Qualla: Fort des Epinettes https://qualla.com/fort-des-pinettes en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:04 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_res/siteimages/rsslogo.png Qualla: Fort des Epinettes https://qualla.com/fort-des-pinettes Fort des Epinettes: Introduction https://qualla.com/fort-des-pinettes/ Six hundred Sioux warriors appeared at the stockade walls in 1794, and the post's master -- one of the McKays -- had to think fast. He bought them off with 200 made beaver worth of trade goods, a transaction that captures the knife-edge reality of Fort des Epinettes. Perched on a high plain 75 feet above a horseshoe bend of the Assiniboine River in what is now Manitoba, this trading post was the first permanent European outpost on the Assiniboine, a place where the fur trade's ambitions collided with Indigenous power, epidemic disease, and the sheer vastness of the northern plains. Between 1768 and 1811, the fort rose, fell, and rose again three times under different management, each chapter revealing the volatile economics and dangerous politics of the Canadian fur trade.

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]]> Thu, 05 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/c/b/c/6/fort-des-pinettes-wp/cbc6-fort-des-epinettes-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Fort des Epinettes: The Pedlars' Gamble https://qualla.com/fort-des-pinettes/ Thomas Correy, Forrest Oakes, and Charles Boyer were pedlars -- independent traders operating out of Montreal without the backing of a major company. Around 1768, they established the first Pine Fort on the Assiniboine, pushing into territory the Assiniboine people considered the...

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]]> Thu, 05 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/c/b/c/6/fort-des-pinettes-wp/cbc6-fort-des-epinettes-the-pedlars-gamble.mp3 0:06 2 full Fort des Epinettes: Gateway to Pemmican Country https://qualla.com/fort-des-pinettes/ The North West Company recognized what the pedlars had stumbled onto. In 1785, they built a second post about three-quarters of a mile upstream from the original site. The location was strategic: near the head of easy navigation on the Assiniboine and squarely in buffalo country,...

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]]> Thu, 05 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/c/b/c/6/fort-des-pinettes-wp/cbc6-fort-des-epinettes-gateway-to-pemmican-country.mp3 0:06 3 full Fort des Epinettes: A Fort Rebuilt from Its Own Wreckage https://qualla.com/fort-des-pinettes/ The story might have ended there, but the Assiniboine had one more chapter to offer. In 1807, the North West Company dismantled Fort Assiniboine and rafted its timbers downriver to the old Fort des Epinettes site, reassembling a post from the bones of its successor. This third in...

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]]> Thu, 05 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/c/b/c/6/fort-des-pinettes-wp/cbc6-fort-des-epinettes-a-fort-rebuilt-from-its-own-wreckage.mp3 0:06 4 full Fort des Epinettes: What the River Took https://qualla.com/fort-des-pinettes/ When geologist Joseph Tyrrell visited the site in 1890, he found that much of it had already been washed away by the Assiniboine's persistent current. Archaeological excavations conducted between 1971 and 1974 recovered what they could. Today the site lies within Spruce Woods Pro...

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]]> Thu, 05 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/c/b/c/6/fort-des-pinettes-wp/cbc6-fort-des-epinettes-what-the-river-took.mp3 0:06 5 full