The Labrador Question and the Society of Merchant Venturers, Bristol, 1763

Abstract

*I should like to express my gratitude to Professor J. Rousseau of Laval University, Quebec, for permission to use the historical material which forms the basis of this paper. •During the period of the Seven Years War the coastal boundary of Labrador ran from a promontory onthe Ariantic oast in Lat. 56o30'N. (Monitor, 30 Aug. 1761) to the mouth of the St Johns River facing the western end of the Island of Anticosti in the Gttlf of St Lawrence (London Gazette, 4-8 Oct. 1763). The inland boundary followed the line of St Johns River north to St Johns Lake. From there it ran west to the south side of Lake Mistassini, and finally north-east to the promontory on the Atlantic already mentioned. In 1826 Labrador was redefined as the territory east of a line running north from Blanc Sablon to Lat.52oN., but no exact position of the northern boundary was given (6 Geo. •v, c. 59, s. 9, quoted in J. D. Rogers, Historical Geography of the British Colonies. vol. v, part •v: Newfoundland (Oxford 1931 ),p. 147). This uncertainty ledto a dispute between Canada nd Newfoundland, andthe case was taken to the Privy Council which established the present boundary in 1927. 2See G. O. Rothney, A History of Newfoundland and Labrador 1754-1783 (unpublished M,• thesis, University of London, 1934), pp. 185-6; M. Wade, The French