Research Project

The Cariboo Gold rush was a time of mass male migration and population to the interior of British Columbia.[1] The daily grind was a brutal one when considering the harsh weather and landscape of what we now collectively call “Beautiful British Columbia,” as denoted on the provincial license plate. Men had it tough. The allure of striking gold and becoming financially affluent was a driving force that often saw men peril at the mercy of mother nature and her powerful entourage of climatic change. For most men, life was dismal during this time of exploration into the interior of British Columbia not only due to the landscape but also because there were not many women to warm their cold beds at night. “British Columbia’s settler society was overwhelmingly and persistently male.”[2] This is where the role of women is paramount in the eyes of the patriarchal society that was relevant to the colonial times of British Columbia during the Cariboo Gold rush. Women’s position in our professed egalitarian society today, is a far cry from their roles and station in Colonial Western Canada.  Through perseverance, opportunism, patriarchal appointment, and the sheer necessity to survive women created paths of entrepreneurial success and recognized business acumen; women were seen as a necessity for the stability of the very social fabric of society in the newly colonized Interior of British Columbia, and Indigenous women were thrown into a world of colonisation that would promote sexual exploitation, see their roles adapting to the influx of settlers, living life under an umbrella of judgement and perception that was unjust, and at the mercy of male colonisers. This paper will argue that women played crucial roles in the social construct of a swiftly developing region in British Columbia during the Cariboo Gold Rush and that their roles were most often manipulated or manufactured by men.

The Cariboo was literally bursting at the seams with men during the Cariboo Gold Rush. Men were coming from California, Europe and as far away as Australia and the Orient.[3] White women that were in the Cariboo at this time were most often married; sometimes married for a second or third time after having been widowed.[4] The communities at this time, for example Barkerville, were ripe with opportunity for the industrious woman. Businesses that were springing up were ones that grew out of necessity. Women were often alone in their business ventures, and sometimes had their husbands as their business partners for more lucrative business such as saloons or hotels. Women’s businesses were often practical in nature and served to meet the needs of the male community. The services rendered were most often categorized as an extension of a typical female duty such as food services (restaurants) and laundries.[5] An affirmation of women in business was the recognition of twelve women in the annual business directory in 1869.[6] A notable business woman during this time was Fanny Bendixen. Fanny Bendixen was the only female to have her name consistently listed in the business directories. She was well known for being the proprietor of several saloons in the Cariboo in the early 1860’s.[7] The entrepreneurial woman, involved in saloons, could expect to acquire considerable wealth.  “Money “flowed very freely” in saloons. In 1868 at Barkerville, brandy sold at nine dollars per gallon, rum and whiskey at eight dollars per gallon, and consequently business was good.”[8] The hurdy-gurdy dancers were also able to profit substantially by selling a dance for $1 and keeping .50 cents of each dollar for themselves.[9] The case of a woman driven business was not entirely without male influence. It is arguable that without the thousands of men spilling into this region at the time, women would not have had the opportunity to flourish within their chosen line of business. The businesses were therefore constructed in association with the needs of the men involved in the Cariboo Gold Rush. Women were recognized as entrepreneurs utilizing the backdrop of the mining towns as a means to establish businesses that would provide vital services to the masses of men aiming to strike it big during the Cariboo gold rush.

Women are also seen as vital for the establishment of normality and prosperity, representing a successful British Colony, and helping to structure the male centric environment. The patriarchal government at the time recognized the necessity of having women in the settlement in order to demonstrate the success of the new British colony. “…only the immigration of white women could redeem the colony.”[10] The idea was to bring white women to British Columbia to save the colony from homosexual relationships and relationships with indigenous women. The fear behind mixed-race children was very real to the British as that did not merry well with their ideas of a successful colony of strong white European descent.[11] The immigration of white women to British Columbia was seen as a cure all to an undermanned female workforce in British Columbia and to relieve the burden of over population in England.[12] An article written by Amor De Cosmos in 1862 titled “The Tynemouth’s Invoice of Young Ladies” perfectly illustrates the extreme excitement and fear should they not arrive, of white British women travelling aboard the ship “Tynemouth” with Victoria as their port. Amor De Cosmos, at the time of this editorial, was not only a member of the Legislative Assembly of Vancouver Island but also carried the important title of Editor for the Daily Colonist. Prior to this he was a journalist. It can be argued that these positions would hold significant merit when it comes to articulating any form of issue that is of great importance for the general public. It can also be assumed that the perspective of a man such as Cosmos would draw attention from many levels of society, purely by having editorial rights for a newspaper. It is questionable whether or not Cosmos, being a male, was motivated for his own personal gain. Was he in need of a spouse as well? Given the way a society takes the information from newspapers as generally an accurate account of what is being reported upon, the newspaper was a perfect place for Cosmos to air his grievances regarding the troubling thought of having the women, the main importance, that are destined for Port Victoria, be snapped up by the Yankees.[13] In the letter, Cosmos uses his journalistic qualities to write an editorial that invokes much excitement and joy when considering the women due to arrive in Victoria, moreover the editorial is a message of urgency and distressing concern. It can be argued that the issue is something that he feels requires the rallying of people to support in order to have the Immigration Board on side. Cosmos mentions the need for the Immigration Board to send help to San Francisco to “prevent “desertions” while the Tynemouth lies at that port.[14] His position in the Legislative assembly would certainly give his cause some pull. In the document Cosmos is discussing the arrival of sixty young women coming from London, aboard the steamer Tynemouth. The letter describes the precedent that was set when a ship carrying twenty women, bound for Victoria from Australia, arrived in Victoria with not a single lady aboard. The women had met men in San Francisco instead.[15] It could also be challenged that Cosmos is doing everything in his power to ensure the success of this arrival by forewarning the public with his letter. White women were seen as the quintessential proof of a highly successful British Colony, bringing virtuousness and the prospect of white supremacy through the birth of healthy white babies. “White women’s child-bearing was closely monitored and celebrated as additional evidence of the march of white supremacy.”[16] A woman’s role in populating the interior of British Columbia was under strict scrutiny by the male populace and guided by the necessities both for family and more strategically for political righteousness.

The roles of Indigenous women and how they are perceived by white males during the gold rush is extremely troubling. At times the negative aspects as seen by the white men are overlooked out of a patriarchal sexual necessity, demonstrating a tremendous amount of hypocrisy. Indigenous women were sexually exploited. The indigenous woman’s role was often as bed-mate to lonely miners for the long cold nights in the interior in the form of co-habitation and most often as prostitute in one of the saloons.[17] During the Cariboo Gold Rush approximately one-in-ten aboriginal women were living with a non-indigenous man.[18] The lack of women at the onset of the Cariboo Gold Rush predicated the hypocrisy of lying with an indigenous woman. Indigenous women were sexually exploited in order to satiate the role of sexual partner for white men during this time of colonisation. Barman explains it best:

Non-aboriginal men had their own reasons for entering into relationships. During the heady years of the gold rush, at least 30,000 White men and several thousand Chinese and Blacks sought their fortunes in British Columbia. Most soon departed, for the difficulties of getting to the gold fields were horrendous, but however long they stayed, their utter loneliness in a sea of men cannot be discounted. The most fundamental characteristic of non-Aborignal women in gold-rush British Columbia was their paucity.[19]

White men justified their relations with Indigenous women by stating that within the Indigenous culture, chastity was not recognized.[20] The co-habitation and sexual exploitation contradicted the following opinion of Indigenous women, “Fishy, infested, flattened, and barefoot, this klootchman is a grotesque foil for Western ideals of womanhood.”[21] A poem, considered autobiographical in nature due to the similarities of a White man and Indigenous woman couple living together at the time, appeared in the Cariboo Sentinel in 1869. The poem is about a man pleading to an indigenous woman to come and stay with him in his cabin in the woods with the promise of alcohol in order to keep him company. Van Kirk implies that alcohol was used to assist with the proliferation of indigenous women into prostitution.[22] What is ironic, when referring back to white women as successful saloon entrepreneurs, is that if they were involved in the business of prostitution then they made their small fortunes off the back of these indigenous women in their constructed role of prostitute.[23]

A woman’s identity is often at the mercy of a male and their expectations on what is required at any given time under the guise of being for the good of the people. Women find themselves in multiple roles, from the savvy entrepreneur where woman capitalise on essential services in a budding community, through the recognition of men, to necessary domestication that is demonstrative of a successful and flourishing British Colony. The woman’s role, as seen by the white man, is to clarify and secure the colony of British Columbia through solidifying marriage with eligible bachelors and producing white offspring. This coincides with the desire to keep the men from mating or co-habiting with indigenous women. Indigenous women definitely have it the hardest. They are sexually exploited and plied with alcohol. Indigenous women are looked upon as sexually available because of their differences in cultural norms in comparison to the patriarchal society of the white man. They are looked down upon in society, and are subject to the whims of the needs of the white man. At this time in history, women were yet to have a proper voice when it came to their rights. Their existence was constructed through roles that satisfied the necessities of the men in their lives and society. One can argue that women were the glue that kept the ship from sinking. The Cariboo Gold rush was not for the faint hearted.

 

[1] Isabel M. L. Bescoby, “Society in Cariboo during the Gold Rush.” The Washington Historical Quarterly 24, no. 3 (July 1933): 207.

[2] Adele Perry, “On The Edge of Empire: Gender, Race, and the Making of British Columbia, 1849-1871,” (Toronto: Franca Iacovetta and Karen Dubinsky, 2001), 16.

[3] Adele Perry, “On The Edge of Empire: Gender, Race, and the Making of British Columbia, 1849-1871,” (Toronto: Franca Iacovetta and Karen Dubinsky, 2001), 16-17.

[4] Sylvia Van Kirk, “A Vital Presence: Women in the Cariboo Gold rush, 1862-1875.” British Columbia Reconsidered: Essays on Women, (Vancouver: Gillian Creese and Veronica Strong-Boag, 1992), 22.

[5] Ibid., 24.

[6] Ibid., 24.

[7] Ibid., 25.

[8] Isabel M. L. Bescoby, “Society in Cariboo during the Gold Rush.” The Washington Historical Quarterly 24, no. 3 (July 1933): 200.

[9] Ibid.

[10] Adele Perry, “’Fair Ones of a Purer Caste’: Bringing White Women to British Columbia.” On The Edge of Empire: Gender, Race, and the Making of British Columbia, 1849-1871, (Toronto: Franca Iacovetta and Karen Dubinsky, 2001), 140-141.

[11] Ibid., 139.

[12] Ibid., 141.

[13] Amor De Cosmos, “The Tynemouth’s Invoice of Young Ladies,” The Daily Colonist (Victoria, BC), 11 September 1862, 3.

[14] Ibid.

[15] Ibid.

[16] Adele Perry, “’An Unspeakable Benefit?’: White Women in Colonial Society.” On The Edge of Empire: Gender, Race, and the Making of British Columbia, 1849-1871, (Toronto: Franca Iacovetta and Karen Dubinsky, 2001), 175.

[17] Sylvia Van Kirk, “A Vital Presence: Women in the Cariboo Gold rush, 1862-1875.” British Columbia Reconsidered: Essays on Women, (Vancouver: Gillian Creese and Veronica Strong-Boag, 1992), 31.

[18] Jean Barman, “Taming Aboriginal Sexuality: Gender, Power, and Race in British Columbia, 1850-1900.” BC Studies, no. 115/116 (Autumn/Winter 1997/98): 249.

[19] Jean Barman, “Taming Aboriginal Sexuality: Gender, Power, and Race in British Columbia, 1850-1900.” BC Studies, no. 115/116 (Autumn/Winter 1997/98): 246.

[20] Adele Perry, “’The Prevailing Vice’: Mixed-Race Relationships,” On The Edge of Empire: Gender, Race, and the Making of British Columbia, 1849-1871, (Toronto: Franca Iacovetta and Karen Dubinsky, 2001), 52.

[21] Ibid.

[22] Sylvia Van Kirk, “A Vital Presence: Women in the Cariboo Gold rush, 1862-1875.” British Columbia Reconsidered: Essays on Women, (Vancouver: Gillian Creese and Veronica Strong-Boag, 1992), 31.

[23] Jean Barman, “Taming Aboriginal Sexuality: Gender, Power, and Race in British Columbia, 1850-1900.” BC Studies, no. 115/116 (Autumn/Winter 1997/98): 244.

Bibliography

Barman, Jean. “Taming Aboriginal Sexuality: Gender, Power, and Race in British Columbia, 1850-1900.” BC Studies, no. 115/116 (Autumn/Winter 1997/98): 237-266.

Bescoby, Isabel M. L. “Society in Cariboo during the Gold Rush.” The Washington Historical Quarterly 24, no. 3 (July 1933): 195-207.

De Cosmos, Amor. “The Tynemouth’s Invoice of Young Ladies.” The Daily Colonist, 11 September 1862.

Perry, Adele. “’An Unspeakable Benefit?’: White Women in Colonial Society.” In On The Edge of Empire:       Gender, Race, and the Making of British Columbia, 1849-1871,  edited by Franca Iacovetta and Karen Dubinsky, 167-193. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001.

Perry, Adele. “’Fair Ones of a Purer Caste’: Bringing White Women to British Columbia.” In On The Edge of Empire: Gender, Race, and the Making of British Columbia, 1849-1871,  edited by Franca Iacovetta and Karen Dubinsky, 139-166. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001.

Perry, Adele. “’The Prevailing Vice’: Mixed-Race Relationships,” In On The Edge of Empire: Gender, Race, and the Making of British Columbia, 1849-1871, edited by Franca Iacovetta and Karen Dubinsky, 48-78. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001.

Van Kirk, Sylvia. “A Vital Presence: Women in the Cariboo Gold rush, 1862-1875.” In British Columbia Reconsidered: Essays on Women, edited by Gillian Creese and Veronica Strong-Boag, 21-37.  Vancouver: Press Gang Publishers, 1992