Saskatchewan River

Ultimate source is at the head waters of the Bow

River, about lat. 51 deg. 40', in the heart of the Rocky Mountains. After a

course of 1205 miles, it flows into Lake Winnipeg, finally discharging

its waters by the Nelson into Hudson Bay. The length of the South

Saskatchewan to its junction with the North Saskatchewan at the Forks is

865 miles; and of the North Saskatchewan, which rises in the watershed

range of the Roc y Mountains, near the source of the Athabaska, is 760

miles. La Verendrye reached the river, then known as the Pasquia, or

Poskoyac, in 1748, and built Fort Bourbon on the shores of Cedar Lake.

He ascended the river to the Forks, a few miles below which he built

Fort Poskoyac. In 1751 a party of French explorers ascended one of the

branches to the mountains, where they built Fort La Jonquiere. Anthony

Hendry reached the Saskatchewan from Hudson Bay in 1754, and descended

the river from the upper waters of the Red Deer, to the Pas. Many

trading posts were afterwards built at different points on the two

branches, both by the North West Company and the Hudson's Bay Company.