The Fur Trade Revisited: Selected Papers of the Sixth North American Fur Trade Conference, Mackinac Island, Michigan, 1991

Capt. Thierry Mallet: Adventurer, Businessman, Writer

Capt. Thierry Mallet: Adventurer, Businessman, Writer Gwyneth Hoyle You men who live in cities....don't you feel at times something tugging at your heart-strings? ...Calling and calling in the middle of the night. . .in the flush of dawn when you catch a gleam of sky from your open window? .. It is the "Call of the Wildw •••• the man who has answered that call will never forget it. ...A camp pitched here, a meal cooked there... The dull roar of the rapid in the distance. The howl of the hunting wolf. The shimmer of the birch leaves. The splash of fish rising . The murmuring of the jack-pines. The Northern lights dancing silently in the sky. Peace and utter freedom!l These words in praise of the northern wilderness are taken from the final sketch in Plain Tales of the North-fifty vignettes, as spare as line drawings, depicting scenes of life in the North, beyond the railway lines and the limits of civilization. This book, along with Glimpses of the Barren Lands, was written by Captain Thierry Mallet, based on his experiences of twenty years of travel in the service of Revillon Freres, the French fur company, as it expanded into the fur trade in Canada and Siberia. The books are treasured by all who love the wilderness. While Mallet was remarkable for his energy, his business skills, and his spirit of adventure, he is remembered today because of his writings. Thierry Mallet was born in 1884 in Lausanne, Switzerland, into a prominent French banking family. The Mallet family trace their roots back to a family of drapers from Normandy who converted to Protestantism in the sixteenth century and, forced into exile for religious reasons, settled in Geneva, Switzerland.2 A branch of the family returned to France and founded the bank MM. Mallet Freres et Cie, with its headquarters in Paris on the Rue d'Anjou, not far from the Elysee Palace and the Place de la Concorde. The family members had business connections throughout North Africa and as far away as Argentina and Indo-China, in enterprises as diverse as manufacturing, insurance, mortgages, and mining in addition to banking.3 Following the family custom, Thierry Mallet was sent to England for his education, to Eton and Oxford. Before he was twenty his education was further enhanced by a trip around the world, acting as private secretary to one of his uncles.4 427 GWYNETH HOYLE PLAIN TALES OFlffiNORTH BY CAPTAINTHIF.RRY MALLET PlUVAmLY PlUNTBD ORevilionFreres FIltTHAVBNUEt1I5jNJfr«t.NEW'YO~ MCMXXV Figure 1. Title page from Plain Tales ofthe North. A short distance from the Mallet bank, not far from the Place de la Concorde, taking up a whole block of the fashionable Rue de Rivoli, opposite the Tuileries Gardens, stood the offices and fur salons of Revillon Freres. The four Revillon brothers had built a highly successful business on the solid foundation laid by their father early in the nineteenth century, each brother responsible for a different aspect of the business. By the beginning of the twentieth century Revillon Freres had branches on Regent Street in London, on 28th Street in New York City, and a warehouse in Leipzig (the home of the twice-annual European fur auction). The business included the design and manufacture of 428 CAPT. THIERRY MALLET: ADVENTURER, BUSINESSMAN, WRITER fashion furs for the retail trade, a wholesale trade in raw furs, and cold storage especially designed for the fur trade. In charge of the New York business was the grandson and namesake of the founder, Victor Revillon. In 1899 he made a trip north by rail to Edmonton and then on Hudson's Bay Company steamboats down the Mackenzie River, seeing with his own eyes the quality and quantity of furs being loaded aboard the boat at each trading post along the river. He made a persuasive report of his impressions to the family members of the board in Paris, and in 1901 Revillon entered the competition for furs at their source in northern Canada. Revillon began with six posts along the north shore of the St. Lawrence River in the first year. Adding more each year, by 1905 it had a string of posts around Labrador, Hudson and James bays, and across northern Ontario. Buying out the independent traders Bredin and Cornwall, it reached as far west as the Rocky Mountains.5 To meet the expense of such an...