Thomas Douglas, fifth Earl of Selkirk, a noble humanitarian Scot concerned with the plight of the crofters of his native Highlands, conceived a plan to settle them in the valley of the Red River of the North.

Selkirk persuaded eighty men and four officers to go to Red River where they were to serve as a military force to protect his settlers from the hostile Northwest Company which resented the intrusion of farmers into the fur traders' empire.

It was the low yield of the Selkirk plots and the ravages of grasshoppers in 1818 that led to the dispersal of the settlement southward.

The Selkirk settlers had been anticipated in their move southward by British fur traders.

These carts were of a type devised in Pembina in the days of Alexander Henry the Younger about a decade before the Selkirk colony was begun.

It was Dickson who suggested to Lord Selkirk that he return to the Atlantic coast by way of the United States.

During the trip Selkirk decided that the route through Illinois territory to Indiana and the eastern United States was the best route for goods from England to reach Red River and that the United States was a better source of supply for many goods than either Canada or England.

Upon arriving at Baltimore, Selkirk on December 22 wrote to John Quincy Adams, Secretary of State at Washington, inquiring about laws covering trade with `` Missouri and Illinois Territories ''.

This epic effort to secure seed for the colony cost Selkirk Ab1,040.

Bailly, after leaving Fort Snelling in August 1821, was forced to leave some of the cattle at the Hudson's Bay Company's post on Lake Traverse `` in the Sieux Country '' and reached Fort Garry, as the Selkirk Hudson's Bay Company center was now called, late in the fall.

As these Swiss were moving from the Selkirk settlement to become the first civilian residents of Minnesota, Dousman of Michilimackinac, Michigan, and Prairie Du Chien was traveling to Red River to open a trade in merchandise.

Accordingly, though the practice violated the no-trading provision of the Selkirk charter which reserved all such activity in merchandise and furs to the Hudson's Bay Company, some settlers went into trade.

* 1852 – Tlingit Indians destroy Fort Selkirk, Yukon Territory.

Alexander Selkirk ( 1676 – 13 December 1721 ) was a Scottish sailor who spent four years as a castaway after being marooned on an uninhabited island.

An unruly youth, Selkirk joined several buccaneering expeditions to the South Seas, including one commanded by William Dampier, which called in for provisions at the Juan Fernández Islands off Chile.

Selkirk judged correctly that his craft, the Cinque Ports, was unseaworthy, and was given the choice of being left ashore on his own.

The son of a shoemaker and tanner in Lower Largo, Fife, Scotland, Selkirk was born in 1676.

While Dampier was captain of the St. George, Selkirk served on the galley Cinque Ports, the St. Georges companion, as a sailing master serving under Thomas Stradling.

By this time, Selkirk had grave concerns about the seaworthiness of this vessel.

Selkirk lived the next four years and four months without any human company.

Hearing strange sounds from inland, which he feared were dangerous beasts, Selkirk remained at first along the shoreline.

Selkirk proved resourceful in using equipment from the ship as well as materials that were native to the island.

" The cardinals promptly ratified Malabranca's desperate decision.

" Classes were promptly cancelled in Beijing primary and secondary schools, followed by a decision on June 13 to expand the class suspension nationwide.

He defended that title for the first time against Graham, winning by a decision, and promptly made four non title bouts before the end of the year, including another win over Janiro and a draw in ten with Bratton.

Will meets his friends, who are supportive of his decision about Anna, until Spike arrives and promptly calls him a " daft prick ".

When it was suggested that the match would be a wise decision due to Thorbjorn ’ s financial situation, he announced that he would rather “ leave my farm than live with this loss of honor, and rather leave the country than shame my family .” Gudrid and her father promptly left Iceland and voyaged to Greenland to accompany Eirik the Red.

Two years later, when Johnson criticized Landis ' decision to give Ty Cobb and Tris Speaker an amnesty after it surfaced they had bet on a fixed game in 1919, Landis told the American League owners to choose between him and Johnson ; the owners promptly sent Johnson on a sabbatical from which he never really returned.

On 23 April 2009, the High Court of Justice ordered that Amadou be conditionally released for health reasons ; in accordance with the High Court's decision, he was promptly released from prison after being detained for 10 months.

Sall promptly announced that he was resigning from the PDS ; this decision meant that he would lose his seat in the National Assembly, as well as his seat on Fatick's municipal council and his post as Mayor of Fatick.

He made a worse mistake by insisting on his decision and was promptly replaced by Lev Rudnev, a 53-year-old rising star of Stalin's establishment.

" However, after considering his decision, White realized that a thirty-minute operatic tragedy, or " one act vaudeville opera ", as Gershwin called it, would disrupt the flow of his review, and promptly reconsidered before Gershwin and DeSylva had begun writing.

The decision in all cases to be given promptly and irrevocably, for which purpose the umpires and the referee should be invariably close together.

However, the Attorney General's decision was promptly challenged by famous psychiatrist Thomas Szasz, who insisted that psychiatry must never become a tool of political rivalry.

It is world-wide knowledge that any power which might be tempted today to attack the United States by surprise, even though we might sustain great losses, would itself promptly suffer a terrible destruction.

When Captain John Gibault of Salem had visited Burma in 1793 his ship, the Astra, had been promptly commandeered and taken by her captors up the Irrawaddy River.

The governor was not used to having his integrity questioned, and he promptly passed the charges on to Woodruff, demanding that Woodruff answer them.

Gorton and company, however, promptly bought land from Miantonomi a few miles south of Pawtuxet, extending from the present Gaspee Point south to Warwick Neck and twenty miles inland.

Morgan took the suggested steps, but when Mrs. Sanderson appeared, there was nobody with her but her husband, whom he promptly sent to headquarters to be questioned.

Touring Africa, the new U.S. Assistant Secretary of State observed `` Africa should be for the Africans '' and the British promptly denounced him.

Whether this, or overt action, was the cause of the crash must be promptly determined.

Eugene told him and he promptly forgot.

There is a death in all partings, she knew, and promptly put it out of her mind.

Economic information is made available to businessmen and economists promptly through the monthly Survey Of Current Business and its weekly supplement.

Upon the expiration of a period deemed adequate for demonstration purposes for each plant, but not to exceed such twelve-year period, the Secretary shall proceed as promptly as practicable to dispose of any plants so constructed by sale to the highest bidder, or as may otherwise be directed by Act of Congress.

If there is anything which we can do in the executive branch of the Government to speed up the processes by which we come to decisions on matters on which we must act promptly, that in itself would be a major contribution to the conduct of our affairs.

The clients boarded the tallyho at the Palace promptly at seven.

`` That's one thing I've never done '', she said promptly.

Then China promptly went Communist, and Mr. Truman had to fight the interminable Korean war for the democratization of Korea before we learned how far our writ did `` reach in Asia ''.

As promptly as Torrio, O'Banion jumped into bootlegging.

Spokesmen for the nation's tradition-minded sculptors promptly claimed that Udall was exiling the statue because of his own hostility to this art form.

The hotly debated plan for the capital's Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial, a circle of huge tablets engraved with his speeches ( and promptly dubbed by one of its critics, `` Instant Stonehenge '' ), is another of Udall's headaches, since as supervisor of the National Parks Commission he will share in the responsibility for building it.

He sucked in his breath and kept quiet while Killpath laid down the sheet again, wound the gold-wire stems of his glasses around his ears and then, eying the report as it lay before him on the desk, intoned, `` Acting Lieutenant Gunnar Matson one failed to see that the station keeper was properly relieved two absented himself throughout the entire watch without checking on the station's activities or the whereabouts of his section sergeants three permitted members of the Homicide Detail of the Inspector's Bureau to arrogate for their own convenience a patrolman who was thereby prevented from carrying on his proper assignment four failed to notify the station commander Acting Captain O. T. Killpath of a homicide occurring in the district five frequented extralegal establishments known as after-hours spots for purposes of an unofficial and purportedly social nature and six '' -- he leaned back and peeled off his glasses `` -- failed to co-operate with the Acting Captain by returning promptly when so ordered.

Alec promptly removed the gun.

He promptly went to communist East Germany.

Mobutu promptly flung out the Russians, who have not since played any significant part on the local scene, although they have redoubled their obstructionist efforts at U.N. headquarters in New York.

Because he spoke openly with what Channing had prophesied someone might -- with daring hyperbole -- Parker vindicated Channing's further prophecy that he who committed this infraction of taste would promptly discover how little mercy liberals were disposed to allow to libertarians who appeared to them libertines.

`` Nobody else can live in your hearth while I am in it '', Hesperus said promptly.

Australia promptly seized the initiative, won the First Test convincingly and inaugurated a dominant post-war era.