Missing Copies of the Omineca Herald
On the 11th or possibly the 25th of July, 1908, the first edition of the Omineca Herald was published in Hazelton, on the Skeena River in Northern British Columbia. In 1912, the press moved across the Bulkley River to New Hazelton, where it remained until it moved to Terrace in 1949. Although first published in July, 1908, the first currently existing edition was published on September 12, 1908 (Vol.1. No.10). Copies published after that date are on microfilm at the British Columbia Archives in Victoria. Copies of pre-World War editions are online in the Open Collections at the University of British Columbia Library. Where, though, are the missing copies? Did the missing July to September 1908 copies in fact survive somewhere? On some archive shelf, perhaps? Or in a box in someone’s attic?
Hazelton People-Rene D'Egville
Rene d’Egville was one of the more colourful people around Hazelton for a while in the years before the First World War. Then, an expatriate from England, he went home to join up. He had filed a preemption claim near Telkwa and ranched there, but he also spent a number of summers in Hazelton as a fish guard where, as an artist, he made detailed drawings of the different species of salmon and trout. With a reputation for eccentricity and usually escorted by a little fox terrier, he was known in Hazelton for his Norfolk jacket, overalls, moccasins and yellow silk toque. No one at the time thought that “poor Deg,” as he was called, would amount to much. Lieutenant R.L.H. d’Egville, serving with the General Staff “somewhere” in France, though, wrote home to his friend Jack Frost at Soldiers’ Aid in Hazelton:
“You’ve made me positively homesick for the old brands of tobacco [in a Soldiers’ Aid parcel], it only wanted a piece of smoked salmon to make the thing complete. . . . I’ve seen quite enough in a short time to know that working under shell-fire is not as funny as it looks in a Bairnsfather drawing; nor can it be said that sleeping under canvas while the playful Hun empties machine-guns from airplanes into the camp is conducive to steady nerves or restful slumber. I have seen the shells falling about sixty to the minute—not a bombardment, of course, merely as an artillery exchange—and fellows playing football with an occasional shell falling among the horse lines and the Canadian band playing O Canada in the offing. . . I have not been in the front line, no nearer than the twenty-five mile snipers, but a lot of our labour people are well ‘forrard’ doing every conceivable job, pleasant or otherwise. And I know that ‘where-did-that-one-go’ feeling, though I confess it does not interest me as much as the ‘where in h— is the next-one-going-to-land’ sensation. The man who says he doesn’t mind being under fire is a d— liar. When you have seen nothing you want to go up; when you’ve seen something the back of the back looks mighty good. . . . I am now confined to an office and do not get away until eleven or twelve at night, but I like it and manage to get some fresh air, though I sometimes feel I would like to go out and split a little wood, and I found myself handling an axe lovingly some time ago. . . . I miss the old trail and the camp fire. It’s going to be a hard job to stay this side. BC’s got me the same as the other fellow.”
After the war the Herald noted, with evident surprise, that poor Deg had served as an efficient cypher officer at the General Headquarters Staff, been mentioned in dispatches, and had gone to the German headquarters at Spa with the Allied Armistice Commission. He seems to have stayed in England after the war and probably become an illustrator for the Bystander Magazine.
The Forks of the Skeena
The Bulkley River, coming in from the right of the photograph, joins the Skeena River at this point. Until about 1870 it was known as the Forks of the Skeena and a notable landmark for explorers and travelers. Because it was the highest point for navigation, a small settlement and several stores grew up here. The small town of Hazelton is a mile up the Skeena River, over the trees on the right of the photograph. (Photo: Geoff Mynett, August 2017)
Wrinch Home in Hazelton 1902-1904
When Horace and Alice Wrinch moved to Hazelton in 1902 they rented a house (see photo below) on the bench above the town from Arthur Nelson, a Gitxsan elder. Horace performed surgeries on the kitchen table in this house. Other times he went to a patient’s own home and performed a needed surgery there, taking with him a door to use as a flat and stable operating surface. While living here he planned and built the first hospital in the interior of northern British Columbia (excluding the small hospital at Atlin on the Yukon border), as well as a family home. He also established a nurses training school and set up a hospital farm to provide food for patients, the hospital staff and his own family. This is the house where it was all planned. (Photo: my own collection)
Community Health Insurance - 1908
On October 31st 1908 the Omineca Herald ran this advertisement on its front page. This hospital ticket scheme that Dr. Horace Wrinch instituted at the Hazelton Hospital lasted for over three decades, although the cost did increase to $1.50 per month after World War I. Although not unique to Hazelton or to British Columbia, it may have been one of the longest such schemes in operation. It not only produced a steady and regular income for the hospital, but also bound the residents of the district into a community that had an interest in ensuring the hospital was successful. My biography of Dr. Wrinch, Service on the Skeena: Horace Wrinch, Frontier Physician contains a detailed description of the scheme and its history. (Photo: my own collection)
The Harrowing Tale of George McKenzie
George McKenzie, a thirty-three year old prospector from the Omineca River, was recovering in the Hazelton Hospital when Horace Wrinch and his family arrived back from Toronto in May 1906. On January 13, McKenzie had left his partner, Charles Newman, in charge of their camp to walk through the deep snow to another site. In the 65 degree below zero weather, his feet froze, so he returned to camp. Dan Sullivan, a fellow prospector, had a medicine chest at his camp four miles away, but Newman refused to go and get it. McKenzie suffered for eight weeks on salt meat, and eventually developed scurvy. Then a passing First Nations man “responding to the dictates of simple humanity” volunteered to fetch help from Sullivan. By the time Sullivan arrived with the medicine chest, McKenzie’s teeth were falling out and the flesh was peeling from his toes. Clearly McKenzie had to be taken to the hospital in Hazelton two hundred miles away as soon as possible. On March 25, Sullivan and three others, including two First Nations men, set out, with McKenzie strapped to a stretcher on a dog sled. The dogs were wild and almost unmanageable. Numerous times they got out of control and ran away with the sled, bumping over logs and rugged terrain. McKenzie, the Boundary Creek Times for May 6 reported, became too weak for the sled and so for the last twenty miles had to be carried on the stretcher, strapped between two pack horses. When they arrived at the hospital in Hazelton on April 5, after a journey of eleven days, MacKenzie was almost dead. He was treated by Dr. Rolls and, when he arrived home, Dr. Wrinch. He was discharged on May 26, cured, but missing four amputated toes. The charge was $15. He was Patient No.125.
Practical Home Physician
R.E. Loring (1853-1934) was the Indian Agent for the Upper Skeena and Bulkley Valley in Hazelton from 1889 to the end of 1920. Part of his job was to render such medical aid as he could to the First Nations in the district. As far as we know, he had no medical training. Nevertheless he gave vaccinations and performed simple surgery. In 1892—eight years before Horace Wrinch arrived in Hazelton as a medical missionary—Loring purchased the latest edition of the 1,200-page The Practical Home Physician and Encyclopedia of Medicine, charging the Department of Indian Affairs for the eight dollar cost. When he found out he had paid one dollar more than he need have, he dutifully reimbursed the Department that one dollar. Coincidentally, when staying with my wife in a bed and breakfast near Hazelton in August 2017, I found on the shelves of our room what I believe could possibly have been this actual book.
Horace and Alice's Marriage
Horace and Alice were married at Alice’s brother’s home in Merton, Ontario, on June 16, 1900. Shortly after they set out by train across Canada on the first leg of their journey to Kispiox and Hazelton in Northern British Columbia.
Hazelton Hospital - Nurses (1)
Dr. Wrinch started a training school for nurses when he opened the hospital in 1904. The first to enroll was Annie Lawrence on May 1, 1905. She graduated on May 1, 1908. This photograph of the nurses at Hazelton Hospital was taken in about 1914/15. The dates after their names are their dates at the nurses training school.
Back row: Amy Grist (1911-1914), Lilian Ruth Adams (1911-1914, Margaret Crawford (1912-1915).
Front Row: Gertrude Martin (1910-1913), Marg Harris, May Hogan (matron and Superintendent of the Nursing School). Marg Harris was probably Martha Harrison, who did not graduate.
