Fort Vancouver Historic Structures Report

History and location

The business of the Columbia District required the use of large quantities of saddlery, harness, and pack gear of all sorts The annual brigades to the Snake Country and California perhaps were the best-known consumers of such equipment, but the long horse trains that carried in the annual outfits at least part of the way to Nisqually, New Caledonia, and other posts and brought out the fur returns probably employed even more gear. The oxen that dragged logs for new construction and for the sawmills required harness, and the animals used for ploughing, harvesting, and hauling about the farms and depot created another heavy demand.

From the start of the Company's operations on the Pacific Slope much of the requirement was met by local manufacture, both at the depot and at the individual posts. But sizable quantities of harness were imported from Europe. In 1842 the Governor and Committee in London felt it necessary to call Chief Factor McLoughlin's attention to the disadvantages of the latter practice. "We cannot help noticing," they wrote, "the heavy outlay, incurred of late years in the purchase of Agricultural implements threshing machines, horse tackle &c &c, which it is desirable to reduce as much as possible: the wood work of Ploughs, we think ought to be prepared in the country, likewise horse collars, hames and harness." [1]

Obviously, there must have been a harness shop at Fort Vancouver practically from its beginning in 1825, but no indication of its exact location during the earlier years has yet been found. Perhaps it was situated outside the stockade as late as 1841, because the list of buildings inside the fort prepared by Lt. George Foster Emmons on July 25 of that year makes no mention of a harness shop or saddler's shop (see Plate III, vol. I).

The first evidence of the existence within the pickets of a structure devoted to the making of horse and draft animal equipment is found in the Vavasour ground plan of late 1845, which shows a "Harness Shop" located between the Big House Kitchen and the Bakery in the northeast corner of the stockade enclosure (Plate VI, vol. I). To be more precise, the Harness Shop was, according to Vavasour, about fifteen feet south of the north stockade wall, about twenty-five feet east of the Kitchen, and about thirty-five feet west of the "Bake House." The site of this 1845 Harness Shop is today identified as Building No. 19 on the site plan of Fort Vancouver National Historic Site.

It will be recalled from Chapter IV on the Bakery, in volume I of this study, that the site of the 1845 Harness Shop had been occupied in 1841 by a building of approximately the same size and shape, which Emmons identified as the "Bakery" (see Plate III, vol. I). Dating from about 1835-37, the structure functioned as a bakehouse until the late summer of 1844, when evidently the oven or ovens were demolished and the usable brick employed in the construction of the ovens in the new bakery that stood some few yards to the southeast. [2]

Very probably when the ca. 1836-44 Bakery was vacated, the structure was transformed into a harness shop. The other possibility--that the old bakery may have been torn down and replaced by a harness shop of about the same size built on its site--does not seem quite as likely.

The Covington map of 1846 or somewhat later does not identify individual structures within the stockade, but it shows what clearly was Vavasour's "Harness Shop" as still standing (Plate XIII, vol. I). The Hudson's Bay Company's inventory of fort structures made in late 1846 and early 1847 lists a "Saddlers Shop" of forty by twenty-five feet. [3] These dimensions agree exactly with those given on the Vavasour plan. The George Gibbs pencil sketch of July 2, 1851, pictures what can only have been the same structure (second building from the left behind the palisade in Plate XIII, vol. I).

By 1854, however, the situation in the northeastern corner of the fort had altered considerably. The Harness Shop, oriented east and west as it had been from its beginning, can still be identified on the carefully made Bonneville survey of that year (Plate XIX, vol. I), but it was closely hemmed in on both sides by new structures. Almost immediately to the west was a small building that can be identified as the post-1852 Kitchen for the Big House. [4] A north-south-oriented structure directly east of the Harness Shop has not yet been identified (the Wash House had burned in 1852).

About this same time there appears to have been another change of function for the Harness Shop building. On January 23, 1854, a board of United States Army officers made an appraisal of Company buildings at Fort Vancouver. No structure designated as a Harness Shop was mentioned in their report, although because the list was not complete this fact is no proof that the Harness Shop had disappeared or ceased to operate. But for the first time in the sources examined for this study, a structure described as the "butcher's shop" is mentioned. [5]

In this connection it may or may not be significant that in June 1853 the United States Army purchased, among other items required for an exploring expedition, about fifty saddles from the Hudson's Bay Company store at Fort Vancouver. This fact does not necessarily imply that the Harness Shop was operating at that time, because the saddles, which proved to be "perfectly worthless," may have represented old stock. [6]

In an attempt to clarify this situation, one must jump ahead several years to June 15, 1860, when another board of army officers appraised the buildings within the old fort. Their map, which seems to have been reasonably accurate though somewhat diagrammatic in certain respects, does not show a harness shop. It depicts only one building--a small, square structure--between the Kitchen and the Bakery. This building was identified as a "Butcher shop &c, in a ruinous condition" (see Plate XXX, vol. I). [7]

It is not by any means certain that this small butcher shop of 1860, which measured about twenty-five feet square if the board's diagram was accurate, was the former Harness Shop or even part of it, though the butcher shop certainly occupied the same site. But the 1860 appraisal does demonstrate that the Harness Shop had long ceased to function in that location and that a butcher shop, probably since about 1853 or 1854, had operated in the same general area.

In 1866 Dugald Mactavish, a longtime Company employee, testified that a saddler's shop existed at Fort Vancouver as late as 1858. Such could have been the case, but he did not indicate that it was then in the same building as it had been in 1845 or 1846. At any rate, Mactavish's testimony is not as disinterested as could be desired, and his memory was faulty in several instances. [8]

Artifacts recovered on the site of the building during excavations conducted during the spring of 1971 convinced the archeologists that the Harness Shop of 1845 was converted to a butcher shop about 1853 and continued to serve that function until mid-1860. "Items suggestive of harness and light wagon repairs" were recovered on the Harness Shop site, but, Messrs. John J. Hoffman and Lester A. Ross concluded, "much of this evidence was overshadowed by culinary items strewn about the area." In other words, bones of cattle, sheep, pigs, goats, and fowl seemed to point to butchering as the last Company use of the site. [9] The archeologists did state, however, that the excavated evidence for this conversion was "equivocal." [10]

That harness making was discontinued or moved to another location about 1853 or 1854 seems probable from both the historical and the archeological evidence. Equally apparent is the fact that a butcher shop was established in the same section of the fort at about the same time. But what is not so clear, to this writer at least, is whether the butcher shop actually occupied the old Harness Shop structure.

The reasons for this doubt can be understood when one examines several of the maps of the fort area for the period 1854 to 1860. These plans are nearly all small in scale and perhaps do not accurately depict the minor buildings. But beginning with the original Bonneville "Plan of Survey" (Plate XIX, vol. I) and extending through the "Map of the Military Reservation at Fort Vancouver" surveyed under the direction of Capt. George Thom in 1859 (Plate XXIV, vol. I), plans of the fort generally, though not always, show two small buildings between the Kitchen and the Bakery in the place of Vavasour's rather large one. For example, the unsigned 1855 "Topographical Sketch of Fort Vancouver and Environs" (Plate, XXIII, vol. I) shows two small structures in the Harness Shop location, but both are oriented north and south. The Thom survey of 1859 places two small, square buildings on the general Harness Shop site. In neither of these surveys is an east-west oriented structure like the 1845 Harness Shop depicted. And, as has been seen, by mid-1860 one of the smaller structures had disappeared, and the survivor was identified as a butcher shop.

Of the many possible explanations for this confusing picture, two seem most likely in the opinion of the writer. Either the old Harness Shop was replaced around 1854 by two smaller structures, or the saddler's shop may have been reduced in size about that time and only one additional building constructed on or near its original site. In either case, one of the structures was employed as a butcher's shop; it is quite possible that harness-making activities continued in the other.

Unfortunately, the northeastern sector of the fort enclosure was so much disturbed by military and other activities after the Company abandoned the post that only a "bewildering maze of remains" remained to be uncovered by twentieth-century archeologists. [11] Thus archeology, while it was able to establish the location and size of the oven foundation of the ca. 1836-44 Bakery, the chimney location and approximate size of the post-1852 Kitchen, and a few remnants of the Wash House, could throw very little light upon the exact size and structure of the 1845 Harness Shop or upon the succession of buildings that occupied the northeast corner after 1854. [12] Therefore, unless additional documentary or pictorial sources come to light in the future, all that can be known about the physical history of the Harness Shop appears to be summarized in this account.

Rather strangely, the personnel rosters for the Fort Vancouver Depot and Columbia District "General Charges" for Outfit 1845 list no person identified as a saddler or harness maker.

Construction details

a. Dimensions and footings. As has already been seen, both the Vavasour plan of 1845 and the Company's building inventory of 1846-47 agree in giving the dimensions of the Harness Shop as twenty-five by forty feet. There seems to be no reason why these measurements should not be accepted, particularly because archeological excavations in 1952 and 1971 uncovered no corner footings that would have proved the dimensions without a doubt.

In 1952 Archeologist Louis R. Caywood unearthed two blocks of wood, each measuring about one by two feet and oriented east-west, a few feet south of a stone foundation. Because they were situated on the same east-west line and spaced about 12-1/2 feet apart, it was assumed that they represented footings of the Harness Shop. [13] When the site was reexcavated in 1971 these blocks had disappeared. Messrs. Hoffman and Ross were aware of Mr. Caywood's find and believed the two blocks were "near the southern edge of the Harness Shop position." [14]

This writer accepts the assumption that these pieces of wood represented footings, but he wishes to advance the hypothesis that they were near the northern wall of the Harness Shop and represented either interior footings of that structure or footings of one of the smaller buildings that may have been erected later on the Harness Shop site. The reasons for this theory are twofold:

(1) If one examines the original versions of the very accurate Vavasour plan of 1845 (Plates VI and VII, vol. I) he notes that the north wall of the Harness Shop was approximately fifteen feet south of the north stockade line, while the south wall of the shop was about forty feet south of the pickets and about on a line with the north end of the Big House. This measurement is as would be expected for a structure twenty-five feet wide.

Now, if one turns to Mr. Caywood's excavation drawings, sheet 9, one quickly observes that the two footings were between twenty-two and twenty-five feet south of the stockade, depending upon which line of pickets is used as a base. In other words, the footings were from seven to ten feet south of where they might have been expected to have been found had they been footings of the north wall of the Harness Shop.

(2) If one extends the north end of the Big House, as shown on Mr. Caywood's drawings, eastward across the Harness Shop site, one finds that this line is about forty-two to forty-four feet south of the stockade, again depending on which line of pickets is used as a base. This distance corresponds reasonably well with the distance of forty feet given by Vavasour for the south wall of the Harness Shop.

Now, if one measures northward twenty-five feet from this assumed south wall site, one establishes a hypothetical north Harness Shop wall that is roughly sixteen to eighteen feet south of the stockade. Switching now to Figure 1 in Hoffman and Ross, Fort Vancouver Excavations--III, one sees that a line 16-1/2 feet south of the center of the re constructed stockade marks the southern limit of the oven foundations as excavated in 1971 In other words, it would appear that the northern wall of the Harness Shop and the southern end of the oven complex were both, after allowing for a small percentage of error, equidistant from the stockade wall and that that distance was very close to that pictured by Vavasour.

This condition is exactly what one would expect. It will be remembered that from about 1836 to 1844 the Harness Shop structure served as a bakery. Company practice, as proved by archeological evidence on the site of the 1844-60 Bakery and by H.B.C. bakeries at other posts, was to build bake ovens outside of, but abutting, the bakehouse structures proper. The ovens were not shown jutting from the north wall of the Harness Shop on the Vavasour map of 1845 or on the "Line of Fire" map of September 1844, because by those dates, as will be recalled, the bricks had been removed for use in the new bakery.

Having thus suggested the locations of the north and south walls of the 1845 Harness Shop, it seems reasonable to speculate on the positions of the other two walls. It has been seen that the Vavasour plan placed the west wall about twenty-five feet east of the 1845 Big House Kitchen and the east wall about thirty-five to forty feet west of the 1845 "Bake House." Unfortunately, these measurements could not have been correct, because the distance between the 1845 Kitchen and the Bakery was closer to 125 feet than to 105 feet.

Nevertheless, the east-west position can be established within fairly close limits. On the east, archeologists have uncovered two privy pits situated along the west side of the northern end of the east stockade as it stood in 1841 (line CF on Plate I, vol. I). These privy pits appear to have been about sixteen to seventeen feet east of the ca. 1836-44 oven complex unearthed in 1971. Because the east wall of the ca. 1836 Bakery (later Harness Shop) must have stood at least five feet west of these privies, the north wall of the structure could not have extended more than about eleven or twelve feet east of the oven complex. Allowing eleven feet for the width of the oven complex as reported by Messrs. Hoffman and Ross, the north wall of the Harness Shop must have extended about seventeen or eighteen feet west of the ovens (in order to make a total length of forty feet). [15]

A west wall standing seventeen or eighteen feet west of the oven com plex would have meant that the hearth area found both in 1952 and 1971 lay outside the confines of the Harness Shop. Such a conclusion coincides with the findings of Messrs Hoffman and Ross, who have shown, on the basis of the type of bricks found about the hearth and its adjacent fallen chimney, that these features were associated with the post-1852 Kitchen that closely neighbored the Harness Shop on the west. [16]

It would appear, then, that the oven complex was not centered on the north wall of the ca. 1836 Bakery. Perhaps supporting such a conclusion is the fact that Emmons in 1841 depicted the only door to this structure as not centered on the south wall but placed about one-third of the wall length from the west end (see Plate III, vol. I).

b. General construction. Because no footings that can positively be related to exterior walls were found, there are no physical clues as to the type of construction. Undoubtedly, however, the usual Canadian-style, squared-log technique was employed. In fact the Harness Shop probably was built in much the same manner as the 1845 Bakery (which has already been described in considerable detail in this report) except that it may have been better finished, because it was described in the 1846-47 inventory as being "lined and sided." [17]

The roof and the gable ends of the Harness Shop are visible in several paintings and drawings of Fort Vancouver made between 1846 and 1854 (see Plates XIV-XV, XVIII, and XX, vol. I). These views show the Harness Shop as an unusually low structure for Fort Vancouver, with the ridge of the gabled roof running parallel to the north stockade wall. Perhaps the clearest picture is that drawn by the talented and versatile George Gibbs on July 2, 1851 (Plate XX, vol. I). He depicts the roof of the Harness Shop as barely rising above the pickets between the Kitchen and the Bakery. The eave line was well below the top of the stockade, and the roof evidently was covered by vertical boards. From the height of the building it must have been a one-story affair; or, if there was a garret, it must have been very low.

Chimney. In none of the pictures showing the roof of the Harness Shop can a chimney be discerned. The archeologists who excavated the oven foundations of the ca. 1836-44 Bakery in 1971 found fragments of locally made bricks, apparently dating from about 1844 and later, associated with the oven foundations, leading them to conclude that there may have been "possible reuse of the oven foundation during the period of the Harness Shop; that is after 1844." [18]

In view of the absence of all pictorial evidence of a chimney in connection with the Harness Shop, however, this writer is inclined toward the view that no metalworking or other operation requiring fire was conducted in that structure after the bakery was transferred to a new building. This hypothesis seems strengthened by the fact that the inventory of articles in use in the "Saddlers Shop," reproduced later in this chapter, lists no items associated with forges, stoves, or fires of any sort. In the opinion of the writer, therefore, the ovens were dismantled in 1844, and thereafter there was no provision for heating or smithing in the Harness Shop.

Door. It has already been mentioned that the Emmons plan of 1841 shows only one door in the ca. 1836-44 Bakery, and there is no good reason to assume that the situation changed when the building was con verted to a saddler's shop. This door was situated in the south wall, about one-third of the entire wall distance from the west end (see Plate III, vol. I).

Probably this door was made of tongued and grooved beaded planks in the same manner as the warehouse and shop doors already described in this report. It should be noted, however, that archeologists in 1971 recovered hinges, hasps, keyhole plates, padlock parts, and other hardware from the Harness Shop site. These should be carefully studied by the architects making the construction drawings.

While on the subject of hardware, it might be well to note that, while there were tapered wood screws at Fort Vancouver during the 1840s, it appears to have been general Company practice to affix hardware, particularly exterior hinges, hasps, etc., with nails. For hardware such as hinge butts, these nails were hand forged, with tapered heads to match the countersunk holes in butt hinges. In fact, one such nail was found on or near the Harness Shop site still in its hinge. [19] For large hinges, such as on gates or powder magazine doors, however, heavy, hand-forged, rosette-headed nails were generally used.

Windows. No thing is known about the windows in the Harness Shop. No windows are discernable in the gable ends in any of the available views, and there are no known pictures that show the lower part of this structure. It can be assumed that there were several rather small windows in each wall, probably centered in the bays.

Exterior finish. Because the building was described as having been "sided," it is probable that it was weatherboarded on the outside. The same type of siding probably was used in the gables, although vertical boards were quite as likely to have been used above the plates.

Probably this building was finished in much the same manner as was the Old Office, with unpainted or very thinly painted siding; Spanish brown door, door trim, and window trim; and white sash.

c. Interior finish and arrangement. Aside from the fact that the Harness Shop was "lined," the historical evidence throws no light upon the interior. It can only be guessed that the building was a single large room without interior supports. The walls almost certainly were lined with vertical tongued and grooved dressed boards. The joints probably were beaded. In view of the information in one version of the 1846-47 inventory, the room probably was also ceiled with boards. Because no evidence of a hard-packed earth floor was found by archeologists, it can safely be assumed that this structure had a wooden floor. [20] In fact, in view of the evident attention given to detail in this building, the floor planks may even have been planed. The interior undoubtedly was unpainted.

Furnishings

No inventory of "articles in use" in the Harness Shop prior to 1848 has yet been found by this writer. As has been noted previously in this study, the 1848 lists of Company-owned items employed in depot operations were unusually detailed that year. Nevertheless, the following list of "articles in use" in the "Saddlers Shop" at the time of the spring, 1848, inventory seems remarkably short for a shop that even at that late date must have turned out a considerable quantity of saddlery and harness:

Elsewhere in the depot inventories there are indications of the type of equipment that was manufactured and repaired in the Harness Shop. Probably at any given time there would have been a number of such items in the shop waiting to be repaired, in the process of fabrication or repair, or completed and waiting to be taken to the warehouses, sale shop, or farm.

For example, among the "Country Made" (locally manufactured) products found in the Fort Vancouver inventory for Outfit 1840 were:

4 Spanish Saddles
2 Spanish Saddles Infr. [inferior] [22]

In the inventory of 1844 the following items were among the articles in use listed under the heading "Farm Utensils &c":

Recommendations

a. It is recommended that the Harness Shop be rebuilt in accordance with the construction data furnished in the body of this chapter. Where specific facts are not available, general Hudson's Bay Company building practices, as presented throughout this report, should be followed.

b. In view of the important interpretive possibilities offered by the Harness Shop, it is suggested that this structure be furnished as an active saddler's and harness maker's shop of the period. Items of pack horse equipment, for instance, could be used to illustrate the entire story of interior land communication and transport--from the obtaining of horses from the Nez Perces and California to the brigade routes and the organization and gear of a Hudson's Bay Company pack train.

1. H.B.S., 6:302.

2. The physical and historical evidence for the assumption that the ovens of the 1836-44 Bakery were demolished, except for the foundations, is well presented in the excellent report by Hoffman and Ross, Fort Vancouver Excavations--III, pp. 49, 53-57.

3. H.B.C.A., B.223/z/5, MS, fol. 265d.

4. For the history of this structure, see pp. 167-68 in vol. I of this report.

5. Br. & Am. Joint Comm., Papers, [9:] 104-6.

6. Philip Henry Overmeyer, "George B. McClellan and the Pacific Northwest," Pacific Northwest Quarterly 32 (January, 1941): 17-18.

7. "Proceedings of a board of officers, Fort Vancouver, June 15, 1860, A.G.O., Ore. Dept., Doc. File 212-S-1860, in National Archives; also printed in Br. & Am. Joint Comm., Papers, [9:] 174-77.

8. Br. & Am. Joint Comm., Papers, [2:] 202-3. In listing the buildings that he remembered as standing within the stockade in 1858, Mactavish very obviously referred to the 1846-47 inventory and merely checked off such structures as he believed were still in existence twelve years later. For an evaluation of his testimony, see Hussey, History of Fort Vancouver, pp. 154-55.

9. Hoffman and Ross, Fort Vancouver Excavations--III, pp. 57, 72.

10. Ibid., p. 69.

11. Ibid., p. 6.

12. In their report on the archeological excavation of the Harness Shop site, Messrs. Hoffman and Ross have provided a very thoughtful discussion of the succession of structures in the north eastern corner of the fort. While this writer would hesitate to state some of the conclusions in such a positive manner, the discussion is of much value in clarifying a confusing situation. See Ibid., pp. 67—71.

13. Caywood, Final Report, p. 16, and Excavation Drawings, sheet 9.

14. Hoffman and Ross, Fort Vancouver Excavations--III, p. 17.

15. Ibid., p. 15.

16. Ibid., pp. 52-53.

17. Elliott, "British Values in Oregon, 1847," p. 34; and Br. & Am. Joint Comm., Papers, [2:] 118-19. It should be noted, however, that the version in the Company's archives says "lined & ceiled." H.B.C.A., B.223/z/5, MS, fol. 265.

18. Hoffman and Ross, Fort Vancouver Excavations--III, p. 53.

19. Ibid., pp. 39-43. Figure 9 in this excellent archeological report contains a drawing of such a nail.

20. Interview, J. A. Hussey with J. J. Hoffman and Lester Ross, February 23, 1972.

21. H.B.C., Account Book, Fort Vancouver, 1848, H.B.C.A.,B.223/d/181, MS, fols. 83-83d.

22. H.B.C., Account Books, Fort Vancouver, 1840-41 [Country Produce Inventories], H.B.C.A., B.223/d/137, MS, p. 17.

23. H.B.C.A., B.223/d/155, MS, pp. 166-67; H.B.C.A., B.223/d/160, MS, p. 146.