At this site in the Kiche Manitou Campground of Spruce Woods Provincial Park are two plaques erected by the Historic Sites Advisory Board of Manitoba (or its successor, the Manitoba Heritage Council). One commemorates Fort Des Epinettes (Pine Fort), a fur trade post operated here by independent Montreal traders between 1768 and 1781. Pine Fort was re-established in this vicinity by the North West Company on two subsequent occasions, 1785 to 1794 and 1807 to 1811.
Situated on the trade route along the Assiniboine River where the route branches southward to the Missouri, Pine Fort was strategically located for securing furs from the Cree, Ojibway, and Assiniboine as well as buffalo robes, horses and corn from the Mandans. As a North West Company post it also developed into a pemmican and trade goods depot supplying posts in the Assiniboine and Souris valleys. Competition with the Hudson’s Bay Company and disruption of Native trade alliances led to declining trade and forced the abandonment of Pine Fort on all three occasions.
In the early 1700s, the Assiniboin people occupied the northern plains from the Red River to the Rocky Mountains. The Assiniboine River is named after this branch of the Dakota Nation. Composed of several independent groups totalling about 28,000 people, they spoke Nakota, a variation of the Siouan Dakota language. They travelled widely on a seasonal basis and lived in encampments of 400 to 1,500 people, sometimes gathering in groups of up to 3,000.
The Assiniboin played a key role in developing the inland fur trade. They encouraged and guided early explorers such as Pierre Gaultier de Varennes de La Verendrye, supplied pemmican to forts and fur brigades, and traded as far north as York Factory on Hudson Bay. Alliances with Cree and Ojibway to the north and east, and Mandan and Hidatsa to the south, formed a trading network that became the foundation of the early fur trade.
By the mid-1800s, European diseases had decimated the Assiniboin population. Responding to westward expansion of the fur trade and decline in local bison herds, the Assiniboin left southwestern Manitoba and moved to Saskatchewan, Alberta and Montana, where their descendants remain.
Pine Fort and Assiniboin (Nakota) First Nation commemorative plaques (August 2012)
Source: Gordon GoldsboroughSite Coordinates (lat/long): N49.65169, W99.25534
denoted by symbol on the map above
Fort des Pinettes - Pine Fort, Manitoba Historic Resources Branch.
This page was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.
Page revised: 13 February 2021
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