Editing Fort Qu'Appelle (section)

== Origins and early history ==
The current site is the third Fort Qu'Appelle. The first was a [[North West Company]] trading post (1801–05), also in the valley but near what is now the Saskatchewan-Manitoba border. The Hudson's Bay Company itself first used the name for a post north of present-day [[Whitewood, Saskatchewan|Whitewood]] (some {{cvt|174|km}} east of Regina on [[Saskatchewan Highway 1|Highway 1]]) from 1813 to 1819.{{citation needed|date=September 2023}}

Prior to the mid-19th century establishment of the more lengthily surviving fur-trading post at the ultimate site of the town, it "was the hub of several historic trails that traversed the northwest".<ref>Garth Pugh. "[https://archive.today/20130203183435/http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/articles/fort-quappelle Fort Qu'Appelle]". The Canadian Encyclopedia. Accessed 1 March 2012.</ref> It was the site of a Hudson's Bay Company post from 1852 to 1854. An [[Anglican Church of Canada|Anglican]] mission was established,<ref name="esask.uregina.ca"/><ref>{{cite book
 | title =The American magazine
 | publisher =Crowell-Collier Pub. co.
 | volume=22
 | year =1886
 | pages =525–526
 | url =https://books.google.com/books?id=CPEJAAAAIAAJ&q=%22fort+qu%27appelle%22&pg=PA680
 | quote=Suddenly, the prairie road stopped short, and, 400 feet below us, we saw the beautiful Qu'Appelle Valley, with its four shining lakes, and the winding river connecting them, and on either hand the echoing hills.  No wonder it is named Qu'Appelle 'the valley that calls'; the hills are formed in strange winding shapes, in cones and pyramids and serpent-like forms that catch each sound, and sent it back and forth across the placid water.  Some hills look like great walruses and seals, with their smooth brown backs glistening in the sun; upon others, a light growth of trees, now gorgeous with the Autumn colours, follow the lines of the ravines and coulees. We drive down the valley where the little settlement of Fort Qu'Appelle lies; past the stockade of the Hudson Bay Company, which encloses the warehouses and the residence of the chief factor, Archie McDonald; over the little bridge, and past the second of the lakes, four miles to the Government School. ... The buildings of the mission stand on the shore of the lake, and only a short distance from the school. In 1866, Father Ritchot traveled from Winnipeg by dog-train for the purpose of founding this mission, and from that time to this the Fathers have worked faithfully among the Indians and half-breeds. ... the mission buildings consist of the monastery, a little church, a house for the farm-hands, and for cooking purposes, stables, old store-houses, and a great oven made of clay. ... Back of the monastery is the Indian graveyard; some of the graves are marked simply by a rude wooden cross, but many have singular structures of wood, resembling Chinese pagodas, over them; these are painted black with strange decorations in white painted on them, such as 'polka dots', bands and stripes, and there was one with great white drops to represent tears.}}</ref> which still survives as the town's St. John the Evangelist Anglican parish church.{{citation needed|date=September 2023}}

[[File:Fort Qu'Appelle from the northwest, circa 1910.jpg|left|thumb|Fort Qu'Appelle from the northwest with the eastern shore of Echo Lake, {{circa}} 1905]]
The post was revived again from 1864 to 1911. With the signing of [[Treaty 4]] by [[Cree]] and [[Saulteaux]] peoples at Fort Qu'Appelle the [[North-West Mounted Police]], now the [[Royal Canadian Mounted Police]] (RCMP), arrived<ref name="McLennon">McLennon.</ref>{{full citation needed|date=July 2017}} and have maintained a continuous presence in the town ever since.<ref>{{cite book
 | last =Leggo
 | first =William 
 | title =The history of the administration of the Right Honorable Frederick Temple, Earl of Dufferin ... late Governor General of Canada
 | publisher =Lovell Print. & Pub. Co.
 | year =1878 
 | chapter =Treaty of Qu'Appelle – No. 4 in September 1874 – "Who Calls" – Indian Tradition – Account of proceedins at Fort Qu'Appelle 
 | chapter-url =https://books.google.com/books?id=KC56AAAAMAAJ&q=%22fort+qu%27appelle%22&pg=PA565
 |quote=The Council at Fort Qu'Appelle, a Hudson Bay trading post, at the junction of the Qu'Appelle and Assiniboine, was composed of representatives of the Plain Crees and Salteaux nations.}}</ref>

Substantial transformation of Fort Qu'Appelle occurred when farm development began in the 1880s and farmers required a nearby urban centre for selling their grain and other products, purchasing agricultural and domestic supplies and for social gathering beyond rural schools and churches. It was not anticipated that initial partition of agricultural land into farms of one-quarter section ({{convert|160|acres|disp=sqbr}}) would not last long and farm population would substantially reduce very quickly; the process accelerated in the 1970s when farmers began selling their land and retiring in substantial numbers to Fort Qu'Appelle as the custom of elderly farmers remaining at home with offspring passed into history, and more retired to town.{{citation needed|date=September 2023}}

[[File:Fort Qu'Appelle cycling club before Hudson's Bay store, 1898.jpg|thumb|left|Fort Qu'Appelle cycling club before Hudson's Bay store, 1898]]
The name "Qu'Appelle" comes from is French for 'who calls' and is derived from its Cree name, kah-tep-was (in Modern [[Plains Cree language|Plains Cree]]: kâ-têpwêt ᑳ ᑌᐻᐟ 'river that calls'). There are several versions of the origin of this name, but the most popular suggests it refers to a Cree legend of two ill-fated lovers."<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://esask.uregina.ca/entry/quappelle_river.html |title=Lewry, Marilyn. "Qu'Appelle River". The Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan. CANADIAN PLAINS RESEARCH CENTER, UNIVERSITY OF REGINA. Retrieved 10 December 2011 |access-date=10 December 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120503112830/http://esask.uregina.ca/entry/quappelle_river.html |archive-date=3 May 2012 |url-status=dead }}</ref> The name refers to the once-popular legend of the Qu'Appelle Valley versified by [[E. Pauline Johnson]] and known nation-wide. "Fort Qu'Appelle was the crossroads of a number of historic trails that traversed the North-West Territories."<ref>[http://esask.uregina.ca/entry/fort_quappelle.html McLennan, David. "Fort Qu'Appelle". The Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan. CANADIAN PLAINS RESEARCH CENTER, UNIVERSITY OF REGINA. Retrieved 3 March 2012]</ref>
{{check quotation}}

The town is immediately adjacent to the site of the original Fort Qu'Appelle [[Hudson's Bay Company]] trading post, whose "factory" is maintained as a historical site and museum. The Hudson's Bay trading post was built in 1864<ref name="esask.uregina.ca">[http://esask.uregina.ca/entry/fort_quappelle.html David McLennon, "Fort Qu'Appelle," ''Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan''.] Retrieved 19 November 2007</ref> when the company's activity was still largely confined to the [[fur trade]] with [[First Nations in Canada|First Nations]] residents.<ref name="ReferenceB">[http://esask.uregina.ca/entry/fort_quappelle.html McLennan, David. "Fort Qu'Appelle". The Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan. CANADIAN PLAINS RESEARCH CENTER, UNIVERSITY OF REGINA. Retrieved 14 March 2012]</ref> "[P]emmican was shipped down valley on a Hudson's Bay Company cart trail to supply the paddlers of the fur trade in more forested regions."<ref>Norm Henderson, "Qu'Appelle Valley". ''The Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan''. http://esask.uregina.ca/entry/quappelle_valley.html. Retrieved 1 December 2012.</ref>

Despite the once well-known gathering of General Middleton and soldiers at Qu'Appelle, at the westernmost extreme of the still-incomplete [[Canadian Pacific Railway]] (CPR) and some kilometres south of the Qu'Appelle Valley, "[i] Middleton empowered Captain French, an Irish officer who had been in the North-West Mounted Police (NWMP), to raise a mounted force in the vicinity of Fort Qu'Appelle. ... This mounted troop ... joined the [[10th Royal Grenadiers]] from Toronto and the Winnipeg Field Battery under the command of artillery officer Lieutenant-Colonel C.E. Montizambert, to form the west-bank column that would march from Qu'Appelle to Batoche",<ref>Peter Borch, Daria Coneghan, "French's Scouts," ''The Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan.'' http://esask.uregina.ca/entry/frenchs_scouts.html. Retrieved 18 January 2013.</ref> where the notorious battling would occur.

After ethnic European settlement by farmers had become established in the 1880s—a post office being established in 1880<ref name="ReferenceB"/>—the original Hudson's Bay Company activity was replaced by its department store on Broadway Street in 1897. By this time the fur trade had lapsed but the town community and farmers travelling into town for shopping had substantially increased in number. The store building remains though long disused by the Bay.

[[File:Fort Qu'Appelle, circa 1910.jpg|thumb|left|Fort Qu'Appelle, circa 1910]]
There was once certain ambiguity as to entitlement to the town-name between the present town and the once-significant regional centre bearing the name "Qu'Appelle"; the matter ceased to be an issue in 1911 when the two communities agreed to deem the then-CPR station site as Qu'Appelle and the town in the valley as Fort Qu'Appelle.<ref name="QuAppelle EofS">{{cite encyclopedia | last = McLennan | first = David | title = Qu'Appelle | encyclopedia = The Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan. | publisher = CANADIAN PLAINS RESEARCH CENTER, UNIVERSITY OF REGINA | url = http://esask.uregina.ca/entry/quappelle.html | access-date = 13 July 2007 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20170730044128/http://esask.uregina.ca/entry/quappelle.html | archive-date = 30 July 2017 | url-status = dead }}</ref> As did the town of Qu'Appelle, Fort Qu'Appelle early-on had "a bid to succeed Battleford as the territorial capital" but "lost out to Regina ... in 1882".<ref>Garth Pugh. "[https://archive.today/20130203183435/http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/articles/fort-quappelle Fort Qu'Appelle]". The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica-Dominion. Retrieved 16 March 2012.</ref>

The name Fort Qu'Appelle was given to a number of trading posts in the Qu'Appelle valley. Near [[Fort Espérance]] both the Hudson's Bay Company and the [[North West Company]] had temporary posts that were apparently called Fort Qu'Appelle. (The Hudson's Bay Company and the North West Company merged in 1821.) From 1855 until 1864 the Hudson's Bay Company had a Fort Qu'Appelle a little south of where [[McLean, Saskatchewan|McLean]] was later established. It was an outpost of [[Fort Ellice]] and was mainly a source of [[pemmican]]. In 1864 it was moved to the present site of Fort Qu'Appelle.<ref>Elizabeth Brown Losey. "Let Them be Remembered: The Story of the Fur Trade Forts", 1999, page 659-667</ref>

Three industrial boarding schools for First Nations adolescents were established in 1883, including one on the south side of Mission Lake across from [[Lebret, Saskatchewan|Lebret]] on the north side of the lake, as well as [[Battleford]] and High River.<ref>Blair Stonechild. "[http://esask.uregina.ca/entry/aboriginal_peoplesof_saskatchewan.html Aboriginal Peoples of Saskatchewan]". ''The Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan''. Retrieved 1 December 2012.</ref>

It was often claimed that colonial administration of Canada, once [[British North America]], was very different from that in other British colonies. But it has been alleged to have been corruption on the part of [[Edgar Dewdney]] when he was [[Lieutenant Governor of the North-West Territories]] to place the capital in Buffalo Bones rather than Fort Qu'Appelle or Qu'Appelle. On the other hand, Fort Qu'Appelle is strikingly similar to [[Murree]], northeast of [[Rawalpindi]] and once the summer capital of [[British India]], and [[Pyin Oo Lwin|Maymyo]], [[Burma]] highlands. It was in 1915 that "Sir Robert Borden has been invited by the Saskatchewan Art Society to unveil a memorial at Ft. Qu'Appelle to the signing of the first treaty in 1874 between the Dominion and the plains Indians."<ref>{{cite web
 | title =Qu'Appelle Memorial
 | work =The Christian Science Monitor
 | date =23 October 1915
 | url =https://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/csmonitor_historic/access/213177652.html?dids=213177652:213177652&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:AI&date=Oct+23%2C+1915&author=&pub=Christian+Science+Monitor&desc=QU%27APPELLE+MEMORIAL&pqatl=google
 | archive-url =https://archive.today/20130411165732/http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/csmonitor_historic/access/213177652.html?dids=213177652:213177652&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:AI&date=Oct+23,+1915&author=&pub=Christian+Science+Monitor&desc=QU'APPELLE+MEMORIAL&pqatl=google
 | url-status =dead
 | archive-date =11 April 2013
 | access-date = 2013-02-10
}}</ref> The site of the fort was designated a [[national historic site of Canada]] in 1953.<ref>{{CRHP|18988|Fort Qu'Appelle|12 August 2012}}</ref>

<gallery>
File:Qu Appalle Valley 1885 Rebellion.jpg|Troops on the march, [[North-West Rebellion]], Qu'Appelle Valley, 1885
File:Police parade before Fort mainstreat shop.gif|Police parade before Hudson's Bay Company shop, built before the town developed
File:Hudson's Bay post pre-1914.jpg|Hudson's Bay post, pre-1914. Today a museum
File:Treaty 4 monument.jpg|Monument to Treaty 4 signing
</gallery>