British Columbia

===Fur trade and colonial era===
{{main|Columbia District}}
{{See also|Oregon Country|Oregon boundary dispute}}
Lands now known as British Columbia were added to the [[British Empire]] during the 19th century. Colonies originally begun with the support of the [[Hudson's Bay Company]] (Vancouver Island, the mainland) were amalgamated, then entered Confederation as British Columbia in 1871 as part of the Dominion of Canada.

During the 1770s, [[smallpox]] killed at least 30 percent of the Pacific Northwest [[First Nations in Canada|First Nations]].<ref>{{cite web |last=Lange |first=Greg |date=January 23, 2003 |title=Smallpox epidemic ravages Native Americans on the northwest coast of North America in the 1770s |url=http://www.historylink.org/essays/output.cfm?file_id=5100 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080526181907/http://www.historylink.org/essays/output.cfm?file_id=5100 |archive-date=May 26, 2008 |access-date=February 22, 2011 |publisher=[[HistoryLink]]}}</ref> This devastating epidemic was the first in a series; the [[1862 Pacific Northwest smallpox epidemic]] killed about half to two-thirds of the native population of what became British Columbia.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www2.h-net.msu.edu/reviews/showrev.php?id=4547 |title=Plagues and Peoples on the Northwest Coast |publisher=.h-net.msu.edu |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101227194037/http://www2.h-net.msu.edu/reviews/showrev.php?id=4547 |archive-date=December 27, 2010 |access-date=February 22, 2011}}</ref><ref name="Boyd">{{cite book |last1=Boyd |first1=Robert Thomas |title=The Coming of the Spirit of Pestilence: Introduced Infectious Diseases and Population Decline Among Northwest Coast Indians, 1774–1874 |publisher=[[University of British Columbia Press]] |year=1999 |isbn=978-0-295-97837-6 |pages=172–201 |chapter=A final disaster: the 1862 smallpox epidemic in coastal British Columbia |access-date=February 10, 2021 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=P_FdUPbmwCgC&pg=PA172 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210511153639/https://books.google.com/books?id=P_FdUPbmwCgC&pg=PA172 |archive-date=May 11, 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="lange">{{cite web |last=Lange |first=Greg |title=Smallpox Epidemic of 1862 among Northwest Coast and Puget Sound Indians |url=https://www.historylink.org/File/5171 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210125204435/https://www.historylink.org/File/5171 |archive-date=January 25, 2021 |access-date=February 8, 2021 |publisher=[[HistoryLink]]}}</ref>

[[File:Spanish fort San Miguel at Nootka in 1793.jpg|thumb|left|[[Fort San Miguel]] at Nootka in 1793]]
[[File:Kwakiutl house pole InvMH975-123-1.jpg|thumb|upright=.6|[[Kwakwaka'wakw]] [[Totem pole|house pole]], second half of the 19th century]]
The arrival of Europeans began around the mid-18th century, as [[fur trade]]rs entered the area to harvest [[sea otter]]s. While it is thought [[Francis Drake|Sir Francis Drake]] may have explored the British Columbian coast in 1579, it was [[Juan José Pérez Hernández|Juan Pérez]] who completed the first documented voyage, which took place in 1774. [[Juan Francisco de la Bodega y Quadra]] explored the coast in 1775. In doing so, Pérez and Quadra reasserted the [[Spanish Empire|Spanish]] claim for the [[Pacific coast]], first made by [[Vasco Núñez de Balboa]] in 1513.

The explorations of [[James Cook]] in 1778 and [[George Vancouver]] in 1792 and 1793 established British jurisdiction over the coastal area north and west of the Columbia River. In 1793, [[Sir Alexander Mackenzie]] was the first European to journey across North America overland to the Pacific Ocean, inscribing a stone marking his accomplishment on the shoreline of [[Dean Channel]] near [[Bella Coola, British Columbia|Bella Coola]]. His expedition theoretically established British sovereignty inland, and a succession of other fur company explorers charted the maze of rivers and mountain ranges between the Canadian Prairies and the Pacific. Mackenzie and other explorers—notably [[John Finlay (fur trader)|John Finlay]], [[Simon Fraser (explorer)|Simon Fraser]], [[Samuel Black]], and [[David Thompson (explorer)|David Thompson]]—were primarily concerned with extending the [[fur trade]], rather than political considerations.{{Citation needed|date=March 2024}} In 1794, by the third of a series of agreements known as the [[Nootka Convention]]s, [[Spanish Empire|Spain]] conceded its claims of exclusivity in the Pacific. This opened the way for formal claims and colonization by other powers, including Britain, but because of the [[Napoleonic Wars]], there was little British action on its claims in the region until later.

The establishment of [[trading post]]s by the [[North West Company]] and the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), effectively established a permanent British presence in the region. The Columbia District was broadly defined as being south of 54°40 north latitude, (the southern limit of [[Russian colonization of the Americas|Russian America]]), north of Mexican-controlled California, and west of the [[Rocky Mountains]]. It was, by the [[Treaty of 1818|Anglo-American Convention of 1818]], under the "joint occupancy and use" of citizens of the United States and subjects of Britain (which is to say, the fur companies).{{Citation needed|date=March 2024}} This co-occupancy was ended with the [[Oregon Treaty]] of 1846.

The major supply route was the [[York Factory Express]] between [[Hudson Bay]] and [[Fort Vancouver]]. Some of the early outposts grew into settlements, communities, and cities. Among the places in British Columbia that began as fur trading posts are [[Fort St. John, British Columbia|Fort St. John]] (established 1794); [[Hudson's Hope]] (1805); [[Fort Nelson, British Columbia|Fort Nelson]] (1805); [[Fort St. James]] (1806); [[Prince George, British Columbia|Prince George]] (1807); Kamloops (1812); [[Fort Langley]] (1827); [[Fort Victoria (British Columbia)|Fort Victoria]] (1843); [[Yale, British Columbia|Yale]] (1848); and Nanaimo (1853). Fur company posts that became cities in what is now the United States include [[Vancouver, Washington]] ([[Fort Vancouver]]), formerly the "capital" of Hudson's Bay operations in the Columbia District, [[Colville, Washington]] and [[Walla Walla, Washington]] (old [[Fort Nez Percés]]).

[[File:Edward Gennys Fanshawe, Fort Rupert, Beaver Harbour, Vancouver's Island, July 23rd 1851 (Canada).jpg|thumb|left|[[Fort Rupert]], Vancouver Island, 1851]]
With the amalgamation of the two fur trading companies in 1821, modern-day British Columbia existed in three fur trading departments. The bulk of the central and northern interior was organized into the [[New Caledonia (Canada)|New Caledonia]] district, administered from Fort St. James. The interior south of the [[Thompson River]] [[drainage basin|watershed]] and north of the Columbia was organized into the Columbia District, administered from Fort Vancouver on the lower Columbia River. The northeast corner of the province east of the Rockies, known as the Peace River Block, was attached to the much larger [[District of Athabasca|Athabasca District]], headquartered in [[Fort Chipewyan]], in present-day Alberta.

Until 1849, these districts were a wholly unorganized area of [[British North America]] under the [[de facto]] jurisdiction of HBC administrators; however, unlike [[Rupert's Land]] to the north and east, the territory was not a concession to the company. Rather, it was simply granted a monopoly to trade with the First Nations inhabitants. All that was changed with the westward extension of American exploration and the concomitant overlapping claims of territorial sovereignty, especially in the southern [[Columbia River drainage basin|Columbia Basin]] (within present day Washington and [[Oregon]]). In 1846, the [[Oregon Treaty]] divided the territory along the [[49th parallel north|49th parallel]] to the [[Strait of Georgia]], with the area south of this boundary (excluding Vancouver Island and the [[Gulf Islands]]) transferred to sole American sovereignty. The [[Colony of Vancouver Island]] was created in 1849, with Victoria designated as the capital. New Caledonia, as the whole of the mainland rather than just its north-central Interior came to be called, continued to be an unorganized territory of British North America, "administered" by individual HBC trading post managers.