Hostess, charity organizer.

Annie McDermot was born at Fort Garry around 1830, daughter of Andrew McDermot, the pioneer free trader of Rupert’s Land. She married A. G. B. Bannatyne, prominent in business and politics in the Red River Settlement. They had three children. She was highly educated and devoted much of her time to charitable works. One of her interests was the Winnipeg General Hospital which had been built on land donated by her father and her husband. In February 1869 she horsewhipped Charles Mair (either in her husband’s store or on its front steps, depending on who tells the story) over slurs Mair had published about mixed-blood women in Red River.