Colonial Despatches

The Campement-du-Chevreuil, or “Deer Camp,” was a resting place for Hudson's Bay employees who packed fur along the “Brigade Trail.” It was located in a valley between Mount Davis, Sowaqua Creek Trailhead, and Tulameen Mountain.1 The Brigade Trail, now known as the HBC Heritage Trail, which the HBC developed after the 49th parallel dispute between Great Britain and the United States, ran through the camp. However, both the trail and the camp were dangerous, or situated in dangerous areas. Famously, the HBC chief trader Paul Fraser was killed at Campement-du-Chevreuil when a tree fell on his tent.2

The camp was situated at the edge of Chevreuil Creek.3 A.C. Anderson marks the camp as a point on his Memorandum of Distances by the Fort Hope Route in Notes in Reference to the Routes of Communication with the Gold Region on Fraser's River.4

• 1. Hudson's Bay Company (1849) Heritage Trail Map, Hope Mountain Centre for outdoor learning.
• 2. Ibid. ; Hudson's Bay Company Heritage Trail, Hope Mountain Centre for outdoor learning.
• 3. Chevreuil Creek, British Columbia, Canada, Mindat.
• 4. Douglas to Stanley, 15 June 1858, 7830, CO 60/1, 54.