2. Explorers and first settlers.

Canada’s first settlers were Indians and Eskimos (Inuit). Later the were called Native Canadians, but in fact they were of course immigrants just as much as the Europeans. They simply came in earlier and so appeared to European settlers to be native to the country. The Indians migrated to Canada from Asia at least 12,000 years ago, during warm phases of the last Ice Age, when the ice retreated and allowed people to cross over the Bering Straights and move into North America. The Eskimos arrived considerably later, about 5,000 years ago, after the Ice Age had declined, and the northern coasts were freed for human movement. Both groups belonged to the Mongoloid race, marked by narrow almond-shaped eyes, high cheek bones, straight black hair, and a yellowish-brown skin.

The Indians moved down from Alaska either along the Pacific coast to British Columbia or up the Yukon and across to the Mackenzie Valley into what are now the Prairies. They have entered the Great Lakes – St. Lawrence system and so migrated east across the Ontario and Quebec of today to the Maritimes.

The Eskimos differ from American Indians in many ways. They belong to several different tribes and live in the world’s Arctic regions, from Greenland to Canada, and from Labrador to the Arctic coasts. Eskimos are more mongoloid in appearance than the Norh American Indians. Their language and way of living are quite different from the language and customs of the many Indian tribes of North America.

When the white man came to Canada at the beginning of the 16^th century there were four distinct Indian groups: the Athapascans, who lived in the area between Hudson Bay and the western mountains; the West Coast Indians, who inhabited the shore of the Pacific Ocean; the Algonquins, who occupied the northern forests and prairies from the Atlantic Ocean to the Rocky Mountains, and the Iroquois and Hurons who lived in what is now southern Ontario and New York State in the USA. Although the Hurons and Iroquois were related, they were deadly enemies.

In this wide sweep the early comers developed different cultures and separate languages. Perhaps more significant than language has been their mode of life. By far the greater part of the Indians, and all the Eskimos were by tradition hunters and fishermen, living a semi-nomadic life following the migrations of the fish or animals on which they preyed. Many still continue in these occupations, though aided by modern tools. The Eskimos catch seals, white whales, walruses and arctic fish off the Hudson Bay, Arctic and Labrador coasts. They used to hunt caribou (the North American type of deer), but this is declining as the caribou have become more depleted. The Pacific-coast Indians fish for salmon and crabs up the fjords of the west. Prairie Indians have long ago ceased to hunt buffalo, some instead herd beef cattle, some still trap in the forests and fish in the western rivers and lakes. Finally, in the extreme south-east are remnants of the semi-agricultural and hunting people of the Lower Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River, many of whom have taken up farming or work in the cities. They used to grow maize, squash, beans and tobacco on their plots – crops which the whites took up and developed. Estimates of the Indian population at the time of the European invasion vary, but most put numbers at between 200,000 and 220,000. With the immigration of European settlers, who wanted the very land the Indians were farming, and in other cases they took over parts of the Indian hunting grounds and conflicts began. Indians began to be driven back to marginal land or remoter areas; they tried to resist and thus raids and counter-raids were made. This was part of the tragic history of the Native Canadians.

The first Europeans to visit Canada were the Northmen or Vikings. Leif Eriksson and his bearded Viking followers reached Canada in the 11^th century. They settled in Newfoundland at L’Anse Aux Meadows, which was confirmed by archaeological excavations in the 1960s and 1970s.

A burst of exploration took place during the Age of Discovery in the 15^th and 16^th centuries. In search of a route to the Far East, explorers found what they called a New World.

In 1497, Giovanni Caboto (John Cabot) landed on the Canadian coast from his ship and claimed the land for England’s King, Henry VII.

European fishermen and navigators continued to visit the shores of Canada, but the first real exploration was undertaken by Jacques Cartier. Cartier, like explorers before him, was searching for a passage to the Far East, and his searches led him to explore the Gulf of St. Lawrence in 1534.

Returning in 1535, Jacques Cartier sailed up the St. Lawrence to the Iroquois village of Stadacona (the future site of Quebec City) and then farther upstream to another Indian village, Hochelaga (the future site of Montreal, which takes its name from the hill Jacques Cartier named Mt. Royal). On his voyage, Jacques Cartier picked up a local native name for village, Kanata (the origin of the name Canada) and applied it to the entire region he had explored. In general Jacques Cartier undertook four expeditions. He claimed the fertile new land he had discovered for the King of France. But France was engaged in European wars at that time, so little was done to promote colonization to the New World. But fishermen still came to the Grand Banks, and in 1583 Sir Humphrey Gilbert claimed Newfoundland for England.

The story of the explorers of the New World is full of adventures. Among them there were French, Danish, English, Dutch – who sailed into Canadian waters. Some of them were looking for treasures, others for a trade route which would lead through or round North America to Asia and the East Indies. Henry Hudson, an Englishman working for the Dutch, was the best known of these explorers. He sailed up the Hudson River in what is now the American state of New York, and he also explored parts of the coastline. Later, he went looking for a northwest passage – a water route round the North American continent to Asia. He sailed through waters filled with icebergs and ice floes and finally reached the great bay which now bears his name.

In order to strengthen his claims to New France, King Henry IV granted wealthy Frenchmen monopolies in the New World in return to promises to colonize the land. In 1604 a French expedition landed and spent the winter on the Bay of Fundy. In fact it is present day Annapolis. Only 35 of 79 men survived the bitter winter and among them was Samuel de Champlain who was to become one of the greatest explorers of North America. In 1608 Champlain returned with an expedition of his own, spending the winter at the site of modern Quebec City. We can say that he founded Quebec, since he built a storehouse and three houses there. Champlain began to develop the fur trade with the local Indians by exchanging horses for furs and he gradually explored the inland area. He named it New France. Thus we can understand why Quebec Province is called today French Canada and why the majority of the people are French-speaking. Champlain worked hard to develop Quebec’s fur trade and to bring colonists to New France. In 1642 Montreal was founded, but in fact the number of colonists from France was just a fraction of the number who were settling in the English and Dutch colonies in the south.

During the latter part of the 17^th century, New France found itself in constant strife with the British. English merchants in New York and New England (the present territory of the USA) desired control of the fur trade as did their Indian (Iroquois) allies.

In 1668, a British ship sailed into Hudson Bay and then returned to England with a cargo of fine furs. King Charles II was excited by a trading possibilities and issued a trading charter in 1670, which was the beginning of the great fur-trading company, known as the Hudson’s Bay Company. The founding of the company brought many British settlers to Canada. It also meant a beginning of the end of French exploration and settlement. As a result of the Treaty of Utrecht (1713) which marked the end of the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1713) France recognized British claims to Hudson Bay, all of Acadia in what is now New Brunswick, and Newfoundland.

The real disaster for France came in the Seven Years’ War of 1756-1763. The British army occupied New France, and in 1763 the Treaty of Paris ending the Seven Years’ War confirmed British sovereignty: France ceded all its territories in what is now Canada to Great Britain.

The British were now masters in North America.