Hudson's Bay Company

Historical Context Essay

Marion Spies (Bergische Universität-GHS Wuppertal)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.1.1: Canadian Writing and Culture (Anglophone): Colonial and The Nineteenth Century, 1783-1900.
Vol. editors: Glen Nichols (Mount Allison University), Wendy Roy (University of Saskatchewan), Denis Salter (McGill University), Karis Shearer (University of British Columbia), Cynthia Sugars (University of Ottawa)

Domains

Colonialism and colonisation
Companies
Organisations and institutions (economic)

Dates

Date of occurrence 1670-05-06-1699-08-25

Places

Canada (Location)
United Kingdom (Involved)
United States (Involved)

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Two French

coureurs de bois

managed to interest English merchants in the opportunities of Hudson's Bay, the inland sea in North America. On May 2, 1670, the English therefore established the Company of Adventurers Trading into Hudson's Bay (HBC). With his charter of the same year, King Charles II granted the company the largest empire any private company has ever controlled. The founding charter granted the company control over all lands draining into Hudson's Bay, a very large area called Rupert's Land, which included much of the western prairie and northern subarctic regions. In the northwestern reaches of North America, English rule from then on was sustained by the HBC.

Compared with the French, the HBC's traders benefited from the direct sea voyage to London and cheaper English

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575 words

Citation: Spies, Marion. "Hudson's Bay Company". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 30 April 2004 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=521, accessed 22 November 2024.]

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Hudson's Bay Company

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