- MS-0559
- Series
- 1834-1884
Alexander Caulfield Anderson was born near Calcutta, India in 1814 and died at Saanich in 1884. He was educated in England and joined the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) in 1831 as an apprentice clerk. After a year of service at Lachine, he was assigned to various HBC posts throughout the northwest, including Fort Vancouver, Fort McLoughlin, Fraser Lake, Fort George, Fort Nisqually, Fort Alexandria and Fort Colvile. He was promoted to chief trader in 1846, and would have been made chief factor had he been willing to accept a post in New Caledonia. Between 1846 and 1847, in response to the Oregon boundary issue, Anderson led three exploring expeditions in an attempt to find a route, from the HBC post at Kamloops to the HBC post Fort Langley, which would fall entirely within British territory. Two of the routes that he identified were used at various times by the HBC brigades between the interior posts and the ocean. He retired from the Company in 1854, and settled with his wife Eliza Birnie, whom he married in 1837, in Cathlamet, Washington. They eventually had 13 children. In 1858 Anderson was persuaded by James Douglas to accept the position of postmaster of Victoria; he later served briefly as collector of customs, and also had various business interests in Victoria. In 1876 he was appointed as both Dominion inspector of fisheries and the federal representative on the Dominion-Provincial Joint Commission on Indian Land in British Columbia. His appointment to this commission ended in 1878. Anderson was considered scholarly, and wrote several reports, articles and manuscripts about the history of the northwest coast.
Records include: A.C. Anderson's correspondence in and out (box 1), including letters from Peter Skene Ogden, 1837-1839, Sir George Simpson, 1836-1839, and letters to Alexander Grant Dallas, 1852, and William Fraser Tolmie, 1854; journals, certificates, notes and diaries and a manuscript "History of the Northwest Coast". Some of these records were previously catalogued in the Old Manuscript Collection of the BC Archives; a conversion list of old call numbers and a subject index are in the hard copy finding aid in the reference room. Box 1, file 1-4 consists of correspondence inward; Box 1, file 5 consists of correspondence outward; Box 1, file 6-7 consists of miscellaneous fur trade papers and appointments; Box 1, file 8-9 consists of certificates and will; Box 2, file 1-9 consists of notes, diaries and histories; Box 2, file 10 consists of the draft of Notes on North-Western America; Box 3 and 4 consist of miscellaneous records
Anderson, Alexander Caulfield, 1814-1884