Moodie, John D. (1849 - 1947)

John Douglas Moodie was born in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1849. He travelled to Ottawa, Canada in 1880. A year later he went to Rapid City, SD, where he remained until joining the Northwest Mounted Police in Ottawa in 1884. He served in various places in Saskatchewan until 1899, then served in the Boer War until 1902. In 1903 he was posted to Dawson City; in 1906 he sailed from Halifax to Fort Churchill, where he was appointed governor of Hudson Bay with instructions to formally claim all islands north of Canada for the Dominion. During his time in the north Moodie built posts at Fullerton Inlet, Chesterton and Churchill. In 1915 he retired from the force and served as a police magistrate in Saskatchewan. In 1939 he moved to Duncan, BC; in 1943 he moved to Calgary, where he died in 1947.