A thief climbed the high wooden doors that surround a national historical site in the St. Boniface neighborhood of Winnipeg this week and took thousands of dollars in skins used in public demonstrations of how life could have been in skins exchange positions 200 years ago.
Around 140 skins have left the Fort Gibraltar Trading Post trunks, which is within the High Fort Walls in Whittier Park, according to the executive director of the Du Voyageur Festival.
“It’s quite clear that whoever arrived at the fort, had a goal,” said Breanne Lavallee-Deckert.
“I was clearly directed towards the skins … there is a resale value there potentially. It is obviously a large amount to take, so I would not think that someone is taking some just to fix their moccasins.”
Hundreds of pounds were stolen during the robbery on Monday. To get them out, it would have required to climb the Fort, possibly using a ladder, said Lavallee-Deckert.
The thieves or the thieves broke a window to enter the commercial post cabin. The Du Voyageur Festival has submitted a police report on what Lavallee-Heckert says that it is thousands of dollars in lost skins used for educational programming.
They came from coyotes, foxes, bears, lynx, mink, musk and more, including 45 castors.
Articles represent 50 to 75 percent of the Du Voyageur Festival collection. Each contains different brands from the festival, such as the initial FDV letters for the Du Voyageur Festival and the festival logo.
Fort Gibraltar was an advanced position founded by the Northwest Company in 1809, where Red and Assiniboine rivers meet in Winnipeg forks.
In the first days he was treated by Voyageurs, Canoe Guiders, Interperators, Traders and others that trade with skins and goods.
The European fixation with the skin fashion of Castores almost promoted the extinct beaver in the seventeenth century. That in turn promoted the colonization of North America in search of more skins.
The fort was an important center for trade with local indigenous communities that provided a life line. In exchange for food, they exchanged Pemmican, a dry meat that often consists of bison beaten to a pulp and mixed with fats and, sometimes, berries, which was sent to remote commercial positions and caches.
The Hudson Bay company was also growing its workforce as traffickers and merchants at this time.
HBC and NWC rivals frequently entered into conflicts that became violent for a period called Pemmican wars, which included the battle of Seven Oaks in 1816 that played a crucial role in the people of Methis obtaining free trade rights.
The fight was partly stimulated by a fight for control and access to food trips on which they depended, Pemmican.
In 1970, the first Du Voyageur festival took place as a Francophone, Methis and heritage celebration of the first nation in Manitoba.
Eight years later, the organization rebuilt Fort Gibraltar in the Whittier Park in St. Boniface, on the other side of the river from its original site.
Since then, the Du Voyageur Festival has provided educational experiences throughout the year, including school tours where students can interact with actors dressed in an appropriate outfit for the period that give public lessons in the commercial life of skins in 1816.
That is a reason why the loss of so many skins is worrying.
“They are part of our repertoire and everything we have in Fort Gibraltar and how children learn about animals to have been in skins trade,” said Lavallee-Deckert.
“It is our school program where we have 10,000 children who go to the fort every year … so, it is only a real loss for our community.”
She said she hopes that the skins will be resuruous.
“I am Metis, so I am thinking of those animals. We take care of them and make sure that we honor not only the skins as an object to use for the interpretation, but once it was an animal that was once alive,” said Lavallee-Deckert.
“We all feel a little shocked and we really hope we can recover them first to bring them back to our collection,” he said.
“They are not only on display, they are a really important piece of how we share our history and it would be great if we could continue doing it.”
Winnipeg police said Thursday that his real estate crimes unit will be used to monitor and investigate, but had no more details.
