[Red Bullets]

One of the oldtimers on the prairies was James McKay. He came to the new world in 1815 as an 18 year old in the employ of the HBco.. One of accountings was when he was traveling west with two other men somewhere between Battleford and Fort Pitt in the early/mid 1800's, during lunch on the trail, they had three young Blackfoot FN men come into their camp. They knew the territory was not Blackfoot territory and instincts told them they three FN were scouts for a larger warring party and if they let them walk away they would be sure to be killed, their topknot and their horses taken. They unemotionally shot the three FN scouts and disposed of the bodies in a slough. McKay and his companions carried on their way west unmolested. This may seem a very cruel assumption of the FN men by McKay's trio but it was noted this was a reality of the times. McKay had one other account of his times in the west. A single FN man stole one of McKay's horses and McKay chased the horse thief down with another horse. When the horse thief's horse was climbing up out of the stream McKay shot the FN thief and the bullet passed through him and also hit the horse in the head killing both. McKay was a rugged man that at 51 in 1848 was asked to be part of the search for Sir John Franklin. He went on to become the first person to vote at what was then the polling station of the Northwest Territories in 1881.(before 1905 Alberta was part of the Territories.) He passed in about 1894 at age 97. Three of John's sons became reverends and one son, James, became one of the first politicians in Manitoba.