x Life in An Early x

HENEVER I see a slick

R.C.M.P. car speeding along

the smooth, paved highway, it
brings back memories of the pioneer
force which was then known as the
North West Mounted Police.

Great changes have taken place
since the scarlet tunic first made its
appearance on the Western Plains.
Those were tough and rugged times,
and a strong force was needed (out-
side the settled districts) to control
Indian activities, check poaching and
horse stealing and to protect the
settlers. The old methods of travel by
saddle-horse, buck-board and wagon,
across rough, ungraded territory is a
far call to the day of automobile,
aeroplane and radio communication,
but we who were connected with the
Force in its earliest days, feel that the
Royal Canadian Mounted Police
Force carries on the same old tradi-

North West Mounted Police
Barracks

tion which its pioneers worked so
hard to establish.

I well remember the days that I
spent as a child in the N.W.M.P.
barracks at Maple Creek in Saskatche-
wan, where my father, an original
member of the Force, was stationed.
This must have been around the early
1900’s—it was during the Boer War
anyway. My father helped to estab-
lish posts at Regina, Fort Walsh and
Fort McLeod, all of which were
stockaded against Indians. My father,
David Paterson, was a Q.M.S.—well
known from Fort Garry (established
by H.B.C.), right across the Prairies to
Fort McLeod as Sergt. “Pry” Paterson.
He was Chief Scout for the N.W.M.P.
from the international boundary
north to the Saskatchewan River,

during the Riel Rebellion.

During the course of his activities
then, he was shot in the thigh and had

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Page Forty-two

Told by
A. V:- PA GERSON

to

G. ARMSTRONG

his leg broken by a bullet, which was
not taken out until years later, when
it began to give him trouble. There
were no “local” anaesthetics in those
days and the usual ones were not
always available. It took some grit to
lie still on his bed, while the police
surgeon dug the bullet out without
one. This bullet my father hung on
his watch-chain as a charm, and was
an object of admiration to the chil-
dren in the barracks. He was. then
stationed at Maple Creek, the head-
quarters of “A” Division, where I
grew to boyhood. All N.W.M.P.
barracks of any size were built in
accordance with the same _ plan.
This one was about 214 miles from
the town and covered an area of
about ten acres, the pasture lands
being outside this. The buildings
were mainly of frame construction
and built around an open square,
with paths and roads leading from
one to another. The maintenance
work around the place was performed
by short-term prisoners.

The first building inside the gate
was the gaol, then the orderly room
and other police offices — I remem-
ber there a cottage occupied by
the Sergeant-Major—S. M. Flintoff.

There were two very large barns
housing some of the finest horseflesh
on the Continent. These animals, in
a good many cases, received more
attention than the men, as a great
deal depends on their ability to stand
long and arduous patrols in all kinds
of weather, through rough country,
where places of shelter were far apart.

V. MAWSON

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