We do not know his name: Klatsassin and the Chilcotin War
   
 

The Capture

[ Murderers Surrender, Detail, Detail from the Alexis Map showing the site of the capture of Klatsassin.	 From map originally drawn by Indians Alexis and Ualas as interpreted by Mr. Ogilvie, Signed W. Cox, Benshee Lake., Alexis and Ualas, Public Record Office, Great Britain MPG 654 1 ]

Two forces combining over 100 men were sent out in search of Klatsassin and his supporters, one from the west under Chartres Brew and one from the east under William Cox. It was a long campaign, 146 days from the dispatch of the first party to the return of the last. The men were called volunteers but they did not work for free. Each was fed and paid a daily wage by the colony, commensurate with pay rates in the colony. Yet, there was dissension, insubordination, incompetence and a near mutiny.

Finding the Tsilhqot’in in their vast territory proved to be an impossible task. The one man among the colonial forces who knew the territory intimately was the only man killed by the Tsilhqot’in in the whole campaign. Then, one day a messenger arrived…

Colonial Correspondence

Colonial Dispatches

Newspaper or Magazine Articles

 
Great Unsolved Mysteries in Canadian History