Treaty No. 9 Commemoration 26 September 2005 © John S. Long Nipissing University.

Treaty No. 9Commemoration 26 September

2005©John S. Long

Nipissing University

How the Commissioners explained Treaty No. 9 to the Cree in 1905

6 W’s

W 1:

What is a treaty?

W 2:

Why was there a treaty?

W 3:

Why was it # 9?

W 4:

Why was it made in 1905?

W 5:

Where was it made?

W 6:

What happened?

W 1

What is a treaty?

an agreement between two or more nations

4 types of treaties:

treaties of peace and friendship

land surrenders

land surrenders with continuing rights to hunt and fish

modern comprehen-sive land claim agreements

(e.g. JBNQA 1975)

The parties to historic treaties do not always agree about what kind of treaty it was/is.

Historians do not always agree either.

“[Cree] claims were purchased as far north as the Albany River in 1905 when the federal government concluded the James Bay Treaty (Treaty No. 9).”

The Northern Connection

Robert J. Surtees

(1992) p.4

W 2

Why a treaty?

Canadian government needed a “surrender” of the “Indian title” recognized by the Crown, in order to settle and develop the land

• Canadian Pacific Railway

• Temiskaming and Northern Ontario Railway (Ontario Northland)

W 3

Why was it # 9?

It was the 9th treaty since 1867.

http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ch/rcap/sg/images/sg_e136-00b.jpg

W 4

Why in 1905?

* First Nations requesting assistance/protection

*CPR (1885) had crossed unsurrendered land

*surveyors and prospectors

W 5

Where?

W 6

What happened ?

The Ojibway and Cree “accepted the terms

as stated” . . .

How the Commissioners explained Treaty No. 9 to the Cree in 1905

This presentation is based on the actual records kept by Treaty Commissioners

Samuel Stewart (L) , D. George MacMartin (C), and Duncan Campbell Scott (R) in 1905.

Right foreground: Dr. Alex Meindl of Mattawa.

The conclusions I reach from the Commissioners’ records are consistent with what I know of Cree oral tradition.

The HBC had notified each post, in advance, of the approximate date when government representatives would arrive to make a treaty with the Indians.

We don’t know how HBC personnel or clergy or neighbouring treaty Indians explained what was going to happen.

We do know how the Treaty Commissioners tried to explain Treaty No. 9 in 1905.

We will focus on what was explained and agreed to at Fort Albany, Moose Factory, and New Post.

We might expect that the journal of Duncan Campbell Scott, the Canadian poet and writer, would be an excellent source of information.

Scott’s journal is the hardest to read and is not very helpful at all in under-standing how Treaty No. 9 was explained to the Ojibway and Cree in 1905.

At Fort Albany . . .

“Made Treaty”

3 August 1905

D.C. Scott Journal

At Moose Factory . . .

“Made Treaty in the morning”

9 August 1905

D.C. Scott Journal

At New Post . . .

“Made Tr”

21 August 1905

D.C. Scott Journal

Scott’s article published in Scribner’s Magazine in 1906, however, is very helpful.

Scott indicates that

the treaty was simplified

and

interpreters were needed

The simplified message was:

The King►is the great father ► has Indians’ interests at heart► is always compassionate

“The simpler facts had to be stated, and the parental idea developed that the King is the great father of the Indians,

“watchful over their interests, and ever compassionate. After gifts of tobacco, as we were seated in a circle

“in a big room of the Hudson’s Bay Company, the interpreter delivered this message.”

Duncan Campbell Scott

“The last of the Indian treaties”

Samuel Stewart’s journal provides a bit more information.

At Fort Albany . . .

“As at the other points, full explanations were given of the Treaty and it provisions”

3 August 1905

Journal of Samuel Stewart

At Moose Factory . . .

“Geo. MacLeod, one of the H.B.C. officials acted as an interpreter being assisted occasionally by Bishop Holmes and Mr. Mowat.

“When the points of the treaty were explained to them, they expressed their perfect willingness to the terms and conditions.”

9 August 1905

Journal of Samuel Stewart

At New Post . . .

“As usual the point in which the Indians desired full information was as to the effect the treaty would have on their hunting and fishing rights.

“When assured that these would not be taken from them, they expressed much pleasure and their willingness to sign the treaty.”

21 August 1905Journal of Samuel Stewart

The third Commissioner, D(aniel) George MacMartin, represented the province of Ontario.

He was a miner from Perth and the son of a lawyer.

After the first signing, at Osnaburg, MacMartin began recording how Treaty No. 9 was explained.

At Fort Albany . . .

A Cree who would be admitted to the treaty, James Linklater, was the interpreter.

Here’s how D.C. Scott told Linklater to explain the treaty:

The Commissioners had been sent by the King.

The King wished his subjects, white and Indian, to be happy and prosperous.

The King wished to set aside a reserve for their use and benefit, where no white man could trespass.

The King wished to assist them.

After signing the treaty they would receive:

* a gift of $8 (cash) per person

* a perpetual annuity of $4 per person

* a feast to commemorate the event

* a chief and councillors would be elected

* a flag for the chief

At Moose Factory, discussing the treaty took only half an hour

(Anglican Bishop George Holmes had somehow explained the treaty in church the night before.)

McLeod, who the Commissioners refused to admit into the treaty, was told to say:

The Commissioners had been sent by the King to make a treaty.

Naskumituwin = an (oral) agreement, a covenant

The King wished them to be happy and prosperous.

By entering the treaty they would be protected.

*gifts of $8 per person

* perpetual annuity of $4

* a feast

“when they were ready . . . schools would be established for . . . educating their children”

a reserve (formula of one square mile per family of five)

they were “not obliged to live on it until they felt inclined”

“set aside as their own on which no white man could trespass or enter upon, without their permission”

“they could follow their custom of hunting where they pleased”

“elect a chief and advisors“

a flag for the chief

At New Post one of the Cree signatories, John Luke, was interpreter:

a present of $8 per person

a perpetual annuity of $4 per person “provided they accepted the terms of the treaty”

“a reserve or tract of land would be set aside and surveyed . . . for their sole use and benefit, that they were not obliged to live on”

“allowed to hunt and fish where they pleased . . .

election of a chief

a flag for the chief as a “reminder that he and his band had agreed to become good citizens, and to obey the laws of the land”

food for a feast

“We wished them all to be happy and enjoy themselves ”

At Fort Albany, Moose Factory & New Post there was:

no mention of any restrictions on hunting, fishing

no reference to “surrendering” the land or any rights

no mention of lands required for settlement, mining, lumbering

How did the Commissioners explain Treaty No. 9?

It was explained orally, with interpreters.

It was simplified.

Gifts of money.

Promises of assistance and protection from a generous father-King

Election of a chief and councillors, a flag for the chief, and a reserve . . .

. . . which unknowingly (for the Ojibway and Cree) signaled the imposition of the federal Indian Act.

No restrictions on hunting or fishing

The written document was not interpreted.

The Cree (and Ojibway) agreed to what was said.

At Fort Albany, “Wm. Goodwin -said that they were very glad to accept the terms as stated.”

At Moose Factory, Fred Mark said that “they concurred in all that had been said.”

At New Post, “Angus Weenusk replied that they accepted the terms as stated.”

Then the treaty was signed.

“The govern-ment said there is no agreement yet. He wanted ten men to sign and they signed.”

“after having been first interpreted & explained”

One of the Commissioners held the pen, and made the sign of the cross, with each ‘signatory’ touching the top of the pen.

The mark of the cross is a further complication, perhaps like swearing an oath on the Bible.

What is the “spirit and intent” of Treaty No. 9?

Which one?

Oral Treaty

- assistance and protection

- cultural survival

- happiness and prosperity

- co-existence

Written Treaty

- surrender and removal

- assimilation- genocide- the Indian Act- involuntary wardship

Prior to 1905, the Cree and Ojibway had coexisted with Europeans, as equals, for two centuries.

It had generally been a symbiotic relationship, advantageous to both parties.

When they met with the Treaty Commissioners, they were undoubtedly willing to continue some modest sharing their territory.

Fred Mark’s comment at Moose Factory, “that they were satisfied that they would be better cared for and protected by the King”

suggests some may have understood that the HBC was being replaced by the King’s government of Canada (Rupert’s Land transfer of 1870)

But MacMartin’s journal shows us that they were not asked to share the land.

Instead, the Commis-sioners tricked them into signing a treaty which would “cede, release, surrender and yield up” all their lands and rights.

Treaty No. 9 tried to impose a new, unequal relationship which repudiated the previous two centuries of coexistence . . .

. . . and would threaten the very survival of the northern Ojibway and Cree.

They came together as nations but, in the eyes of the government, they left as masters and dependents . . .

. . . a system of involuntary wardship, a relationship unilaterally defined by the federal Indian Act.

Their territory may or may not have been acquired by Canada. If it was, we have seen that this was done without their informed consent.

They have resisted this imposed relationship, and they continue to seek . . .

. . . a genuine restoration of that respectful nation-to-nation relationship that existed prior to 1905.

The betrayal of Treaty No. 9 and the imposition of the Indian Act underlie almost every conflict between First Nations and other Canadians in northern Ontario today.

“Commemoration” means remembering.

As a non-Aboriginal Canadian, I commem-orate but do not celebrate the signing of Treaty No. 9 in 1905.

The signing represents a legacy of shame, of deception and of our governments and institutions attempting to impose their will on First Nations.

I do commemorate and celebrate the positive legacy of 1905:

* the promises made in 1905 (which the Cree and Ojibway have patiently waited to be kept)

*the concern of the Mushkegowuk and Anishnabek in 1905 (and today) for maintaining their culture

*their resistance*their survival

Miigwetch.

Thank you.

Merci.

For more information:

www.archives.gov.on.ca/ english/exhibits/james_ bay_treaty/index.html