Clark County history: In the fur trade, New Year’s Day was the season’s beloved holiday

In the fur trade, New Year’s Day, not Christmas, was the season’s more beloved holiday. Before Christmas and after New Year’s Day, Hudson’s Bay Company Fort Vancouver employees and families enjoyed an extended year-end celebration. The company released employees from work, allowing them a raucous holiday period crowded with events. We know this thanks to an HBC clerk. Thomas Lowe kept a diary describing the fort community’s 1840s holiday proceedings. For New Year’s Eve 1845, he mentioned, “Singing, dancing, and all kinds of fun carried on to a late — or rather early — hour in Bachellor’s Hall.”

The fort’s mixed population enjoyed additional New Year’s food and drink provided by the company. In 1844, Lowe mentioned steak, wheat and a half-pint of rum on “the last day of the year.” For 1847, employees received “a pint of rum to make themselves merry.” These extra rations likely kept workers’ families going due to food shortages and alcohol restrictions.

Between the holidays, the fort’s officers and families attended various social parties, including dances, balls and card parties, continuing as the year’s end approached. Even the stern chief factor, Dr. John McLoughlin, hosted holiday card parties in 1844.

With Americans immigrating west, Oregon City, Ore., grew, and the U.S. Army Regiment of Mounted Riflemen came. Joseph Lane, governor of Oregon Territory, hosted a ball in the city in 1845 for several fort gentlemen and their families. “A party of the regimental band performed during the evening,” Lowe wrote, noting that it “did not break up until between two and three o’clock in the morning.” Lowe and friends had breakfast with the mounted rifle leaders the following day and “heard their beautiful brass band perform.” Lowe and his companions “passed the day shopping and strolling” in the city.

Men from the fort went out on New Year’s Day to visit and swap praises. On Jan. 1, 1846, Lowe journaled that he “visited all of the ladies in the Fort to wish them a Happy New Year and many returns.” Weather permitting, the men held shooting matches. On New Year’s Day 1848, Lowe wrote, “the only way we could enjoy ourselves was taking our guns and pistols and firing at a target.”

At 3 p.m., company officers enjoyed a large formal dinner. Six U.S. Army artillery officers from the new military garrison on the slope above visited the fort in 1850. “The dinner was kept up until rather an unusual hour at this place,” Lowe reported, “and one or two of the (Army) officers indulged pretty freely.” The celebration continued after dinner, sometimes loudly. Lowe recounted in 1846 that they “had a splendid Ball up in the Hall, which went off remarkably well and was kept up until 3 o’clock in the morning, after which we sat down to supper.” Lowe said Dr. Forbes Barclay held a whist-playing card party in his quarters in 1850.

The celebration often continued days past Jan. 2. In 1846, the crew of the 18-gun sloop HMS Modeste invited the fort’s staff aboard to see plays with singing and hornpipes. “We went ashore at about 12 at night, highly delighted with the evening’s entertainment,” Lowe concluded.