With Christmas just days away, my mind has turned to seasonal tales I have come across in my research. One that stands out is the story of Isabel Gunn. Isabel, alias John Fubbister, alias Mary Fubbister, was born in Orkney in 1780. In 1805–6, she met John Scarth, a Hudson’s Bay Company fur-trader who was back from Rupert’s Land (Canada) on furlough.

We cannot know what made Isabel assume a new identity as “John Fubbister,” enlist in Hudson’s Bay Company service, and board John’s ship in June 1806. Perhaps she could not bear to let John return to Rupert’s Land now that his furlough was over. Or perhaps she saw an opportunity for adventure. Either way, this action made her one of the first – if not the first – European women to travel to Rupert’s Land, as the Hudson’s Bay Company had forbidden traders to bring their British-born wives into the territory.

“John Fubbister’s” secret remained undetected until 29 December 1807, when he stumbled into the rival North West Company’s nearby trading house following Christmas celebrations.

Alexander Henry the Younger, a well-known fur-trader, explorer and writer, recorded what happened next:

“A very extraordinary affair occured this morning. One of Mr Heneys Orkney lads came over to my house, who apparently was indisposed and requested of me the favour to allow him to remain in my house for a short time. I was surprised at the fellow’s demand however I told him to sit down and warm himself […] I […] was much surprised to find [him] extended out upon the hearth uttering the most dreadful lamentations. He stretched out his hand towards me and in a pitiful tone of voice begg’d my assistance, and requested I would take pity upon a poor helpless abandoned wretch, who was not of the sex I had every reason to suppose, but was an unfortunate Orkney Girl pregnant and actually in Childbirth […] The man that debauched her in the Orkney two years ago, was now wintering above at the Grande Fourches. In about an hour after she was safely delivered of a fine boy, and that same day she was conveyed home to Heneys in my Carriole, where she soon recovered.”

She had, somehow, managed to conceal her pregnancy and had, evidently, continued the physical work demanded by life at the trading houses.

From that day, Isabel Gunn/John Fubbister was known as Mary Fubbister, and was employed as a washerwoman at Albany Fort. Peter Fidler records that she was a good employee who “worked at any thing and well like the rest of the men.” Despite this, she was dismissed in September 1809 and returned with her son to Stromness under the name Isabel Gunn.

The details of Isabel’s life after leaving Rupert’s Land in 1809 are sketchy. Hudson’s Bay Company records indicate that she worked as a “stocking knitter” and that she died in poverty in Stromness in 1861. It is not known what became of her son, James.

Isabel’s story is a poignant reminder of the impact of inequality and exclusion on real lives. That it occurred during the holiday season enhances its power. It is a reminder that while someone may seem to be doing fine, they may need a friend to confide in; that many people are carrying burdens they may feel unable to share without being offered a safe place to do so.

All best wishes of the season to my readers.

Sources:

Fidler, Peter. “Journal of a Journey from Swan to the Red River and down it in [a] Canoe from the Elbow to Its Entrance into Lake Winnepeg and along the South and Eastern Shores to Its Discharge into the Elongation of the Saskatchewan River or Nelson’s River.” 1807. MS. Library and Archives Canada, microfilm HBC 4M4 (E.3/3), p. 114.

Henry, Alexander, the Younger. The Journal of Alexander Henry the Younger, 1799–1814. Edited by Barry Gough, Champlain Society, 1988.

van Kirk, Sylvia. “Gunn, Isabel.” Canadian Dictionary of Biography Online, vol. 5, University of Toronto/Université Laval, 2003–, accessed December 22, 2016, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/gunn_isabel_5E.html.

van Kirk, Sylvia. Many Tender Ties: Women in Fur-Trade Society, 1670-1870, University of Oklahoma Press, 1983.