Only a heritage marker points to the site of Moose Jaw’s first courthouse, the site of which is now under the asphalt of Safeway’s parking lot on the northwest corner of High Street West and First Avenue.
The 1893 courthouse was a big step up from the decade before, when the Canadian Pacific Railway was being built across the Prairies and Sam Steele of the Mounted Police, acting as magistrate, was hearing cases from a Red River cart.
In his capacity as police magistrate, Steele worked under the most primitive conditions. In Regina, his courtroom was nothing more than a marquee which was often so cold the clerks had to keep their ink bottles on top of the stove to prevent the ink from freezing.
Between Moose Jaw and Medicine Hat, he had no courtroom at all. He tried cases while seated on a Red River cart, “with planks stretched across it for a bench and the evidence taken down on the flap of his dispatch bag.”
As he worked, he could see the construction trains loaded with rails, ties and spikes hurrying to the end-of-track, and he could tell how many miles of track would be put down that day.
Seymour de Puisaye Green, a Moose Jaw settler and justice of the peace, held court here in the late 1880s.
Some of the cases he tried included setting of the prairie on fire, refusing to put out a prairie fire, improper use of firearms, selling intoxicants, and an assault and battery for which the penalty was one dollar and costs or seven days at hard labour.
Moose Jaw’s first “temple of justice” was built on land donated to the territorial government by William Grayson. (At the time, 25-foot frontage lots on High Street West were valued at $20 each.)
Construction of the two-storey, wood-frame courthouse got underway in the spring of 1893. A Moose Jaw Times reporter of that day wrote a description of the interior layout of the building: “The main entrance to the first storey was by way of a porch facing High Street. This led directly into the guardroom from which four doors afforded access to other areas.
“One door led to the three cells, two of which were constructed of oak with iron bar frontings; the third cell was iron lined with oak. Cell doors were operated by a one lock system enabling a guard to open all three doors simultaneously, or each door separately.
“A second door led from the guard room to the kitchen, the third door led to the constables’ room while the fourth door was the entrance to another office.”
Entrance to the second storey was by an outside enclosed staircase on the west end of the courthouse.
The courtroom located on this floor had a seating capacity of “upwards of 200.” Railings separated the witnesses, jury and the judge’s platform. The second floor also accommodated a judge’s room, jury room and coat room.
Sheds, stables, barns and outhouses filled the backyard, for the courthouse preceded motorized transportation, running water and indoor plumbing by more than a decade.
This building served Moose Jaw until 1909 when it was replaced by the handsome Neo-Classical courthouse on the northeast corner of First Avenue and Ominica Street.
The new courthouse was designed by Toronto architects Darling and Pearson and built at the cost of $57,000. Faced with pressed red bricks trimmed with Bedford stone, one of its most striking features are the huge Doric columns.
The present courthouse is the “oldest continuously functioning courthouse in Saskatchewan,” and was the first building in Moose Jaw to receive provincial heritage status.
As for Moose Jaw’s 1893 courthouse, it went on the auction block in 1911 and sold for $575. One of the last businesses to occupy the building was the Moose Jaw Times after fire gutted its Main Street location the previous winter.
