Humpback Bay is an embayment on the north coast of Porcher Island, off Malacca Passage, about 15 miles (24 km) south of Prince Rupert, British Columbia. The bay hosts a community named Porcher and the now-derelict Porcher Island Cannery near the mouth of Back Creek. The salmon cannery was built by the Chatham Sound Fishing and Packing Company in 1928 but operated for only four years before closing at the end of the 1932 salmon season. The site was later purchased by the Canadian Fishing Company and used as a summer gillnet station until 1968, when operations moved to North Pacific Cannery. Humpback Bay continued as a net storage facility until the 1980s, when the Crown lease was sold.

Porcher Island, located near the mouth of the Skeena River, is named after Edwin Augustus Porcher, who served in the Royal Navy from 1821 to 1878. While stationed at the Esquimalt Naval Base with the North Pacific Squadron on Vancouver Island, Porcher made four summer voyages as Commander of HMS Sparrowhawk to the North Coast of British Columbia. The ship navigated through the Inside Passage from Esquimalt to the Hudson’s Bay Company trading post at Fort Simpson, passing close to the island in Chatham Sound that now bears his name. Porcher Island has always been sparsely populated, except for a brief influx of homesteaders in 1906. The island’s isolation, along with wet, cool summers and severe winters, has deterred many from settling permanently. Nonetheless, three small settlements established during the 20th century remain inhabited today: Hunts Inlet, Humpback Bay, and Oona River.

The Porcher Island Cannery occupied approximately 20 acres (8 ha) along the rocky shoreline of Humpback Bay. All the buildings were wooden-framed, painted in the colors of the Canadian Fishing Company, featuring white siding and red trim, and interconnected by a boardwalk. At the north end of the site was a cluster of residences, including houses for the manager and bookkeeper. The company store had an attached storage area for weekly grocery supplies and a small suite at the rear for the storekeeper. Next to the store stood a building housing a large diesel-electric generator that supplied power to the community. The southernmost structure was a boathouse. An elevated wooden path led to a reservoir and dam on Back Creek, which provided drinking water. A short video of the old cannery is here. Read more here and here. Explore more of Humpback Bay and porcher Island here: