Carlton Trail
Encyclopedia
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
Northwest for most of the 19th Century. It stretched from the Red River Colony
Red River Colony
The Red River Colony was a colonization project set up by Thomas Douglas, 5th Earl of Selkirk in 1811 on of land granted to him by the Hudson's Bay Company under what is referred to as the Selkirk Concession. The colony along the Red River of the North was never very successful...
up to what is today Fort Qu'Appelle, Saskatchewan
Fort Qu'Appelle, Saskatchewan
These figures do not include the substantial population living along the shores of the Fishing Lakes.-Origins:The current site is the third Fort Qu'Appelle. The first was a North West Company trading post , also in the valley but near what is now the Saskatchewan-Manitoba border...
via Fort Ellice
Fort Ellice
Fort Ellice was a Hudson's Bay Company trading post built in 1831 in Rupert's Land near the junction of the Assiniboine and Qu'Appelle rivers. The fort was located in what is now west-central Manitoba, Canada, just east of that province's border with Saskatchewan.It was an important fort, as it was...
. From here the trail ran north and crossed the South Saskatchewan River
South Saskatchewan River
The South Saskatchewan River is a major river in Canada that flows through the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan....
near Batoche, Saskatchewan until it reached Fort Carlton
Fort Carlton
Fort Carlton was a Hudson's Bay Company fur trade post from 1810 until 1885. It was rebuilt by the Saskatchewan government as a provincial historic park and can be visited today...
on the North Saskatchewan River
North Saskatchewan River
The North Saskatchewan River is a glacier-fed river that flows east from the Canadian Rockies to central Saskatchewan. It is one of two major rivers that join to make up the Saskatchewan River....
. After this point the trail ran due west along the river to Fort Edmonton
Fort Edmonton
Fort Edmonton was the name of a series of trading posts of the Hudson's Bay Company from 1795 to 1891, all of which were located in central Alberta, Canada...
at what is now Edmonton, Alberta. The distance in total the trail traveled between Fort Garry (Winnipeg
Winnipeg
Winnipeg is the capital and largest city of Manitoba, Canada, and is the primary municipality of the Winnipeg Capital Region, with more than half of Manitoba's population. It is located near the longitudinal centre of North America, at the confluence of the Red and Assiniboine Rivers .The name...
) to Upper Fort des Prairies (Edmonton) was approximately 900 miles (1,500 kilometers). Many smaller trails jutted off from the main trail, such as the Fort à la Corne
Fort de la Corne
Fort de la Corne was built in 1753 by Louis de la Corne, Chevalier de la Corne at the same time that the second Fort Paskoya was built. It was built a little lower than the Saskatchewan River Forks at the mouth of the Pehonan Creek, a new establishment which originally bore the name of Fort des...
Trail in the Saskatchewan Valley
Saskatchewan Valley
The name of a geographic area in Saskatchewan, Canada encompassing generally a triangle from North Battleford, to Saskatoon, north to the Saskatchewan River Forks east of Prince Albert, Saskatchewan...
.
Connecting the west, the trail was of great import during the 19th century as a highway for the inhabitants. Different sections of the trail were known by many different names in different eras, including The Company, Saskatchewan, Fort Ellice Trail, Winnipeg Trail, Edmonton Trail, and Victoria Trail. It is said that if one were to travel the Carlton Trail by Red River Ox Cart it would take about two months.
The main mode of transport along the trail was by Red River Cart. It was an integral route for Métis
Métis people (Canada)
The Métis are one of the Aboriginal peoples in Canada who trace their descent to mixed First Nations parentage. The term was historically a catch-all describing the offspring of any such union, but within generations the culture syncretised into what is today a distinct aboriginal group, with...
freighters, and Hudson's Bay Company
Hudson's Bay Company
The Hudson's Bay Company , abbreviated HBC, or "The Bay" is the oldest commercial corporation in North America and one of the oldest in the world. A fur trading business for much of its existence, today Hudson's Bay Company owns and operates retail stores throughout Canada...
employees as well as the earliest white settlers. With the coming of the Canadian Pacific Railway
Canadian Pacific Railway
The Canadian Pacific Railway , formerly also known as CP Rail between 1968 and 1996, is a historic Canadian Class I railway founded in 1881 and now operated by Canadian Pacific Railway Limited, which began operations as legal owner in a corporate restructuring in 2001...
in the late 1880s, and the numerous branch lines that followed the trail assumed less and less importance. By the early 1900s many portions were fenced off, although local sections of the trail remained in use as late as the 1930s.
The use of the trail was designated an Event of National Historic Significance
Events of National Historic Significance (Canada)
Events of National Historic Significance are events that have been designated by Canada's Minister of the Environment, on the advice of the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada, as being defining actions, episodes, movements or experiences in Canadian history...
in 1972.