The Tagliamento was falling, however, and a number of troops succeeded in fording the river.
As freighters for the Hudson's Bay Company many of these settlers made, with their ox or pony carts, the long journey over the natural prairie roads to Fort Garry, fording or swimming the streams, carrying furs for a thousand miles or more on the eastern trip, and returning brought loads of merchandise for the company.
Here in 1640 the Scottish Covenanters planted guns to protect them while fording the river, after which they defeated the English on the Durham side at Stellaheugh, and subsequently occupied Newcastle.
