Sarah Ballenden

Sarah Ballenden

Historical Mainstream Fiction

By Alex Aitken

Published 2011 by Alex Aitken

Copyright 2011 Alex Aitken

Smashwords Edition

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Wild? You bet, ‘twas wild then, an’ few an’ far between

The squatters’ shacks for whites was scarce as furs when things is green,

An’ only reds an’ ‘Hudson’s men was all the folk I seen.

– E. Pauline Johnson

Table of Contents

Cast of Characters

Prologue

Chapter 1

Cast of Characters

in alphabetical order

(Fictional characters are in italics)

REVEREND DAVID ANDERSON,

first bishop of Rupert’s Land

MARGARET ANDERSON,

sister of Reverend David Anderson

JOHN BALLENDEN,

chief factor, Upper Fort Garry

SARAH BALLENDEN (née McLeod),

wife of John Ballenden

A. BARCLAY,

London governor, Hudson’s Bay Company

JOHN BLACK,

chief trader, chief accountant Upper Red River District

MARGARET BLACK(née Christie),

wife of John Black

GAETAN BOUVIER,

Métis voyageur, trader and merchant

JOHN BUNN,

physician and member of the Council of Assiniboia

BURNING EARTH,

Sioux chief

WILLIAM BLETTERMAN CALDWELL,

major, governor of Assiniboia

MRS CALDWELL,

wife of Major Caldwell

ALEXANDER CHRISTIE,

governor of Assiniboia 1844-48

WILLIAM COCKRAN,

Anglican missionary, Red River District

MARGARET COCKRAN,

wife of Reverend William Cockran

EDEN COLVILE,

HBC administrator, governor of Rupert’s Land

SOPHIA CRAWFORD,

member of ladies’ tea circle

COLONEL DUNDAS,

commanding officer 83rd Regiment of Foot

JEAN BAPTISTE FALCON,

Métis buffalo hunter

PATRICK ALOYSIUS FINNEGAN,

retired fur trader

CHRISTOPHER VAUGHAN FOSS,

captain of Pensioners, Red River

LIZZIE GLYNN,

member of ladies’ tea circle

GORTON,

sergeant of Pensioners, Red River

GOULLE,

Métis fur trader

JAMES HARGRAVE,

chief factor,York Factory

WILLIAM W.S. JOHNSON,

lieutenant 83rd Regiment of Foot

DAVID JONES,

Anglican missionary, Red River District

MARY JONES,

wife of Reverend David Jones

LOUIS LAFLECHE,

Catholic missionary, St. Francois Xaviér

LARONDE,

Métis fur trader

JOHN A. MACDONALD,

Kingston lawyer

MCGILLIS,

Métis fur trader

ANNABELLA MACKENZIE,

pupil at Red River Academy

ALEXANDER RODERICK MCLEOD,

chief trader, Columbia District

JOHN MCLOUGHLIN,

chief factor, Columbia District

CAPTAIN MACRAE,

senior captain of the buffalo hunt

J.P.PRUDEN,

member of the Council of Assiniboia

ANN PRUDEN (née Armstrong),

wife of J.P.Pruden

CAROLINE PRUDEN,

daughter of J.P.Pruden

LOUIS RIEL SNR.,

Métis leader

ALEXANDER ROSS,

member of the Council of Assiniboia

PIERRE-GUILLAUME SAYER,

Métis fur trader

NILS SZOLTEVKI VON SCHULTZ,

American rebel

SIR GEORGE SIMPSON,

governor, Hudson’s Bay Company

LADY FRANCES SIMPSON,

wife of Sir George Simpson

JAMES SINCLAIR,

Métis fur trader

ADAM THOM,

Recorder of Rupert’s Land

Prologue

Late in August, in the year 1853, the S.S. Prince of Wales II, nine days out from York Factory on Hudson’s Bay, rode the grey Atlantic swell. On its deck, the tall, slim figure of a woman, all in black, her cloak and hood buffeted by the wind, gripped her collar against her pale cheeks. She stood well back from the little ceremony being conducted near the rail.

The few who had gathered clutched their hymnbooks and sang with faces elevated, watery eyes raised towards the billowing sails. Their voices carried on the wind:

"……Hear us when we cry to Thee

for those in peril on the sea."

From where she stood, the woman watched the casket raised up and the small wrapped body delivered down into the leaden waves. A crewman delicately tossed a wreath of white blossom into the rising foam. Then she heard the anguished cry of the young mother, struggling in the arms of an older man, her hands stretching out to the place where her child had gone. The woman moved towards the two, ignoring the mourners who were now turning away, anxious to return to the warmth of the lounge, their hymn-books closed in their hands.

The young mother, no more than seventeen, pulled against the restraining arms of her husband. Long black strands of hair were plastered by wind and spray against her fine cheek-bones, her wild, dark eyes searching the water. The other woman reached out to touch her shoulder and spoke to her quietly in Cree. Desperate eyes looked into the face under the hood. Just then the man, taking a new hold on the thin shoulders, swept his wife away, moving her off quickly below deck.

He flashed a parting look at the woman, a look filled with challenge and threat.

Inside the ladies’ lounge, tongues were already wagging. A matronly figure in a raccoon hat and silver fox stole dominated the central table. She had about her a certain presence that expressed itself in her undisputed right to begin and to end all conversations on any subject. She was Miss Anderson, sister of Reverend David Anderson, the first bishop of Rupert’s Land, and she had accompanied her brother from England in the fall of 1849 to manage his household and to teach the young ladies of the Red River Academy.

Miss Anderson had discovered, like so many other English ladies, that four years was long enough to spend in this Hudson’s Bay Company wilderness. She had been beset by the freezing chill of its winters and the hot, insect- ridden summers, surrounded by mixed-bloods who aspired to positions in society well above their class. Now she was going home.

She should never have brought that child on board. That’s what I say, Miss Anderson went on. The child was ill before we even left York Factory. But they just don’t know, do they? After all, they’re just children themselves. Sniffing the air, she refastened her stole, draping it carefully over her flat bosom.

I blame the husband, Margaret, another said. What can he be thinking of? Taking a girl like that back with him to Scotland! She looked around the circle of faces, seeing the approving nods. I mean, it never works out, does it? These marriages to native women are best to remain in Rupert’s Land. Whatever will his family think?

Still, it was a nice service, don’t you think? a small older woman said, wistfully. The poor child… and one can’t help feeling sorry for the mother. She stopped short at Miss Anderson’s withering look.

Miss MacKenzie, a tall, spare woman, burst into the room. She had a large nose and small eyes that peered around the tables. Her thin, grey hair was tied tightly back over the ears and fastened behind with a large tortoiseshell clip. She took a seat at the table, addressing Margaret Anderson as she did so.

Who do you think is on board? The words came out in a rush of breath. I saw her just now on the deck, talking to that Indian girl. I thought it was she I saw on the Spring Packet from Norway House. She looked round the table at the hushed, expectant faces. Then she leaned forward slightly, and spoke in a whisper. Sarah Ballenden! She sat back, her thin lips tightening into a smile.

Gasps punctuated the silence that followed, the women looking from one to the other in shocked surprise. Then Miss Anderson spoke.

Well, well! I wondered who that was. I noticed her over by the mast during the burial and I thought she looked familiar, but I couldn’t see her face. You’re right, of course, Emily. She must have joined the packet at Norway House. I heard that’s where she’s been for the last year. Mrs. Ballenden! Well, well!

There was a subdued buzz of conversation around the table, and Miss Anderson smiled to think that this voyage would not be such a bore after all. Here was a subject that would engage her ladies for the next seven weeks - and what a subject it was. Sarah Ballenden!

Who is Sarah Ballenden? The small woman’s piping voice arrested the conversation.

Margaret Anderson’s eyes gleamed. Oh, you wouldn’t know her my dear, she said in a patronizing tone. You haven’t been at the fort long enough. We wouldn’t normally talk of her, you understand - the scandal and all… She paused for a moment, mischief lighting up her face. "But since she is on board, and since you are all going to be hearing about it…well.." The ladies leaned forward expectantly.

Outside on deck, as the ship ploughed eastward through the freezing waters of the North Atlantic, the lone woman watched the little wreath of white flowers rise and fall on the distant swell. She drew her fingertips down across her cheek, imagining the lines at the edges of her mouth. Her hand stroked her long neck, still soft and smooth - smoother than the necks of European women, white women whose necks grew lined and wrinkled, concealed behind ropes of pearls, high braided collars and fat sagging chins. For some things she thanked her Cree heritage. Some things.

The cold spray stung her cheeks. A sudden fit of coughing made her reach into her sleeve for a lace handkerchief. Small specks of blood caught in its laundered folds.

Watching the waves break against the ship and tumble into little white crests below, she thought how many waves there would be before she reached Scotland. Eight weeks at sea, sailing away from Rupert’s Land to that distant country that had forced itself into her life. Did he still love her? Could he still love her after all that had occurred? After all she had done?

She was only thirty-seven. Not old. Still desirable, perhaps. She vacantly regarded the dull mirror of the ocean, tears filling her eyes at the faces she saw there.

Returning to her narrow cabin, Sarah Ballenden removed her cloak and fell on the little bunk, her thin shoulders heaving with silent sobs.

Chapter 1

In the summer of the year 1832, a girl waited by the edge of a muddy river in a far-flung outpost of the British Empire called Rupert’s Land. Her dark eyes eagerly searched the bend of the river a half-mile downstream.

Sarah McLeod was her name. She was fourteen and already an exquisite beauty.

She sat on the grassy bank, hands clasped around her shapely legs, shoes cast aside and bare toes pressing into the cool earth. Her jet-black tresses fell straight to her shoulders. She wore the black slip uniform of what was to be the Red River Academy. Until its construction was completed, she was boarding at the parsonage with the other girls. Now and then she lifted a slim brown arm to shade her eyes from the bright morning sun.

Are they coming? She called to other students on the bank. Can anyone see them?" Then she leaned back and resumed her vigil, hands on the grass and arms straight out behind propping her up. The other girls chattered and giggled, some sitting or lying on the bank, some standing at the water’s edge peering down the river.

"I know who you’re watching for, Sarah McLeod, and his name starts with G." Sarah turned towards the singsong voice behind her. It was Annabella McKenzie, a short plump girl with fat cheeks and a dimpled chin, a shade fairer- skinned than Sarah but still possessed of the thick black hair and dark eyes that disclosed their common heritage.

Shush! Sarah pushed at the other girl.

Annabella described herself as Sarah’s best friend in the way that less-endowed girls seek to shine in the reflected light of the radiant. Sarah enjoyed the fawning attention with a passive pleasure, but had never seen the need to reciprocate with anything remotely akin to friendship. At this moment, Sarah, would have cared little if Annabella had fallen into the Red River and been washed out of sight.

G L, Annabella sang annoyingly, as Sarah turned her gaze back to the river. Across the little creek from where she sat, rose the spire of St. Johns, the Upper Church, the refuge of the English missionaries. It dominated the flat landscape that rolled away south towards Fort Garry. Across the river to the east, only the Catholic Church and a smattering of wooden shacks fringed the flat swampy plain.

Sarah pondered the bare, cheerless prospect of the Red River Settlement and the huge inverted bowl of the sky that fixed her in its prison on the great endless plain. It was only a few weeks since she had been taken from her wild mountain home in the far west, torn from her family, exiled from the warm shack where she had grown up with her brother and three little sisters.

Her ears pricked up - a faint and distant wail, growing and fading in the stillness of the afternoon. It came again, stronger and more continuous. Sarah stood up, leaning towards the sound. Conversation buzzed along the bank. They’re coming! Do you hear them? They’re coming!

Now they could all hear them. The sporadic notes joined themselves into a distinct melody that soared on the light breeze. The Campbells are coming! Hurray Hurray! - the advancing cry of the great Caledonian war pipes that tugs at the heart-strings of Scots, and the sons and daughters of Scots, wherever they may be. The girls whooped and cheered, running along the bank, arms waving, as the elevated prow of the lead canoe came into view.

To those who witnessed it, there was nothing in their later experience more memorable than the arrival of that little chieftain of the north, Governor Sir George Simpson, at one of the outposts of the Hudson’s Bay Empire. The spectacle of it, the colour, the music and the frenzy, captured the hearts and souls of the onlookers, moving them to tears of passion and pride.

They’re here! They’re here! Annabella shouted.

Now Sarah could hear another sound drifting across the water. It was a deep, resonant rhythm of voices that made her heart leap in her breast. It was the song of the voyageurs, timed to the stroke of their bright paddles that flashed in the sunlight, echoing from two dozen throats as the three birch-bark canoes skimmed in unison against the currents of the wide river.

In seemingly no time at all the flotilla was passing close to the bank, and Sarah saw the high prow of the lead canoe emblazoned with the painted crest of the Company of Adventurers. Behind it bobbed the tall beaver hat of its little emperor.

A cannon boomed from the Lower Fort – the first shot of a seven gun salute - and the governor raised a stiff arm in return.

The voyageurs’ anthem resounded over the river, their gaily-painted paddles cutting the water, and Sarah was on her feet waving and examining the faces of the paddlers. She could see the Iroquois in the first canoe, Simpson’s hand-picked team, their dark muscled shoulders driving the paddles and their bright feathers pointing at odd angles from long black hair. Her eyes searched the other canoes, the red and black shirts and the varied headgear of the voyageurs: tall scarlet-tasselled night bonnets, blue cloth caps, pointed toques, some plumed with feathers, some wound with coloured handkerchiefs. They were close now, and she could see the crimson sashes at their waists and the beaded garters at their knees. They smiled up at her where she stood on the bank, and they sang their loud powerful chorus as if they were singing only to her:

Lui ya longtemps que je t’aime,

Jamais je ne t’oublierai

Then she saw him in the last canoe, his dark hair curling up around his cap, black eyes in a smiling face, singing his chorus to the strong strokes of his paddle - her love, her dream, her Gaetan. Tears stung eyes her as she cheered him on, waving frantically.

Gaetan recognized the girl on the shore. She was the beautiful schoolgirl from the Red River. He smiled broadly in her direction.

Sarah lay on the narrow bed in the little dormitory in the parsonage, wide-awake in the darkness, her clenched fists holding the thin blanket up to her chin. Mrs. Mary Jones, wife of the Reverend David Jones, whom the girls were to call Ma’m and who had a thin white face and a kind smile, had long since blown out their candle and wished them goodnight. Only the odd snuffle and little sleeping moan broke the silence.

She thought of Gaetan, the shining handsome Gaetan, the dark flash of his eyes, the white even teeth when he smiled, the wild curl of his long hair. She could almost see him in the darkness of the room and bit her lip to keep from calling out his name.

The first time she had seen him, he was sitting astride a log on the riverbank amid a hustle and bustle of men and packs. Canoes were being made ready. People were saying tearful farewells. The annual express was preparing to leave Fort Vancouver, and Sarah was saying goodbye to her father, Alexander Roderick McLeod. As her father spoke to her, continuing his endless lecture on how she was to behave in school and the great benefits she would obtain from the new Red River Academy, her eyes fell on the young voyageur. At that moment Gaetan took the short-stemmed pipe from his mouth and smiled at her, that dark alluring smile from his eyes that she would never forget. Seeing him again today had opened the floodgates of her memory, and she lay in the dark, her mind too active for sleep.

It all came back to her: her little home, her mother, her family, her father and the long, hard trip on which he had sent her. It would surely have been unbearable had it not been for Gaetan, her Gaetan.

Fort Vancouver, on the Columbia River in Oregon Country, a hundred miles from the Pacific Ocean, was founded on the morning of March 19th. 1825, by Governor George Simpson, who claimed the land, the trade and the great river for His Majesty George IV.

To govern it, Simpson needed a special kind of man, a leader of men. He needed a dominant awe-inspiring chief factor who could command whites and Indians alike. He found his man in the old Nor’Wester, Dr. John McLoughlin. McLoughlin was a giant of a man, six foot four in height and wide in the shoulders, with huge hands and thick, powerful limbs. A mane of white hair that fell to his shoulders and the grim set of his features in a big face earned him the name White-Headed Eagle among the Indians. Among the whites he would one day be called the Father of Oregon.

On the night before Sarah was to leave, McLoughlin relaxed in the Company officers’ mess with Sarah’s father, Chief Trader Alexander Roderick McLeod. It had been another loud, jovial evening, with no shortage of food and drink. Now it was late, and the others had departed - the pipers, the dancers, the other officers of the fort and two American mountain men, travelling in the district, to whom McLoughlin had extended his usual warm invitation.

The two old friends shared a bottle of whisky before the wide fireplace.

Perhaps in the whole dominion of the Company of Adventurers, there were no two men more alike or more attuned to each other than these. In appearance they could have been brothers. Both were of Gaelic extraction, Mcleod, a big Highlander from the shores of Loch Maree and McLoughlin, the son of an Irish farmer from Rivière-du-Loup. Both men had served their apprenticeships in the old North West Company with a vigour and vitality that had not escaped the notice of George Simpson in his search for good men. McLoughlin had trained as a physician in Quebec; McLeod was a trader, with a natural way with the Indians and half-breeds. They’d both served for years in this Columbia District, the wildest and most dangerous outpost of the Company’s territories. They had been together since the great merger in 1821 and were on intimate terms with each other’s families. Both had taken Indian wives of the half-breed caste, marrying them à la façon du pays in places where there were no churches and no clergymen. Both had sons and daughters in places where there were no schools and no tutors, and both were aware of the surfacing problems for these wives and children coming from the growing European influences in these colonies. Now, late into the night, warmed by drams of Scotch whisky in front of the fire, they voice their mutual concerns.

So she’s off tomorrow then, Sandy, McLoughlin leaned back in his armchair. He was the only man who ever called McLeod Sandy.

Aye, McLeod stared into the fire. A servant drifted silently in and placed an armful of logs on the glowing embers. Mother will miss her. We will all miss her. McLoughlin smiled.

But it has to be, Sandy, if she is to have any prospects in this life.

Aye, John. She would be going further than the Red River for her education, if it was within my means to send her.

Scotland, eh Sandy? Where the education and the whisky are unmatched, eh? Both men laughed. Then McLeod grew serious.

Scotland, aye. But I have her brother away in school and the three other lassies at home still to look to. He added, with a smile, We are not all so well set up as Chief Factor McLoughlin.

McLeod well knew of the huge drain on John McLoughlin’s finances, occasioned by the education of his two sons in England. Nor did McLoughlin ever miss an opportunity to bemoan the fact.

"These two of mine are costing me a fortune, Sandy, and so far I’ve seen damn little return. I have more good reports in the fort on the ones I didn’t send than I’ve heard on the two in England. Hell, man, I might have been well set up, as you put it, but for these two."

In their cups the conversation became more personal, penetrating private thoughts and fears.

And Mother, Sandy? She’ll miss her, I dare say.

McLeod nodded with a slight grunt. His wife, a Cree mixed-blood woman, had borne his children, and all he ever called her, then or since, was Mother. It was a Scottish term of affection from an old chief trader who displayed little in the way of affection. He had met her at Norway House, a main Company depot at the north end of Lake Winnipeg, base camp for the Athabaska brigades, and he took her west to be his wife and the mother of his children.

Aye, it can be hard on the women, McLoughlin went on. Marguerite was heartbroken when the boys left for England.

McLeod nodded, lighting his pipe and spitting into the fire. He thought about Marguerite Wadin McKay, a Métis, deserted by old Alexander McKay when he returned to Scotland. She became John McLoughlin’s wife