Bamberton, British Columbia

This article is about the town. For the provincial park also called Bamberton, see Bamberton Provincial Park.

Bamberton is an industrial site located on the Saanich Inlet, just south of Mill Bay, around 45k kilometres north of Victoria on Vancouver Island.

The community of Bamberton was first developed in 1912 when the Associated Cement Company plant was built. Bamberton was owned by the cement company and occupied by the plant, its employees and their families until the plant closed in 1980.

Since the plant closed, ownership of Bamberton has changed hands multiple times and several development plans have been proposed. In 2015 the Malahat First Nation purchased Bamberton and announced a partnership with Steelhead LNG. With them, they have proposed the creation of a Liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility at the Bamberton site.

Aboriginal people began to inhabit Vancouver Island around 2000 BCE. The Malahat, Tseycum, Tsartlip, Tsawout, and Pauquachin came to reside along the Saanich Inlet. The land of the Saanich Inlet is a central part of the culture of First Nations people for both spiritual practice and economic subsistence.

From the late 1700s to the mid 1800s, devastating First Nations' population declines occurred throughout B.C. due to disease outbreak and armed conflict as a result of the arrival of European settlers. In 1852, the Saanich First Nations' communities signed the Douglas Treaties selling their land to the Colony of Vancouver Island. In 1913, the McKenna-McBride Commission established the location of present-day reserves, including Tsawout Village at Saanichton Bay, Tseycum Village at Patricia Bay, Pauquachin Village at Coles Bay, Tsartlip Village at Brentwood Bay, Malahat First Nation south of Mill Bay, the Cowichan Lake First Nations, and the Cowichan tribes near Duncan.

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