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Given such employment challenges, combined with the variety of marriage rules from multiple ethnic groups, it is not surprising that for some couples, sustaining family relations was very difficult. That some couples succeeded is evidenced by the size of their families. For instance prominent trader J.B. Bonneau and his wife Louise had eight children. Francois Desmarais and his wife Marie had five children, and Angus McGillis and his wife Marguerite had six children. Some failed relationships are evidenced by the stories that appear in the letters and journals of the period.

It is not clear how often the families of wives of traders accompanied them of their yearly trips. Some believed that the wives stayed in the larger posts and did not go inland, while others felt that the wives, being from the Aboriginal tribes from the area of the inland post, would not go out for the summer, but would stay inland. It is not possible to answer the question definitively, but there are records of traders and postmasters travelling with their families. David Thompson is perhaps the best example; he took Charlotte Small with him everywhere and they had 13 children together. Charlotte’s mother was Cree and her father an NWC partner.

In another example, John McKay recorded the birth of a boy to his wife at Brandon House 17 May 1806. It seems that John McKay had delayed the whole brigade’s trip in order to allow his wife to give birth. The notes recorded in that journal upon their arrival at the staging point assure us that Mrs. McKay had accompanied them. However, it was decided that John McKay and family would not return to Brandon House. It seems he was demoted in Albany Factory on the Bay. The family returned inland the next year.

Before the amalgamation of the HBC and NWC, many of the employees had families inland. Alexander Henry the Younger included a census of the Northwest population in his 1805 journal from Pembina. [Insert table from Henri] He counts spouses of white traders as "white" women. At that early date, calculations reveal that at least half of the fur trade population had wives and families. The Assiniboine River had the highest proportion. Most of the men employed in that area had wives and families. The first people to declare themselves Métis came from this group. After the development of Red River and the union of the companies, the wives and daughters of the fur traders who retired there became important in the formation of the new community.

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