Inuvialuit Use

Cadzow (1913) in a letter dated 1907 refers to "Huskies" from the coast, over a hundred men, women and children, dancing and feasting at Rampart House for a week at New Years 1907. "The Huskies have come in from the Arctic coast to see us and I think we will have a good trade with them next year as they talk of coming to the Old Crow Mountains to live next winter" (Cadzow 1913:35).

In a letter to his commanding officer at Dawson, written on 15 September 1911, during the smallpox epidemic at Rampart House, RNWMP Constable Fyfe reported that "the two families of Eskimo up the river at fish camps have been inspected by Dr. Smith and found to be in a healthy condition" (RNWMP [Fyfe] 1911). In mid October 1911 he made a patrol up to the Eskimo Camp to examine them for smallpox, but found them all well (Fyfe 1911). Unfortunately, no locations are given for the camps.

When the Archdeacon of the the Yukon and the Arctic, Hudson Stuck, and his companion Walter Harper made their circuit of the Alaskan arctic coast in 1918, they travelled through what is now Ivvavik National Park and passed just north of Vuntut National Park's northwest corner (Stuck 1920). They travelled up the Firth River from Herschel Island en route to Fort Yukon in April 1918, with an "Eskimo" (Inuk), named Billy Bump, and his daughter. Billy Bump's "home camp" was at the head of the Firth River near the international boundary.

On the Alaskan side of the boundary, but still in the Firth drainage, Stuck and Harper met another "Eskimo", Titus, who had a large house of split logs (built around growing trees) at "Of-no-k-via." From Titus' cabin it was a two-day trip to a tributary of the Colleen River in Alaska. There were a number of Inuit at Of-no-k-via who travelled west to Van Go-it-ti (Christian Lake), Alaska, to trade with the Chandalar Kutchin (Gwitchin). Stuck conducted a Sunday Service using "Eskimo hymns out of a Herschel Island book we found here" (Stuck 1920:340). After leaving Of-no-k-via, Stuck reached another Eskimo camp on the Colleen River side of the divide. Charley, his family, an aged couple and a young man were living in this camp.

Inuvialuit families wintered in the Old Crow area in the 1920s and 1930s for trapping and hunting (Nagy 1999) and spent time in the Flats (at Dechyoo Njik) during the summers of that period as well (Charlie Peter Charlie Sr. in Fafard 1999). Several Gwitchin men could speak the "Eskimo" language well enough to communicate (Nagy 1999).

When RCMP officer E. A. Kirk sketched a map of the Old Crow Flats in 1939 to show the locations of RCMP patrols and camp sites (Figure 2.11), he indicated an area north of the Old Crow River and west of Timber Creek as an "area some years visited by Eskimos" (RCMP 1939). The names of at least three geographical features within Vuntut National Park reflect the use of this area by the Inuvialuit (Figure 2.1). Ch'inekai Van, one of the northernmost lakes on the east side of Timber Creek, formerly Chin Ne Kui Van (Stager 1974), means "Eskimo Lake" (YGPNB 1998).

Figure 2.11 Click on photo to enlarge and see other photos

The Inuvialuit used the site as a camp for hunting as late as the 1940s. It was one of the few lakes not used by the Vuntut Gwitchin at that time. A second lake, Tan Ch'ohli (Tun Chyo Li), the largest lake north of the Old Crow River between Thomas and Timber Creeks, was also known as Husky Lake (Stager 1974). Charlie Peter Charlie Sr. indicated that "Inuit" people visited the lake as recently as the 1950s (YGPNB 1998). North of Tan Ch'ohli is Tun Chyoo Li Dhat or Husky Mountain (Stager 1974).

INUVIALUIT USE OF OLD CROW FLATS