Part 10 (1/2)
For thereby hangs a tale redolent with a record of hard work. In the spring of 1899 a Board of Health had been formed, under the general oversight of the Mounted Police, for Superintendent Steele (later succeeded by Superintendent Perry) was chairman, Corporal Wilson (though not on the Board) Sanitary Inspector, H. Grotchie and Dr. J. W. Good succeeding Dr. Thompson, who was the first medical officer, but had gone on leave. The year 1898 had been fever-scourged and haunted by a plague of scurvy, due largely to the lack of vegetables and fruit it was said.
Dr. Good determined that this condition, resulting from the rush of thousands of people to camp on a frozen swamp, would not recur, and when Dr. Good made his mind up and contracted those heavy black brows of his something had to be done or he would know the reason why.
Dr. Good was a noted specialist in Winnipeg from the early days--a man of powerful physique, wide general education, and a grim kind of manner, which was redeemed from dourness by the constant bubbling up of the irrepressible humour which made him a most entertaining companion. He went into Dawson over the pa.s.ses in the big trek princ.i.p.ally from sheer love of the adventure, as most would say (and he had the adventurous spirit), but largely, I imagine, to be of service in what, to his practised understanding, might become a death camp. He had no need of seeking wealth, as his practice had always brought large revenue from the well-to-do, though a lot of poor people got no bills for his services. Dr. Good was and is (for he is still happily with us) a distinct type, and I say this out of personal acquaintance through many years. His battle for the health of the people of Dawson and districts was great and successful. He gives a semi-humorous report of it in a formal report to the Mounted Police Department. From it we make an extract: The Doctor says, ”The duties of the Medical Health Officer were somewhat varied. I will give you a summary of them. Firstly, to inspect hospitals from time to time; secondly, to see indigents at his office or their homes, if necessary, and to examine them and see if they could be admitted to hospital. Thirdly, to inspect the water supply. Fourthly, to inspect the food and aid in the prosecution of those selling food unfit for use. Fifthly, to visit all vessels arriving, and when fish, cattle or food were on board, inspect everything before it can be landed.
Sixthly, to inspect all cattle, sheep and hogs before they could be slaughtered to see if they were healthy, from which it must be inferred that the Medical Health Officer had studied veterinary medicine as well.
I regret to say this was not the case.” (This was the Doctor's modesty, but Steele says the knowledge of veterinary science he displayed was remarkable.) And then the Doctor adds in his humorous way: ”Now, from the above, it must be plain that the Medical Health Officer led an exceedingly active and useful life.” And we agree with him. And the Doctor goes on to give us a vivid picture of conditions in Dawson City when he took hold: ”We found practically one vast swamp, which is usually navigable in the early spring, still in almost a primitive condition, or even worse, cesspools and filth of all kinds occupying irregular positions, typhoid fever and scurvy rife in the land. We immediately went to work to put the house in order, getting out all the garbage and refuse on the ice in the early spring, so that it might be carried down the river at the break up. We then specified places at which garbage, etc., should be dumped. We had the streets cleaned, by prison and other labour, had offensive material removed and rubbish burnt, while the Governor, with great vigour, inaugurated a system of drainage, so that in a short time the change excited the wonder and admiration of the people.” The doctor is evidently fond of Scriptural phrases, for above he has spoken about ”putting the house in order,” and now he adds: ”We had, of course, some difficulties to contend with, the fact that people to a large extent were 'strangers and pilgrims,' and unaccustomed to any restrictions unless those of a primitive order.” But the Doctor, with the aid of the Mounted Police officers already named, as well as Corporals Wilson, McPhail and the men generally, triumphed and made the place healthy. Perhaps there is nothing more remarkable in the record of the Police than the way in which, wherever they were stationed, they always fought epidemics and disease amongst Indians or whites or Esquimaux to the utter disregard of their own safety, though it was not necessarily part of their ordinary duty.
How close an oversight was kept by the Mounted Police as to the movements of people in that wild country is evidenced by the fact that men could not ”disappear” between the Police posts or elsewhere without their case giving rise to swift inquiry. If they left one point for another and did not arrive in a reasonable time the fact was in the knowledge of the Police, and they immediately started to trace the missing parties to see whether they had gone lost through missing the trail or had vanished off the earth by the hands of murderous characters. All this comes out in the famous case of one O'Brien who was tried and executed at Dawson for one of the most cold-blooded crimes imaginable. As I was writing, at this point a letter came from Mr. H. P.
Hansen, of Winnipeg, who said he had stayed at Fossal's road-house in the Upper Yukon about two weeks before O'Brien committed his triple murder. He and O'Brien were the only guests and had started out on the trail together. Hansen says, ”No doubt this man had murder in his heart at the time,” but as he had no knowledge of the fact that Hansen carried money carefully concealed, O'Brien, probably with some disgust, did nothing. That O'Brien ”had murder in his heart” is more than likely, because when his trial came off a ”Bowery tough” who had been in prison with him in Dawson for some other offence testified that O'Brien had proposed that they should, when freed, go along the river and find a lonely spot. Here they should camp, shoot men who were coming out from Dawson with money, put their bodies under the ice, and thus cover their tracks. This was too much of a programme for even the ”Bowery tough,”
but it shows...o...b..ien's disposition. O'Brien, however, seems to have decided to haunt that trail till he could make a killing, and so he seems to have doubled back after leaving Hansen and landed at Fossal's road-house again, whence he started out with three men on Christmas Day of 1899. The three men were Olsen, a Swede, who was a telegraph line repairer, and two men from Dawson, F. Clayson, of Seattle, and L.
Relphe, who had been a ”caller-off” in a Dawson dance-hall. Clayson was known to have a large sum of money on him, and he became the particular object of O'Brien's attention, but because ”dead men tell no tales” the others had to share in the disaster, and O'Brien, at an opportune time in a camping-place, as afterwards transpired, shot all three men first through the body and then through the head to make sure. There was no human witness to the event. But when these men did not turn up at the next point on the trail, and O'Brien did, the Police began rapid investigation. If there were no eye-witnesses in the case a web of circ.u.mstantial evidence would have to be woven around the figure of the fourth man of the party if the facts that would emerge justified it.
This was done with consummate skill but with absolute fairness by the Mounted Police, Inspector Scarth, officer commanding at Fort Selkirk, being the directing hand, Corporal Ryan doing some important parts and Constable Pennycuick being the ”Sherlock Holmes” genius whose keen detective instincts and arduous persistent work won high praise from the judge at the trial, being those mainly instrumental in bringing this cold-blooded and cruel murderer to justice. The Police have always had a free hand as to expense in the enforcement of law, and the O'Brien case ran up a bill of over $100,000. But the reputation built up throughout the years by these guardians of public safety, that they would get a criminal if they had to follow him to the ends of the earth, saved the Dominions uncounted expenditure in other ways, and established Canada in the opinion of the world as a country where desirable citizens could come, build homes, rear their families and pursue their avocations freer from molestation than in any other similarly situated place on the face of earth. And that was an enormous gain for a new land which needed immigrants to populate its vast territory and develop its immense latent resources.
Somewhat briefly, the way the Police got O'Brien was in this fas.h.i.+on.
The Police, as above mentioned, kept close ”tab” on travellers by trail or river for the sake of their safety, and a few days after Olsen, Relphe, Clayson and O'Brien left Fossal's road-house at Minto, Sergeant Barker, who was in charge at Five Fingers, and who had been notified of their departure, wired to White Horse that the party had not been heard of since. And the wires were kept hot in all directions, while patrols also were sent out to locate the men who had not turned up at the usual points. At that time murder was not necessarily a theory connected with their disappearance. Nearly ten days after Christmas the alert Police at Tagish post saw a man with horse and sleigh making a detour of the trail on pa.s.sing their quarters. This aroused their suspicion, and they gathered in the man and his outfit, after pulling them out of a hole in the ice to which the detour had brought them. The man said his name was...o...b..ien, but he was sullen and would say no more. They took no chances, but brought him before the commanding officer, who sentenced him to ”six months” for vagrancy. Several big bank notes were found on his person, also packed in crevices on the sleigh, and also a strange nugget of gold, shaped like a human hand holding a smaller nugget. It was found out that O'Brien had displayed this nugget as a curiosity at a road-house a few nights before, and later on it was found that Relphe, one of the men who had vanished, had a penchant for curios, and amongst them had this nugget and a specially odd coin. Things were beginning to look interesting and, as Inspector Scarth wanted a man who answered O'Brien's description for robbing the cache of Mr. Hansen at Wolf's Island, O'Brien was sent up to Fort Selkirk and held on that charge.
Then Sergeant Holmes (rather a curious coincidence in detective names) was sent on detachment to Fossal's road-house with Constable Pennecuick to see if there were any traces of the lost men. Pennecuick proved himself a veritable sleuth. In a short time he discovered a place on the river bank where some one had climbed, although snow had fallen plentifully since. He also found to his surprise a clear view of the river up and down for miles. This was unusual in such a place, and on investigation he found that trees had been cut down so that a look-out could be kept. He examined the tree stumps closely, and found they had all been cut with an axe which had three flaws in it, one at one end and two near together. He kept portions of the wood, and later on discovered that when O'Brien had been released from jail in Dawson, some months before, he had been given his stuff back, and the police-sergeant testified at the trial that he had furnished O'Brien with an axe (a very necessary thing for travellers on the northern trails) in place of one that had been lost. The sergeant said, ”It was a spare axe and I sharpened it for him, and gave it to him with a sort of apology because it still had three rather large nicks in it, one at the top and two close together at the bottom.” Of course, Pennecuick did not know about this axe when he found the trees chopped down, but his examination of the stumps shows that he omitted nothing in his scrutiny.
When Pennecuick noted that, he hunted for traces of a trail, and found such traces leading to the river. He got a broom and swept the whole way down. Klondikers recall Christmas '98 as soft in the morning and freezing at night. So marks made that morning would stay, and Pennecuick found that some heavy body or bodies had been dragged down to a place in the ice where, though now frozen over, these bodies had been put in the river. Pennecuick reasoned that if O'Brien was going to kill these men he would not do it on the river where he might be seen. So the sleuth went back up into the bush and swept away till he came to some evidences of blood, then he found three .32 revolver bullets, and one in the earth from a .45 rifle.
Next day, as Pennecuick came back to work he met a dog on the river.
Dogs crop up all over the Northern history, and many times they were important links in the chains of evidence. Pennecuick recognized the dog as...o...b..ien's, which had been kept in barracks at Dawson by the Police and fed and petted when O'Brien was in jail there before. The dog recognized the uniform, fawned on the wearer of it, and when Pennecuick said ”Go home, sir, go home,” the dog turned and trotted up the bank and then turned aside where some slight trail showed. Pennecuick, of course, followed, and came to a tent cabin in which he found the .45-calibre rifle. Raking in the snow, he discovered that clothing had been burned, for he found some b.u.t.tons with the name of a Seattle firm. Then he went in and searched the stove and found more relics. But he felt that probably O'Brien had emptied the pockets of his victims' clothes before he burned them, and likely had thrown the things away from the fire that might lead to his identification with the murder if he kept them. So Pennecuick did the same thing with articles out of his own pocket, watching where they fell. Then he carefully swept again, and found not only his own things, but a key that fitted Clayson's safe in Seattle and the strange coin that Relphe had carried. When the spring came the bodies were found on sand-bars and were easily identified, even by the fitting of some fragments of teeth that Pennecuick had found where the men had been shot in the head by the revolver after they had fallen before the rifle. And at the trial also the large bills that had been found in possession of O'Brien were identified as having been the property of Clayson, as the nugget and coin were shown to have been Relphe's.
There were other items of evidence, the exhibits nearly exhausted the alphabet, and there was a very long list of witnesses brought from many quarters. The Crown Prosecutor was Mr. Fred O. Wade, K.C. (now Agent-General for British Columbia in London), and he handled the case with consummate ability. His address to the jury was a marvel of logical, irresistible emphasis on every point of evidence. Inspector Scarth gave Mr. Wade most valuable a.s.sistance during the long trial. The prisoner O'Brien was ably defended, but there is no evidence so strong as circ.u.mstantial evidence when it is compactly pieced together, and the jury took only half an hour to reach the verdict of ”Guilty.” O'Brien received the death sentence, and spent a lot of time before his execution in cursing the Mounted Police who, as another outlaw once said, ”would give a gunman no chance in this blamed Canada country.” It was a long and costly effort on their part, extending nearly two years in the case of O'Brien, but it gave notice to the world that Canadians would not tolerate lax views on the sacredness of human life.
It seems appropriate that in that same year, 1900, an injustice to the Mounted Police should be at length removed by the granting of medals to the men of the Force who had served in the North-West Rebellion of 1885.
At the conclusion of that rebellion, medals had been granted to all others who had been on military duty against Louis Riel's revolt, but they were only given to the Mounted Police who had been actually under fire in an engagement. We do not care to know who was responsible for this extraordinary piece of invidious distinction. The Mounted Police have practically always been on active service and always liable to be under fire at any moment. Those who know the history know that all the members of the Force rendered service of enormous value to Canada and the Empire during that war time, whether in an engagement or not. They policed the vast plains and, with endless patience and cool courage, held at peace the thousands of Indians who might have swept the defenceless settlements with destruction. These men deserved the medal and should have had it at the outset, but better late than never.
It is antic.i.p.ating a little in one respect, but in another it is looking backwards. During the years since their organization the Mounted Police had furnished escorts and convoys for the successive Governors-General in their official tours over the vast North-West. Before the railway era this involved long journeys and much extra duty, cheerfully undertaken and chivalrously as well as skilfully carried out for the comfort of these distinguished travellers, amongst whom were our present good King and his much-loved son, the Prince of Wales. In recognition of these services the Commissioner has received for himself and his men warm thanks, as well as expressions of high admiration for the courtesies and services rendered by the Police, as well as for their fine bearing as soldierly men.
And all these find fitting climax in the fact that His Majesty King Edward, ”First Gentleman of Europe,” gave his personal recognition of all the splendid services rendered to the Empire by the Police by conferring on the Force the t.i.tle ”Royal.” This intimation was made in the Canada Gazette in 1904 in this manner:
”His Majesty the King has been graciously pleased to confer the t.i.tle of 'Royal' upon the North-West Mounted Police Force.”
Referring to this honour, Commissioner Perry said in his report of that year:
”The force is deeply sensible of the high honour conferred upon it, and I trust it will continue by loyalty, integrity and devotion to duty to merit the great distinction which His Majesty has been so graciously pleased to bestow upon it.”
The Commissioner has always trusted and believed in his men, and he has not been disappointed.
CHAPTER XIII
MODESTY AND EFFECTIVENESS
”The population of the Territories has doubled in ten years and the strength of the Force has been reduced by half. Our detachments have increased from 49 to 79.” This was one of the striking and illuminating statements made by Commissioner Perry in his Annual Report for 1901. The Commissioner was looking around and ahead and did not intend that the Government should be left ignorant of the rapid changes which were taking place. The reduction of the Force was a tribute to the extraordinary efficiency of its members in establis.h.i.+ng peace and order throughout a vast domain. But it is not fair or human ”to ride a willing horse to death,” and with increased population and widening areas to oversee, the strain being put upon the men in the corps was too great.
In even the organized portions of the Territories there was only an average of one constable to every 500 square miles. It was highly important that with half the population foreign born, alien to our laws, unacquainted with our inst.i.tutions and disposed to bring with them a sort of a hatred of authority born of experience under old-world despotisms, there should be present the educative and restraining influence of an adequate number of the riders in scarlet and gold.
Without that influence the newly-found liberty of these European immigrants would soon degenerate into licence. Those of us who recall those critical formative days agree with the statement that the constables took a large view of their duties and that their tact and discretion led these strange people not only to obey the laws but to look upon the Police as friends willing to aid and a.s.sist them in every way.
The Commissioner therefore strongly urged not only the maintenance of a sufficiently large force to meet the situation, but pressed for the adoption of his particular policy to have a reserve of at least fifty men always in training at headquarters who would be qualified for detachment duty whenever occasion arose. He gives adequate reason for this policy when he says, ”The men on detached duty are in responsible positions; they have to act on their own initiative, often on matters of considerable public concern; their advice is sought by new settlers. To carry out their important duties satisfactorily they must be well trained, have experience, and be of good character. It is therefore unwise, contrary to the interests of the public and the good reputation of the force, to send on detached duty men who have not the proper qualifications, necessary experience, and who have not yet established a reputation for reliability and sobriety; in other words who have not been tested and proved.”