The Hudson Bay Company

Essay by howyoudoinHigh School, 10th grade May 2004

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There have been many fur trading posts, and different companies by many different people, but there is only one that has lasted as long, been the most powerful, and been as successful as the Hudson's Bay Company.

The quest for the North West Passage started in 1576 by a man known as Martin Frobisher. Martin Frobisher had attempted to find the North West Passage three different times; failing each time he tried to find the Northwest Passage. These failures prompted Henry Hudson to try and find the North West Passage. Henry Hudson was the first man to successfully sail through the Hudson River. When he returned to England in 1610 he was commissioned by a syndicate of English courtiers to try and chart the North West Passage. When he went back to try and find the North West Passage he discovered the Hudson Bay, which was named after him. However, after a very hard and long winter trapped in the ice, his crew mutinied.

Henry Hudson, his young son, and some of his faithful crewmates were forced to set sail on a smaller boat away from the ship. Henry Hudson was never seen again.

Over the next two decades, ten other explores kept exploring this region. Then in 1631, they had figured out that the Hudson's Bay was not the North West Passage. However, they found that this land was inhabited with some of the richest furs ever, the Beaver belt.

The Hudson's Bay Company was granted a Royal Charter from King Charles The Second on May 2, 1670. The Charter had granted the company rights to "sole trade and commerce" within in the entrance of Hudson Strait. The King had bestowed this right to Prince Rupert and his seventeen associates. The Charter said "that the Company was to control...