Fort Pitt Provincial Park

For other places with this name see Fort Pitt (disambiguation).

Fort Pitt
  • waskahikansis (Cree) 'little fort'
  • Itakapioxis (Blackfoot) 'circle of houses'[1]
Battle of Fort Pitt
LocationFrenchman Butte, Saskatchewan, Canada
Coordinates53°34′16″N 109°47′31″W / 53.571°N 109.792°W / 53.571; -109.792
Built1829[2]
Original useTrading post
Demolished1885
Rebuilt1886 (partial)
Official nameFort Pitt National Historic Site of Canada
Designated7 June 1956
Fort Pitt Provincial Park is located in Saskatchewan
Fort Pitt Provincial Park
Location of Fort Pitt in Saskatchewan
Fort Pitt Provincial Park is located in Canada
Fort Pitt Provincial Park
Fort Pitt Provincial Park (Canada)

Fort Pitt Provincial Park is a provincial park in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. Fort Pitt was built in 1829 by the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) and was a trading post on the North Saskatchewan River in Rupert's Land. It was built at the direction of Chief Factor John Rowand, previously of Fort Edmonton, to trade for bison hides, meat and pemmican. Pemmican, dried buffalo meat, was required as provisions for HBC's northern trading posts.[3]

In the 1870s the abundance of buffalo in the area had been severely diminished through the overhunting necessary to meet the growing demand from the HBC for both furs and pemmican. One academic journal states "with the disappearance of the buffalo, pork had replaced pemmican altogether",[4] showing the drastic effects of the HBC on the local buffalo population.

Fort Pitt was built where the territories of the Cree, Assiniboine, and Blackfoot converged. It was located on a large bend in the river just east of the present day Alberta–Saskatchewan border and was the major post between Fort Edmonton and Fort Carlton. In 1876, it was one of the locations for signing Treaty 6. It was the scene of the Battle of Fort Pitt during the North-West Rebellion of 1885. The site was designated a national historic site of Canada in 1954.[5]

In 1986, approximately 10.4 ha (26 acres) of land surrounding the remains of the fort was designated as Fort Pitt Provincial Park by the government of Saskatchewan.[6]

  1. ^ Fromhold, Joachim (2001). 2001 Indian Place Names of the West - Part 1. Calgary: Lulu. pp. FFF. ISBN 9780557438365.
  2. ^ "Fort Pitt Provincial Park". Historic Places. Parks Canada. Retrieved 7 February 2021.
  3. ^ "Provincial Parks". The Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan. University of Regina. Archived from the original on 20 September 2022. Retrieved 20 September 2022.
  4. ^ Dobak, William (Spring 1996). "Killing the Canadian Buffalo". Western Historical Quarterly. 27 (1): 33–52. doi:10.2307/969920. JSTOR 969920.[permanent dead link]
  5. ^ Fort Pitt. Canadian Register of Historic Places. Retrieved 12 August 2012.
  6. ^ Bob Beal. "Fort Pitt". The Canadian Encyclopedia. Retrieved 9 September 2019.