McKenzie, James, approximately 1777-1849

James McKenzie was born around 1777 near Inverness, Scotland, and died in 1849 in Quebec. His parents were Alexander Mackenzie of Achnaclerach and Catherine Mackenzie, and he was the brother of Roderick Mackenzie. In 1795, McKenzie began a seven-year apprenticeship with the North West Company under his brother Roderick in the Athabasca department. He had two sons with an unknown Indigenous woman near Terrebonne, Quebec, and in 1825, married Ellen Fitzsimmons, the under-aged daughter of Captain Thomas Fitzsimmons. They had seven children. McKenzie kept journals in Fort Chipewyan (Alberta) dated from 1799 and 1800, which illuminated the harshness of life in the fur trade and his contempt for Canadians, Indigenous peoples, and the North West Company. McKenzie physically abused members of the New North West Company (also known as the XY Company), sold Indigenous women to engagés, provided Indigenous peoples with bad tobacco and watered-down rum, and rewarded rather than punished a hunter responsible for the death of an engagé. Promoted partner in 1802, McKenzie was reassigned to the Athabasca country, where he constructed a “watch house” near the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post and ordered the destruction of the company’s property. Along with this, he debauched Indigenous peoples, plundered furs, and harassed workers of the Hudson’s Bay Company. McKenzie’s actions provoked some Chipewyan people into killing six North West Company workers that harassed them. Following the amalgamation of the two North West companies in 1804, McKenzie’s harassment intensified, causing the withdrawal of the Hudson’s Bay Company from the area in 1806. In 1807, McKenzie joined the Beaver Club in Montreal and soon after was appointed to the king’s post in Mingan, Quebec. McKenzie ventured up the Labrador coast to Musquaro, where he met the Naskapi peoples. In 1811, he bought a house near Terrebonne, Quebec, which facilitated visits to his brothers Roderick and Henry, and to his two sons with the unknown Indigenous woman. In 1815, he assisted John McDonald of Garth in dispossessing around four-hundred voyageurs of the Hudson’s Bay Company of their local tavern. McKenzie left the North West Company in 1818 to become an independent merchant at Tadoussac and Quebec. He was commissioned as a justice of the peace in 1821 and was believed to have settled in Quebec City.

Revised on June 10, 2024, by Leah Louttit-Bunker

http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/mckenzie_james_1849_7E.html