1798

Francis Ermatinger was baptized on 30 September at Lisbon, Portugal. Francois (Francis or Frank) Ermatinger and his brother Edward were sons of Lawrence Edward Ermatinger and grandsons of Lawrence Ermatinger. Lawrence was a Swiss merchant who made his way from London to Montreal in the late 1750s or early 1760s and achieved some successes in the fur trade.

1818

Francis and his brother Edward were appointed clerks in the service of the Hudson's Bay Company and sailed from Gravesend on May 18 arriving at York Factory on August 14. On September 8, Francis left the factory for the Severn district, where he was stationed during his first years of service.

1820

In 1820 or 1821 he was in charge of Trout Lake, an outpost of the Severn district. Francis married a Cree Woman before 1825.

1825

Francis had one daughter with the Cree woman. On July 21 Francis and his brother left York Factory for the Columbia district, where they had both been appointed to serve as clerks. Francis left his wife and his daughter and never saw them again, although he did provide for them. The daughter eventually married David Bird in March of 1841.

1827

Francis married Cleopatra (Cleo), an Okanogan woman, most probably at Fort Kamloops, New Caledonia.

1828

His son Lawrence was born August 23 at Fort Kamloops. Governor Simpson visited the fort en route to Fort Langley in October.

1831

Francis took Lawrence from his mother and sent him to Fort Vancouver to be cared for and educated under the direction of Dr. John McLoughlin and his wife Marguerite.

1832

From 1832 to 1838 Ermatinger was in charge of the trade with the Flathead Indians near the borders of the Snake country and along the headwaters of the Missouri.

1835

Francis married Mary Three-Dresses, a Pend d'Oreille woman, at Pend d'Oreille Country, Western Montana. Mary was the daughter of Che-Les-Qua Three Hats and Matilda (Madeline). They had two children, both sons who died in infancy.

1838

In April his daughter Mary (Blue Eyed Mary) was born in Montana at Tobacco Plains (according to her own testimony). Because her father was a chief trader with the Hudson Bay Company, her people may have been on a winter buffalo hunt when she was born. At the time of her birth, her father, Francis Ermatinger, was trading with the Flatheads and Pend d'Oreilles from a base at Fort Hall, Idaho. When Mary was about four months old, July 15, her father was escorting a party of missionaries (including a Swiss gentleman named John Sutter) from the Rendezvous at Popo Agie River to Fort Hall. The four women of the party were the second group of white women to cross over the Continental Divide. Francis was placed in charge of the Snake country trade at Forts Hall and Boise, and he remained in charge of Fort Hall until 1842 when he was promoted to the rank of chief trader.

1841

Francis Ermatinger and Father De Smet meet in Fort Hall. Francis guides the Oregon bound party to Fort Vancouver.

1842

Francis marries Catherine Sinclair, daughter of William Sinclair and Marie Wadin McKay, on 10 August at Fort George, Columbia District, Oregon. Frances was born about 1824 and baptised three years later on July 9, 1827. Her father was at the time a clerk at Rainy Lake. He had entered the HBC in 1810 as an aprentice. Edward had known him while at Island Lake. Sinclair was the eldest son of a Cree woman and a high-ranking HBC officer. Mary McKay was the daughter of Marguerite Wadin McKay, later the wife of Dr. John cLoughlin. Her uncle on her mother's side was Thomas McKay, early trapper of the HBC and Oregon pioneer. Her aunt Betsy Sinclair bore a child of Sir George Simpson, and later married Robert Miles, HBC accountant. Her uncle, James Sinclair, was a free trader and merchant at Red River. He led the 1841 contingent of Red River families destined for settlement on the Nisqually Plains across the Rocky Mountains). Catherine died on 11 Nov 1876 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada and was buried in Nov 1876 in St.John's Cem., Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.

1843

Frances Marie Ermatinger, was born on the 3rd of June. Catherine had another daughter from an affair she had with an HBC employee while Francis was in England. After much grief, she and Francis were reconciled and lived happily the rest of their lives …

1844

George T. Allen, who frequently saw Ermatinger at Fort Vancouver during these years, described him as a `regular jolly jovial Cockney whom we sometimes styled Bardolf from the size and colour of his nose.' (Allan, "Reminiscences of Fort Vancouver") "John H. Couch and Francis W. Pettygrove established mercantile houses in Oregon City in 1842 and 1843, respectively. As the American settlements were largely concentrated in the vicinity of Willamette Falls, these stores received the business of the settlers who had formerly been dependent on the supplies at Fort Vancouver. The Columbia Department could ill afford to lose this profitable trade, and in 1844 McLoughlin established a branch store at the Falls with Ermatinger in charge.

1845

Ermatinger was a popular figure in Oregon City, and when the Provisional Government was reorganized in the summer of 1845 to include the British residents of the Willamette Valley as well as the Hudson's Bay Company, Ermatinger was appointed treasurer of the territory, a position which he held until he resigned to return to Canada

1846

"In June 1845 Governor Simpson instructed the board of management of the Columbia Department (McLoughlin, Ogden, and Douglas) to close the store at the Falls and send Ermatinger either to Fort Colvile or by sea to England. Although the Company's property at the Falls was sold to McLoughlin, the Company continued to maintain a store there; but Ermatinger was transferred to York Factory and departed with Warre and Vavasour in March 1846, leaving his wife and daughter behind with the McLoughlins. On his way home, after climbing Athabasca Pass, Father De Smet has a brief meeting with Francis Ermatinger (Committee's Punchbowl).

1847

or 1848 he had charge of the Athabasca district at Fort Chipewyan at the west end of Lake Athabasca, a position he retained until 1850 when he spent a year in Canada on furlough. As seen in McLoughlin's letter to Ermatinger of 15 March 1848 (Letter 78), his family did not rejoin him until the late spring of that year.

1852

or 1853 Francis was in charge of Fort William on Lake Superior and then retired from the Company on June first. He moved to St. Thomas, Ontario.

1858

He died on 12 August at St.Thomas, Elgin Co., Ontario, Canada where he was buried at St.Thomas, Parish Cemetery.

1865

On 23 Jan in St.Ignatius Mission Mary married a 1/2 Spokane Indian, Perrish (or Pierre) Ashley. Mary died on 14 October 1940 in St.Ignatius, Lake County, Montana where she was buried on 17 October.