Peter Pond is not an easy subject for a biography, even though he played a crucial role in the early exploration of the vast area between southern Ontario and the Rocky Mountains. He is, as the title of Barry Gough’s book indicates, elusive.
Pond’s name is known to most Canadian history students, but he doesn’t get the attention given to other traders and explorers, such as Sir Alexander Mackenzie. He does not fit into conventional tales of the fur trade, since he came earlier than the more well-known explorers and was a colonial American — not a Scot, like so many of the others. Also, less has been written about Pond. Perhaps Gough’s book will help to bring him the attention he certainly deserves.
There are no known paintings or sketches of Pond, so we can’t say for certain what he looked like. It’s safe to guess, though, that he was a fine physical specimen, given the intense demands of his chosen profession. As Gough writes, Pond was formidable, a veteran of militia at a time of armed conflict between England and France in North America. He tackled the uncharted Northwest without fear.
Pond was born in Milford, Connecticut, in 1740, fought in the Seven Years War, helped found the North West Company, worked as a Yankee in British North America just after the American Revolution, and returned to Milford in retirement. When he died in 1807, there was no obituary, and no marker was placed on his grave.
It doesn’t help that Pond was barely literate. There are not many direct clues to his life, and what he left us is incomplete.
The second half of his memoirs has gone missing from the original journal.
One of his most important lasting gifts is the collection of maps he produced, despite a lack of formal cartographic knowledge or scientific precision. They covered what was known about the Northwest in his day and form a valuable reference point for the exploration of the area — on the ground back then, historically today. Four of Pond’s maps have been reproduced in The Elusive Mr. Pond.
Mackenzie and others have taken more of the spotlight, but it was Pond who set the stage for much of what they did. He was the first explorer to record the Mackenzie River system, and his work far from the river’s mouth had an impact on the quest for the Northwest Passage. Where others were confident that a navigable strait existed, Pond knew there was land and had drawn the maps to prove it. Pond’s life was not without controversy; he was implicated in two murders, and the truth about them will never be known.
Gough fleshes out Pond’s story with information from other fur trade biographies, Colonial Office papers from The National Archives in the United Kingdom, as well as North West Company and Hudson’s Bay Company documents. Gough’s status as one of Canada’s leading historians is certainly justified by this volume. Bit by bit, piece by piece, he brings together a compelling biography of a man who might finally get his just place in the annals of history.
Gough’s personal style of writing takes readers along on his journey of discovery and makes us part of his quest. It is engaging and effective; in Gough’s hands, history cannot be boring.
— Dave Obee (Read bio)
Dave Obee is a member of the board of Canada’s History Society and editor-in-chief of the Times Colonist in Victoria.