Colour Sketch for the Decoration of the Chapel of the Bishop’s Palace, Sherbrooke: “The Annunciation,” Ozias Leduc, 1922. (Musée des beaux-arts du Canada/National Galery of Canada)
Yesterday, my nephew François took me to see my brother Jean-Pierre. He is hospitalized in the very large building I showed in an earlier post.
When we arrived, a priest was giving him the Last Rites. The priest invited all of us to kiss him and leave him a message. No one knows how long he will live, but he is in a room for the dying.
My brother is very weak. He can barely lift his head from the pillow and he cannot sit in bed without the help of three persons, one for each arm and a person who rearranges his pillow.
We stayed with him the entire afternoon and the little group returned to the hospital in the evening. I stayed home. I don’t want to know how much we paid in parking fees, but if members of his family did not help my brother, he would require the services of at least one professional twenty-four hours a day. A nurse came in to give him morphine and she obviously kept an eye on us, but he wasn’t alone.
Good News
I have good news. Quebec doctors were becoming an aristocracy:
However, here is what doctors themselves did in late February 2018.
We, Quebec doctors, are asking that the salary increases granted to physicians be cancelled and that the resources of the system be better distributed for the good of the healthcare workers and to provide health services worthy to the people of Quebec, the letter posted on 26 February states
Chasse aux canards par un matin brumeux(Hunting for Ducks on a Foggy Morning), Ozias Leduc (Galerie Michel Bigué)
I added a paragraph to my last post, after it was published. By and large, posts are not read twice. I am therefore publishing what you haven’t read.
One paragraph in Wiki2.org’s entry entitled Official Language Act (Quebec) seems reassuring. Quebec’s Language Laws, Bills 22 and 101, do not take rights away from English-speaking Canadians. Their children may attend an English-language school. But the children of immigrants, are required to attend a French-language school. All signs, such as traffic signs, must be predominantly, if not entirely, in French. I remember mentioning in a post that a Quebec café or restaurant owner was required to remove the letters WC from the door to a public toilet room. WC (water closet) may be used in France, but not in Quebec. Stop signs are called arrêts in Quebec. In short, Quebec insists on looking French. Traffic monitors and advertising displays are in French.
Section 1, which provides that French is ‘the official language of the province of Quebec,’ is misleading in that it suggests that English is not also an official language in Quebec, which it is by virtue of Section 133 of the BNA Act and the federal Official Languages Act. … No legislation in the National Assembly proclaiming French the sole official language in the province can affect these bilingual areas protected by the BNA Act.
Although this paragraph is reassuring, to my knowledge, when Premier Robert Bourassa said that the province of Quebec would be unilingual (French), he meant ‘officially’ unilingual. Given that Canada’s official languages are French and English, why would Premier Bourassa say that Quebec would, henceforth, be a unilingual province, i. e. ‘officially’?
In other words, the rights of English-speaking Canadians are respected under the Official Languages Act of 1969, as per the paragraph I quoted. One difficulty arises for French-speaking Quebecers. After the age of 11, children are unlikely to acquire native fluency in a second language, but there are exceptions. Some individuals speak eighteen languages by the age of 18. They may make mistakes and they may have an accent, but… However, a large number of French-speaking Quebecers find ways of teaching English to their children. English is a North-American reality.
I have two students who mastered French. My star student is Gillian Pink, from Antigonish. Gillian is working at Oxford University.
Candlelight Study, Ozias Leduc, 1893 (Google)
Language Bills, Referendums, and Sovereignty
Let us return to Bill 22 and Bill 101. I have noted that there was an exodus from Quebec when Bill 22 was passed. In my opinion, Bill 22 was seen as a step in the direction of sovereignty. So have Bill 101 and the two referendums (1980 and 1995).
Quebec’s new Premier, François Legault, has stated that there would not be another referendum, but he and members of Coalition avenir Quebec will be seeking greater autonomy for Quebec. What does he mean? Quebec Premier René Lévesque did not sign the Constitution Act of 1982, and none of his successors have done so. The fact remains that I’ve been in the midst of an identity crisis for sixteen years, or since I left Antigonish, Nova Scotia.
My Quebec Health Insurance Card does not cover the cost of appointments with a doctor in provinces other than Canada. Yet, I am a Canadian, but a French-speaking Canadian living in Québec, whose mother tongue is French, who loves French literature, but who speaks English fluently and feels Quebec is safer as a province of Canada, than a country.
However, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms requires all provinces to provide primary and secondary education to their official-language minorities at public expense.
Would that Quebecers had not elected a party advocating greater autonomy for Quebec. Quebecers have to protect their language, but greater autonomy for Quebec suggests distancing Quebec from other Canadian provinces.
May all Canadians live in peace and harmony. Culturally, I am French. But home is also Antigonish, Nova Scotia, where I owned a lovely blue house, across the street from the campus of St Francis Xavier University and St Ninian’s Cathedral.
Ozias Leduc
Ozias Leduc (8 October 1864 – 16 June 1955) is my featured artist. His subject matter is often religious. But his art is nevertheless diverse and still lifes seem a favourite subject. Well-known artist Paul-Émile Borduas was one of his students. I am embedding a video. It is a French-language video with a lyrical ambiance. A couple is getting on a raft that will take them to Ozias Leduc’s house. It may be the smaller house.
Ozias Leduc’s house (Google)
Ozias Leduc’s house (Google)
St Ninians’ Cathedral, Antigonish, Nova Scotia
Closer to me, is St Ninian’s Cathedral, in Antigonish. Paintings in our Cathedral were the work of Ozias Leduc. I was in Antigonish when they were restored.
Love to everyone 💕
St. Ninian’s Cathedral, Antigonish, Nova Scotia
Leduc’s Boy with Bread, 1892-99, National Gallery of Canada (Wiki2.org.)
Quebec is a Canadian unilingual (French) province located in an officially bilingual (French and English) country. Consequently, Quebec does not comply with the Official Languages Act of 1969. The Official Languages Act put French and English on an equal footing in every province of Canada, regardless of demographics. In 1969, the citizens of 9 out of 10 provinces were predominantly English-speaking Canadians. When the Official Languages Act was passed, French-speaking Canadians could, at long last, be educated in French outside Quebec.
To Francophones living outside Quebec, the Official Languages Act seemed a miracle. Until then French-speaking Canadians, Catholics predominantly, could not attend a public French school. Typically, if financially possible, French-speaking Canadians enrolled in English-language Catholic private schools. My parents enrolled me at St Ann’s Academy, an all-girls Catholic private school in Victoria, British Columbia.
However, in 1974, five years after a “dream come true,” Quebec, under the leadership of Premier Robert Bourassa‘s Quebec’s Liberal Party[1] declared itself a unilingual province. It passed Bill 22. There was an exodus of English-speaking Canadians from Montreal, not to mention head offices or headquarters.
Education being provincial legislation, under Bills 22 and 101, immigrants to Quebec were required to enroll their children in French-language schools. They were not invited to do so, but compelled, in an officially unilingual province located in an officially bilingual Canada. The birth rate had declined in mostly French-speaking Quebec. So, immigrants would give Quebec French-speaking children. In fact, as soon as they arrive(d) in Quebec, immigrants (young adults and adults) who did/do not speak French, took and still take, French courses. Matters remain as they were in the 1970s. Demographics have not been kind to Quebecers.
English being the global lingua franca, there was resistance to educating children in French, exclusively. Consequently, French-speaking immigrants, such as North Africans, settle(d) in Quebec.
Despite unilingualism, children born to English-speaking Canadians living in Quebec can study in English-language school.
Do not remove this video. The CBC is a public service.
At no point, have Quebecers given their province a clear mandate to separate from Canada. Quebec has sought sovereignty through two referendums. The first took place in 1980, when René Lévesque was Premier of Quebec. The second was held in 1995. A little less than half of Quebec’s citizens said ‘no’ to sovereignty, and a province’s sovereignty is too important a matter to be decided in a 50/50 referendum. Canada passed its Clarity Act (Bill C-20). Quebec is not a country. It is a province.
The Constitution Act of 1982
Not only is Quebec an officially unilingual province, but René Lévesque did not sign the Constitution Act of 1982, nor have subsequent Quebec Premiers. Yet, Quebec, led by George-Étienne Cartier, was one of the four original signatories of the Constitution Act of 1867. Once again, at no point have Quebecers given their province a clear mandate to negotiate sovereignty.
For my own safety, I would not visit with members of my family living on the west coast without first taking a private insurance. Yet I am a Canadian and, as a Canadian, my Health Insurance Card should be valid everywhere in Canada: banana leaves and wet ceramic floors!
Conclusion
Premier Couillard’s Quebec Liberal Party erased Quebec’s deficit and Quebecers are employed. There has to be a reason to defeat a leader and a reason to elect a leader. There was no reason to defeat Dr Couillard and no reason to elect François Legault. Under monsieur Legault’s Coalition avenir Québec (Coalition for the Future of Quebec), the province will remain unilingual. Quebecers whose French is impoverished will blame others: les Anglais. The Constitution Act of 1982 will not be signed. While monsieur Legault prospers, Quebec’s social programmes will be endangered: “austerity,” he says. More autonomy for Quebec is an objective, and a door will be slammed to curb immigration. (See Coalition avenir Québec, Wiki2.org.) Just who was behind this “victory?” On October 1st, 2018, reason took a leave in Quebec, or so it appears.
As a university teacher, I taught French as a second language and French literature to English-speaking Canadians. Concerning ‘unilingualism’ in Quebec, it is useful to read Wikipedia’s entries entitled Official Language Act and Charter of the French Language.
Section 1, which provides that French is ‘the official language of the province of Quebec,’ is misleading in that it suggests that English is not also an official language in Quebec, which it is by virtue of Section 133 of the BNA Act and the federal Official Languages Act. … No legislation in the National Assembly proclaiming French the sole official language in the province can affect these bilingual areas protected by the BNA Act.
There are several political parties in Quebec, but I am told that in this part of Quebec, the Eastern Townships, most Quebecers support sovereignty for the Province of Quebec. Monsieur Legault is a former member of the Parti québécois. The PQ has been home to Quebecers seeking sovereignty: les Péquistes. As the statement above indicates, les Caquistes, members of Coalition avenir Québec, support increased sovereignty. So does Québec solidaire and other parties. You may remember that, when Pauline Marois was elected Premier of Quebec, someone tried to shoot her. The person who jumped forward to stop the gunman was killed. (See 2012 Montreal Shooting, Wikipedia.) The shooter was an Anglophone.
Quebec has language laws, which, enforced rigidly, are stifling. More importantly, these language laws cannot fully protect French-speaking Quebecers. They may, in fact, lull French-speaking Quebecers into thinking their language is protected. Well, their language, my mother tongue, isn’t and cannot be protected unless there is sufficient emphasis on learning to speak and write French correctly in Quebec schools and in Quebec homes.
Moreover, I wonder if Quebecers are taught Canadian history. If so, it seems lessons prepare students to believe that we, “poor French-speaking Canadians,” have been persecuted by English Canadians.
Yes, Orangemen prevented French-speaking and Catholic Canadians from going to Western Canada and being educated in their language. They killed Louis Riel, and, after his death, French Canadians living west of Quebec had to enroll their children in English-language schools. But a few French-speaking communities survived, and, in September 1969, the Official Languages Act came into effect. Matters have been corrected.
It is not true, at least not altogether, that the Rebellions of 1837-38 opposed the English and the French. The Rebellions took place in both Lower and Upper Canada. Lower Canada’s Louis-Joseph Papineau and Upper Canada’s William Lyon Mackenzie did not want Britain to help itself to their money. Responsible government is what both Canadas, Upper and Lower (down the St. Lawrence river) wanted. Again, matters have been corrected.
However, the arrival in Lower Canada of United Empire Loyalists, people who fled the recently independent United States, was perturbing for the French-speaking citizens of Lower Canada. They had viewed Lower Canada as their Canada. A party was born, leParti canadien, and its members, not all, referred to themselves as patriotes. Welcoming United Empire Loyalists was not a ploy aimed at hurting French-speaking Canadians. It was history unfolding and a change in demographics that did not benefit French-speaking Canadians.
We must differentiate the two events: the Rebellions and the arrival of United Empire Loyalists.
Les P’tits Canadas
Several of these United Empire Loyalists settled in the Eastern Townships. In the villages of the Eastern Townships, such as Cookshire, where my father was raised, French-speaking Canadians lived in p’tits Canadas. For a long time, they called themselves Canadiens, as in the “Canadiens” hockey club. Those who spoke English were les Anglais. Beginning with the Révolution tranquille, the 1960s, French-speaking Quebecers, started referring to themselves as Québécois/Québécoises.
Canadians & Quebecers/Québécois
But what is very frustrating is dealing with a double identity. Quebec is a Canadian province. No referendum has granted Quebec a mandate to separate from Canada. But it is doing so, bit by bit. Quebec has not signed the Constitution Act of 1982.
So, the health-card used by Quebecers is not valid outside Quebec. It does cover the cost of a stay in a hospital. However, if one needs to be treated by a specialist, during a stay in hospital, he or she will send you his or her bill. I realize that Education and Health are provincial legislation, but to what extent, may I ask. Moreover, I pay taxes to both the Federal Government and Revenue Quebec. I am a Canadian whether I live in Quebec or in Nova Scotia. Unilingualism may be a way of promoting autonomy for Quebec, but it may also chase people away from Quebec.
But it gets worse. I now live in an anti-immigration province. Marine Le Pen is happy that Quebecers have elected an anti-immigration Premier. When Marine endorsed monsieur Legault, Premier Legault dissociated himself immediately from Marine Le Pen. The fact remains that, for the next four years, the government of Quebec will be an anti-immigration government.
Contrairement à ce que serinaient les libéraux immigrationnistes béats, les Québécois ont voté pour moins d’immigra… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…— Marine Le Pen (@MLP_officiel) October 02, 2018
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says the notwithstanding clause ‘should only be used in exceptional cases.’ (Adrian Wyld/Canadian Press)
Then comes secularism, or laïcité. There is, of course, laïcité and laïcité. Under its new Caquiste government, laïcité in Quebec will not allow the wearing of clothes and jewellery that reveal one’s faith: no little cross worn as a pendant. No veil. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau quickly stated that women had the right to dress as they pleased. But Premier Legault plans to use the notwithstanding clause.
Quebec’s immigrants cannot break the law. The mutilation of female genitalia is forbidden in Canada, which includes Quebec. But forcing first generation immigrants from the Middle East to take off their veil may be imprudent. One must realize that first-generation immigrants are vulnerable. They have lost their country. Should they also feel unwanted? Canada has its first nations, its two founding nations, but people from all over the world live in this country and all of us must build the road to the future together, which means respecting differences. If we start building walls, we are lost.
Conclusion
I suspect that, during Premier Legault’s tenure, the parking fee will be higher. I also suspect the poor will be poorer and the rich, richer. We know that Monsieur Legault plans to give further autonomy to Quebec, which means, as mentioned above, that Quebec’s new Premier is unlikely to sign the Constitution Act of 1982, nor, for that matter, care for French-speaking Canadians living outside Quebec. He and his team will invest time and energy in providing greater autonomy for Quebec, which may lead to an exodus from Quebec. Quebec needs its immigrants and its taxpayers, but I dare not speak further…
Quebec had an excellent Premier, Dr Philippe Couillard. In no way did he and members of his cabinet deserve this slap in the face. Former Premier, Dr Couillard, will no longer lead Quebec’s Liberals.
Love to everyone 💕
I made some changes to my post. In an earlier version, I repeated myself (the Constitutional Act). Moreover I want to investigate Quebec’s unilingualism further. I don’t like it. It’s a danger to car drivers, it may be vindictive as well as impolite and petty. Yet, I am a former President of the Canadian Association of University and College Teachers of French: l’APFUCC (l’Association des professeurs de français des universités et collèges canadiens).
Léo Delibes: Lakmé – Duo des fleurs (Flower Duet), Sabine Devieilhe & Marianne Crebassa
Gabriel Dumont, resistance fighter Gabriel Dumont was a man of great chivalry and military skill, superbly adapted to the presettlement prairie life (courtesy Glenbow Archives). (Photo credit: The Canadian Encyclopedia)
We do not require a long post on Gabriel Dumont (1837 – 1906), not at this point. A synopsis will suffice.
Dumont, the Bison Hunter
What we need to know is that Dumont was famous as a bison hunter. “In the 1860s, Gabriel was the chief of the Métis bison hunters and commanded approximately 200 hunters.” (Virtual Museum of Canada). As noted in the caption above, below his photograph, he was “superbly adapted to the presettlement prairie life.” His life gives us an insight into the life of Métis before the bison disappeared. The bison/buffalo fed the Métis, prairie Amerindians (North-American Indians), and voyageurs.
I should also point out that Dumont was among the Métis who left the former Red River Colony at the time of the Red River Rebellion, hoping Métis could settle on river lots further west, in Saskatchewan or Alberta. They did, briefly. Gabriel Dumont operated a ferry service, “Gabriel’s Crossing,” and opened a General Store with a billiard table, on the South Saskatchewan River.
Father Alexis André
Once Métis arrived, so did a priest. Father Alexis André (1832 – 1893), an Oblate born in France,would minister to the Métis who had left the Red River. He helped Gabriel Dumont form a Provisional Government for the community he was founding, Saint-Laurent de Grandin. As you know, Gabriel Dumont, a linguist, could not write.
At times, Father André was a spokesman for Métis. For instance, he feared for their well-being as he saw the bison disappear. Father André and North-West Mounted Police commissioner George Arthur French “urged the federal government to exercise tighter control over these hunts so as to prevent the extermination of the bison.” (See Alexis André, Dictionary of Canadian Biography.) But the federal government had turned its back on petitions, which is why Gabriel Dumont sought Louis Riel’s assistance. Louis Riel was well educated and possessed charisma.
Louis Riel returns
Dumont is, in fact, best remembered for going to Montana to ask for Louis Riel’s help. Therefore, the two figures are inextricably linked. Riel was to be the political leader of the North-West Rebellion and Gabriel Dumont, its military leader.
But the Canadian government was pushing its way west not realizing that Métis and Amerindians could remain on their rectangular lots abutting a river. Petitions went unanswered. So, blood was shed. At the Battle of Batoche (9 – 12 May 1885), 250 Métis fought Major-General Frederick Middleton’s superior force of 916 regulars and militia. Dumont escaped, but, on 15 May 1885, Louis Riel surrendered. (See The Battle of Batoche, Wikipedia.)
Father André also tended to the spiritual needs of Louis Riel during the period Riel awaited his execution. Father André believed Riel was insane, but Riel left a good impression on Father André.
The priest spent hours in conversation with the Métis leader and was impressed with Riel’s sincerity, yet convinced of his insanity.
(See Alexis André, The Dictionary of Canadian Biography.)
As we know, moving west was a mere respite for Métis and the indigenous people of the Prairie Provinces. On 20 July 1871, a year after Manitoba entered Confederation, British Columbia also joined. A dream came true. Canada stretched from sea to sea: A Mari usque ad Mare. The people of British Columbia wanted a wagon road built between Lake Superior and the Pacific Ocean, but Cartier offered a railway instead. Construction would begin within two years and be completed in ten years. Cartier/Canada also agreed to take over the colony’s considerable debt of almost $1.5 million and provide an annual subsidy of $216,000.
Hoping to attract white settlers to B.C., land commissioner Joseph Trutch refused to recognize Indian land rights in the 1860s. (Courtesy of the National Archives of Canada) (Photo credit: CBC.ca)
During the 1860s, B.C. refused to recognize Indian land titles and often usurped Indian land and gave it to speculators and settlers. (Courtesy of the Library of Congress) (Photo credit: CBC.ca)
Conclusion, later…
I will not conclude at this point, because my computer no longer works properly. It has to be repaired. Something went wrong.
The late Kenojuak Ashevak , considered one of the pioneers of Inuit art, saw her first-ever print, Rabbit Eating Seaweed, included in the 1959 Cape Dorset collection. The early work points to the distinctive style for which the famed artist would become renown. (Historymuseum.ca) (Photo credit: CBC.ca)
I apologize for not posting for a long time. There has been a change in my life, but it is not a serious change.
Here is my story. A few weeks ago, I told my doctor that my memory was playing tricks on me. Test confirmed mild cognitive impairment. I will lose my driver’s license and my precious little red Toyota.
Do not be alarmed. I was not diagnosed until the early 1990s, but I have suffered from Chronic Fatigue Syndrome/ME since 1976. Victims get lost in mid-sentence and don’t remember words and names. I continued working and had a successful but shorter career than I would have liked. The only difference between the old and the new diagnostic is age. I am now older. But it could simply be that moving tired me out and that taking a mortgage, at my age, was stressful. Life is not always easy.
In short, I could not work on posts for several days because I was making various arrangements that would allow me to stay home for many long years, despite mild cognitive deficiency. Ironically, destiny led me to purchase a lovely apartment in the appropriate building. It has elevators, a heated interior swimming pool, and, as I have told you in an earlier post, it is located very near a small market place that includes a post office and most of the facilities I require.
My next post is on Métis leader Gabriel Dumont and the North-West Rebellion. Métis and Amerindians were losing their land, so surveyors can cut it up into little squares while a railroad was being built that woul take citizens from sea to sea: A Mari usque ad Mare, the Canadian motto.
As a leader, Gabriel Dumont was second only to Louis Riel. They resisted losses brought by Canadian expansion westward. The video inserted below is a fine account of events that took Canada from sea to sea, but a post is necessary.
Gabriel Dumont(Photo credit: The Canadian Encyclopedia)
Signing of the Treaty of Ghent. Admiral of the Fleet James Gambier is shaking hands with United States Ambassador to Russia John Quincy Adams; British Under-Secretary of State for War and the Colonies Henry Goulburn is carrying a red folder. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The Treaty of Ghent, 1814
In my last post, I mentioned Dr Bigsby. The Treaty of Ghent, signed on 24 December 1814, put an end to the War of 1812, a war between the British and the Americans. Under the terms of the Treaty of Ghent, an official border had to be drawn between Canada (British) and the Union (American). Our Dr Bigsby was with the Commission whose members drew the border between Canada and the United States. Also engaged in drawing the border was Simon Fraser, an explorer. (See Treaty of 1818, Wikipedia)
Because many voyageurs worked with the Hudson’s Bay Company, it could be that our canotier was among the last persons to realize that Nouvelle-France had become a British colony.
However, the voyageur‘s world changed when the border was traced between Canada and the United States. Moreover, because of the Louisiana Purchase, the central part of the United States was no longer a French colony. Napoléon had sold a third of what constitutes the present-day United States.
The Purchase was one of several territorial additions to the U.S. (See Louisiana Purchase, Wikipedia)
Louisiana: the green area (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The Consequences
Following the The Louisiana purchase, 1803 and the Treaty of Ghent, 1814, Grand-Portage ceased to be part of a territory that had been considered French or English territory. Settlers would soon begin arriving in both Manitoba, a British possession, and in Minnesota. As for our voyageur, he had to use other trading-posts and was still in the employ of the North West Company and the Hudson’s Bay Company.
The American Fur Trade Company, 1808
At this point, the United States entered the fur-trade business. On 6 April 1808, John Jacob Astor (17 July 1763 – 29 March 1848), German (Waldesians)- born Johann Jakob Astor, established the American Fur Company and also established the Pacific Fur Company. Ramsay Crooks, John Jacob’s employee and his successor, hired American canoemen, but his employer would never have become the richest man in the world had Congress not allowed him to hire Canadiens.
The Americans recruited by Ramsay Crooks did not prove equal to the task. They could not work in unison. They carried guns, quarreled among themselves, and killed North-American Indians. So Ramsay Crooks decided that an exception had to be made to the Embargo Act of 1807.
Ramsay Crooks therefore wrote to Astor:
“It will still be good policy to admit freely & without the last restraint the Canadian Boatmen. these people are indispensable to the succesful prosecution of the trade, their places cannot be supplied by Americans, who are for the most part are [sic] are too independent to submit quiety to a proper controul, and who can gain any where a subsistence much superior to a man of the interior and although the body of the Yankee can resist as much hardshiip as any man, tis only in the Canadian we find that temper of mind, to render him patient docile and persevering. in short they are a people harmless in themselves whose habit of submission fit them peculiarly for our business and if guided as it is my wish they should be, will never give just cause of alarm to the Government of the Union it is of course your object to exclude foreigner except those for whom you obtaine licences.” [i]
As a result, during Thomas Jefferson‘s presidency, the American Fur Company was allowed to employ Canadian voyageurs, which it did, with considerable success, for twenty years. In fact, John Jacob Astor, whose great-grandson perished in the sinking of the Titanic, had a fine employee in Gabriel Franchère (1786-1863). Franchère and voyageurs sailed to the mouth of the Columbia River. They travelled on the Tonquin, under the command of Jonathan Thorn, an impatient and hard man. The Tonquin left New York on 8 September 1810 and arrived at the Columbia River on 12 April 1811 to establish the first American-owned (if Canadian-staffed) outpost on the Pacific Coast, Fort Astoria (present-day Astoria, Oregon).” [ii]
You will note that I have used bold letters to write “if Canadian-staffed.” Nute writes that “John Jacob Astor, the prince of American fur-traders and the organizer of the largest American fur company, is said to have remarked that he would rather have one voyageur than three American canoemen.” [iii]
Gabriel Franchère(Photo credit: Wikipedia)
A Note on Gabriel Franchère
When the American Fur Company surrendered to the North West Company, in 1812, Gabriel Franchère found his way back to Montreal where, temporarily, he remained in the employ of John Jacob Astor. Franchère is the author of a book entitled Relation d’un voyage à la côte du Nord-Ouest de l’Amérique septentrionale dans les années 1810, 11, 12, 13, et 14 (Narrative of a trip to the American North West in the Years 1810, 11, 12, 13, and 14). It would seem that the book is the possession of Marianopolis College, in Westmount, Montreal.
What I would like to point out here is that Franchère did not stay in Montreal. He returned west and died in Minnesota, where Astor’s men settled when they retired from what we could call “active duty.” It shoud also be pointed out that this was a most articulate gentleman who nevertheless worked as a mere clerk not to say voyageurs and had so loved his work that home had become Minnesota. As for voyageurs in the employ of the Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC), most of its employees retired in neighbouring Manitoba (Canada).
Beaver pelts had been very precious because they were used, among other things, to make hats. Remember the high hats. But as John Jacob Astor realized, the beaver had nearly become extinct, which for him meant abandoning the fur trade. As I have noted, a large proportion of his men settled in Minnesota when they could no longer carry two bales, or when steam boats replaced the canoe. They had opened up a very large number of forts and “[t]hey, with their traders, were thus the first white settlers of most of these areas.” [iv]
—ooo—
But what of the intrepid hommes du Nord, the North men, or young voyageurs? As it happens, “[i]t was they, too, who did the actual exploring of the interior, for the greater explorer, like Alexander Henry, Jonathan Carver, and Alexander Mackenzie [who] relied on their canoemen for knowledge of navigable streams, portages, wintering grounds and other topographical features.” [v]
A new canoe was used, mentioned in The Voyageur & his Canoe “The Kootenay-Salish canoe was built for the rapid rivers of southern BC [British Columbia], with both ends extending out under the water (art work by Lewis Parker).” [vi]
The Kootenay-Salish Canoe by Lewis Parker (Photo credit: The Canadian Encyclopedia)
In short, we have just learned about a third employer. As well, we saw that most voyageurs remained where they had worked, thereby becoming settlers, and that the more intrepid worked for explorers. I am sure that Simon Fraser had voyageurs in his employ when he chartered British Columbia. The Kootenay-Salish canoe was their canoe.
Un Canadien errant (A wandering Canadian, )
Banni de ses foyers, (banned from his hearths, )
Parcourait en pleurant (travelled while crying)
Des pays étrangers. (in foreign lands.)
Parcourait en pleurant (travelled while crying)
Des pays étrangers. (in foreign lands.)
Un jour, triste et pensif, (One day, sad and pensive, )
Assis au bord des flots, (sitting by the flowing waters, )
Au courant fugitif (to the fleeing current)
Il adressa ces mots: (he addressed these words:)
Au courant fugitif (to the fleeing current)
Il adressa ces mots: (he addressed these words:)
“Si tu vois mon pays, (If you see my country, )
Mon pays malheureux, (my unhappy country, )
Va dire à mes amis (go tell my friends)
Que je me souviens d’eux. (that I remember them.)
Va dire…
Hudson’s Bay Company Ships Prince of Wales and Eddystone bartering with the Inuit off the Upper Savage Islands, Hudson Strait, NWT. Watercolour by Robert Hood (courtesy Library and Archives Canada/C-40364) (Photo credit: The Canadian Encyclopedia)
The Hudson’s Bay Company ships Prince of Wales and Eddystone bartering with the Inuit off the Upper Savage Islands, Hudson Strait by Robert Hood (1819) (Hudson Strait, Wikipedia)
The French Régime
During the French régime, the voyageurs or canoemen who travelled to the heart of the continent to collect beaver pelts were hired by a “bourgeois” who used the selection criteria I listed in my last post:
short legs,
a powerful upper body, and
a good singing voice.
The Hudson’s Bay Company
Matters changed when Pierre-Esprit Radisson(1636–1710) and his brother-in-law,Médard Chouart des Groseilliers(1618–1696), discovered the sea we now know as the Hudson’s Bay. They collected enough beaver pelts to fill a hundred canoes. Having done so, they travelled to Canada which, at that point in history, was the western part of Nouvelle-France. The eastern part was l’Acadie, comprising Maine, part of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.
Radisson and Groseilliers thought that officials in Canada would be interested in their discovery: one could harvest the coveted pelts travelling by boat, large boats. Officials confiscated the fur Radisson and Des Groseilliers had brought back. It was proof of their discovery. They were treated like coureurs des bois, mere adventurers, not to say criminals.
Prince Rupert of the Rhine (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Radisson being very shrewd, he and Des Groseilliers went to Boston to seek the help they required to travel to England. The Bostonians agreed to take them to England where a member of the royal family, Prince Rupert of the Rhine(17 December 1619 – 29 November 1682), took an interest in the findings of the two explorers. He financed a trip to the Hudson’s Bay. The first ships to venture to what would be Rupert’s Land were the Eaglet and the Nonsuch that left England on June 3, 1668. The Company was chartered on 2 May 1670. That is how the Hudson’s Bay Company was established.
According to the Canadian Encyclopedia, the Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC)
is the oldest incorporated joint-stock merchandising company in the English-speaking world.[I]
Rupert’s Land showing York Factory (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The British Régime
Under the terms of the Treaty of Paris, signed on February 10, 1763 by France, Britain and Spain, France relinquished its claim on its two provinces of New France. The Treaty of Paris ended the Seven Years’ War, an international conflict.
The North West Company
After New France became a British Colony, a second Fur Company was founded, the North West Company, and it established its headquarters in Montreal. The most prominent figures in the newly-founded company were Benjamin Frobisher, his brother Joseph, and Simon McTavish.
The North West Company competed with the Hudson’s Bay Company from 1779 to 1821, when a merger was negotiated. The conflict between the two companies reached an apex on 19 June 1816 when Robert Semple, Governor-in-Chief of Rupert’s Land challenged a party of Métis at Seven Oaks. The Métis were allies of the North West Company. Semple and 20 of his men were killed.
The Merger
This event served as a catalyst in the merger of the North West Company and the Hudson’s Bay Company. After the merger, the man in charge, was the immensely capable and pleasant Sir George Simpson (1787 – September 7, 1860), a Scots-Quebecer. Sir George Simpson was Governor-in-Chief of Rupert’s Land and administrator over the Northwest Territories and in British North America (now Canada) from 1821 to 1860. He was knighted by Queen Victoria.
To sum up, let us simply say that we had voyageurs working for
a “bourgeois,”
The Hudson’s Bay Company (1670 – ),
The North West Company, revived in 1990, but not a fur-trading company,
a merger (1821-1860; end of the fur trade).
However, by 1821, only one company remained: the Hudson’s Bay Company.
York boats were used by the Hudson’s Bay Company to transport furs in the Northwest. The sails could be used in open water.(Canadian Encyclopedia)
A Métis Family by Peter Rindisbacher (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Louis Riel’s demise is a fine example of what happened to French-speaking Canadians and their Amerindian spouses in the western provinces of Canada. A new post will follow.
From Coast to Coast
John A. MacDonald was the first Prime Minister of Canada and a Father of Confederation
Georges-Étienne Cartier was a Quebec Leader and a Father of Confederation
Gabriel Dumont (a Métis leader) took Riel to Saskatchewan (second Rebellion)
Louis Riel is the grandson of Jean-Baptiste Lagimonière/Lagimodière (1778-1855), a farmer and a voyageur who made a name for himself. On 21 April 1806, he married Anne-Marie Gaboury (1780 – 1875), the first white woman resident in the west, and the grandmother of legendary Louis Riel.
Upon learning that the Earl of Selkirk, DOUGLAS, THOMAS, Baron DAER and SHORTCLEUCH, 5th Earl of SELKIRK (1771 [St Mary’s Isle, Scotland] – 1820 [Pau, France]) was settling the Red River, Lagimonière and his wife went to live in the Red River settlement. But rivalry between the Hudson’s Bay Company and the North West Company was so intense that North-West Company men nearly destroyed the settlement.
Lagimonière was sent to Montreal to speak to Lord Selkirk, but taken prisoner on his way back to Manitoba. Lord Selkirk attacked the fort and the settlers were able to resume a difficult but relatively normal life. Lord Selkirk rewarded Lagimonière for his services, by giving him a large grant of land between the Red River and the Seine, close to present-day Winnipeg. Lagimonière had become a celebrity.
Louis Riel
The Lagimonières had several children: four girls and four boys and, at one point, they became a very prosperous family. One of the Lagimonière daughters, Julie, married a Métis, a neighbour named Louis Riel, and is the mother of Louis Riel (22 October 1844 – 16 November 1885; aged 41) who is considered the father of Manitoba.
Louis Riel
Louis Riel (1844 -1885; by hanging)
An intellectually-gifted child, Louis Riel was sent to the Petit Séminaire, in Montréal. In a petit séminaire, one prepare for the priesthood. Louis Riel dropped out before graduation and studied law under Rodolphe Laflamme.
He was not very fond of the subtleties of laws and slowly found his way back to Manitoba working odd jobs in Chicago and St Paul, Minnesota. Many voyageurs who had been employed by John Jacob Astor’s American Fur Company retired in Minnesota. Riel then travelled back to the Red River settlement, which had changed during his absence.
On his arrival in St-Boniface, the current French area of Winnipeg, Riel observed that settlers had arrived from Ontario. They were white Anglo-Saxon Protestants who disliked Catholics. Many were Orangemen or Orangists. Settlers had also moved up from the United States.
As well, land surveyors were dividing up the land, but not in the manner it had been divided formerly. The long strips of land of New France were becoming square lots. This land still belonged to the Hudson’s Bay Company, but the Crown was preparing for a purchase (1869) and no room was being made for the Métis.
Moreover, William McDougall, an outsider, had been appointed Lieutenant-Governor of the territory and was overseeing the progress of the land surveyors.
As for the Métis, they had suffered from an invasion of grasshoppers, so food was scarce. Moreover, immigrants were dwarfing Métis and Amerindians. They needed a leader and went to Louis Riel, who was literate and had studied law.
A good will mission arrives from the Federal Government. One member of this group is Donald A. Smith, the chief representative of the Hudson’s Bay Company. Frightened by Thomas Scott and Charles Boulton, Métis have them imprisoned and court-martialed. They are condemned to death by Ambroise Lépine.
Charles Boulton is pardoned, but
Thomas Scott, a Orangeman, is executed, despite pleas on the part of Donald Smith of the Hudson’s Bay Company.
Manitoba enters into Confederation: 12 May 1870
The Bishop of Saint-Boniface, Bishop Taché, returns from Rome carrying and amnesty proclamation for all acts previously performed. At this point, Riel and his men reach an agreement and the Manitoba Law is passed on 12 May 1870. The Federal Government gives land to the Métis and makes both French and English the official languages of the new Province of Manitoba.
However, in 1870, after learning that Colonel Garnet Wolseley is being sent to the Red River by the new Governor General, A. G. Archibald, Riel flees to the United States but returns home to Saint-Vital in the fall of 1871. He then offers to help keep Fenians from attacking the Red River Settlement.
Louis Riel
is elected into office in 1873;
He is re-elected to the Federal Assembly in 1874, but a motion to expel him from the room was proposed by Orangist or Orangeman Mackenzie Bowell and passed.
But Riel is re-elected into office. However, he was prevented from sitting with other members of Parliament.
At about the same time, Ambroise Lépine’s death sentence for the “murder” of Thomas is commuted. Lépine spends two years in jail and loses all his rights. However, Lépine and Riel are amnestied, in February 1875. Louis Riel’s amnesty is “conditional to five years of banishment from ‘Her Majesty’s Dominions.’”
Riel has a nervous breakdown in 1875 and is hospitalised for three years (1875-1878), under assumed names. He is treated for depression and turns to religion. At this point, Riel starts believing he has a divine mission to guide his people.
Riel was released from hospital and went to the United States where he managed to earn a living, became an American citizen, joined the Republican Party and, in 1880, married a Métis woman, Marguerite Monet. There is little information about Marguerite. Born in 1861, she died in 1886. Riel fathered three children, one of whom died as an infant.
But in June 1884, Riel is asked, by Saskatchewan Métis, Gabriel Dumont to help Métis whose rights are being violated. Dumont had been defeated and wounded at the battle of Duck Lake, on 26 March 1885. Riel goes to Saskatchewan believing that it is his divine mission to do so. He takes over a Church in Batoche, Saskatchewan, gathers a small army, but on 6July 1885, he is officially arrested and accused of ‘treason.’
He is tried and his lawyer asks that he be examined by three doctors one of whom comes to the conclusion that Riel is no longer responsible for his actions. This divided determination was not made public and Riel was condemned to death. Riel himself did not wish to use insanity as his defence.
Appeals fail so Louis Riel is hanged in Regina on 16 November 1885 and the body is then sent by train to Saint-Vital and he is buried in the cemetery of the Cathedral at Saint-Boniface.
To this day, opinion remains divided as to Riel’s guilt. Riel, who was hanged for “treason,” is nevertheless a Father of Confederation.
Comments
Yet, Louis Riel had been elected into office three times. He is still considered by many as the father of Manitoba. Moreover, Riel had brought Manitoba into CanadianConfederation as a bilingual province and with Métis being allotted the land they needed.
Yes, the Red River Rebellion was ‘treason,’ but clemency had been requested by the judge and there were mitigating circumstances: Riel’s mental health is one of these contingencies. However, the execution of Thomas Scotthad long generated enormous resentment on the part of Ontario Orangemen or Orangists. As a result, being amnestied did not weigh in Riel’s favour.
As for the North-West Rebellion of 1885, it was ‘treason.’ Riel was found guilty and condemned to death, but the judge had asked for clemency. However, Orangists remembered the execution of Thomas Scott, and despite appeals, Riel was hanged ostensibly for ‘treason,’ but also, in all likelihood, for the “murder” of Thomas Scott.
I have been unable to create posts, except drafts, since 20 January 2018. I am too tired and somewhat discouraged. But I continued working on French-speaking Canadians as a founding nation and also wrote a post on SOGI (sexual orientation and gender identity), a programme promoting an acceptance of diversity that is consistent with Canadian anti-bullying legislation. There’s an uproar in British Columbia that may be the result of entrenched discrimination against people whose sexual orientation differs from the most common form, which is heterosexuality. Communication is very difficult, whatever the topic, but sexuality is a particularly sensitive area. People often hear what they wish to hear or expect to hear. We then enter into a dialogue de sourds, a dialogue of the deaf.
Moreover, now that it has become possible for a man living in the body of a woman, and vice versa, transgender adolescents are the victims of bullying. Transgenders may undergo treatment that will correct gender identity. It consists in transgender hormone therapy as well as surgery and psychotherapy. (See Transgender, and Sex assignment, Wikipedia).
Some men are born inside the body of a woman, and some women, inside the body of a man. However, the story of human sexuality is very complex and cannot be the subject matter of a mere post. So, teachers, and bloggers, have to simplify and state, in a nonjudmental way, that there is a continuum in sexual identity which includes homosexuality as well as bisexuality and asexuality. Anti-bullying legislation was first used in Quebec, in 2004, but the current battle is fought in British Columbia and spilling east.
I continued working on French Canada as a founding nation. This topic took me west of Quebec and, for reasons I cannot understand, it published itself before I could finish it. It has reverted to draft form, as it requires serious revisions. Many Quebecers have some Amerindian ancestry very few women were sent to New France before the Louis XIV sent filles du roy (the King’s Daughters) to New France. However, west of Quebec, voyageurs and fur traders married Amerindians and founded a nation: the Métis nation whose most famous and controversial figure is Louis Riel.
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