7/30/2019 Fort Lac La Biche

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Fort Lac la Biche (Buckingham House, Greenwich House)

This Metis community in northern Alberta became home to many Metis who left RedRiver after the Resistance of 1869-70 and left Saskatchewan after the 1885 Resistance. Itwas founded in 1798-99 as a result of the competition between fur trade companies. By

1872 it was a well-established Metis community with more than fifteen times thepopulation of Edmonton. It is second to Fort Chipewyan as the oldest settlement of Alberta.

Lac la Biches is located on the lake of the same name also called Red Deer Lake. TheCree name for the lake was Waskesiu Sakhahegan, which means Elk Lake. Its locationon fur-trade routes resulted in posts being built there in the late 1790s. Both DavidThompson and George Simpson passed through here, using the Beaver River to go fromthe main Methye (La Loche) Portage route to reach the Athabasca River. The Metispeople, mostly from Red River, coalesced around the Oblate mission that was establishedin 1853.

In 1798 David Thompson of the North West Company established a trading post,Thompson built Red Deers Lake House and spent the winter of 1798-99 at Lac La Biche.The construction of Red Deers Lake House (later called Buckingham House), on thesoutheast shore of the lake. This marked the beginning of European settlement at Lac LaBiche. In 1799, Peter Fidler of the Hudson's Bay Company arrived on the south shore of the lake and also established a trading post. This post, Greenwich House, operated until1821, when the two companies amalgamated. In 1853, the Hudson's Bay Companyopened a new trading post at the present town site of Lac La Biche. Later trails where cutinto Lac La Biche from Fort Edmonton and Red River carts moved goods from St. Paulto Lac La Biche after which they were transported down the Athabasca River by boat.

The first two Oblates to travel to Western Canada were Rev. Father P. Aubert andBrother Alexandre Tache. In the spring of 1853 Father Remas started a mission at Lac laBiche. The mission would later be officially named Notre-Dame-des-Victoires. The firstsite chosen for the mission was not entirely suitable so in 1855 a new site on a bay northand west of the current Town of Lac La Biche was chosen. Notre Dame des Victoiresbecame one of the most important Oblate missions in Western Canada. For more than aquarter of a century the mission served as the main supply depot for all Catholic missionsin the North West.

Edited and Compiled by Lawrence BarkwellCoordinator of Metis Heritage and History ResearchLouis Riel Institute