Boat Encampment (Settlement) adopted 4 March 1954 on Columbia River Basin manuscript 31. Name rescinded 11 March 1974, due to flooding of Kinbasket Lake behind Mica Dam.

Source: BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office

Had been identified as "Boat Encampment (Ferry)" on Palmer and Chapman's 1915 reconnaissance map of the Northern Selkirk Mountains.

Source: BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office

David Thompson wintered at the mouth of Canoe River 11 January - 17 April 1811. On the latter date he started up the Columbia River. Canoe River and Boat Encampment commemorate the construction of his canoes and his winter camp at this place. (Canadian Alpine Journal, vol VI, 1914-15).

Source: BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office

"This point, at the confluence of the Columbia, Canoe and Wood Rivers, is one of the most historic in British Columbia. In the early nineteenth century, NWC and HBC fur traders starting annually from Fort Vancouver (now Vancouver, Washington), travelled up the Columbia River in heavy boats, 30 feet long, 5.5 feet across, clinker-built and pointed at the ends, each capable of carrying eight men and 2.5 tons of goods. Here, at the top of the "Big Bend" of the Columbia, they cached their boats and started off on foot across the difficult Athabasca Pass to the far side of the Rockies. Some while later, the westbound brigade for the year would come over the same pass, load their packs in the waiting boats, and start down the Columbia to Fort Vancouver. The first man at Boat Encampment was David Thompson, NWC, who in 1811 built here the canoes which carried him down the Columbia to the Pacific."

Source: Akrigg, Helen B. and Akrigg, G.P.V; British Columbia Place Names; Sono Nis Press, Victoria 1986 /or University of British Columbia Press 1997