The Steersman's Ledger:
Joseph Delard in the HBC Account Books
The Subject — and the Summary That Stood In for the Record
Joseph Delard was a French-Canadian engagé from Sorel, Quebec, who spent his working life in the North West Company and then the Hudson's Bay Company, and settled after the fur trade on French Prairie in the Willamette Valley of Oregon, where he died at St. Louis in 1869. His fur-trade years reach the published record almost entirely through a single HBCA biographical sheet, compiled in 1987: NWC in the Columbia from 1817; HBC from the 1821 union; bowsman 1824–25; steersman 1825–27 in the Columbia and 1827–32 at Thompson's River; “no longer employed but had outstanding accounts” 1832–36; Willamette settler 1837–39; freeman 1839.
A biographical sheet is a finding aid — an archivist's distillation of the underlying ledgers. It is the right place to begin and the wrong place to stop. This methodology sets the summary aside and rebuilds the career from the account books: nineteen HBCA volumes read one outfit at a time, and the Montreal notarial act they point to. The books confirm the summary at nearly every point, depart from it on one rank, and let the man be proven a single continuous individual rather than a surname shared by several — a real risk in a world where Deslard, Despard, and Delard men served side by side.
| Name | Joseph Delard (also Deslard, Delore, Delor, Delart; indexed in Oregon as “Peter”) |
| Baptized | 30 December 1792, St-Pierre de Sorel, Quebec (PRDH #455108) |
| Parents | François Delard & Catherine Lavallée |
| First recorded | 1813 NWC advance (F.4/5) |
| Engaged | 3 January 1817, Montreal: “Joseph Delard de Sorel,” steersman out of Lachine and middleman in the North, three years (Beek); ledger transfer to Columbia, 1817 (F.4/32 fo. 330) |
| Documented ranks | Middleman for the interior (1817 engagement); bout — end man (F.4/46, 1821); steersman, outfits 1824–1833 (B.239/g/4–g/13) |
| Accounts | Columbia District, outfits 1821–1836 (B.239/g/1–g/16); capacity blank from 1834 |
| Oregon | French Prairie settler; married Lisette Souchouabe (Shuswap), then Marie Poirier. The Early Oregonian gives arrival 1815; the January 1817 engagement places his departure west that year |
| Died | 26 August 1869, St. Louis, Marion County, Oregon |
Two Account Series and an Engagement, Read Entry by Entry
The reconstruction rests on two distinct HBCA record series, each recording at a different level of detail, together spanning 1813 to 1836 — and on the notarial act that one of them cross-references.
The F.4 series — North West Company records. A December 1813 advances ledger (F.4/5), the NWC general ledger carrying Joseph's 1817 account (F.4/32), and the 1821 dissolution-balances ledger (F.4/46) struck when the NWC wound up and merged into the HBC.
The B.239/g series — abstracts of servants' accounts. Sixteen consecutive annual volumes (g/1 through g/16), each recording every servant's outfit-year account: name, age, parish, capacity, district, years of service, and running balance. Read in sequence, they are the spine of the career — and the instrument of the continuity proof.
The notarial engagement. The 1817 ledger entry points to the Montreal engagé book, and from there to the engagement itself in the minutes of the notary John Gerbrand Beek.
Reading the abstracts directly recovers what the finding aid does not carry: the parish on each account line, the age and service that prove single-man continuity, and the capacity in each outfit. HBCA manuscript pages are transcribed below, not reproduced; the transcription tables carry every figure the argument uses.
The 1813 Advance: The Trail Pushed Back
HBCA F.4/5, folio 6, is a North West Company advances ledger. In a December 1813 list, Joseph Deslard draws an advance of £2·10·0. The surrounding names are the Sorel and Trois-Rivières engagé milieu — Cournoyer, Chalifoux, Lavallée, Bellanger, Beauchemin, Bibeau, Cardin, St-Pierre, Forcier. An advance of this kind is what a man received when outfitting to go west.
| Entry | Adv. Joseph Deslard — £2·10·0 |
| Page totals | Brought forward £128·2·3; carried £235·16·8 |
| Neighbours on the page | Augustin Beauchemin, J. Bte and Antoine St-Pierre, Baptiste and Charles La Vallé, Pierre Bellanger, Emanuel and Paul Cournoyer, Pierre Bibeau, Charles and Michel Chalifoux, Thomas Cardin, Augustin, Jacques and Pierre Forcier |
| States | Name and amount only — no parish, age, or capacity |
The 1813 advance extends the documented working life eight years earlier than the abstract series. It names Joseph Deslard, not a birth year or parish — so it extends the trail without, by itself, welding it to the 1792 Sorel baptism. An independent adult advance in 1813 does, however, fit a man born in 1792 (age ~21) more comfortably than one born in the later 1790s.
The 1817 Ledger: Montreal to Columbia
HBCA F.4/32 is the North West Company general ledger. Folio 330 carries the account of Joseph Deslard: charged in 1817 with 175·10 “To Sundries of Montreal Engagé Book 227,” and credited the same amount “By Columbia 1817.” In one line the ledger records his 1817 engagement being carried over from the Montreal outfitting book and transferred to the Columbia department. The folio was supplied by the HBCA on request and is transcribed here rather than reproduced.
| Side | Year | Entry | Amount |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dr. | 1817 | To Sundries of Montreal Engagé Book [fo.] 227 | 175·10 |
| Cr. | [1818] | By Columbia 1817 — “Columbia” written again beneath | 175·10 |
The ledger makes the sheet's “NWC from 1817, Columbia” primary. It carries no age or parish — a financial line, not a biographical one — but its cross-reference to the Montreal Engagé Book named exactly where the engagement would be found. That engagement is the next document.
The Engagement: “Joseph Delard de Sorel”
The engagé book reference on fo. 330 led to the engagement itself — a printed North West Company form completed in the hand of the Montreal notary John Gerbrand Beek on 3 January 1817. Its opening line names the man and his place: “Joseph Delard de Sorel.” He engages to McTavish, McGillivrays & Co. for three consecutive years wintering in the Northwest, and the handwritten capacity has two parts: gouvernail de la Chine — steersman on the canoe route out of Lachine — with milieu dans le Nord, middleman in the interior, written beneath. Having declared he did not know how to sign, he made his mark.
| Engagé | Joseph Delard de Sorel |
| Employers | William McGillivray, Simon McGillivray, Archibald Norman McLeod, Thomas Thain, John McTavish and Henry Mackenzie, of Montreal, trading as McTavish, McGillivrays & Co. (“et Kenneth McKenzie” struck through) |
| Capacity | Gouvernail de la Chine [steersman out of Lachine]; interlined: Milieu dans le Nord [middleman in the North] |
| Term | Three consecutive years wintering in the dependencies of the Northwest, by Michilimackinac and Fort William if required |
| Wages | “neuf…” livres ancien cours — 900 per the SHSB abstract |
| Advance | Thirty-two piastres, ten more on departure (as read) |
| Equipment | The printed form's standard outfit for the first year: two blankets, six ells of cotton, a pair of beef-hide shoes and a collar |
| Signature | Declared he could not sign; made his ordinary mark (+) |
This is the document that makes the identity link primary rather than sheet-based. The Columbia steersman is here recorded, in his own 1817 engagement, as Joseph Delard of Sorel — matching the fo. 330 ledger transfer and the sixteen-outfit abstract run that follows. His mark independently echoes the Oregon church records, in which Joseph Delard could not sign. And the act fixes his starting rank in the interior: a middleman.
The engagement gives “de Sorel” but names no father and no age. It ties the account-man to Sorel and to the Delard name; it does not, by itself, distinguish him from any other Joseph Delard of Sorel, nor state the parentage that would tie him specifically to the 1792 baptism. That last step remains a convergence, set out in the identity argument below.
The 1821 Dissolution: An End Man at the Merger
HBCA F.4/46 is one of the North West Company's 1821 dissolution-balances ledgers, struck when the company wound up and merged into the HBC. Its servants are line-numbered with a Capacity column. At line 101: Deslard, Joseph — Bout — 600. On the same page, at line 89: Poirier, Toussaint — Bout — 600 — Joseph's future second father-in-law, with the same rating, in the same account.
| Line | Name | Capacity | Wages | Dr. | To be credited |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 101 | Deslard, Joseph | Bout | 600 | 779·10 | 600 |
| 89 | Poirier, Toussaint | Bout | 600 | same page, same rating | |
| Capacities used for canoemen on this folio: Bout (600) and Milieu (400 and below); others are rated Clerk, Interpreter, Carpenter, Blacksmith, Taylor | |||||
In North West Company usage the canoemen were milieux, the middle paddlers, or bouts — the two end men, the avant (bowsman) and the gouvernail (steersman), paid more for their skill. This folio uses exactly that two-way division. The entry therefore places Joseph among the senior canoemen in 1821 — up from the middleman rank of his 1817 engagement — but does not say which end of the canoe he worked. It cannot be read as a bowsman rating.
Sixteen Outfits: The Continuity Proof
The abstracts of servants' accounts carry Joseph Deslard through every outfit from 1821 to 1836. The first three volumes record him in the Columbia District without age or parish. From outfit 1824 they do more than confirm his presence — they prove he is one continuous individual. His age advances by exactly one year, and his years of service advance by exactly one, in lockstep, outfit after outfit, and his parish — Sorel — is written on his own account line in every volume. No plausible reading reconstructs this as two men.
| Vol. | Outfit | Fol. | Age | Yrs Svc | Parish | Capacity | Dr. bal. 1 June |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| g/1 | 1821–22 | 44 | — | — | — | (not legible) | [1200] |
| g/2 | 1822–23 | 42 | — | — | — | — | 1055·15 |
| g/3 | 1823–24 | 43 | — | — | — | “Columbia Service” | 243·4 |
| g/4 | 1824–25 | 38 | 27 | 8 | Sorel | Steersman | £6·10·3 |
| g/5 | 1825–26 | 36 | 28 | 9 | Sorel | Steersman | 10·6·4 |
| g/6 | 1826–27 | 51 | 29 | 10 | Sorel | Steersman | 2·2·6 |
| g/7 | 1827–28 | — | 30 | 11 | Sorel | Steersman | 10·8·3 |
| g/8 | 1828–29 | 32 | 31 | 12 | Sorel | Steersman | (faint) |
| g/9 | 1829–30 | 36 | 32 | 13 | Sorel | Steersman | 8·11·1 |
| g/10 | 1830–31 | 58 | 33 | 14 | Sorel | Steersman | 25·5·1 |
| g/11 | 1831–32 | 40 | 34 | 15 | Sorel | Steersman | 14·14·0 |
| g/12 | 1832–33 | 41 | 35 | 16 | Sorel | Steersman | (faint) |
| g/13 | 1833–34 | 41 | 36 | 17 | Sorel | Steersman | 9·16·7 |
| g/14 | 1834–35 | 42 | 37 | — | Sorel | (blank — account only) | ~19·14·9 |
| g/15 | 1835–36 | 39 | 38 | — | Sorel | (blank — account only) | ~20·7·6 |
| g/16 | 1836–37 | 44 | 39 | — | Sorel | (blank — account only) | ~33·1·2 |
All sixteen volumes. District Columbia throughout. Balances in g/1–g/3 are in the earlier currency of account and are not comparable with the sterling balances from g/4; bracketed and approximate figures are faint on the film.
| Vol. / fo. | Line | Name | Age | Parish | Capacity | Yrs | Dr. 1 June |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| g/4, fo. 38 | 32 | Deslard, Jos. | 27 | Sorel | Steersman | 8 | £6·10·3 |
| g/4, fo. 38 | 33 | Dispard, Jos. | 31 | Yamaska | Middleman | 9 | — |
| g/14, fo. 42 | 108 | Deslard, Joseph | 37 | Sorel | (blank) | — | ~£19·14·9 |
| g/14, fo. 42 | 110 | Despard, Jos. [?] | 41 | Yamaska | — | — | — |
Thirteen consecutive outfits in which age rises by exactly one, ten of them with service rising in step, and the same parish on the same account line from 1824 to 1836, establish that a single individual is being tracked. This is the load-bearing proof of the reconstruction: it is what allows the F.4 records, the abstracts, and the end-of-service entries to be read as one man's career rather than a surname's scattered appearances.
Antoine Deslard and Joseph Dispard: The Same-Name Tests
The continuity proof gains force from two controls sitting in the same volumes. In B.239/g/1 (outfit 1821), a second Deslard appears one folio away from Joseph: Antoine Deslard — keyed to the Athabasca District, not Columbia. This matches the NWC index independently, which records Antoine Deslard in the 1821 Athabasca general blotter (F.4/37). Same surname, same volume, same year — two different men, two different districts.
The second control is closer still. In g/4 and again in g/14, the line beside Joseph's belongs to a Joseph Dispard (Despard) of Yamaska — a middleman, aged 31 in 1824 and 41 in 1834, with his own years of service. Two Josephs with near-identical surnames, on adjacent lines, each aging one year per outfit on his own track: the abstracts themselves keep them apart, as the 1839 mission register would.
| Folio | Name | Account ref. (parish col.) | District | Wages |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 44 | Deslard, Jos. | 1559 | Columbia (block headed by Dubreuille, Degrais) | 1200 |
| 45 | Deslard, Ant. | 1274·14 | Athabasca | 1200 |
Antoine in Athabasca and Joseph Dispard of Yamaska beside him are not threats to the identification but strengthenings of it: the abstracts separate same-surname and near-same-surname men by district, parish, age and service, and Joseph's sixteen-year Columbia trail is not being confused with another man's. It is the same discipline the companion study applies to the two Josephs of the 1839 mission register.
Middleman, End Man, Steersman: The Ranks in the Records' Own Terms
Set the engagement and the two account series side by side and a coherent rise appears. The 1817 act hires Joseph as steersman on the canoe route out of Lachine and as middleman in the interior. The 1821 dissolution ledger rates him bout — an end man. From outfit 1824 the abstracts record him as steersman in every volume through outfit 1833. From 1834 the capacity column is blank and only a rising debit remains. The career, in the primary hand, runs:
- 1813 — NWC advance, £2·10·0 (F.4/5)
- 1817 — engaged at Montreal: steersman out of Lachine, middleman in the North (Beek; F.4/32 fo. 330)
- 1821 — bout, end man (F.4/46)
- 1824–1833 — steersman (B.239/g/4–g/13): ten consecutive outfits, Columbia District
- 1834–1836 — capacity blank, debit rising (B.239/g/14–g/16): outstanding accounts
The biographical sheet gives “bowsman 1824–25, steersman 1825–27.” The abstracts read here record steersman in outfit 1824 and in every outfit after it, and the 1821 bout rating does not specify either end of the canoe. The sheet, however, cites a separate run of the abstracts — B.239/g/61–79, with its bowsman year at g/64 — not the g/1–16 volumes examined here. Until g/64 is read, the difference is recorded as a disagreement between the two runs, not as an error in either. The independent proof narrative by Connie Lenzen, CG, which documents Joseph's Sorel origin and Oregon life in full, reaches the fur-trade career through the same sheet; this methodology adds the account-book layer beneath it.
Joining the Account-Book Man to the Man from Sorel
The account books and the engagement prove a single individual, Joseph Delard or Deslard of Sorel, at work from 1813 to 1836. Tying that individual to the Joseph Delard baptized at St-Pierre de Sorel in 1792 — and to the Oregon settler who died at St. Louis in 1869 — is a separate step, and the honest way to take it is joint by joint.
A birth-year scatter has to be handled first, because a casual look suggests a five-year gap between the abstracts (age consistent with b. ~1797) and the baptism (1792). Assembled across every source, the “birth year” ranges across more than a decade — and most of that scatter comes from the Oregon and census records disagreeing with one another:
| Source | Birth year | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| PRDH #455108 / Sorel register | 1792 | Baptismal register — contemporaneous, primary (hard anchor) |
| Early Oregonian (OR Sec. of State) | 1792 | Compiled; carries the baptismal date |
| Early Oregonian — alt. | 1794 | Alternate compiled estimate |
| B.239/g abstracts (13 vols with age) | ~1796–97 | Age stated to clerk, internally consistent |
| HBCA biographical sheet | ca. 1797 | “Age given as 28” in 1825 |
| 1860 U.S. census (age 65) | ~1795 | Household-reported age |
| 1850 U.S. census (age 49) | ~1801 | Household-reported age |
| St. Louis burial, 1869 (aged 80) | ~1789 | Age given at burial; transcription, original not examined |
There is exactly one hard datum — the 1792 register — surrounded by self-reported estimates that scatter from about 1789 to 1801 for a single, well-documented Oregon individual. The abstracts' ~1797 sits inside that cloud rather than outside it. The Oregon record's own internal disagreement is direct proof that this community's non-baptismal ages are not reliable to five years — which dissolves the “two men, five years apart” concern. It is not two hard records in conflict; it is one anchor amid noise.
| 1 | 1792 Sorel baptism ↔ Oregon settler (d. 1869 St. Louis). The Early Oregonian names the Sorel parents; Lenzen documents the Oregon life; the father-name compression ties to the specific PRDH Delard family. | Strong |
| 2 | Oregon settler / Sorel origin ↔ fur-trade career. Primary: the 1817 Beek engagement records “Joseph Delard de Sorel,” matching F.4/32 fo. 330 (Montreal engagement to Columbia, 1817) and the abstract run. The mark echoes the Oregon records. Remaining inch: the act states origin but not parentage or age. | Strong |
| 3 | Engagement and ledgers ↔ B.239/g account-man. The sixteen-outfit continuity proof, with the Antoine Deslard and Joseph Dispard controls. | Strong |
With the 1817 Beek engagement in hand, Link 2 is no longer sheet-based: a primary notarial act records the fur-trade man as “Joseph Delard de Sorel,” and his mark matches the Oregon records. What the engagement does not supply is parentage or age — so it ties the account-man to Sorel and to the Delard name without, by itself, naming him as the son of François Delard and Catherine Lavallée baptized in 1792. That final step remains a convergence: name, parish, period, a man who could not sign, and the absence of any competing candidate all point one way, but no single document yet states the parentage outright. This is a narrow and well-defined gap, not an open question about whether the fur-trade man came from Sorel.
What This Methodology Does Not Yet Answer
- The remaining inch — parentage: No document yet names the fur-trade Joseph as the son of François Delard and Catherine Lavallée. The BAnQ paper original of the Beek minute, or a second act naming kin, is the record most likely to close it.
- The two-men test at Sorel: A PRDH search for any second Joseph Delard of Sorel of a compatible age would test the convergence directly. No competing candidate is presently known.
- The sheet's own volumes: The biographical sheet cites B.239/g/61–79, including g/64 for its bowsman year. Reading g/64 will show whether that run records Joseph as bowsman in 1824–25 or whether the sheet departs from both runs.
- The Thompson's River posting: The sheet places him at Thompson's River from 1827; the abstracts read here record the Columbia District, of which Thompson's River was a post. Post-level confirmation would live in the post records, not these district abstracts.
Primary Source Documentation
Hudson's Bay Company Archives (Archives of Manitoba, Winnipeg)
- HBCA, F.4/5, NWC advances ledger, December 1813, folio 6 — Joseph Deslard, £2·10·0.
- HBCA, F.4/32, NWC general ledger, folio 330 — Joseph Deslard, 1817, “Montreal Engagé Book” to Columbia. Reproduction supplied by the Archives of Manitoba; transcribed, not reproduced.
- HBCA, F.4/46, NWC dissolution balances, 1821, folio 28, line 101 — Deslard, Joseph, Bout, 600; Toussaint Poirier at line 89.
- HBCA, B.239/g/1 through B.239/g/16, abstracts of servants' accounts, outfits 1821–1836 — Joseph Deslard, of Sorel, sixteen consecutive volumes; Antoine Deslard (Athabasca) in g/1; Joseph Dispard of Yamaska beside Joseph in g/4 and g/14. All HBCA manuscript pages transcribed, not reproduced.
- HBCA Biographical Sheet, “Delard (Deslard), Joseph” (March 1987, rev. June 1999) — archival summary, citing B.239/g/61–79.
- HBCA NWC Account Books Name Index — Antoine Deslard, 1821 Athabasca general blotter (F.4/37); Joseph Deslard, F.4/32 fo. 330.
Notarial Records (BAnQ Vieux-Montréal)
- Greffe de John Gerbrand Beek, CN601,S29, minute du 3 janvier 1817 — engagement of Joseph Delard de Sorel to McTavish, McGillivrays & Co., gouvernail de la Chine and milieu dans le Nord, three years, Northwest. Digital image: FamilySearch, DGS 008864168, image 2130. Finding aid: SHSB Voyageur Contracts Database, entry 22941.
Oregon and Quebec Records
- PRDH-IGD #455108 — birth and baptism of Joseph Delard, 30 December 1792, St-Pierre de Sorel; parents François Delard & Catherine Lavallée.
- Oregon Secretary of State, Early Oregonian Database, “Delard, Joseph” — birth 1792 (alt. 1794); father Guillaume François Delard; death 1869, St. Louis, Marion Co.
- 1850 and 1860 U.S. Federal Census, Marion County, Oregon — Joseph Delard / “Peter Delor,” stated ages 49 and 65.
- St. Louis Catholic Church, Marion Co., burial of Joseph Delart, husband of Mary Poirier, “aged 80 years,” August 1869 — as transcribed; original not examined.
Independent Professional Corroboration
- Connie Lenzen, CG, “Joseph Delard” — a fully sourced proof narrative documenting the Sorel origin, the 1839 St. Paul legitimation, the two marriages, and the Oregon life; reaching the fur-trade career via the HBCA biographical sheet.
Reference
- Kenneth P. DuLong, “Engagements: A Guide to Fur Trade Employment Contracts, 1670–1821” (1989) — les bouts, the avant and gouvernail, distinguished from les milieux.
This methodology accompanies the case study summary and the companion study that untangles two families the online trees had merged.
Case Study: The Steersman's Ledger → Two Families the Trees Merged →