Lac La Biche - History - Aboriginal Descendants

Fosseneuve | Terror at the Mission | Trading Post | Pioneers

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FOSSENEUVE

The King of the Scowmen

Louisson Fosseneuve, who became known as Captain Shot, made his living bringing supply laden scows up North on the Athabasca River. A Metis from Manitoba, Captain Shot gained a reputation for excellence as a scow pilot and as an active member of the Metis community.

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"From Edmonton to the North Pole, everybody knows by sight or by reputation, Captain Shot, he is not described otherwise!" – From the Notebook of a Young Missionary, 1911.

At six foot three, with hawk-like features, scraggy beard, and piercing eyes, he looked more like a gunslinger from the American wild west than the king of the Athabasca scowmen. To be sure, Louis Fosseneuve could handle a gun. From his buffalo hunting days he had acquired the nickname "Sure Shot" and a reputation for fearlessness. But he turned away from hunting and lent his considerable talents to conquering the Athabasca River.

Louis Fosseneuve was born at St. Boniface, Manitoba in 1841, the son of Baptiste Fosseneuve and Marguerite Beaulieu. Though better known as Louis, his real given name was Louison and though his surname has appeared in various places as Fassoneure and Fousseneuve, so far as the Roman Catholic Church was concerned, the correct spelling was Fosseneuve and that was how it appeared on his certificate of marriage.

As a boy he watched for the fabled Red River Carts rolling in and out of the Red River Settlement during the buffalo hunts, trying to measure the success of the hunt by listening to the squeal of the axles. Quiet axles meant hunger, loud axles meant plenty. As a young man he took part in the hunt and began driving the carts.

Somewhere along the way Fosseneuve drove a cart to Lac La Biche for Bishop Henri Faraud. Like so many before him, he took one look at the beautiful lake and fell in love. He built a house near Notre Dame des Victoires and made a living packing goods for the Hudson's Bay Company and serving as a guide and dog-sledder. He was enormously strong. During one of the Hudson's Bay Company's famous "packing contests," he carried 800 pounds. He later began running scows on the Athabasca River and it was here that he left his mark on Alberta history.
In 1867 Bishop Faraud was given the task of transporting five Grey Nuns from Lac La Biche to Fort Providence, located on the Mackenzie River about 200 km southwest of present day Yellowknife. He hired the 26 year old Fosseneuve to help carry out the important assignment. The original plan to travel with one of the Hudson's Bay Company barges so that the crews could help each other fell through because the Nuns were 26 days late arriving at Lac La Biche. Water levels were falling at an alarming rate, making the already dangerous trip down the Athabasca River and through the Grand Rapids extremely treacherous. The HBC boat departed and Bishop Faraud was left on his own.

Certificate of marriage of Louison Fosseneuve and Therese Ladouceur

This is to certify that Louison Fosseneuve, son of age of Baptiste Fosseneuve and of Marguerite Beaulieu, on the one part, and Therese Ladouceur, daughter of age of Joseph Ladouceur and of Julie Auger, on the other part, have been duly married in the church of Notre-Dame des Victoires of Lac-la-Biche, by Reverend Father V. Végreville o.m.i. on the 12th of november, in the year eighteen hundred and seventy-two.

E. Lacombe, O.M.I.

Note 1: The Fosseneuve are also known under the nick-name of "Shot".
Note 2: Thérèse Ladouceur who was at least twenty one years old when married in 1872, is evidently old enough to get her pension.

Faraud had undoubtedly picked the young Fosseneuve because he knew he could trust him. He was not disappointed. Fosseneuve completed the mission in dashing style by successfully shooting the Grand Rapids - something not thought possible in a partially loaded freight scow until then. News of the amazing feat spread and "Sure Shot" the buffalo hunter became "Shot" the scowman and eventually "Captain Shot," the highly respected businessman. Legend has it that Fosseneuve singlehandedly opened a new trade route to the North by running the Grand Rapids in 1867. But legends are a polite form of exaggeration. Scows had already been plying the Athabasca. What Louis Fosseneuve demonstrated was that the Athabasca River could be a viable, navigable waterway to the North which could cut transportation costs and he believed that fully loaded scows could be run safely over the rapids.

"This lake [Lac La Biche] is at the height of land. We had to find the means to freight our luggage from there to the confluence of the two Athabaska Rivers. Two courses could be attempted:: one by land and the other by water. (one and the other were considered as unworkable. The drat because of its bottomless and unending swamps; the second, because of its numerous and danger- It was admitted as unquestionable by the Indians travelling these areas, and by the rowers in general; that if any barge ever tried to overcome, these obstacles, no one could, save his life: `Even allowing for the part of some large. exaggerations, undertaking woe nod inviting."

Bishop Henri Faraud, alluding to the important feat Louison Fosseneuve accomplished. Not everyone agreed. After all, there were, among others, the Brulé Rapids, Long Rapids, Crooked Rapids, and Cascade Rapids to contend with. As late as 1881 Hudson's Bay Company Factor, Richard Hardisty, doubted whether the rapids could be overcome. Even the venerable Fosseneuve was not sure which rapids could or could not be run with fully loaded scows and it was not until sometime between 1883 and 1885 that he successfully guided a fully loaded flat bottom scow over the Grand Rapids. Nevertheless, in 1881 Hardisty was ordered to run a brigade of scows from Athabasca to Fort McMurray. The crews struggled but made the journey safely in the spring of 1882 and thereafter the Athabasca-Fort McMurray river route became the principal transportation route to the North.
Determined to capitalize on this development, Fosseneuve started a business and, as more people began to move into the North, he prospered - particularly during the Klondike gold rush of the late 1890s. No doubt his legendary reputation of being the first man to guide a scow over the Grand Rapids helped. But he also handpicked his crews. Each spring, fierce, hard men would come from Lac La Biche, Saddle Lake and Whitefish Lake to work the scows to Waterways (Fort McMurray) and then walk back. Fosseneuve paid them $45 for the trip.

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