Voorhis Interactive: Posts of the Trade

[Abitibi (2)]   Fr GMaps
ID: 2  Voorhis Number: 2 ;   Location: Ontario, Canada [48.747, -79.905] ;    Founded: pre 1688 , Closed: NA .

A second fort was located on the S. W. shore of the Narrows at the end of a long peninsula commanding entrance to Lower Lake Abitibi, about 30 miles distant from the first fort. It was built by the French before 1688 and is shown as Maison Française on Jaillot's map 1695 No. 7. Franquelin's 1688, and De l'Isle's 1703 (No. 18).

After the recall of the French troops about 1760, both the Abitibi forts were occupied for short periods by freetraders, but the Hudson's Bay Company was established in the first of the forts at the east end before 1774, and it became an important outpost of Moose Factory after 1783. At first all supplies for this post were brought from Moose Factory up the Abitibi river, but for some years before 1890 they were taken up the Ottawa. Both forts were operated by the Compagnie du Nord in 1695. The free traders in the second fort at the Narrows were succeeded by the North West Company about 1783 which operated the fort until the union of the two companies in 1821, when the Hudson's Bay Co. took over this fort. In 1783 the Hudson's Bay Co. built the first Frederick House at the confluence of the Abitibi and Frederick House rivers to compete with the free traders established in the old French fort at the narrows. In 1794-96 the Hudson's Bay Co. built a "good house at Abitibi", and rebuilt the old De Troyes fort.

This post has been in continuous operation for more than 200 years. After construction of the Transcontinental railway in 1914, Abitibi post was discontinued and superseded by La Sarre, a small station on the railway nearby, the furs being shipped by rail to Montreal and not sent by canoe to Moose Factory as formerly.

Both forts are shown on Geological Survey Map of 1901 "Lake Abitibi Region", No. 71.



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