter Grant and C. J. B. Chaboillez is a blank for Pembina ;
.thus Tanner "found no people, whites or Indians," when he got there (probably
in summer of 1797, though his dates are all slippery). To the foregoing
posts at the mouth of Pembina r., add the one Henry caused Langlois to build
in the summer of iSoi, on the N. side: see May I7th-I9th, 1801, beyond ;
add
the one the H. B. Co. started to build on the E. side of Red r., Sept. 13th,
1801 : see that date beyond ; add the X. Y. Co. house built by J. Crebassa,
Sept., 1801. After Henry's time, in the fall of 1812, Fort Daer was built by the
H. B. Co. on the N. side of Pembina r. and W. side of Red r., site of present
Pembina town, and named for Baron Daer (Lord Selkirk). In the spring of
1823 the H. B. post and Catholic mission moved down to Fort Douglas ; and
that summer the town had grown up to about 60 cabins, with 350 persons, of
whom two-thirds were half-breeds, the rest Swiss and Scotch settlers (Keating).
In 1870 the H. B. Co. were still maintaining an establishment there, on supposed
British soil ;
this they were allowed to retain, on request and by courtesy,
pending the final readjustment of the boundary.
^ The sources of Pembina r. are on the N. and N. E. slopes of Turtle mt.,
W. of the Pembina mts., about long. 100". The lakes of which Henry speaks
are somewhat further E. Rib Bone translates F. Placotte correctly, but is
easily corrupted to Ribbon and even Riband. We hear of placottes when it is
a matter of taking out certain rib pieces in cutting up buffalo ;
and we observe
that Tanner says, p. 133 : " We went to Pekaukaune Sahkiegun, (Buffalo Hump
Lake,) two days' journey from the head of Pembinah River." Three of the
largest of these lakes are now called Pelican, Rock, and Swan ; between the
first two of these are two small ones. Lake Lome and Lake Louise, lately
named for personages prominent in Canadian politics and society. At Swan 1.,
where there is an Indian reserve of that name, occupying nearly a township,
the river is at its northernmost bend. Thence its general course is about
S. E. till it crosses the parallel of 49° about 10 m. W. of long. 98°, not far
from a place called Elkwood, Thence it continues in North Dakota, running
S. E. in Cavalier Co., and then nearly E. through Pembina Co.; but it almost
touches 49" again near Gretna, Man., where a branch of the Canadian Pacific
meets one of the Great Northern Ry. The approximation to the boundary is
closer there, in fact, than at the mouth of the river. The Pembina has many
tributaries, but the principal branch is Tongue r., which falls in through Pembina
Co. about 4 m. up stream from the town of Pembina.
Henry's Hair hills are those now known as Pembina mts., though hardly to
be dignified as such. They form for a long distance the western boundary of
the valley of the Red r. , and to the same extent represent the eastern edge of
the prairie plateau which stretches thence westward to the Coteau of the Mis-