Map of the Railway Belt, NW971-24 C212d.
Canadian Pacific Railway construction, d-01440.
Rediscovered Land Records from BC’s Railway Belt
BACK ON T TRACKS
The BC Archives holds millions of records, so occasionally items are “rediscovered.” The Kamloops Government Agent land records (series GR-0522) are one such case. The archives has held these records since the 1960s, but somehow they were never processed by staff. Now, thanks to months of hard work from the BC Archives Government Records team, these records are finally accessible.
By Rachel McRory Government Records Archivist
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he records cover 100 years of land use history in the Kamloops area, from 1877 to 1977. There are over 47 linear metres of records and maps created and used by the local government agents. These agents were important figures in the early colonial history of British Columbia. They were often the only government representatives in an area, so they took on many different roles. This included the work of land agents, who documented all uses of Crown (publicly owned) land. Kamloops is an interesting area of British Columbia for land records because it was part of what is known as the Railway Belt. Building a railway to connect British Columbia with the rest of Canada was a key part of the Terms of the Union, by which British Columbia became a province of Canada in 1871. The terms included the transfer of the Railway Belt land to the federal government. This was a 40-mile-wide piece of provincial Crown land stretching from the Rocky Mountains to
Port Moody. The land was used for construction of the railway; the sale of some of the land to settlers helped finance its construction. Unfortunately, British Columbia’s vast, mountainous terrain and a variety of political factors led to delays. The Railway Belt was not transferred to the federal government until 1883, and the exact northern and southern boundaries of the belt were not confirmed until 1895. This situation was confusing for both settlers and government officials. It was often unclear if the provincial or federal government controlled a piece of land. In 1895, settler D.A. Wright attempted to receive the title for the land he had applied for. Told that the Provincial Land Agent did “not have the power to grant this,” he appealed to the Dominion Land Agent, who wrote, “I cannot at the present time explain how this manner is to be straightened out.” It was unclear
