Report from the Committee Appointed to Inquire into the State and Condition of the Countries Adjoining to Hudson's Bay, and of the Trade Carried On There (In: Reports from committees of the House of Commons which have been printed by order of the House, and are not inserted in the journals, Vol. II)

[London], 1776. Hardcover. Near fine. Second edition of this important report, first issued in 1749 and bound here (as issued) with 12 other committee reports first published between 1737 and 1765. Folio, 486 pp, with one folding map (not related to the Hudson's Bay report), in a later binding of quarter leather and marbled boards. Each report has its own title page, but a title page for the full volume is lacking; otherwise a fine copy. According to ESTC (N69513), four volumes of these committee reports were officially ordered to be printed on 28 June, 1773, and were published in 1774-1776. They were reprinted, along with 11 additional volumes and an index, between 1803 and 1820. The 1803 reprint of this report is commonly found, but this 1776 edition is scarce. See Peel 26, TPL 213. In 1749, the House of Commons appointed a committee of enquiry into the lands and trade of the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC). It was undertaken as a result of a petition made by a group led by Irishman Arthur Dobbs, who hoped to have the HBC''s trade monopoly revoked on the grounds that their policies had led to a loss of British control of the fur trade and that showed little interest in promoting expeditions in search of the Northwest Passage. The Report offers a history of the Company from its formation and includes the journal of Joseph La France, a pioneer trader with the Indians inhabiting the region of the Great Lake, who describes visits into French Canada, the state of the fortresses there, and French trade with the Indians. It also includes testimony given before the Committee by many witnesses, including serveral people employed by the HBC as well as merchants engaged in trade in HBC territory. The Appendix includes the text of the HBC's charter, a list of vessels sent by the HBC in search of a Northwest Passage, tables of the HBC's annual sales and exports, "A Journal of a Voyage and Journey undertaken by Henry Kelsey, to discover, and endeavour to bring to a Commerce, the Naywatamee Poets [an unidentified people who may have been the Hidatsa or Gros Ventre], 1691," and much other interesting material.