History Pre-confederation (to 1867)
Fortune's A River
The Collision of Empires in Northwest America
- Publisher
- Harbour Publishing Co. Ltd.
- Initial publish date
- Nov 2008
- Category
- Pre-Confederation (to 1867)
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9781550174595
- Publish Date
- Nov 2008
- List Price
- $28.95
-
Hardback
- ISBN
- 9781550174281
- Publish Date
- Oct 2007
- List Price
- $36.95
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Description
Winner of the John Lyman Book Award for best Canadian naval and maritime history
Finalist for the Nereus Writers' Trust Non-fiction Award
Finalist for the Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize, BC Book Prize
Longlisted for the 2007 Victoria Butler Book Prize
Honourable Mention for the Canadian Nautical Research Society's Keith Matthews Award
Fortune's a River is the most authoritative and readable account to date of just how British Columbia became British and how Oregon, Washington and Alaska became American. By the closing years of the 18th century, the stage was set for a major international confrontation over the Northwest Coast. Imperial Russia was firmly established in Alaska, Spain was extending its trade routes north from Mexico, Captain James Cook had claimed Northwest America for England and Captain Robert Gray had claimed the Columbia River region for the United States. Open warfare between Spain and England was narrowly averted during the Nootka Sound Controversy of 1789-1794, and again between Britain and the US in the War of 1812, when a British warship seized American property in Oregon.
In Fortune's a River, noted historian Barry Gough re-examines this Imperial struggle for possession of the future British Columbia and fully evokes its peculiar drama. It turned out the great powers were reluctant conquerors in this area. Russia and Spain withdrew of their own accord. Britain was in a position to dominate, but couldn't be bothered. The US vaguely wished to fulfill its manifest destiny by securing the Northwest Coast, but it was not a priority. In the end the battle was carried on by private enterprise and individuals of vision. Alexander Mackenzie established an overland route to the coast and with his partners Simon Fraser and David Thompson, set up a network of fur trading forts south to Oregon. US president Thomas Jefferson countered by sending out the Lewis and Clark expedition to strengthen American claims and an American entrepreneur, John Jacob Astor, established a lonely US outpost at Astoria. Gough examines each of the players in this territorial drama, bringing them fully to life and vividly recounting their hardships and struggles. Fortune's a River is a major historical work that reads like a wild west adventure.
About the author
Dr. Barry Gough, one of Canada's foremost historians, is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, Fellow of King's College London and Life Member of the Association of Canadian Studies, and has been awarded a Doctor of Letters for distinguished contributions to Imperial and Commonwealth history. He is well recognized for the authenticity of his research and the engaging nature of his narratives, and is the author of many critically acclaimed books, including Fortune's A River: The Collision of Empires in Northwest America (Harbour, 2007), which won the John Lyman Book Award for best Canadian naval and maritime history and was shortlisted for the Writers' Trust Non-Fiction Prize. Gough has been writing for almost four decades. He lives in Victoria, BC, with his wife, Marilyn.
Awards
- Short-listed, Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize, BC Book Prize
- Short-listed, Finalist for the Nereus Writers' Trust Non-fiction Award
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First Governor of Vancouver Island
Possessing Meares Island
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Churchill and Fisher
The titans at the Admiralty who fought the First World War
Britannia's Navy on the West Coast of North America, 1812-1914
From Classroom to Battlefield
Victoria High School and the First World War
The Elusive Mr. Pond
The Soldier, Fur Trader and Explorer Who Opened the Northwest
Juan de Fuca's Strait
Voyages in the Waterway of Forgotten Dreams
Distant Dominion
Britain and the Northwest Coast of North America, 1579-1809
Through Water, Ice & Fire
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New dimensions in ethnohistory
Papers of the second Laurier Conference on Ethnohistory and Ethnology