Rupert's Land (French: Terre de Rupert), or Prince Rupert's Land, was a territory in British North America comprising the Hudson Bay drainage basin, a territory in which a commercial monopoly was operated by the Hudson's Bay Company for 200 years from 1670 to 1870. It was named after Prince Rupert of the Rhine, a nephew of Charles I and the first Governor of the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC). In December 1821, the HBC monopoly was extended from Rupert's Land to the Pacific coast.
Areas belonging to Rupert's Land were mostly in present-day Canada and included the whole of Manitoba, most of Saskatchewan, southern Alberta, southern Nunavut, and northern parts of Ontario and Quebec. It also extended into the areas that would eventually become Minnesota, North Dakota, and Montana. The southern border west of Lake of the Woods to the Rocky Mountains was the drainage divide between the Mississippi and Red/Saskatchewan watersheds until the London Convention of 1818 substituted the 49th Parallel.
1870Jul, 15
Rupert's Land and the North-Western Territory are transferred to Canada from the Hudson's Bay Company, and the province of Manitoba and the Northwest Territories are established from these vast territories.
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Events on 1870
- 15Jan
Thomas Nast
A political cartoon for the first time symbolizes the Democratic Party with a donkey ("A Live Jackass Kicking a Dead Lion" by Thomas Nast for Harper's Weekly). - 30Mar
Reconstruction Era
Texas is readmitted to the Union following Reconstruction. - 12May
Royal Assent
The Manitoba Act is given the Royal Assent, paving the way for Manitoba to become a province of Canada on July 15. - 18Jul
Papal infallibility
The First Vatican Council decrees the dogma of papal infallibility. - 19Sep
Siege of Paris (1870-71)
Franco-Prussian War: The Siege of Paris begins, which will result on January 28, 1871 in the surrender of Paris and a decisive Prussian victory.