Various nomadic
Arctic peoples lived and hunted in this region. The
Thule people arrived around the year 1000 from the west, the ancestors of the present-day
Inuit. The
Dene people arrived around the year 500 from farther north. Since before the time of European contact, the region around Churchill has been predominantly inhabited by the
Chipewyan and
Cree peoples. Europeans first arrived in the area in 1619 when a Danish expedition led by
Jens Munk wintered near where Churchill would later stand. Only 3 of 64 expedition members survived the winter and sailed one of the expedition's two ships, the sloop
Lamprey, back to Denmark. Danish archaeologists in 1964 discovered remains of the abandoned ship, the frigate
Unicorn, in the tidal flats some kilometres from the mouth of the river. The discoveries were all taken to Denmark; some are on display at the
National Museum in Copenhagen. After an abortive attempt in 1688–89, in 1717, the
Hudson's Bay Company built the first permanent settlement,
Churchill River Post, a log fort a few kilometres upstream from the mouth of the
Churchill River. The
trading post and river were named after
John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, who was governor of the Hudson's Bay Company in the late 17th century. The fort,
Prince of Wales Fort, was rebuilt at the mouth of the river. The fort was primarily built to capitalize on the
North American fur trade, out of the reach of
York Factory. It dealt mainly with the Chipewyan living north of the
boreal forest. Much of the fur came from as far away as
Lake Athabasca and the
Rocky Mountains. A defensive battery, Cape Merry Battery, was built on the opposite side of the fort to provide protection. As part of the Anglo-French dispute for North America, in 1731–1741, the original fort was replaced with Prince of Wales Fort, a large stone fort on the western peninsula at the mouth of the river. In 1782, the French
Hudson Bay expedition, led by
La Pérouse, captured it. Since the British, under
Samuel Hearne, were greatly outnumbered and, in any event, were not soldiers, they surrendered without firing a shot. The leaders agreed Hearne would be released and given safe passage to England, along with 31 British civilians, in the sloop
Severn, on condition he immediately publish his story
A Journey to the Northern Ocean. In return, the British promised the same number of French prisoners would be released, and a British seaman familiar with the waters safely navigated the French away from the Hudson's Bay coastline at a time of year when the French risked becoming trapped in winter ice. The French made an unsuccessful attempt to demolish the fort. The worst effect was on the local indigenous peoples, who had become dependent on trade goods from the fort, and many of them starved. Hearne returned to Churchill the following year but found trade had deteriorated. The
First Nations population that had survived the incursion had moved to other posts. Hearne's health began to fail and he delivered up command at Churchill on 16 August 1787 and returned to England. Extensive reconstruction and stabilization of the fort's remains have occurred since the 1950s, and is currently maintained as a heritage site by Parks Canada. Between the years of decline in the
fur trade and the emergence of Western agricultural success, Churchill phased into and then back out of obsolescence. After decades of frustration over the monopoly and domination of the
Canadian Pacific Railway, western Canadian governments banded together. They aggressively negotiated for the creation of a significant new northern shipping harbour on Hudson Bay,
linked by rail from
Winnipeg. Initially,
Port Nelson was selected for this purpose in 1912. After several years of effort and millions of dollars, this project was abandoned, and Churchill was chosen as the alternative after
World War One. Surveys by the
Canadian Hydrographic Service ship opened the way for safe navigation. Construction was completed by 1929. Once this transportation rail link from farms to the Churchill port was completed, commercial shipping took many more years to pick up. In 1932,
Grant MacEwan was the first person to cross through Churchill customs as a passenger. This was purely due to his determination to take the Hudson Bay route to
Saskatchewan from Britain—most passengers returned via the
St. Lawrence River. In 1942, the
United States Army Air Forces established a base called Fort Churchill, east of the town. After World War II, the base served several other purposes, including being a
Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) and a
Strategic Air Command facility. Following the demolition of the base it was repurposed into
the town's airport. Naval Radio Station Churchill, call sign CFL, was activated as an ionospheric study station by the
Royal Canadian Navy in support of the
U-boat high-frequency direction finding (HFDF) net and became operational on 1 August 1943. Around 1949, Churchill became part of the Canadian SUPRAD (signals intelligence) network and remained in that role until it closed its doors in 1968. The Operations and Accommodations building remains today but is abandoned. This area was also the site of the
Churchill Rocket Research Range, part of Canadian-American atmospheric research. Its first rocket was launched in 1956, and it continued to host launches for research until closing in 1984. The site of the former rocket range now hosts the Churchill Northern Studies Centre, a facility for multidisciplinary
Arctic research. In the 1950s, the British government considered establishing a site near Churchill for testing their early nuclear weapons before choosing Australia instead. Up to about fifty years ago, Churchill was the location to which
Iqaluit children were sent for
high school, prior to the opening of Iqaluit's own school. ==Environment==