Qu'Appelle River - History

History

In 1787, the North West Company established a fur trading post at Fort Espérance on the lower river. After it was abandoned in 1819, the Hudson's Bay Company established a post at Fort Qu'Appelle in 1852 immediately adjacent to the site of what became the town of the same name.

The Qu'Appelle River and Valley derive their name from a Cree legend of a spirit that travels up and down it. The aboriginal people told the North West Company trader Daniel Harmon in 1804 that they often heard the voice of a human being calling, "Kâ-têpwêt?", meaning "Who is calling?" ("Qui appelle?" in French). They would respond, and the call would echo back (there is a strong echo phenomenon at Lebret). Pauline Johnson, the half-Mohawk poet, whose "work was well received by critics and was popular with the public during her lifetime, but faded into obscurity after her death," and who made speaking tours of Canada, the United States, and England between 1892 and 1909, learned of the legend and elaborated upon it with Victorian sentiment. In her version, a young Cree swain heard his name while crossing one of the lakes and replied, "Who calls?" Only his echo could be heard (hence Echo Lake), and he realized it had been his bride-to-be calling out his name at the instant of her death. Despite its evidently fictional nature, it is the trumped-up romantic version that holds sway today.