Volume 1

FROM WINNIPEG TO BAS DE LA RIVIERE. 215
and Veaudrie [Toussaint Vaudry ""] started for Portage la
Prairie, to summer there. i6th. Gave out baggages and
sent off the canoes and boats. At ten I embarked, passed
them, and camped at the entrance of Red river, jyth.
Stopped by the strong N. W. wind and rain. My brigade
overtook me. i8th. The wind continued ;
examined and
dried the packs. Portage la Prairie pemmican and packs
rotten, through the carelessness of the master, igth. Wind
continued ;
embarked and worked against it all day ; at sunset
I arrived at Bas de la Riviere. 20th. I remained awaiting
the canoes from Athabasca river, Fort des Prairies, Lake
Winipic, and Upper Red river ; my brigade went ahead.
S7inday, June 21st. We embarked at the Gallois in six
light canoes, manned by 15 men. We were: from Athabasca
river, Mr. McLain Fort des Prairies, Mr. [John]
;
'*
McDonnell; Swan river, Mr. McGillis"; Upper Red river,
'* No question of identity. The name occurs in many forms in the Henry
MSS.—Vaudry, Veaudry, Vaudrie, Veaudrie, and in any case with n for u by
scribe's error ; Thompson calls him Vaudril. Toussaint Vaudry was a wellknown
character, who had been 30 years in the Northwest in 1818, when he was
at Toronto as a witness in the Semple case. He went with Thompson to the
Mandans in 1797-98, and with Henry on the same journey in 1806. We shall
hear more of him when we come to that part of Henry's journal.
'®
John McLain, a clerk of the N. W. Co., was in charge of Fort de la Montee,
on the Saskatchewan, in June, 1814.
" There were at least three persons of this name :
A. McGillis, full name
unknown ; Hugh McGillis ; and Donald McGillis. The one here in mention was
not Donald (who is the " M'Gilles" of
Irving's Astoria, and of whom we shall
hear more when Henry is on the Columbia). But he may have been either A.
or Hugh, both of whom were at Fort Dauphin and in that region for some years
before and after 1800, and have more than once been confused. The proof that
they were two persons appears in Henry Feb. 17th, 1806, when A. McGillis
reaches Pembina from Fort Dauphin, Hugh McGillis being known to have been
at Leech 1. at that date. The certain memoranda I have of A. McGillis are
^^ l^ft
only the one just said, and one in Thompson's MS. of July 9th, 1806, at which
date " Mr. McGillis of Fort Dauphin" was at Lac la Croix on the new Kaministiquia
route.—Hugh McGillis was in the Fort Dauphin Dept. in 1799 I
Encampment isl. in Lake Winnipegoosis Sept., 1800. en route to winter, 1800-01,
at the N. W. Co. house on that Red Deer r. which falls into the lake said ;
wintered 1802-03 at Fort Alexandria, where he arr. Oct. 2ist, 1802 ;
returned
Oct. 19th, 1803, from Grand Portage to Fort Alexandria, and wintered there