The tale of Robert Evan Sproule is indeed a sad one. It has been much talked about and written about over the years, and therefore I will only give a brief summary here. My interest, as always, is in the family history of Robert Evan Sproule and there is an important job now to be done.
He came from Maine, as
we know from that first article that I had seen. I was familiar with the
Sproule families in Maine, as I have traced them when I was chasing a family
for the Sproule DNA Project. I have a tree on Ancestry of Maine Sproules and I thought
it would be easy, therefore, to find the family of Robert Evan Sproule. He wasn’t
there. He wasn’t on any tree that I could find.
And yet, when I
contacted the right person who sent me extensive files of amazing research, I got
a bit of a shock. His family was known all along. Everyone knew who he was, or
they should have. There were plenty of clues were there in the newspaper coverage.
Robert Evan Sproule ought to have been on his family tree. Robert Evan Sproule ought to have been on nearly all of the Maine Sproule family trees. He is a descendant of the very first Sproule in
Maine. He is from one of the chief families. And yet he is not there. We have
to get him back where he belongs.
Kootenay Lake, British Colombia |
Poor Robert really was an unfortunate
man. Hehad found a promising area on the Kootenay Lake, in British Colombia in
1881, and in 1882 he staked a claim, planning to mine there. He filled in all the right paperwork, so it was
an official claim. He was mining for minerals and he called his mine the Blue
Bell mine.
At the end of that
year Robert Sproule ran into financial problems, it was costing a lot to get
the mine going. And there was also competition. An affluent consortium was
financing three other miners. One of these miners was Thomas Hamill, the victim
in the murder case. Hamill had the area on the other side of the lake from
Robert Sproule. Robert left the mine at the end of 1882 taking an official
leave-of-absence, and Thomas Hamill stepped in and illegally ‘jumped the claim’.
There followed court
cases, with our poor Robert Evan Sproule trying to get his claim back. Thomas Hamill
was well financed, and even though the first verdict went to Sproule, Hamill
was able to appeal to the Supreme Court of British
Columbia.
In 1884 Robert Sproule finally got his mine back, but he was far from out of the
woods. He had gained partners to invest in the mine and they also helped with
the court costs. One of these partners defaulted on his payments, and the Court
seized his share in the Blue Bell mine. They auctioned it off to the highest
bidder who turned out to be the infamous claim-jumper Thomas Hamill.
Map showing Blue Bell Mine and Kootenay Lake |
During 1885 Robert Evan
Sproule found new partners and worked the mine.
On 1 June 1885, Thomas
Hamill came to the Blue Bell mine. Whatever happened, we don’t really know, but
Robert Sproule allegedly shot Hamill in the abdomen.
Thomas Hammill, the Victim |
Robert Sproule was
arrested and charged with the murder. The court case and subsequent appeals
gave rise to much fuss in both Canada and the US. There even seem to have been
protests in the streets. The case against Robert had hinged on his hatred of
Hamill, and on two eye witness testimonies. Apparently, these two witnesses
withdrew their statements at the appeal stage, and claimed they were paid to
give their testimony.
But, as we know,
Robert Evan Sproule was hanged on 29 October 1886.
Now, which of the Sproule families of Maine is our Robert Evan Sproule from?
Notes
- Special thanks to Greg Nesteroff and his excellent blog THE KÜTNE READER Adventures in Kootenaiana. Thank you so much for all your superb work on this story.
- Thomas Hammill, the Victim pic from The Blue Bell Grave, by Greg Nesteroff, 28 Sep 2018
- Map showing Blue Bell Mine and Kootenay Lake is from "Dr. W. A. Hendryx and Robert E. Sproule" by Nancy Foster Renk posted on North Idaho Past/Present, January 26, 2016
Sproule's Saga Continues the Vancouver Voyager, Karen McGill, 5 July 2013