Charles John Griffin (1827 - 1874)

Born 1827 in County Limerick, Ireland

Husband of Elizabeth Margaret (Bird) Griffin — married 14 May 1863 in Manitoba, Canada

Died 1874 at about age 47 in Ottawa, Carleton, Ontario, Canada

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Biography

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NOTE: I have seen his name spelled GRIFFIN and GRIFFEN.

When John Charles GRIFFIN was born on June 24, 1827, in Limerick, Limerick, Ireland, his father, George, was 39 and his mother, Mary, was 38. He married Elizabeth Margaret 'Eliza' Bird on May 14, 1863, in Manitoba. They had one child during their marriage. He died on July 25, 1874, in Ottawa, Ontario, at the age of 47

Griffin began his Hudson's Bay Company career in 1846 at Fort Coulonge in Montreal. After working as a Company apprentice at Fort Coulonge, Edmonton, and York Factory, he moved west to Fort Langley (1850-1851). With a year's duty in Babines, New Caledonia (now the British Columbia mainland), he returned to Fort Langley for another year before arriving at Fort Victoria in 1853

On a chilly December 15, 1853, a group of Europeans, Hawaiians, and Indians led by Fort Victoria Chief Factor James Douglas landed on the southern tip of San Juan Island and turned loose 1,369 sheep to graze on the sweeping prairies that gave onto the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Douglas also brought along seed for crops and farm yard animals, including several Berkshire boars.

He then appointed Charles John Griffin chief agent of this new Hudson's Bay Company establishment in December j1853. Gazing at the magnificent Olympic Mountains directly across the Strait of Juan de Fuca, Griffin appropriately called his prairie home "Belle Vue Sheep Farm." Then elevated to "chief trader" here in 1857.

The company's London headquarters, acting on advice from Alexander Grant Dallas, an HBC director in Victoria, ordered on Feb. 9, 1861 that Belle Vue Farm should be closed "as soon as circumstances would permit. Charles Griffin left exactly one year later. Griffin was then reassigned as Chief Trader to the Red River, then to Oxford House N.E. of Lake Winnipeg, and finally to Churchill for his final 9 years of work.

He and wife moved to Ottawa in 1873 and he died in 1874.

Sources

Contains reference to their marriage in this Bird family bio * https://glenbow.ucalgary.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/m-8736-34.pdf

Very extensive bio of his work history with HBC * https://www.gov.mb.ca/chc/archives/_docs/hbca/biographical/g/griffin_charles.pdf

Nancy Marguerite Anderson bio of his work with HBC, particularly on Vancouver Island * https://nancymargueriteanderson.com/charles-john-griffin/

Journals created by Griffin while in charge at Belle Vue Farm * https://www.nps.gov/sajh/learn/historyculture/belle-vue-sheep-farm-journals.htm

United States National Park Service very detailed history of Belle Vue Sheep Farm and Charles Griffin * https://www.nps.gov/sajh/learn/historyculture/belle-vue-sheep-farm.htm

His burial location and details in Ottawa https://www.ancestrylibrary.ca/imageviewer/collections/2168/images/32386_bw0005-00013?treeid=&personid=&usePUB=true&_phsrc=zWG42&_phstart=successSource&pId=5928

An ancestors bio of Charles - good data https://www.ancestrylibrary.ca/family-tree/person/tree/174177873/person/312258800469/story?_phsrc=zWG44&_phstart=successSource