Douglas Road - History

History

Originally traversed by HBC employees in 1828 and charted by HBC explorer Alexander Caulfield Anderson in 1846, the route was heavily travelled by prospectors seeking to avoid the dangers of the Fraser Canyon to access the gold-bearing bars of the Fraser around today's Lillooet. Pressure for an alternative route to the Upper Fraser had mounted in the wake of the Fraser Canyon War of the winter of 1859, and miners were wary of travelling through the territory of the Nlaka'pamux (Thompson Indians), even though the war was over.

Thousands had travelled the route already, in nightmarish conditions including heavy rain and even heavier infestations of mosquitos, when Governor Sir James Douglas decided to formalize the route with the construction of a wagon road over the land portions in order to avert starvation among the thousands already on the upper Fraser. As one of the very first acts of the newly incorporated Colony of British Columbia, the Governor commissioned the building of the road in an unusual road-development scheme whereby men willing to work on the road would invest twenty-five dollars each, which would be paid back in goods upon reaching Cayoosh (Lillooet).

Five hundred men, in two teams of two hundred fifty, a cosompolitan mix of British, Americans, Chinese, Mexicans, Scandinavians, Kanakas (Hawaiians), Germans and others signed up for the job. Controversy erupted at the end of construction over whether prices at the Port Douglas end of the trail or the more expensive rates at Lillooet would be used to reckon the reimbursement as promised. The Governor settled finally on the cheaper Port Douglas prices.

But the construction work was of very poor condition, such that when the Royal Engineers resurveyed the route a year later it was unusable, and further public funds were dedicated to fixing and improving it, adding bridges and taking down steep hills. Despite their efforts the route was little-used by 1861 or so, although it remained in use by locals and the occasional traveller for years afterwards. Regular steamer service to and from Port Douglas ended in the 1890s, although small-steamer traffic on Anderson and Seton Lakes continued for decades after, ending on Seton Lake only in the 1950s.