Yukon who is who

Samuel Carter (1869 – 1911)

Sam Carter was born at Quebec City, Quebec, He joined the North-West Mounted Police in 1888 and served in Prince Albert and Battleford, Saskatchewan, and Fort McPherson, NWT, and Herschel Island and Dawson in the Yukon. Carter was in the second contingent of officers sent to the Yukon during the Klondike gold rush.¹⁾ In the early summer of 1898, Corporal Green and constables Carter and Dundas left Dawson on the steamer Willie Irving to form a detachment on the Stewart River. They distributed and received mail at a post similar to those up and down the river.²⁾

Samuel Carter retired from the Force in September 1910 after twenty-two years of service. In December 1910, he was hired as a guide for a police patrol from Fort McPherson to Dawson, the opposite direction to that usually taken at that time of year. He was designated as a Special Constable, but it is not clear if he was formally engaged at that rank. Carter had travelled the route in the opposite direction during the 1906-1907 patrol. The patrol was carrying the mail and travelling to serve as part of the Mounted Police contingent attending the coronation of King George V in England in June 1911. Indigenous guide Esau George was hired for a day to show them the way and offered to stay without pay to take them to Forrest Creek and an easy route to Dawson, but Inspector Fitzgerald dismissed him near the mouth of Mountain Creek. Fitzgerald’s confidence was misplaced, and the patrol was missing when Esau George travelled to Dawson six weeks later. Corporal William John Dempster was sent out with a search party and found the bodies within fifty-six km of Fort McPherson.³⁾

The men were buried at the post in March 1911. Veteran Sam Carter is listed as number 34 in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Honour Roll along with Inspector Fitzgerald and constables George Francis Kinney and Richard O’Hara Taylor. Carter is the only peace-time veteran listed on the roll. Mount Carter, between the Blackstone and Hart rivers is named for him.⁴⁾