Islands of Truth: The Imperial Fashioning of Vancouver Island

David Mardiros is a lawyer and anthropological consultant in Terrace,
British Columbia.

Before the arrival of Europeans, the coast of British Columbia was home
to some of the most sophisticated aboriginal cultures and densest
concentrations of population north of Mexico. Unlike Mesoamerica,
however, the story of how Europeans came to dominate the Northwest Coast
of North America has attracted little academic scrutiny. Daniel
Clayton’s book is an ambitious analysis of both the concerns of
aboriginal peoples and the diverse groups of Europeans with whom they
came in contact on Vancouver Island in the period from the 1790s to the
1860s.

Although the book began as a doctoral dissertation, it presents the
subject matter in clearly crafted language that is accessible by a
general audience and reads more like a volume of popular history than an
academic publication. While some of the most dramatic events have been
well documented previously (James Cook’s landing at Nootka Sound, for
example), Clayton’s use of original sources brings a fresh perspective
and provides insight into the competitive interests of the European
powers whose economic activities brought them to northwestern North
America. From the trade in sea otter pelts (which made vast fortunes for
individual traders and their governments) to the boundary disputes
between Britain and the United States, Clayton shows how a region of the
world that was unknown to Europeans until the late 18th century became a
region of serious conflict and competition among them.

Of greatest interest is the attention Clayton gives to the interests
and perspectives of the First Nations upon whose territories the
geopolitical games of the English, Spanish, and Americans were played
out. Although this part of the book is, unfortunately, less successful
than the other sections because of a lack of documentary and
ethnohistorical evidence for the conclusions the author puts forward,
Islands of Truth is part of a welcome trend in historiography in its
attempts to demonstrate how aboriginal peoples actively participated in
the economic and political processes that were, ultimately, to alter
their world forever. The book is an important addition to the expanding
literature on the nature of the relationship between indigenous and
nonindigenous peoples in a region where the legal basis and consequences
of that relationship have yet to be fully articulated.