The ‘cream of the crop’ of the Hudson Bay art collection goes to auction in Yorkville today, to help pay off some of the former HBCs debts.

I took a fast look at the art up for auction, trying to see if any Indigenous art was on the block. Quick history lesson: the Hudson Bay Company dominated the fur trade in Canada for more than 200 years. From 1670 to 1870, they controlled most of Rupert’s Land, about 8 million square kms from BC to Quebec to Nunavut and encompassing what are now 6 northern United States. Of course, First Nations peoples were living on this land - land that was stolen and claimed as if no one was around or living on it. Remember terra nullis, land belonging to no one, was the law of the day - imperial nations crossed the ocean, armed with the Christian churches blessing to take the land and Christianize anyone they found. I write a lot about Rupert’s Land in my latest book, The Knowing, but to put it bluntly, Rupert’s Land was a monstrous plantation for the British and for what was to become the fur-trading giant - the HBC. A series of British governors ruled Rupert’s Land, many of them - at the beginning of the HBC’s reign - had ties to slavery and the African National Company, which dominated the slave trade in the 18th Century.

Many of the HBC’s first governors served as directors of the RAC - not only did they profit from slavery, but they were themselves slave owners and plantation owners in both the Caribbean and in British North America. They also worked for the British East India Company.

If you wonder where the tone from the Indian Act and Indian Residential Schools came from - look no further than those early days of the HBC and who ruled the company.

Anyhow, one of my favourite villainous governors was Sir George Simpson who lorded over the business from 1820 to 1860, which included 250 trading posts. He was a Scot, a ruthless businessman, vain, egotistical, a misogynist, a racist, an abuser of women and, by all accounts an absolute ass.

But, if you hurry now, you can head down to Yorkville and bid on a painting of Sir George and other masters of empire, remembrances of the good old days of colonial domination and oppression and the unfreedom of Indigenous peoples.

Every cent of that auction should be going to the debt owed to First Nations people, whose land was stolen, families destroyed, just so European men could wear fancy hats.

Hopefully this is the last of the HBC’s celebration of colonialism to hit the auction block.