Volume 1

220 KAMINISTIQUIA RIVER—FORT WILLIAM.
US were two vessels lying with their sides against
the bank,
Henry uses. Senator Masson prefers Kaministikia, and I observe Kaministiqua
and Kaministiqa on the latest U. S. chart of Lake Superior. The initial k
varies to c and g, the q to g, and there were permutations in most of the
vowels. Thus, Gamanestigouya appears in Verendrye's journal, 1738-39 ;
we
hear from the
beginning of Camenistiquoia or Three Rivers, in allusion to the
three channels by which the river debouches ;
Kaministi Kweya is said by
Pettitot to mean Wide r. ; Caministiquia is Sir A. McKenzie's form ;
Harmon
prints Kaminitiquia ; Kamanaitiquoya appears in Malhiot ;
Kamanatekwoya
or river of Fort William is in Keating, p. 135. I have found Wandering r.
once ;
and Dog r. was common in Henry's, Thompson's, and Harmon's
time, as above noted. The river discharges from the W. into Thunder bay
of Lake Superior between lat. 49® 20' and 49^ 20' 30" N., in long. 89°
20' 30" W., by three channels, which form a triangular delta including
two islands. The upper or N. one of these is the main mouth, 23^ m.
from that of the lower or Big fork ; the middle or Little fork empties
about midway between the other two. On the S. side, some 3 m. from
the first forking, McKay's mt. rises 1,000 ft. above the bay, and the last
rapids in the river are about the same distance (direct) above the point
of this hill. The main entrance to the river was dredged to a depth of
II ft., with a width of lOO ft., in 1875. On the N. two rivulets make into the
bay, at distances of about i and 2 m. respectively; further N., 2^ or 3 m.
from P'ort William, is Prince Arthur's Idg., to which steamboats come.
Off the
delta 5 m. is the little group of Welcome isls. ; and at nearly twice that distance
further is the bold point of Thunder cape, which delimits the bay 14 m.
S. E. from Prince Arthur's Idg. ; the steamboat channel rounds the cape between
itself and Pie isl. The ground about the fort is low and swampy, in its natural
state supporting a heavy growth of mixed woods of spruce, larch, fir, poplar,
birch, and white cedar, with white pine and maple on McKay's mt. Fort
William stood and stands on the N. bank of the N. or main channel, a mile up.
Thompson's observations yielded for the position a mean of lat.
48° 23' 42" N.,
long. 89° 24' 15" W. The H. B. Co. post was built across the river, at Pointe
de Meuron.
After Duluth's original post had been abandoned, there was nothing
until La Noue rebuilt it, or built on the same site, in 171 7. a post which
had been abandoned and long forgotten by the time of the change from the
French regime to English rule, 1763. I find the date of founding of Fort
William to vary, with different authorities, from 1 801 to 1807 ;
the date usually
assigned is 1803, memorable alike to England, France, Spain, and the United
States of America. The cloud is easily accounted for, if not entirely dispelled,
by the records we possess. The movement from Grand Portage to Kaministiquia
appears to have begun in 1801; and building went on in 1802 and 1803,
as we see by Henry, but was not expected to be completed till 1804. Moreover,
the fort did not receive its present name till 1807, when it was so called
in honor of William Macgillivray, then one of the personages of the N. W.
Co. Thus, Harmon simply calls it, in 1805, the "New Fort," at which he