8 March 2008
Railway Labourers Escaped from Being Held Against Their Will
In August 1896, the Canadian Pacific Railway recruited 82
labourers in Ontario for its ballasting gangs working on the roadbed between Moose Jaw and Medicine Hat and on the Soo Line between
Moose Jaw and Portal.
Every labourer had to pay two dollars to the company for his work contract, and agree to a $10 reduction from his wages to repay
the cost of his transportation to the Prairies.
The labourers were taken from Owen Sound to Fort William (now Thunder Bay) by boat. By the time the boat docked, some of the men
had lost interest in the venture and wanted out of the contract.
The railway company said no and forced all 82 men into two railway cars and locked the doors.
As the train sped westward, the men tried escaping through the windows and a few were successful.
When heads were counted at Winnipeg, 13 men were missing - along with the wallet of one of the guards. During a brief stop at that
point, the train was guarded by almost the entire Winnipeg CPR police force, which was kept busy pushing the men back into the coaches
as they tried to leave via the windows.
When the train pulled out of Winnipeg, a row broke out on board, which escalated to a revolt at Brandon. In the melee, 23 labourers
escaped, and between Brandon and Moose Jaw, five more disappeared.
When the men were herded into the CPR dining hall at Moose Jaw for breakfast, only 41 heads were counted. "Even after the
arrival here, the leakage did not cease," reported the Moose Jaw Times. "Before night, when the gang was loaded up on the
trains to be taken to the scenes of the ballasting, nine more had vanished, and of the 82 originally sent west under contract, only 32
reported themselves present."
Eight were sent to work on ballasting gangs west of Moose Jaw while the remaining 24 were assigned to the Soo Line.
"Some of the men were orderly and appeared very respectable," observed the Times. "They had embraced what seemed a cheap
opportunity to come out and see this country... The conduct of their companions had forced the company to harsh measures, which did not
add to the pleasure of the trip."
One escapee caught at Moose Jaw was charged under the Masters and Servants Ordinance, found guilty and fined $20 or one month in
jail.
The next episode involving the rail company and immigrant labourers became a national scandal that aired in the House of Commons.
On the night of 1 Apr 1913, residents of Boharm heard what sounded like gunfire, and saw several men jump from a
slow-moving train near the first crossing west of the village.
By the following morning, the mysterious incident was common gossip and spreading fast. No one could understand why the CPR and
Mounted Police pretended to know nothing about it.
A week later, the cat was out of the bag.
The Moose Jaw Evening Times reported that the CPR, while transporting a large number of Eastern European immigrants to railway work
camps in British Columbia, kept the men in locked rail cars under the supervision of armed guards, and neglected to feed them.
When the immigrant train reached Boharm, the labourers had had enough. They broke through a door and 17 escaped before guards
opened fire.
Apparently three men were wounded but no attempt was made to pursue them.
The Moose Jaw Evening Times called the incident a "scandalous affair," and a "brutal disregard of the law of
humanity." "An investigation is demanded into the CPR's methods of hiring and treating its foreign labour, and no attempts
to hush up the matter should be tolerated," fumed the newspaper. "What right has the railway to import labourers under armed
guards, to lock them up without feeding them, and then have its men fire on those who resent being treated worse than criminals?"
The railway attempted to cover up the whole nasty affair and even accused the Times of manufacturing sensationalism, but within two
weeks it had become a national scandal.
The Russian consul-general in Montreal strongly protested the alleged maltreatment of the immigrants, and on the local
level the Moose Jaw Trades and Labour Council appointed a committee to investigate the railway's violations of laws.
W.E. Knowles, MP for Moose Jaw, rose in the House of Commons and armed with the labour committee's report, accused the railway of
brining in workers under contract and transporting them under armed guards, all in violation of the law, and called upon Prime Minister
Robert Borden to launch an investigation.
Gradually the hubbub subsided and the incident forgotten in the passage of nearly a century, but from then on railways probably
behaved better when transporting their workers.
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