From the Great River to the Ends of the Earth (The Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate)

From the Great River to the Ends of the Earth Oblate Missions to the Dene 1847-1921

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THE UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA TRESS WESTERN CANADIAN TUBLISHERS

From the

Oblate Missions to the Dene, 1847-1921

to the

of the

First published by The University of Alberta Press Athabasca Hall Edmonton, Alberta Canada T6G 2E8 and Western Canadian Publishers 10336-114 Street Edmonton, Alberta Canada T5K183 Copyright © The University of Alberta Press and Western Canadian Publishers 1995 ISBN 0-88864-263-6

Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data McCarthy, Martha. From the great river to the ends of the earth (The missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate in the Canadian North West) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-88864-263-6 i. Oblates of Mary Immaculate—Missions—Northwest, Canadian—History. 2. Tinne Indians—Missions—Northwest, Canadian—History. 3. Indians of North America—Missions—Northwest, Canadian. 4. Missions—Northwest, Canadian—History. I. Title. II. Series. BV23OO.O2M321995

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be produced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any forms or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. Printed on acid-free paper. °° Printed and bound in Canada by Best Book Manufacturers, Louiseville, Quebec. Frontispiece: Bishop Breynat on the Mackenzie River, 1030, PAA.

TheAlberta Foundation for the Arts COMMITTED TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF CULTURE AND THE ARTS

He shall rule from sea to sea, From the Great River to the ends of the earth. Psalm 72:8

Plus loin que le pays que nous habitons est une vaste contree, connue sous le nom de Grande Riviere Mackenzie ... assez vaste pour former un royaume et meme un empire. Beyond this country where we are lies an immense territory, known as the Great River Mackenzie ... vast enough to form a kingdom or even an empire. Fa.ra.ud to Mazenod, 29 December1855

Our Dene nation is like this great river. It has been flowing before any of us can remember. We take our strength, our wisdom and our ways from the flow and direction which has been established for us by ancestors we never knew, ancestors of a thousand years ago. Frank T'Seleie, Chief of Fort Good Hope Band Cited in Northern Frontier, Northern Homeland by Thomas Berger

For my husband Don McCarthy

CONTENTS

Abbreviations ix Acknowledgments xi Foreword xiii Preface xv Introduction xvii

1 Worlds Apart: The "Old" World i 2 Worlds Apart: The "New" World n 3 Policy and Pragmatism: The Oblates and the Hudson's Bay Company 27

4 Rivals in Faith: Oblates Versus Anglicans 45 5 Structures and Infrastructure 57 6 When Two Worlds Met 73 7 Lay Leadership Among the Dene 97 8 Metis Auxiliaries 107 9 Health and Well-Being: Medicine and Mission 119 10 Protest and Prophecy 131 11 Education and Evangelization 155 12 Oblates, Dene, and the Canadian Government 171 13 A New Heaven and a New Earth 179

Appendix A Appendix B Appendix C Notes 211 Bibliography Index 263

Dene Population Statistics 194 Sickness and Medicine i^ Oblate Missions to the Dene 210 245

ABBREVIATIONS

AASB

Archives Archbishop of St. Boniface

AD

Archives Deschatelets

ADM

Archives Diocese Mackenzie—Fort Smith

CMS

Church Missionary Society [Anglican]

HBC

Hudson's Bay Company

HBCA

Hudson's Bay Company Archives

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NAC

National Archives of Canada

OAGP

Oblate Archives Grandin Province

OMI

Oblates of Mary Immaculate

PAA

Provincial Archives of Alberta

PAM

Provincial Archives of Manitoba

RMQ

Rapport des Missions du diocese du Quebec

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Ji would like to thank all the Dene elders who gave so generously of their time and knowledge to me. Elizabeth Yakeleya, John Blondin, Paul Wright, and Fred Widow of Fort Norman met with me; Mabel Martin interpreted for me. Cecilia Tourangeau talked to me in Inuvik just after leaving the hospital, and I am most grateful for this. Hyacinth Andre spoke to me and guided me around Arctic Red River, while I was staying at the mission house. Sister Alice Rivard took me to see Madeleine Villeneuve, Sarah McPherson, and Celine Laferte at Fort Simpson just before she left the north, after spending fifty years there. I flew with Father La Grange in his plane when he went to say Mass at Jean-Marie River; Sister Rivard introduced me to Sarah Hardisty there. Gus Kraus at Fort Simpson, a white trapper and prospector, who moved from Chicago to Peace River to the

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North West Territories in the early years of this century, gave me his perspective on this history. My thanks go to all the Oblates, especially Bishop Denis Croteau and Fathers Ebner, Labat, and La Grange, who extended their hospitality to me throughout my stay in the Mackenzie-Fort Smith Diocese. I am grateful too for the cordial welcome I received from all the Oblates at the Provincial House in Edmonton, at St. Albert, and at Deschatelets in Ottawa. My conversations with them expanded my awareness for this book. Sister Dora and the rest of the Grey Nuns whom I met welcomed me with their own community of generosity, for which I am most grateful. My deep appreciation goes to the Oblate archivists—Father Gilles Mousseau at the Diocesan Archives in Yellowknife, Father Gaston Montmigny of the Oblate Archives Grandin Province in St. Albert, and Father Romuald Boucher at Deschatelets in Ottawa—for their willing and generous assistance in finding documents for me. I also owe a great deal to the cooperation and aid of the late Guy Lacombe of Western Canadian Publishers. Katharine Martyn, Assistant Director of the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto, was kind enough to send me some material from the J.B. Tyrrell Collection that was unavailable at the time I visited Toronto. Her help is much valued. I was pleased to receive a Research Time Stipend from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada for 1990—1991. This financial support was essential to the completion of this book. Western Canadian Publishers contributed toward the publication costs, for which the publishers and I are grateful.

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TOREWORD

Ihe .he Western Oblate History Project was established to prepare a series of

critical studies dealing with the history of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate in the western and northern regions of Canada. In the interests of impartiality and objectivity it was decided that the Project would limit itself to identifying major research areas and allow independent scholars complete freedom with respect to methodology and the interpretation of their data. These three research areas were: (i) studies analyzing the establishment, expansion and administration of the Congregation in the Canadian North West; (2) thematic studies; and (3) biographical studies. Martha McCarthy's study encompasses two of these three research areas. To begin with, it is a history of the establishment, expansion and consolidation of the Oblate missionary activity in the Mackenzie Basin. In addition,

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it is a thematic study in that it deals with the evangelization of the Dene, a nation that was dear to the pioneer Oblates and their successors. More important, the author was the type of scholar the Project hoped to attract. Her 1981 Ph.D. thesis, "The Missions of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate to the Athapaskans, 1846-1870," was consulted widely by researchers and became a standard reference. In the meantime, she acquired a greater knowledge of Native history and wished to incorporate this sensitivity into a volume that would go beyond her thesis and focus more closely on the Dene response to the Oblate apostolate. Beyond the Great River: Oblate Missions to the Dene, 1847—1921 is the result of that desire to transcend traditional missionary accounts, and through ethnohistory, evaluate the Dene response to the Christian message as it was preached by the Oblates. Dr. McCarthy has balanced documentary sources with the Dene oral tradition and blended a thematic framework with a creative narrative approach that provides a meaningful form to different elements. She has also identified the changes in Oblate missionary activity beginning as an initial proclamation of the Gospel, later encompassing education and health care and finally evolving into an intermediary role between the Dene and the federal bureaucracy. With respect to the response of the Dene, she demonstrates that the Dene were free to accept, reject or modify the teachings of the Oblates. The Oblate apostolate in the Mackenzie was a complex phenomenon. In addition to interaction with the Dene it necessitated relations with the Hudson's Bay Company, Anglican competitors and the Dominion government and its agencies. RAYMOND HUEL General Editor Western Canadian Publishers

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.his book is one in a series devoted to the history of the Oblates of Mary Ihii Immaculate in western and northern Canada. Each volume illustrates a different facet of the many enterprises undertaken by the Oblates, as they established missions, developed parishes, and assumed the cares of bishops for the entirety of the region. Their evangelization of the Dene of the Athabasca and Mackenzie regions was one of their first ventures into the field of foreign missions and, for many years, absorbed much of their attention. Over many years together, Oblate and Dene developed their understanding and acceptance of "the other" and a shared belief. Today the Oblates, though greatly diminished in numbers and advanced in age, still constitute almost the entire Roman Catholic clergy of the north. The story of their missions to the Dene illuminates much of the history of the Canadian north, its peoples, and their coexistence with Christianity. xv

My interest in this field began with the writing of my Ph.D. thesis, entitled "The Missions of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate to the Athapaskans, 1846—1870: Theory, Structure, and Method" (University of Manitoba, 1981). In 1987 I proposed to the Western Oblate History Project that I would prepare a history of the Oblate missions to the Dene of the Athabasca and Mackenzie regions up to 1921. In the years since the completion of my thesis, I had become more familiar with Native history through teaching and writing. As a participant in the Denendeh Seminar in 1987,1 made my first visit to the people and places I had written about. I hoped to bring an increased sensitivity to this work, to write a book which would give greater attention to the Dene share in the mission process, yet still preserve insight into the Oblates' motives and actions.

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TROM THE OJREAT -RIVER TO THE ENDS OF THE -EARTH

INTRODUCTION

^^/1-lexandre Tache, OMI, visited Fort Chipewyan for the first time in 1847, inaugurating the Oblate missions to the Dene of the Athabasca District, and the subsequent rapid expansion into the Mackenzie District. The Oblates' primary objective was to transfer the Roman Catholic faith to the Dene. A necessary corollary was to improve Dene lives by providing medical care, education, and help in times of need. At their first encounters, the priests from France or Quebec, with only a tenuous grasp of Native language and culture, tried to convey the message of Christianity as they had learned it in their home countries. Over the course of many years, however, they learned much from the Dene, how to survive and travel in the north, how to speak the languages of the people, what was acceptable and not acceptable to them. They also became aware

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of a Dene spirituality and world-view based on community sharing which, in many ways, was closer to early Christianity than was the more secular and individualistic nineteenth-century European Christianity they knew. During this mission process the Dene also changed. They were not empty vessels into which the Catholicism preached by the Oblates could be poured. The history, religious beliefs, and changing circumstances of the Dene influenced their acceptance or rejection of the Christianity preached to them. If that faith had been totally alien, they would have rejected it altogether, or conformed only superficially. But when they accepted Catholicism, they did so, in many ways, on their own terms, in conformity with their own cultural and spiritual understandings. They accomplished for themselves much of what present mission theory calls "inculturation," long before that concept or ideal was expressed or accepted. According to this theory, the Christian message must assume its own life within many cultures without destroying them. It cannot continue as an imported religion, though, when European Christianity came in lock-step with Western civilization, it threatened to do so. The impact of Western civilization efforts by the Oblates in their missions to the Dene of the Athabasca and Mackenzie districts, however, was comparatively light from 1847-192,1. The Oblates' religious message could readily be absorbed by the Dene to become part of their own culture and faith. The Oblates, French and Roman Catholic in origin, operated under English and Protestant sovereignty. Though they shared much common ground with other contemporary missionaries, the Oblate Congregation also had a distinctive spirituality and zeal, which it inculcated in its members. This was shown clearly in the mission methods they brought from France. The concept of "civilization" with which the Oblates were imbued also distinguished their missionary endeavour. Theirs was an ultramontane1 view of missions, a search to expand the frontiers of civilisation chretienne which was, they believed, identical with Roman Catholicism. The British imperialism which marked the Christianity of many Anglican missionaries in the north was alien to the Oblates. Ultramontane Roman Catholic missionaries, seeking the conversion of peoples, were as demanding of change, however, as were secular imperialists, even if the desired changes were different. Though they did not consciously seek to impose secular "civilization," Western thought and the cultural aspects of Christianity were inseparable from their religious message and the social changes they encouraged.

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In the initial period of their missions, the Oblates relied on the Dene and Metis to provide subsistence for them and teach them how to live and travel in the north, to mediate for them with new groups of Dene, and to pressure the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) to accept their missions. In the face of opposition of the Anglican Church Missionary Society (CMS), the Oblates extended their missions at a very rapid pace, stretching their resources of clergy and finances to the limit. The bishops, with highlydeveloped strategic skills, moved priests quickly to counter their CMS rivals at every post. They also responded promptly to the initiation of CMS schools, which threatened to alienate the Metis from the Roman Catholic Church. With the cooperation of the Sisters of Charity of Montreal (the Grey Nuns), the Oblates constructed and staffed the residential schools which dominated Providence, Fort Chipewyan, and Fort Resolution. Simultaneously, they struggled to provide clergy, bishops, financial support, and the diocesan structure of the institutional Church, into which they hoped to incorporate the Dene. They laboured, with the key contributions of brothers, to establish themselves firmly in place with houses, chapels, churches, schools, farms, and fisheries. They developed their own transport system of roads, boats, and eventually steamboats. In all these aspects, Western thought and politics dominated; the Dene had little share in making these decisions. As the missions became more firmly established, the Oblates moved from their dependence on the Dene and Metis in the early years towards an independence of life and travel by the end of the nineteenth century. When this process accelerated in the early twentieth century, and the Canadian government became more actively involved in the Athabasca and Mackenzie districts, the Oblate bishops shifted roles. They became intermediaries with the government, seeking aid directly for the Dene and for the preservation of their own missions and role in the north. Government financing for schools, hospitals, and the support of the indigent replaced earlier Oblate efforts to give medical care, education, and help in time of need. The negotiation of Treaty n with the Mackenzie Dene in 1921, however inept it was, marked the transfer to the Canadian government of control of social policy, which had previously been an integral part of the Oblate missionary enterprise. After that date, though the Oblates continued to speak for the Dene, they did so primarily by putting pressure on the government to improve its social policies and less through direct intervention in the lives of the Dene. Their activities in the north centred again on the teaching and perpetuation

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of the Catholic faith among the people from the base of their missions formed between 1847 and 1921. The Oblates also definitively established their Inuit missions after 1921 and these absorbed much of the time and attention which had previously been devoted to the Dene. By 1921 many Dene were third-generation Catholics, who identified themselves as such. They shared in the sacraments and life of the Church, endured considerable hardships to attend the great religious feasts and held devout gatherings at their winter camps with their own spiritual leaders. Their Catholicism was distinctively Dene, much as many other branches of Catholicism exhibited unique characteristics. The institution was never quite as monolithic as it appeared to outsiders, despite the universality of its beliefs and rituals. Each branch of Catholicism preserved singular aspects while conforming to the teachings and practice of the Church. The complex history of these missions cannot be treated from a single viewpoint; "each side of the Christian curtain has to be viewed from its own perspective."2 This is not an easy task. Few are qualified to view the missionary and the missioned-to with equal competence and understanding. In the past, mission history has been dominated by single-minded authors who seem to understand only one side, either that of the missionary or that of the Native. Much of the problem can be attributed to the confusion caused by the fact that "Christianity and civilization" were almost inseparable in nineteenth-century mission thought. Church historians tend to concentrate on the transfer of Christianity, neglecting the social and cultural changes which it exacted. Those at the other end of the spectrum, primarily influenced by anthropology, concentrate their judgments on the imposed "civilization," disregarding the validity of a genuine acceptance of Christian beliefs by those who received the evangelizing. ^ This dichotomy can be seen in works dealing with the Oblate missions to the Dene. The major source of information on these has been Aux Glares Polaires by Father Pierre Duchaussois, OMI, published in 1921, and translated into English in 1923 as Mid Snow and Ice. Duchaussois was an accomplished observer. He used his access to Oblate documentary and oral sources to present a readable and comprehensive survey of these missions. His outlook was that of an Oblate writing about what he and his contemporaries thought of as an heroic age of missions. He made no pretence to impartiality, nor could he be expected to adopt an ethnohistorical approach. Though still valuable, his work belongs in the genre of traditional church histories. XX

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So, too, do Bishop Emile Grouard's Mes SoixanteAns (19208) and Bishop Gabriel Breynat's three-volume work CinquanteAm au Pays desNeiges (1945, 1947, and 1948). These recollections of missionary bishops and their individual experiences of mission are significant works. Much ethnological material can be gleaned from them, but their primary purpose is to recount the expansion of the Oblate missions despite years of hardship and privation. Father Donat Levasseur's volume for this series, Les Oblats de Marie Immaculee dans I'Ouest et le Norddu Canada, 1845—1967 is a survey of all the Oblate missions over a period of 125 years. It does not and cannot deal in any detail with the Dene missions. Nor does it analyze the Oblate motives and means of evangelization, or the motives and attitudes to Catholicism of those on the other side of the process. My Ph.D. thesis, "The Missions of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate to the Athapaskans 1846—1870: Theory, Structure and Method" (University of Manitoba, 1981), endeavoured to analyze these Oblate missions, using the techniques of current historical scholarship. I explained the thought-system and ideology of missions which the Oblates brought from France, the hierarchical framework of the Roman Catholic Church which they formed in the Athabasca-Mackenzie, and the methods they used to preach the Gospel to the Dene and establish the Church among them. My concentration was on the Oblate side of the missions, their motives and effects. Only in the last chapter, "Athapaskan Adaptations," detailing the various prophetic and syncretic movements which recurred throughout the first years of contact, did I deal at length with the Dene reaction to the Catholicism preached to them. In 1984 Kerry Abel completed her Ph.D. thesis at Queen's University entitled "The Drum and the Cross, An Ethnohistorical Study of Mission Work Among the Dene, 1858-1902." This thesis dealt with both Oblate and Church Missionary Society (Anglican) missions among the Dene. Writing as an ethnohistorian, trying to consider both sides of the missions, she emphasized the Dene independence in religion, and claimed that previous writers, including myself, had given too much weight to the missionary side of the equation. Leaning heavily on anthropological scholarship, she concluded that "Ultimately, as has been suggested, the Christian missions have not made profound changes in the daily lives or cultural outlook of the Dene." (p. 326) I disagree with this conclusion and believe that the Catholicism preached to the Dene by the Oblates, and accepted by them almost on their own terms, did have a profound impact on their lives and outlook. INTRODUCTION

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This does not mean that they completely altered themselves; no one would expect such a result. The history of their acceptance of Catholicism shows that these spirit-guided people were able to integrate the spirituality of Catholicism into their lives, fit its rules of conduct into their society like the traditional guidance of the elders, and find in its rituals and sacraments helpful spiritual contacts in times of trouble or joy. The Catholicism they incorporated became theirs; no one has the right to define it out of existence. This book attempts to delineate the dialogue (and it was a two-way conversation) between the Oblates and the Dene in the first three-quarters of a century of their relationship. That dialogue took place, however, only in relation to the message of faith, which the Dene were free to accept or reject, to adapt or alter. It is in the study of this fundamental aspect of missions that ethnohistorical methods can be of most value. The initial comprehension (and ignorance) on both sides, and the altered understanding of each, leading to mutual acceptance, can best be evaluated in this way. The mission of the Oblates to the Dene, however, included many aspects besides the religious dialogue. They developed varying relationships with governing powers and opposing missionaries; they acted for the Dene, on their own and with the government, through social institutions such as schools and hospitals. Much of this decision-making process took place almost independently of the Dene. The superstructure of missions, such as the mission buildings, the schools, the relationship of the Oblates to the governing powers, the development of the episcopacy and the integration of the Dene region into the structure of the Roman Catholic Church, and rivalry with the CMS, were all primarily undertaken at the discretion and direction of the Oblates. For these facets of mission, ethnohistory is not a viable tool; traditional historical method, narrative and intellectual, must come into play, and the emphasis is necessarily on one side of the Christian curtain. The history of northern Canada and the history of missions are marked by a mingling of cultures, with each affecting the other and bringing into being a new people and a new way of life. It is fitting that the historical method applied to this field should also be a blend. Most of the interpretation here is based on primary documents in the various Oblate archives. These provide a wealth of material for the diligent; individual priests and bishops wrote voluminous reports on their missions and the lives of the Dene whom they hoped to convert. Other documentary sources—the Hudson's Bay Company Archives, the Church Missionary Society Archives, and the Department of Indian Affairs—furnish XXII

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counterbalancing views to those of the Oblates. Nevertheless, all these sources give perceptions of the Dene and, in the latter sources, of the Oblates, by outsiders. Confining oneself to these necessarily leads to imbalance. The oral history of the Dene experience with the Oblates is available to few professional historians. My visits to Fort Norman, Arctic Red River, and Fort Simpson improved my understanding of and sensitivity to the Dene, their history, and their beautiful land. Time and expense ruled out more, or lengthier, visits. Where possible, I have integrated what I learned from the Dene elders into the text. Much of what I learned from them, however, cannot be documented. Julie Cruikshank has pointed out that the value of oral tradition does not lie in the new facts it brings to light: "Its most important contribution may consist of new questions, perspectives, and interpretations."4 These influences are present throughout the book, but it is impossible for me to define exactly where and when my perspectives and interpretation were altered. Archival research remains as essential to a history of a relationship between whites and Natives as oral tradition. The two approaches should complement each other. Because both oral and written accounts carry with them the perspective of their authors,5 a good historian uses caution and interpretive proficiency. Although my own background and training equip me best to use archival resources, this has not ruled out my attempt to combine the results of archival research with an understanding and appreciation of Dene thought and culture. If for no other reason, that understanding is essential to show the ways in which Catholicism sometimes complemented, rather than replaced, Dene faith and history. Archival research has brought to light many facets of the early mission period that had been lost to oral tradition because so many Dene elders died during that time. It illuminates, though imperfectly, the motives, actions, and changing lives of both the Oblates and the Dene in the first seventy-five years of their relationship. The establishment of the Oblate missions to the Dene, and their continuity to 1921, can only be understood by an awareness of their dialogue with the Dene and of how each side viewed their encounters and messages at various times and places. This must be combined with an understanding of the many other facets of the Oblate missions that were carried out with little or no consultation with the Dene. It is only through exposition and evaluation of all these factors that we can hope to reach a better understanding of the Oblate missions to the Dene as they expanded throughout the vast area drained by Dehcho, the Great River (Mackenzie). INTRODUCTION

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1 W O R L D S APART: T H E "OLD" W O R L D

To, or well over a century, the Oblates of Mary Immaculate have been the Roman Catholic bearers of the Gospel to the Dene. They moved quickly from being strangers in a strange land to becoming identified as the priests of the north. With the Dene they formed communities of faith from Lake Athabasca north to the Mackenzie Delta, around each of the great lakes Athabasca, Slave, and Great Bear, and along the many tributary rivers of Dehcho, the Great River (Mackenzie).1 Little in the background of either Oblates or Dene would have foretold their lengthy and close relationship, nor the development of the uniquely Dene form of Catholicism. Their attitudes to the Great River, expressed in

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the quotations on page v, reflect the very different outlooks of Oblate and Dene. To the Oblates, the Great River had Biblical connotations reminding them of the Great River Euphrates cited in the psalm. They were missionaries, called, they thought, by God, and sent by their superiors and their Church to transmit the Gospel to all the peoples of the world, to the ends of the earth. Impelled by this religious fervour, they sought to evangelize the Dene of the Great River of the north. The Oblates also had a more secular outlook on missions. Imbued with this, Henri Faraud could see the Great River and its peoples as a vast kingdom of souls to be gained for God through the agency of the Oblates under his direction, whatever the claims of any other power to sovereignty. He sought to solidify the Oblate missions by building chapels, residences, and schools, finding alternative methods of transport to supply his missions and recruiting the help of the Grey Nuns to staff his schools. The Oblates used medical care as a potent adjunct to the simple preaching of the Gospel. Faraud used every means he could to prevent the missionaries of the opposing Church Missionary Society from gaining a foothold in that vast region. The Dene did not share the Oblate missionary's view of Dehcho. They had a religious respect for their own Great River and for the land through which it flowed, as the source of their history, life, and contact with the spirits. The Dene Cultural Institute, on the two hundredth anniversary of Alexander Mackenzie's trip down that river, sought to convey "a new sense of the importance of the river, and a greater appreciation of history from a Dene perspective."2 Dehcho symbolized the continuity of the people through countless generations, surviving through changes, adapting, yet remaining essentially Dene. The river was a constant, a part of their life, a landscape to be lived with, not controlled and conquered, even for religious purposes. Their removal from that land would have been inconceivably painful, for they did not share the European attitude, as the missionaries did, of seeking new opportunities in foreign lands.3 When they first met, the Oblates and the Dene each had a faith which guided their actions; each had a culture which they considered supreme. Each had a system of education, the one based on literature and schooling, the other grounded in oral tradition and example. They had lived radically dissimilar lives on separate continents, with no knowledge of each other nor expectation of meeting. Rooted in these two different worlds though they were, they were able to communicate with each other and to develop a community of belief and a mutual understanding. This did not occur

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immediately, as the first missionaries had hoped, but through the stability of the very long-term relationship between the two parties. The Oblates' understanding of missions and preparation for their role as missionaries to the Dene began in the south of France, where Eugene de Mazenod founded Les Missionnaires de Provence, the forerunners of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, in 1816. His group of home missionaries was one of many formed to rebuild the Church after the French Revolution,4 when the call to re-evangelize the people was urgent. The Roman Catholic Church already had a long tradition of missions in both the home and foreign fields. The first colonial missions in the modern era were authorized and financed by the national governments of Spain, Portugal, and France. Papal direction of missions began only with the formation of the Sacred Congregation of the Propagation of the Faith, familiarly known as the Propaganda, in 1622. Rome hoped that its missionaries could function independently of the colonial powers, as apostolic labourers sent overseas to announce the Gospel of Jesus Christ, to teach the gentiles to observe whatever the Roman Catholic Church commands, to propagate the Catholic Faith, and to forewarn of the universal judgment of all men.5 This definition, with its effort to separate the missionary effort of the Church from control by secular powers, held true for the nineteenth century as well. During the Counter-Reformation, those priests who tried to win back European Protestants were called "home" missionaries. Little distinction was made between home and foreign missions, other than the geographical one. Both aimed to draw all people on all continents into the Roman Catholic Church. They offered salvation through the practice of the Roman Catholic faith, leading a moral life in conformity with the rules of the Church, and performing works of charity for the poor and needy of the world. The home missionaries of France in the nineteenth century used revivalist methods developed in the seventeenth century Counter-Reformation home missions. They visited parishes which had been without a priest for many years and gave intensive weeks of instruction, sermons, and catechizing. They used hymns, often set to popular tunes, to renew knowledge of the faith in a mostly-illiterate population. Often they preached a terrifying

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sermon on death and judgment, sometimes by an open grave, to move their hearers to repentance. They spent hours in the confessional, helping people to recognize their sins and amend their ways to conform with the teaching of the church. The climax of the mission came with the ceremonial planting of a cross to serve as a lasting reminder of the mission. Afterwards, the priests left to give another mission in another place. The use of catechisms with much rote learning, lengthy sessions in the confessional, and emotive sermons informed the people about the faith and encouraged the practice of Catholicism with obedience to the rules of the Church. This conformity was furthered by the Oblate custom of visiting each family, a practice that was unique to their home missions. During these calls they became aware of family circumstances, and were often able to persuade parents to regularize their marriages within the church. The Oblates pursued similar objectives with the Dene and maintained close supervision over the lives of their converts for the duration of their preached missions. To ensure the continuance of the good results obtained from the mission, the priests established congregations of the laity. These were groups divided by age, gender, or special interests, each with a program of particular prayers and devotions. The members would reinforce each other and become a permanent force for good in the parish as lay leaders, especially vital when many parishes were without a cure. This method of developing lay leaders was very apt for the Dene, who spent most of their time apart from the priests. Mazenod's group in France selected the poor of Provence as their particular field of action. Their motto, EvangeUzarepauperibus misit me (He has sent me to teach the Good News to the poor),6 exemplified their purpose. Poor and illiterate, left without priests or church services for many years during the French Revolution, these people had lapsed into semi-paganism. Mazenod emphasized that the only way to reconvert them was by preaching the gospel to them in their own Provencal language. "The Gospel must be taught to all men and in a way in which it can be understood. The Poor, that precious part of the Christian family, cannot be left uninstructed."7 This task of the home missions to the poor of Provence, who had been for many years without priests or adequate instruction, and who spoke a different language, was similar in many ways to that of the foreign missions, which sought to evangelize those without any Christian tradition. Because of the many years without the practice of the faith, Catholic 4

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•£ A R T H

observers thought the people in some areas of France had reverted to a "savage" state;8 the hallmark of true civilization, civilisation chretienne, they believed, was Catholicism, and no one could claim to be really civilized if he rejected that faith. With such a definition of "savage" and "civilization," it was not unusual to equate the home missions, directed at the unconverted in France, with missions to convert les sauvages of North America. The dissemination of Catholicism, on either continent, was equivalent to the propagation of true civilization. The methods of the Restoration home missions were also readily adaptable for use in the foreign missions. The Oblates learned the local languages as speedily as possible to enable them to communicate their teachings to the Dene, just as they had to the people of Provence in the Provencal language. They were trained in ways to communicate with non-literate people and used those same techniques with the Dene. They adapted the lengthy preached missions of France to the Dene trade gatherings, spending many hours in giving sermons and hearing confessions. They composed hymns and produced brief catechisms in the various Dene languages. They formed confraternities, just as they had in France. Often these groups formed the nucleus of lay leadership within the Church. The home missionaries in France, however, assumed the existence of a substratum of belief in their hearers, or at least in their culture. They concentrated their efforts on changing the way of life of their listeners to reflect that belief. Belief and practice are inextricably linked in human life, as witness the common expression "practising Catholics." Practice, so much easier to measure than belief, is nevertheless assumed to be evidence of it. The same methods, applied to people in the foreign missions who had no foundation in the Catholic faith, encouraged them to practice their new faith as those in France did. Conformity of practice by the Dene, however, did not necessarily indicate an identical understanding of belief. Mazenod went to Rome in 1826 and successfully sought papal approval of his group, which he renamed the Oblates of Mary Immaculate.9 His devotion to Mary and to papal direction of the Church put him at the forefront of the movement that was to culminate in Pius IX's declaration of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of Mary in 1854, and the subsequent declaration of papal infallibility at the First Vatican Council in 1870. Despite papal approval, however, Mazenod's group remained very small. The home missions had receded in significance in France by the 18305, owing to a marked increase in diocesan clergy, who renewed the parish life of the Church and made the revivalist home missionaries redundant. The •WORLDS APART: THE

OLD

WORLD

5

return of the old religious orders to France—the Benedictines, Dominicans, and Jesuits—attracted more prestige and vocations than did newer groups such as the Oblates. Mazenod feared his Oblates might face extinction. An alternative field for his zeal offered itself in the expanding foreign mission field. From the beginning, Mazenod had included the possibility of foreign missions as part of the Oblate vocation. His ultramontane cast of thought was evident here as well, for he assured the pope his missionaries would not feel bound to confine themselves to areas under French sovereignty; consecrated to God, they had no other homeland but the Apostolic and Roman Catholic Church.10 The rising tide of ultramontanism was founded not only on attachment of clergy and people to the pope in Rome; it also asserted the Church's independence of sovereignties and powers in carrying out its mission. The very presence of French missionaries in areas under British sovereignty displayed and encouraged the growth of ultramontanism as a vision of the Church independent of nationalities. It is a strange paradox that the French Roman Catholic Church, a beleaguered garrison in a secular state, sent priests and nuns all over the world, many of them to areas under British Protestant control, where they formed an intransigent minority, brooking no opposition to their zeal. When the Oblates sought to spread the Gospel all over the world, they also sought to extend the institutional Roman Catholic Church. To become a Catholic was not only to accept the teachings of the Church, based on the Bible and tradition. It also involved incorporation into the Church through the sacraments and taking a place in its hierarchical structure. The new converts accepted not only the faith but the allegiance to the direction of the papacy that was so essential to the Church. Centralization of authority in Rome and standardization of religious practice to conform with papal decrees were emblematic of the nineteenth-century Church. This uniformity extended into the field of popular devotions as many regional devotions, given papal approval, were recommended for use throughout the world-wide Church. Aubert11 claims that the real triumph of ultramontanism lay in this substitution of an Italian form of piety for the more austere French devotion of the seventeenth century. The new piety, though perhaps more superficial, was wider in scope, more appealing to the general populace, and not limited to an intellectual and religious elite. It emphasized the importance of the community sacraments of the Church and added many new pious exercises for individual and communal practice. Confraternities and associations of special interest groups were formed 6

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to help their members achieve salvation. Thus, though still responsible for one's own salvation, the means to reach that end became more slanted toward communal prayers and practical works of community charity, such as the foreign missions. This new piety was similar to that already inculcated in the home missions. It could readily be adapted to foreign missions, especially to the community-based sharing cultures of Native North America, so reliant on spiritual contact to guide their actions. Its dependence on oral communication, too, was close to Native custom. Foreign missions came to the forefront of French Catholic thought soon after the Restoration. Much of this impetus derived from the founding, in 1822, of L'Oeuvre de la Propagation de la Foi, a lay society dedicated to the financial support of French foreign missionaries. This initiative began with Pauline Jaricot of Lyon, who had the idea of collecting a small sum weekly from devout men and women to aid the foreign missions. When the pope endorsed Propagation de la Foi in 1823, the faithful flocked to support the society. The first foreign branch of the Propagation formed in Belgium in 1825; by 1836 it had spread over most of Europe and to Quebec. Bishop Norbert Provencher of St. Boniface (Manitoba) was an early supporter of this association and recipient of aid for his missions "au bout du monde."12 He encouraged the formation of the Quebec branch to aid his mission endeavour more directly. The Propagation de la Foi served as the model and pioneer in nineteenth-century support of Roman Catholic missions. Other societies were organized to fill a more specialized role in mission activity. These too originated in France, spreading from there over the Catholic world. Bishop Forbin-Janson, in 1843, founded L'Oeuvre de la Sainte-Enfance to involve the children of France in the salvation of "pagan" children. They could donate their small sums weekly as their parents did to the Propagation de la Foi; eventually, this organization provided funding for the schools of the Athabasca-Mackenzie. In 1838, Zoe de Chesne began L'Oeuvre Apostolique to supply the vestments and other necessities for saying Mass in the missions. These societies provided much support to the Oblate missions in North America. Foreign missions were an integral part of the purpose of the Church in the world, to show the way of salvation to all humanity. The laity could share in that apostolic endeavour, supporting the missionaries through their financial contributions and their prayers. Papal blessings and indulgences for members of these mission societies further stimulated their zeal. Unlike the earlier seventeenth-century missions of France, supported priWORLDS APART: THE "OLD" WORLD

7

marily by a wealthy elite, nineteenth-century mission financing derived from the middle-class. The Councils of the Propagation, based in Paris and Lyon, decided on the disbursement of funds. The directors were businessmen and made every effort to assure themselves and their members of a good return on their investment. They did not claim control over the founding or direction of missions, but their allocation of funds had considerable impact on their extension. Missionary bishops competed vigorously for funding. They made out their requests each year, filling out detailed lists of baptisms and conversions set in relation to the numbers of "pagans" and "heretics" in their territories. They also showed the number of churches, chapels, and schools they had built, to illustrate the growth of the institutional church under their supervision. If they could show prospects of a good return on the investment, evidence that they would, eventually, be contributing to the resources of the Propagation to help other missions, the Council was more likely to allot funding to them. The Oblate bishops of northwestern Canada found it difficult to justify continued support of their sparselypopulated missions, especially when contrasted to the populous missions of the Far East. Along with a business style of management, the foreign missions of the nineteenth century also displayed a strong element of romanticism, praising martyrdom for the faith. Here again the Oblates of the Athabasca-Mackenzie were at a disadvantage. They had little chance of martyrdom, whereas some missionaries in China and Japan had already suffered that fate.13 Martyrs of the cold could not compete with those who were executed for their faith. The lands where we preach the Gospel are not populated like China and Japan, we cannot speak of numerous conversions, we may die of hunger and cold, but we do not have the opportunity to die as martyrs, our poor missions do not have even that poetic aspect ... the martyrdom which we suffer is a long martyrdom, a martyrdom which is altogether commonplace.l4 Faraud thought this mundane type of martyrdom, though unrecognized as such by the Church, was perhaps the worst to be faced:

8

•FROM THE

(JREAT "RIVER TO THE

"ENDS OF THE "EARTH

to die once or a thousand times under the homicidal sword of a persecutor appears to me less harsh than a slow, endless, martyrdom of the body, spirit and heart.15 Another component of romanticism in mission literature was the emphasis on the strange and curious customs of "the others." Letters from missionaries gave readers ofLesAnnales de la Propagation de la Foi, the journal of the association, an idea of the hardships of their life and of the cultures of the "savages" and "infidels" they evangelized. They stressed the piety and moral strength of the new Christians, often contrasted to the decadence of the old Christians of Europe. Converted Natives were held up as examples of what good Christians should be, uncorrupted by "civilized" European bad habits or immoral behaviour. "Civilization" in this context was antithetical to the Christianizing process of the Oblates. This romanticism was so strong that Lafleche expected to find the Indians as beautiful as the day, as loveable as angels, docile as children, fervent as nuns. 1 ^ The "noble savage" of this type of romantic mission literature, though often sought, proved as elusive in reality for the missionaries as the same concept had in political theory. Missionary letters, if emotive enough, drew financial support for the particular mission involved, and also attracted young men to join the missionary orders. Both aspects were vital to all congregations of missionaries, who competed actively to ensure their share. The entry of the Oblates into the field of foreign missions began with the arrival of four priests and two brothers in Montreal, in 1841, at the invitation of Bishop Ignace Bourget. Their purpose was to preach home missions, to revivify a diocese wracked by the Rebellion of 1837 and its aftermath. Although this was a continuation of the work they had pursued in France, Mazenod hoped his priests could use Montreal as a base to engage in missions to the Natives of North America as well. When Bishop Provencher of St. Boniface asked the Oblates to undertake Indian missions in his vast diocese in 1844, this seemed the realization of his dream. Provencher had been consecrated Bishop of Juliopolis in 1822 and was responsible for the part of the Quebec archdiocese stretching from Hudson Bay to the Rockies and north to the Arctic. Quebec supplied him with priests, though he never had more than four at any time. These priests were fully occupied with the fledgling parishes of Metis and French-Canadians

•WORLDS APART: THE "OLD"

WORLD

9

around the episcopal centre of St. Boniface. Few stayed long enough to learn the Native languages or become involved in missions to the Indians.17 When Rome detached St. Boniface from Quebec to make it a separate apostolic vicariate in 1844,18 Provencher's already inadequate supply of priests threatened to disappear altogether. His attempts to secure indigenous vocations at Red River had never succeeded. The funds he received from L'Oeuvre de la Propagation de la Foi, he was told, might not continue if he did not manage to initiate new missions. Those he had begun, to the Sauteux (Ojibwa)19 near Red River, were unpromising. Without priests or money or converts, his church would be little more than an outpost at St. Boniface. He knew that only a religious order could provide him with the priests and the financing he needed to extend his missions. Provencher travelled to Quebec in 1843 and on to France, returning by way of Quebec to St. Boniface in 1844. In France, he asked the Jesuits to renew the contacts they had made with the Natives of the west in the time of La Verendrye and New France. The Jesuits were unable to accept and Provencher returned home empty-handed. Only then did he write to Mazenod, to ask that the Oblates take over his missions. In this roundabout way began the Oblate missions in northwest North America and their encounter with the Dene. Although they did not know the Dene, nor any other Natives of North America, the Oblates foresaw no difficulty in preaching the Gospel to an unfamiliar people. They came to the Dene with their complex of Roman Catholic beliefs, devotion to Mary, and adhesion to the pope, and they expected to share their faith with the people of their new mission field. They also anticipated incorporating them into the familiar structure of the Church, as it had evolved over the centuries, in Europe and in the early foreign missions. The Roman Catholic Church had evangelized and absorbed many different peoples and the Oblates hoped to add all the Natives they met to the fold. They were equipped with methods of evangelization that had proved their worth in France and Quebec. They intended to use all their experience and their enormous zeal to win over the Dene to the Roman Catholic faith and Church.

IO

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"EARTH

2 W O R L D S APART: T H E "
-he Dene, meaning "the people," had lived from time immemorial in the Athabasca and Mackenzie regions, developing and adapting their own faith and culture over thousands of years. In calling themselves "the people," they followed common usage in Native North America. This expression did not signify a feeling of superiority over others or a denial of their humanity, but was a recognition of a community of like persons. The Dene referred to the French as Banlay, according to Petitot, which he translated as "for whom the earth is made."1 This sounds like a recognition of the superiority expressed by many Europeans, who were convinced of their dominion over nature and other humans. Yet, the highest compli-

22

ment the Dene could pay Petitot was to call him "un homme (un Dene)" or "un vrai sauvage."2 This reflects a degree of Dene self-assurance unrecognized by most Euro-Canadian observers. The Dene usually called outsiders enemies or strangers.3 Petitot drew a parallel between this custom and the Greek attribution of "barbarian" for those who did not speak Greek. An analogy could also be made with the designation of "heretics" for Christians outside the Roman Catholic Church, and "pagans," for those who had never been Christianized. It would seem that the Dene terms for outsiders were not so pejorative as the words used by Europeans to distinguish those who differed in race, language, or creed. The Dene had developed their culture over thousands of years in a land of spectacular beauty and of great plenty, although there were occasional periods of severe deprivation. The beauty of the Aurora Borealis and moonlight bright enough to travel by offset the intense cold and long periods of darkness in winter. Their brief hot summer of almost endless daylight was lush with flowers and berries, though swarms of mosquitoes and black flies tormented humans and animals. Each group of Dene identified itself as separate from the others, primarily based on the locality they inhabited; their languages also were distinct. Economies varied with their habitats and each group had some individuality in customs and dress. It is difficult to avoid blurring these distinctions when writing of the Dene and generalizing about their culture and beliefs, just as it is almost impossible to take account of all the differences between European peoples when summarizing their faith and culture. According to the region in which they lived, the people depended primarily on animals to supply them with food and clothing. The forest provided beaver, marten, mink, muskrat, fox, bear, rabbit, moose and woodlands caribou. On the Barrens, great herds of caribou furnished enormous quantities of meat, hides, and sinews, which the Dene made into dried meat and pemmican, clothing, tools, and grease. The caribou was as vital to Dene life and culture as was the buffalo to the Plains Indians. Fish abounded in most of the lakes and rivers at various times of the year. The people camped on the shore and dried the fish for winter provisions or froze them for themselves and their dogs. In summer the women picked berries and made syrup from the sap of birch trees. Salt River provided salt for the people of the Athabasca and Mackenzie throughout the nineteenth century. Dene life depended on the usage of great expanses of land and water, which in turn demanded an immense store of knowledge of the 12

TROM THE CJREAT -RIVER TO THE E N D S OF THE -EARTH

plants and animals of the region.4 The Dene held in high regard those individuals who were most competent in their use of the land. Although plentiful in most years, this varied subsistence, spread over large tracts of land, compelled the people to move frequently throughout the year to harvest these resources. Their environment ruled out the development of large-scale agriculture and subsequent urbanization. Small hunting groups formed the optimum size for most Dene activities, except for the communal hunt for the Barrens caribou. Large groups could not exploit the limited resources of any area at one time without exhausting them. These small hunting groups usually formed from related families and lived much of the year in isolation from each other. Gatherings for trade, at fishing camps and for the Barrens caribou hunt were occasions for more widespread contacts and socialization, for weddings and dances. Their way of life made it difficult for missionaries to have prolonged contact with them, for the missionaries could not join the small winter hunting bands. It is difficult to imagine a wider disparity of lives than those of the Dene in the north and the Oblates from the south of France. Aboriginal caribou-hunters probably were the closest to being an affluent society, since their major food and clothing resource was relatively stable and plentiful. Those who hunted in the boreal forest, dependent on individual animals rather than herds, had a more uncertain base. If a severe shortage occurred, however, they could expect to share in the food resources of their kin and neighbours. 5 They did not have to repay immediately, but had to be ready to share in their turn with those in need. This cycle of reciprocity was the Dene form of life insurance. People who gave freely earned prestige, while any who tried to hoard met with ridicule and rejection. This was so contrary to European notions of self-preservation and economic security that the missionaries could only marvel at it and even they could never accept this practice. The Dene had engaged in the fur trade economy for many years before the coming of the Oblates and its influence was reflected in their societies. Posts had been established in the Athabasca region as far back as 1778, when Peter Pond crossed into the Mackenzie drainage. Fierce competition between the Hudson's Bay Company and the North West Company followed, each vying for the adherence of Dene trappers and the acquisition of the rich furs of the north. After the merger of the two companies in 1821, the HBC maintained a monopoly for many years, and spread its posts to encompass all the peoples of the Athabasca and Mackenzie as trading partners.

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13

The Chipewyan, known to the French as Montagnais^ traded at lie a la Crosse, Fort Chipewyan on Lake Athabasca, and Fort Resolution on Great Slave Lake. In aboriginal times they inhabited the transitional forest between the Barrens and the full boreal forest, from Hudson Bay to the region between Great Slave Lake and Lake Athabasca, and into the Churchill River drainage. The Barren Ground caribou provided them with food, clothing, tents, and utensils. Their seasonal movements were dictated by those of the caribou—the forest in winter, the tundra in summer.'7 Those who continued this aboriginal way of life were the Caribou-Eater Chipewyan, who were able to preserve a great deal of independence from the fur trade because they did little trapping. They were provisioners, bringing in meat, skins, and grease to Fort Chipewyan or to Fort Churchill on Hudson Bay, in exchange for their few needs such as ammunition and tea. In the 18505, as supplies of buffalo pemmican declined, the HBC grew more dependent on the Caribou-Eaters. The Company opened posts at Fond du Lac, at the east end of Lake Athabasca, and at Lac du Brochet on Reindeer Lake, to secure caribou provisions to replace the buffalo. Other Chipewyan engaged in the fur trade, which was more profitable for them than being provisioners. To do so, they moved into the boreal forest between Great Slave Lake and Lake Athabasca, trading at Fort Chipewyan and Fort Resolution. They became much more dependent on the trade to supply their needs than were the Caribou-Eaters. A sub-group of Chipewyan, "those who dwell at the head of the lakes" occupied the boreal forest south of Lake Athabasca and east to the upper Churchill River,8 bordering on Cree territory. Many of them traded at lie a la Crosse and were the first to hear the Roman Catholic priests. The Slaveys, who lived just north of the Chipewyan, were never a single tribal unit. They occupied the region from Slave River to the west end of Great Slave Lake and down the Mackenzie as far as Fort Norman.9 They did not go to the Barrens, but hunted the woodland caribou and moose for subsistence and trapped fur animals for the trade.10 A.K. Isbister claimed that these people provided the richest returns to the HBC, though they lived in wretched conditions.11 This comment illustrated the difficulties faced by the Dene who had become dependent on the fur trade. Slaveys traded at Fort Resolution and at Fort Simpson, the headquarters of the HBC Mackenzie District, at Fort Liard and Fort Norman. The Gens de la Montague, who lived around the upper waters of the Liard River, also traded at Fort Liard after the HBC closed Fort Halkett.

14

T R O M THE §R E A T H I V E R TO THE ' E N D S OF THE " E A R T H

-"p Men and boys at Good Hope, c. 1892. [PAM, Hudson's Bay Company Archives, James McDougall Collection, 1987/13/205 (N8p8o)J

They were known to the traders as " mauvais monde" because of their warlike character.12 The Nahannies also traded at Liard and at Fort Nelson. The Yellowknives hunted caribou to the northeast of Great Slave Lake as far as the Coppermine River, and had long been provisioners to the HBC. Their leader, Akaitcho, assisted the Franklin expedition of 1819-1822 and the Back expedition of 1833—1835. In the early nineteenth century, they warred frequently with the Dogribs but after their defeat by the Dogribs in 1823, the Yellowknives declined in importance. In the mid-nineteenth century, the HBC, seeking more caribou provisions, opened an outpost for the Yellowknives at the east end of Great Slave Lake, where most of them then lived. In the early twentieth century the Yellowknives merged with the Chipewyan and Dogribs and disappeared as a distinct entity after the influenza epidemic of 1928.13 The Dogribs lived to the north of Great Slave Lake; their territories extended beyond Great Bear Lake and east to the Coppermine River. They traded mostly at Fort Rae, though a few also traded at Fort Resolution, and some at Fort Norman. They trapped furs but were predominately provisioners of caribou meat for these posts. This gave them a relative affluence and independence of the trade in comparison to those who depended on trapping furs. They formed one of the largest groups of Dene. The northern limits of the Dogribs overlapped the country of the Bear Lake people and the Hares. The Hares brought their furs to Fort Good

W O R L D S A P A R T : THE "-NEW" W O R L D

15

«-*•• Loucheux camp with skin boats at Fort Norman, 1921. [NAC, MTS Legal Surveys, PA 19488]

Hope or to Fort Norman, the centre also for the Bear Lake people, to whom they were closely-related. Their name derived from their dependence on hares for food and clothing, but they also hunted the Barrens caribou and trapped for the trade. Some Mountain Indians, from west of the Mackenzie River, also traded at these posts as did a few Mackenzie River Loucheux, and a mixed band of Hare-Loucheux. The Hares were divided into two groups, the Kmy-tchaze-Ottine (those who live in the shadow of willows) and the Ta-la-Ottine (those who live at the edge of the firs).1^ The former group lived near the Mackenzie River and Fort Good Hope. They relied on hares for much of their subsistence and fished extensively in summer, making dried fish to supplement their winter diet. They also hunted caribou and brought provisions to Good Hope.15 They became closely linked to the HBC and their young men were the mainstays of the Mackenzie boat brigades to Portage La Loche. The Ta-la-Ottine were primarily caribou-hunters who lived near Great Bear Lake and had less contact with the post and less involvement in the fur trade or its transport. They were most often referred to by the OMI as the gens du large. In the 19305 they numbered about thirty families, who hunted an enormous expanse of land to the northeast of Great Bear Lake.16 Essentially nomadic, they still made rare appearances at the fort and, even at that late date, had only a rudimentary knowledge of Catholicism. The ed'ottine (Mountain Indians), though they proved very devout, were not always able to get to Good Hope to have their children baptized. l6

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TARTH

The distance and difficulties of the journey made it impossible for their women and children to come with the men to the fort and mission. The Loucheux17 lived between the Hares and the Inuit. They derived their name, meaning Squint-Eyes, from their prevailing astigmatism, which Isbister blamed on their habit of looking admiringly at their nasal ornaments.18 They were noted for their argumentative dispositions, which led Alexander Mackenzie to call them "Quarrellers." The Loucheux traded at Good Hope or at Fort McPherson on the Peel River. They hunted caribou and large game for their subsistence but also depended heavily on fish. Although related, the Mackenzie River Loucheux tended to lead separate lives from the Loucheux of Peel River, who were more oriented to trade through the Yukon, with coastal Indian and Russian traders. Many Mackenzie River Loucheux intermarried with the Hares of Good Hope and formed a separate group known as the Batard Loucheux. These various groups of Dene exchanged their furs and provisions for imported merchandise—ammunition, tea, blankets, snares, nets, and so forth—at all the HBC posts, which were situated at strategic sites on the great lakes and rivers of the north. The importance of the provision trade to the survival of the HBC has usually been underestimated in comparison to the attention paid the trade in furs. Without the food brought in by the Dene, the men at the posts could not have survived nor carried on the vital transportation network. The exchange of commodities for furs demanded an extensive and wellorganized transport system, to bring goods into the north and to send the furs out to the London market via York Factory on Hudson Bay. This transport system was as vital to the sustenance of the missions as it was to the trade. The Company hired Metis and Dene men as seasonal wage-labourers for the arduous, often dangerous, transport of goods in heavy York boats over lakes and rivers, and across portages. At Portage La Loche they met the Red River boat brigades and exchanged their furs for the "outfit" or supplies ordered for the coming year's trade. They also traded news and gossip, so effectively that they rivalled modern methods of communication. Unhappily, this interchange and their route through all the posts made the boat brigades prime carriers of the epidemic diseases which decimated the Dene. The three very large lakes, Athabasca, Great Slave, and Great Bear, ultimately drain through the Mackenzie River into the Arctic.19 The Dene recognized the majesty of this river by naming it Dehcho, the Great River, just as the Mississippi was known as the Great River to its people.20 -WORLDS A P A R T : THE "-NEW" W O R L D

17

Flowing past the Mackenzie and Richardson mountain ranges to the west, with the Franklin range on the east, the river extends innumerable beautiful views to the traveller. Its volume increases as many small and large tributaries enter. The Liard River brings its cargo of drift logs and mountain silt to join the Mackenzie at Fort Simpson. At Fort Norman the clear waters of the Bear River pour from Great Bear Lake, the junction of clear and muddy waters very clear when seen from the air. This volume of water is narrowed through the Ramparts of the Mackenzie and joined by the Hare River. Northwards still it flows, merging with Arctic Red River, until it surges into the many channels which form the Mackenzie Delta and reaches the Arctic Ocean. The Dene lived in the east-west valleys and slopes that converged on the Mackenzie River21 and used all the waterways which link the great lakes to the Great River. Each group made their boats from local resources. The Mountain Indians used mooseskin, while the Slaveys and Hares made canoes and rafts from the bark of pines or birches. In winter, dogs pulled sleds and the people walked long distances on snowshoes. The seasons of ice breakup and ice formation were the most difficult in which to travel, as both land and water were unusable. Gatherings at posts and missions were necessarily timed to fit into the best seasons for travel. Even then, lengthy stays were only possible when there was enough fish at the posts to sustain everyone. Men were the hunters who provided meat for the group. A good hunter proved that he had a right relationship with animals and spirits and gained a following because of his powers. The first Oblates soon became aware that the Dene looked down on them for depending on others for their subsistence.22 When they did learn to hunt, they did so as a secular activity; they could never adopt the Dene way of spirituality in hunting. Dene women carried the meat to camp, cooked it, dressed the skins and made the warm clothing that enabled the people to survive the bitter cold of winter. They made these products more beautiful by skilled adornment with quills and beads. This was another aspect of Dene hunting life which the celibate Oblates could not share. Children learned from their parents and the community their respective roles in life, without corporal punishment. Elders instructed them in stories and by example, not by giving orders and punishments. Paul Wright, explaining how the elders told stories of the past to serve as a guide to the people, said it was "as if the elders shared the future with the young, as if they were already there."23 This perception reflects the continuity of Dene l8

T R O M THE C j R E A T 1UVER TO THE 'ENDS OF THE " E A R T H

people and history. The elders, in contributing their stories of the past, simultaneously shared the future of those who would come after them, who would continue to tell these stories and give moral guidance. Julie Cruikshank found a very similar attitude among the Yukon women elders whom she interviewed. They revealed the truth about their own lives in the stories they told, while also perpetuating the history and knowledge of their people. They expected others to learn from their stories according to the capacity and understanding of the hearer.2^ Educated in the rich oral tradition and the expertise developed over centuries of life in the north, each individual contributed to the continuation of Dene culture and history. This did not bind Dene individuals to a changeless way of doing things. Each person was trusted to use his or her individual judgment in a responsible way, with due regard for all the other beings of the world—humans, animals, or spirits. This trust in individual judgment, added to the fact that the Dene lived in small hunting groups for most of the year, made their leadership quite different from that of Europeans. Dene leaders assumed their authority from a common recognition of their special skills and their ability to work with other Dene and with the spirits; they served as leaders only while that acceptance (by both spirits and followers) continued. They did not command or enforce obedience as did leaders in European societies,25 just as they did not forcibly discipline their children. Dene leadership was especially alien to the Oblates, accustomed as they were to the demands of obedience to religious superiors and to the extremely hierarchical organization of the Roman Catholic Church. The religion of the Dene so permeated their personality, society, and economy that it should not be considered as a separate category. There were no religious skeptics among the Dene.26 Religion was an integral part of society, taught by observation and example as were other aspects of culture. Theirs was a cultural religion, not intended for outsiders, and lacking the proselytizing zeal of Christianity. The concept of heresy that so dominated missionary teaching and excluded all other religious doctrine was alien to them. Their attitude was quite the reverse, and they were ready to incorporate new and effective religious beliefs and customs without considering it necessary to abandon the old. They expressed their religious beliefs in myths and sacred traditions preserved in oral retelling. We tend to think of myths as stories springing from the creative mind of the author, contrasted with the "reality" of our documentary history.27 But myths are also "real," expressing a perception of the truth of origins (creation) and the proper way to behave.28 Myths served a W O R L D S A P A R T : THE ""NEW" W O R L D

19

purpose for the Dene which was not unlike that of the Bible for Europeans. However, their truths, being dependent entirely on interpersonal contact, could be lost forever if the teller or the hearer died. The epidemics which devastated the Dene in the nineteenth century destroyed much traditional knowledge. Petitot, like so many other European observers, believed that Dene myths were vestiges of God's revelation given to them ages before, for he was convinced they were the descendants of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel.29 He saw similarities in Dene myths to Bible stories of the Flood, of Noah and the Ark, of giants, the Tower of Babel and the subsequent confusion of languages.30 Such beliefs were prevalent at the time among Europeans, who could not conceive of the long centuries of separate development of peoples in the Americas unless they could be linked in some way to the traditions of Europe and the Bible. Petitot's writings on the Dene and their traditions and beliefs are one of the major sources of contemporary knowledge about them. His enthusiasm for conversion, however, added to his conviction that the Jewish foundation he saw in Dene life would facilitate their acceptance of Catholicism, led him to extremes. Other Oblates rejected many of his notions about the Jewish traits of the Dene. Though his statements are often valuable, they should be taken cautiously and interpreted in the light of later scholarship. The history of the people was expressed in sacred traditions, passed down through countless generations by gifted storytellers.31 Often they told of culture heroes who had contributed significantly to the well-being of their society. These stories emphasized the moral behaviour required of the people and exerted pressure to conform to these standards.32 The elders enforced rules of social behaviour, principally regarding marriage and sharing, by their example and teaching. This practice continued into the twentieth century. Paul Wright remembered the lengthy instructions before marriage given by all the elders and the need to receive permission from both sets of parents before the marriage could take place.33 The elders could easily integrate Catholic teaching on marriage and morality into their traditional teachings. The Roman Catholic Church also interpreted the truths of the Bible with the aid of traditions developed over the centuries; the fact that these were in written form probably gave less flexibility to their interpretation than was possible in an oral tradition. The Church also codified many traditions in doctrinal statements that precluded further alterations and demanded behaviour in conformity with that doctrine. 2.O

TROM THE (JREAT H I V E R TO THE "ENDS OF THE T A R T H

Although conservative in maintaining the sacred authority of their past traditions, the Dene were also open to new religious experiences which might come to an individual. "The balance between faithfulness to tradition and openness to new experience is what constitutes the religious life."34 Just as their concept of leadership made room for individual judgment, so too did they accept new and improved ways of contact with the spirits. They were willing to incorporate these new ways and beliefs into their lives, without finding it necessary to abandon their old ways. Adherence to Dene beliefs was a matter of individual choice and social pressure, not of rules and punishments. Conformity to the Roman Catholic faith, on the other hand, was rigidly enforced on its adherents. Variations were always regarded as heresy, calling for excommunication or separation from the Church. In many ways, the Dene and Roman Catholic faiths appeared diametrically opposed. The Dene believed that their welfare depended on the maintenance of the proper relationship among humans, animals, plants, and spirits—all the beings which shared one world. European divisions into natural and supernatural, the secular and the religious, were incomprehensible to the Dene. Domination of one species by another was equally inconceivable. Humans were not the "lords of creation" but only one among many beings sharing the earth.35 Interaction among these beings was on a personal level; consequently, it was always shifting and changing. Rules of behaviour were intended to assist in interpersonal relations and could not be codified in impersonal and immutable laws. The Dene believed that true understanding could only be achieved through direct contact with the spirits; separation from that spiritual guidance would lead to chaos. Because the spirits lived in the world, alongside humans, Dene did not restrict contact between human and spirit to special times or places. Nor did they depend on priests ordained to a hierarchical position to carry out their religious observances. Their spiritual leaders derived authority from their individual contact with the spirits, recognized by their community, and maintained only by constant reaffirmation in practical results. Dreams were the medium of contact between spirits and humans. Most secondary sources claim that this dream contact could only be achieved through fasting, but Paul Wright said this was not the custom of his people. When the community recognized young people as having possible medicine-power, they trained them for that purpose in the bush. After their training they could see an animal which acted like a person, and learned •WORLDS A P A R T : THE

""NEW" W O R L D

2,1

from that animal spirit.36 The spirits revealed things which gave the dreamer an understanding beyond human knowledge. Afterwards he possessed inkonze or he "knew something." This gift of knowledge from his guardian-spirit was also power, symbolized in the dreamer's medicine-bundle. With that power went responsibility, including the practice of certain taboos. The power giVen in this way could be used for good or evil. Once claimed, the holder could not refuse to use his inkonze, though he could lose it by misuse. Dene ideas of knowledge and power were very different from those of Europeans; no one could achieve inkonze thro ugh hard work and the study of books. The person with inkonze could make medicine to cure the sick, predict where game animals would be found, or conjure away evil spirits. Inkonze was fundamental to all Dene life because the cooperation of the spirits was essential to obtain subsistence, good health, and security from harmful medicine. By relying on the assistance of the spirits not only in the search for food, but also in dealing with sickness and sorcery, the Dene included the harmful aspects of life within their spiritual understanding. In this way, they could deal meaningfully with threats from within or outside their own culture, while preserving the integrity of their faith and the continuity of their society.37 Unlike Catholic priests, who celebrated one God in rituals common to all their society, the maker of inkonze mediated for his people with his personal spirit-guide.38 His authority derived from his individual experience of spiritual contact, not from a position achieved through hierarchical and social ordination.39 Variations in ways of spiritual leadership corresponded to the different notions of societal leadership which distinguished Dene from European. Often the dreamer received a special song to convey his revelation. People with strong medicine powers received a drum song, which came from the Creator. These drum songs were intended "for praying, healing, seeing the future, for thanksgiving, and for preaching and teaching. "4° This conjunction of magic and song may explain why the Oblates often called these persons jongleurs, a term especially prominent in Provence, with allusion to medieval troubadours and magicians. Through these outward signs, others could tell that the person had been gifted with inkonze.^ Oblate emphasis on hymns lent credence to the Dene opinion that the priests acted in ways similar to their own makers of medicine. For the Oblates, God spoke to humans through Scripture, the written word, as interpreted by the Church. Although they believed in the miracles 22

TROM

THE QREAT "RIVER TO THE T=NDS OF THE TARTH

and apparitions that were such a dominant feature of contemporary France, they were suspicious of those Dene who claimed to have direct contact with God. Dene faith was rooted in personal communication with the spirits. At first, the Dene recounted their dreams to the priests, as they were used to doing to their people, but soon realized their mistake. Chief Patrice Kopa at Good Hope explained to his brother-in-law, Little Bird, who was an old Hare maker of medicine that, once baptized, he should no longer speak of dreams, visions, and revelations for "the French priests believe in nothing and make fun of all these things."42 His view of the irreligiousness of the priests is a mirror-image of the notion held by many Oblates and other Europeans that the Dene had no real religion before Christianity. Community recognition was fundamental to the maker of inkonze; much of that support came from his kin, who could advance his case throughout the community.43 In the Mackenzie District, the Metis and the Scots servants of the Company posts also had considerable faith in Dene medicines.44 To ensure effective medicine, it was essential that the maker be paid for his services. This fee was regarded not so much as payment for service, but as a sign of the reciprocal relationship established between the patient and the singer or medicine-maker.4^ The Oblates, however, regarded this as payment extorted from the credulous; they gave their own medicines freely, hoping to distinguish themselves from the Dene medicine-makers. Sometimes the dreamer encouraged the community to gather in song and dance to cement cooperation between animals and people.46 Late in the nineteenth century, Attiche, a Mountain Indian, gave a feast, and burnt a whole deer as sacrifice, amid chanting, dancing, and drums. This was designed to encourage his guiding spirit to send many more deer and caribou for his people47 at a time when the hunt frequently failed, resulting in starvation and death. Such a solemn sacrifice, though extremely rare by that time, displayed the continued Dene conviction, despite some years of missions, that they needed the cooperation of their traditional spirits to obtain well-being through hunting. This was one aspect of Dene traditional faith for which the Catholicism preached by the Oblates could offer no replacement. Though skills and knowledge of the environment were essential to a competent hunter, he could only be successful through his religious experience of contact with the animal guardian spirit. Animals gave themselves only to people with whom they had made contact in dreams, and who were generous and cooperative with one another. If the hunt failed, the Dene •WORLDS A P A R T : THE "'NEW" W O R L D

23

blamed it on their own misunderstanding, disharmony, or a lack of generosity. The observance of hunting taboos and the proper treatment of the animal that gave itself so the Dene could survive were essential. Women could not eat some portions, such as the muzzle of the caribou, and the Dene insisted that the Oblates also observe this stricture. If the individual animal were not treated with respect, its spirit Master would refuse to send any more of that species to be killed. The entry of white hunters and scientists into the north brought new problems of respect for animals. In 1893, the Dogrib Bear Lake chief, Naohmby, hesitated about allowing the American naturalist, Frank Russell, to accompany his band to their hunting grounds. He feared that, if Russell sent caribou skins to museums in the United States, all the caribou would migrate to join them.^8 When the priests joined in hunting, they sometimes failed to keep to the rules, displaying the great gulf that separated them from the Dene in this respect. In the fall of 1899 Breynat shot a caribou near Fond du Lac, but killed it by striking its head with the butt of his gun. The Caribou-Eaters always taught their children never to touch a caribou with a piece of wood as they would strike a dog. Such an insult would cause the spirit of the caribou to tell the species not to come to them any more. Breynat insisted that this was only a superstition, that God had created caribou as their food, and it did not matter what they used to kill it. The chief and councillor referred the matter to Bishop Grouard, who agreed with Breynat. Not willing to accept this as a blanket endorsement, their consensus was that God sent caribou for them, despite Breynat s action, but that Breynat would be unable to kill any more caribou.49 Although the presence of white traders in their territory had had little or no effect on Dene religious beliefs, during the long years of contact they had irrevocably altered much of their society before they met the Oblates. They had incorporated the demands of the fur trade and its transportation into their lives and economy, and suffered through many devastating epidemics of European diseases. Although the changes to their aboriginal way of life may have been slow,50 they were very deep. Their lives still depended primarily on the hunt for food and clothing, but some had moved into the boreal forest to trap fur animals for trade, disrupting their aboriginal round. Others served as boatmen on the summer brigades, again altering their original routine. Still others became provisioners, bringing in meat and grease to the posts to exchange for ammunition, tea, tobacco, and so

24

T R O M THE CJREAT H I V E R TO THE 'ENDS OF THE T A R T H

forth; the provisioners were the least-integrated into the trading network, and could maintain much of their aboriginal independence. As they became enmeshed in the fur trade economy, the Dene also continued to hunt for their food and much of their clothing. They augmented their aboriginal interdependence with neighbours by a new relationship with the traders. In return for furs, food, and wage-labour, the Dene received guns and ammunition, kettles, snares, and traps, also tea, sugar, blankets, and beads. In times of hardship they could expect to receive help from their new neighbours at the posts, just as in their aboriginal life they could turn to those nearest to them for assistance and the sharing of resources. Mutual reciprocity reigned for a time since, to maintain their interior posts, the HBC employees depended on food supplied by the Dene. Stationed at fixed posts, they could not move in a seasonal round to exploit various resources as the Dene did, nor could they import or grow sufficient quantities of food for themselves. The Company also needed a supply of food for the boatmen, which they stored at the posts. With these supplies and some imported foods, the traders could maintain themselves and help the Natives in time of need.51 When their missions began the Oblates, like the traders, depended on the Dene and Metis to provide food for them, to labour at the missions, and to guide them in their travels. They paid for this from their small stock of trading goods and gave assistance in time of need. The initial stage of their missions to the Dene was an era of interdependence, very similar to that of the early fur trade. Through many years of contact with the traders, the Dene thought-system or world-view may have changed, although this is much more difficult to measure than alterations in their economy. Calvin Martin probably overstated the effects of European diseases on the hunting actions and beliefs of the Natives.52 Nevertheless, it is likely that the adoption of hunting for the trade affected aboriginal beliefs based on hunting for survival; for example, dependence on the boat brigades led to the use of medicine to determine the time of arrival of the boats when they were running late.53 Even so, the religion of the Dene still focused on well-being, attained by successful hunts, the curing of diseases, and the overcoming of "bad medicine," all achieved through the intercession of a person gifted with inkonze. Their faith and culture, an integrated whole, governed their lives. They placed the highest priority on spiritual guidance and reciprocity with other humans and animals.

W O R L D S A P A R T : T H E "TSIEW" W O R L D

25

The Dene had probably acquired some knowledge of Christianity from the traders, and perhaps had heard stories of "blackrobes" from the voyageurs. Their knowledge of Christianity, however, had little impact on their lives. Yet their preoccupation with spiritual contact and revelations predisposed them to take a very great interest in new spiritual leaders, such as the Oblates, who evidenced great power in their preaching, rituals, sacraments, and medical care. They could not foresee that these leaders would demand deep-seated changes to their faith,which would prove to be more radical than the economic changes they had made in response to the traders. The OMI, for their part, dismissed Dene medicine for hunting and curing as superstition, and "bad medicine" as sorcery. They firmly believed that the Dene could achieve salvation, which they conceived of as the only true well-being, exclusively through their incorporation into the Roman Catholic Church. They sought to instil in the Dene the creed they lived by, and to substitute their assistance in times of disease and starvation for that of the Dene makers of medicine. They struggled to overcome the reluctance of the Dene to forsake their aboriginal beliefs, which gave them hope and guidance, and to substitute the help and hope of Roman Catholicism.

2,6

T R O M THE

CJ R E A T H . I V E R T O T H E

" E N D S OF THE

"EARTH

3 TOLICY AND TRAGMATISM! THE OBLATES AND THE H U D S O N ' S
the Oblates began their missions to convert the Dene, they found themselves forced to come to terms with the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), the civil authority in the north until 1870. The Athabasca and Mackenzie Districts, whose waters flowed into the Arctic, were not included within the territory of Rupert's Land granted by royal charter to the Company in 1670. These Districts, however, were contained within the region of the Licence to Trade, a monopoly granted to the HBC by the British Government in 1821 and renewed in 1838 for a further twenty-one 7

District of Athabasca, 1883, by Emile Petitot. fNACfi,3/i, National Map Collection] 28

TROM THE QREAT -RIVER TO THE -ENDS OF THE "EARTH

BRITISH NORTH AMERICA NORTH-WIST TEBRm>HY

•POLICY AND P R A G M A T I S M

29

years. Although the HBC had no claim to sovereignty in these licensed territories, it exercised a great deal of authority over all non-Native persons moving within its borders, among whom, of course, were the Oblates. The priests realized that the HBC posts and boat brigades were essential to the success, even to the survival, of their missions. The HBC posts, where the Dene gathered in large numbers to trade, provided an obvious place for the Oblates to make contact with all the various groups. The priests could not hope to contact very many Dene throughout the winter, while the Dene lived in widely-separated and mobile camps. Before 1840 the Company had provided some financial support for Bishop Provencher at St. Boniface because its officers wanted him to use his influence with the Metis to persuade them to be more amenable to Company rules and regulations. Though some thought had been given to the possibility of evangelizing the Indians, the HBC was uneasy about the effect Indian missions would have on its trade. After protracted negotiations, the HBC agreed with Provencher that two Canadian priests, Norbert Blanchet and Modeste Demers, should be sent to establish a mission in their Oregon territories in 1838. This was, however, the last such commit-' ment they were willing to make. They would give no assistance in future to any missions outside the Red River Colony, unless expressly approved by the Company.1 Yet, in 1839, the HBC invited the British Wesleyans to undertake missions at Norway House (Manitoba) and at Fort des Prairies (Edmonton), well outside the confines of the colony. The Company hoped the Wesleyans would prevent large numbers of northern Indians from moving to Red River. Some Cree and Ojibwa had already gone there, seeking missionary teaching, which was only available at Red River. HBC Governor George Simpson feared that trade losses and unrest in the colony would result if more followed their example. The Wesleyans promised not to encourage the Indians to live in agricultural settlements, as the Anglicans did, but to bring Christianity to them in the northern posts. The arrival of the Wesleyans impelled Provencher to expand his Roman Catholic missions. He asked Simpson for a passage for one of his priests, Jean-Baptiste Thibault, to begin a mission at Fort des Prairies in 1840. The Cree of that area, he said, wanted to hear a priest before deciding to commit themselves to the Wesleyan mission. Simpson rejected this prospective Roman Catholic opposition to the Wesleyans he supported. He refused to give Thibault passage on the HBC boats, saying that it was not expedient

3O

TROM THE Q R E A T -RIVER TO THE -ENDS OF THE T A R T H

for the Company to encourage Roman Catholic missions beyond the Red River Settlement.2 Chief Factor Donald Ross at Norway House was more open about his and the Governor's motives: I agree with you perfectly in regard to the necessity of checking the progress of the Catholics by the extension of Protestant Missions for however smooth or accommodating these people may seem whilst establishing themselves amongst us, or however good or worthy many of them individually certainly are, they are most rigidly ruled and guided by a power foreign in its nature, and almost invisible in its proceedings.3 Provencher, refusing to be bound either by HBC expediency or antiCatholicism, sent Thibault across the plains in 1842 and again in 1843—1844 at his own expense. He decided to make this a permanent mission in 1844; Thibault chose a site known as Lac du Diable, which he renamed Lac Ste. Anne. By that time a new Anglican mission had begun at Le Pas, far north of the Red River Settlement. As well, Simpson's original enthusiasm for the Wesleyans faded when the Rev. James Evans at Norway House became embroiled in controversy. When Provencher requested transportation for Thibault in 1844,tne governor was willing to accede, recognizing that the HBC could no longer prevent some increase in Roman Catholic missions. That expansion became more imminent when Provencher invited the Oblates to undertake the Indian missions of his vast diocese, convinced that only a religious order could provide the numbers and continuity of clergy he so desperately needed to extend his church. He made this invitation despite the very strong opposition Simpson had expressed to any foreign priests coming into HBC territories. The Company feared that missions would interfere with its trading Indians, prove very expensive to the Company, and undoubtedly lead to denominational rivalry, which would only confuse the Natives. Both expense and rivalry would detract from profits and could cause great personal difficulties in isolated posts. Another pervasive (and well-grounded) fear among the men of the HBC was that the missions would open the way to freetraders, for "our experience teaches us that missions and illicit traffic advance together. "^ The Governor and Company were particularly alarmed at the prospect of missions in the Mackenzie District, where the scarcity of resources made

•POLICY AND T R A G M A T I S M

3!

it perilous to have large gatherings for prolonged periods of time. Missionaries of all denominations balanced these HBC convictions against the fact that the Dene were very anxious to receive the Christian message. Further incentives for the missionaries were that the Dene were more peaceable than the Plains tribes, had been more isolated from European contact than the Sauteux and Cree near Red River, and that the HBC forbade the use of liquor as an article of trade in the Athabasca or Mackenzie Districts. These factors encouraged all denominations, Wesleyans, Roman Catholics, and Anglicans, to hope for the successful evangelization of the Dene, and to strive to be first into the area. John H. Lefroy, a meteorologist who spent the winter of 1843—1844 at Fort Chipewyan and visited other posts along the Mackenzie, hoped the Anglicans would forestall the Roman Catholics in this promising mission field. 5 Though the CMS too hoped that its missionaries would reach the Dene first,6 it did not have the necessary personnel. James Evans, Superintendent of Wesleyan Missions, visited lie a la Crosse and Fort Chipewyan in 1842 and planned to return in i844-7 He asked Simpson's permission in 1843 to establish missions at Peace River, Athabasca, and lie a la Crosse. This sedentary type of mission, however, which was contrary to the original commitment by the Wesleyans, was anathema to Simpson. He feared widespread starvation if the Mackenzie Dene gathered in large numbers to listen to the missionaries instead of securing their provisions for the winter. He insisted that an itinerant ministry was the only possibility in that country for many years to come.8 If any missionary, Protestant or Catholic, went into the Mackenzie, he would go on his own; "no facilities are to be accorded for carrying out his views."9 Evans set out, without HBC approval, to lie a la Crosse in 1844, but accidentally shot and killed his Chipewyan interpreter Thomas Hassall. This forced him to turn back to Norway House. Chief Factor Roderick McKenzie at lie a la Crosse then invited the Catholic priest, Thibault, to visit his post in 1845. McKenzie hoped to keep his Chipewyan and Cree hunters attached to lie a la Crosse, away from the attractions of the Plains life. He knew that they were anxious to learn more about Christianity and were more likely to remain trading at his post if he presented them with the added attraction of a missionary. When reprimanded for his action, McKenzie justified himself by saying that "Necessity (which has no law) obliged me to ask for him, for every Indian at lie a la Crosse would have been in the Plains, had he not come."10 32

TROM THE (JREAT TIIVER TO THE "ENDS OF THE "EARTH

McKenzie's half-hearted invitation to Thibault, given without the sanction of the HBC, proved decisive for the future of the Oblate missions. Though he could not authorize the establishment of a mission, his invitation to visit lie a la Crosse resulted in Thibault's glowing report of Chipewyan eagerness to receive Christian teaching. This convinced Provencher to send Tache and Lafleche to found a mission at lie a la Crosse in 1846. Although he had arranged for canoes and men to transport them, he was delighted when Governor Simpson offered free transport for the missionaries in the Company boats. Simpson also gave lodging to the two priests until they could construct their own house. He promised that the HBC servants would help them build a mission house, provided the bishop paid for their food and wages. Simpson's assistance gave the priests a considerable edge in their efforts to convert the northern Natives. The HBC found it impossible to deny approval of Roman Catholic missions when it had approved those of the CMS and Wesleyans. It came under increasing pressure in England from the powerful Aborigines Protection Society to devote more of its efforts to spreading Christianity and Western civilization to the Natives, a pressure spurred on by attacks made on the Company's policy by Alexander Kennedy Isbister. Real ambivalence continued within the Company, though it paid at least lipservice to the benefits of Christianity and civilization, and recommended hiring Christian Indians in preference to others.11 Each denomination was suspicious of HBC favouritism to the others, feelings which were encouraged by the inconsistencies of HBC policy. Provencher complained, when Simpson turned down his first request for transport for Thibault to the west, that the Company was opposed to Catholic missions and wanted only English Protestant ones.12 The Governor was apprehensive about the activities of American citizens in Oregon and those of the Belgian Jesuit, Father De Smets, which might detract from HBC claims to the area. Furthermore, he feared a possible alliance between the Red River Metis and traders south of the forty-ninth parallel that would endanger HBC trade and claims in the settlement. His suspicions were heightened when Belcourt, one of Provencher's diocesan priests, helped frame a petition from the Red River Metis protesting against HBC restrictions on trade and land ownership. Sent to the Aborigines Protection Society in England and forwarded to the Colonial Office, it caused publicity harmful to the Company.13 Belcourt's action also aroused considerable animosity against the Roman Catholics among the HBC personnel in Rupert's Land.14 These various misgivings triggered Simpson's

•POLICY AND T R A G M A T 1 S M

33

suspicions of French and Catholic involvement in possible losses of land to the expansionist United States. Despite the assistance he had given to the founding of the mission at lie a la Crosse in 1846, Simpson had not altered his reluctance to encourage Roman Catholic expansion. The British Wesleyans had almost withdrawn from the field but in 1849 the new Anglican Bishop of Rupert's Land, David Anderson, planned to extend his missions. Consequently, the Company could pose as the upholder of British Protestantism, sure that public opinion would support it in "preferring protestants to Roman Catholic missionaries as religious instructors to the native population." ^ The involvement of the Oblate priest, Fran£ois-Xavier Bermond, on behalf of the Metis against the Company in the 18505, exacerbated Simpson's fears and xenophobia. He attributed Bermond's opinion that the HBC were "tyrannical usurpers of the rights of the Metis," to his "being a foreigner and ignorant probably of English laws and history."16 These political activities may have contributed to Bermond's recall to France in 1856, though the primary motive was his opposition to Tache. Both the Wesleyans and the Anglicans complained that the Company favoured the Roman Catholics. Evans asserted this was because they did not interfere with hunting by the Indians, whereas the Protestant clergy tended to collect them in villages.17 Since the latter system was detrimental to trade, the HBC could hardly be expected to endorse it. From another economic standpoint, the transport and living costs of celibate Roman Catholic clergy were much less demanding than were those of the families of other denominations. Where the Protestants saw commercial reasons behind the pro-Catholic bias they perceived, the Catholics blamed any opposition to their missions on political, nationalist, or religious reasons (usually all combined against French Roman Catholicism as represented by the Oblates). Both viewpoints had considerable validity. The wavering policy of the HBC, with its seesaw balancing of economic versus religious and national interests, was bound to be confusing. When Eden Colvile was Associate Governor, stationed at Red River, he proved very helpful to the Catholic missions in the Athabasca and Mackenzie. His wife was a Roman Catholic, and Provencher hoped this would influence his cooperation. A more important influence on his thinking, however, was the unrest at Red River, which he blamed on the Anglican clergy.18 In his rapid tour of the Northwest in 1849—1850, Colvile had gained some familiarity with the Athabasca people and the Oblates. He 34

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was impressed by the relative cheapness of the Roman Catholic missions, and thought the priests adjusted to the needs of the country much better than did the Anglicans. Though Simpson reminded him of the prevalent prejudice against Catholics, Colvile insisted they were the only viable missionaries for the north. I suppose everyone, whatever may be their opinion of the Roman Catholic Church, will admit that it is better for people to be Roman Catholic, than not to be Christian at all.19 No consistent policy on missions was ever adopted by the Company while it controlled Rupert's Land and the Li censed Territories. Its policy could only be described as one of pragmatism. It reacted to the pressure of public opinion by anger when opposition was instigated by one church, and was more likely then to favour another denomination. It responded to lobbying by the leaders of the various churches, and to the economics of the fur trade and transport business. Fluctuations in policy and in attitude toward missions combined to favour the Oblates some of the time and hamper their missions at others, but the HBC could never completely control or prevent the extension of their missions to the Dene. Inclined to monopoly action, it attempted to ensure that the denominations would not compete with each other for the souls of the Indians, but would keep to separate districts.20 Throughout the 18505, however, both Anglicans and Roman Catholics continued to expand their missions, paying little heed to HBC attempts to restrict them. The impartiality advocated by the Company and the segregation of one branch of Christianity from the other had little weight with missionaries convinced of the truth of their cause, equally assured of the errors of the opposition, and impelled by the overriding necessity to convert the Dene to their own branch of Christian faith. This independence of action was shown in the entry of the Oblates into the Athabasca. The Mackenzie Dene who encountered Thibault at Portage La Loche in 1845 pleaded with him to preach the Good News to them, just as he had done to the Chipewyan at lie a la Crosse: We are pitiable, for we do not know God; but we wish to know Him and we would also like to go, when we die, to the beautiful country where God puts those who lead a good life. Come and see us; be charitable to us.21 - P O L I C Y AND

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Mgr. Tache, 1851, newly-consecrated Bishop ofArath. [PAM N^6 ]

Such an appeal was impossible for a missionary to resist. Thibault attempted, unsuccessfully, to reach the Mackenzie in May iS^6.22 Tache, following up on Thibault's contacts and the request made by the Dene for a priest, arrived at Fort Chipewyan on 2 September 1847. He made the trip on his own but was warmly welcomed by Francis Ermatinger, in charge of the post. The HBC traders had warned Tache that the Chipewyan at this fort were much more aggressive than the gentle people of lie a la Crosse and probably impervious to the Gospel. Perhaps they hoped to warn him off and prevent the extension of missions. Their caution was contradicted by the fact that many Dene spent the summer of 1847 near Fort Chipewyan in order to see the priest. According to Tache, 36

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they hoped that knowledge of the Gospel would bring them happiness.23 This is probably a good interpretation of the initial eagerness to listen to the priests which characterized the Chipewyan. The new faith, as they understood it, was not regarded as an imposition, but welcomed as a new way to achieve well-being. Although most had never seen a priest, they already knew their prayers in French through their contact with Thibault at Portage La Loche; the people whom he instructed had taught the prayers to their relatives. The Metis, some of whom had received a little religious instruction at Red River, proved the most ready to accept his teachings. Tache already looked forward to extending this mission to reach the Beavers on Peace River and the many peoples of Great Slave Lake and the Great River (Mackenzie). When Tache returned to Fort Chipewyan on 20 September 1848, many Natives had gathered to meet him. Some had travelled great distances, even coming from Great Slave Lake. Many Caribou-Eaters, contrary to their usual habits, spent the summer near the fort expressly to see the priest. Others of this tribe had gone to Reindeer Lake to see Tache in the spring. Their actions illustrate the enormous magnetism of the priests. These Indians had up to then resisted all HBC efforts to integrate them more fully into the fur trade and attach them more firmly to its posts. Such changes in customs showed the accuracy of Roderick McKenzie's rationale for his original invitation to Thibault, and the attraction which new religious teaching and spiritual power posed for the Dene. Henri Faraud took over this mission in 1849, when Tache's duties in charge of lie a la Crosse prevented him from making long trips. Faraud spent most of the year 1849—1850 at Fort Chipewyan, where he lived at the post. At the time, Chief Trader James Anderson thought him "an amiable, unobtrusive man"2^ —an opinion he would soon radically alter! When he found out that the priest hoped to build a permanent mission at Fort Chipewyan, Anderson protested that this would be detrimental to HBC interests. The post did not have a good fishery, which was the mainstay of any northern post; subsistence was precarious enough without the added burden of a mission using the same limited resources. Fort Chipewyan needed all the meat the Indians brought in for use in the summer boat brigades; if a mission drew on these provisions, the vital transport business would be jeopardized. Anderson suggested that the priests build at Fond du Lac (Athabasca) and at Great Slave Lake (Fort Resolution), both of which had good fisheries. They could then visit Fort Chipewyan in the summer.2^

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-*•• Mission at Fond du Lac, 1893. Photograph byJ.B. Tyrrell. [Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto]

Although he disapproved of a permanent mission at Fort Chipewyan, Anderson assigned his men to help Faraud build a separate house during the winter of 1850—1851. Tache had picked a site near a large swamp that, he assured Joseph Mercredi,26 could be drained. When this was done, the Oblates developed a fine garden on the site, an essential support for their mission.27 On 8 September 1851 Faraud took possession of the new building, naming the mission "Nativity of Mary," in honour of the feast of that day. Joined by Henri Grollier in 1852, the two priests lived at Nativity and served outstations at both Fond du Lac and Great Slave Lake, thus reversing Andersons intentions. The Caribou-Eater Chipewyan at Fond du Lac had travelled with their wives and families to meet Tache at Fort Chipewyan in 1848. This long journey was, however, impossible for them to make regularly and they asked for a resident priest. Governor Colvile awarded free board and lodging at Fort Resolution and Fond du Lac for the priests in 1851; these were the sites recommended by Anderson as preferable to Fort Chipewyan. Ironically, the HBC in London approved of this move by Colvile because Anderson had so strongly recommended the priests "for the propriety of their conduct and their usefulness to the people."28

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Indian Camp at Fort Resolution in Summer. [PAA OB-?//]

The provision post at Fond du Lac was not established until i853.29 Grollier took up Colvile's offer, spent the winter at the new outpost, and named the mission Our Lady of Seven Sorrows. The independent life of the Caribou-Eaters appealed to the priests just as much as it exasperated the traders. The Oblates thought that their lack of contact with neighbouring tribes or fur traders had preserved the natural goodness of the CaribouEaters more than the rest of the Chipewyan who had become more integrated into the fur trade. Thus, the prospects for a mission at Fond du Lac were very favourable. In addition, Joseph Mercredi was appointed as interpreter and later HBC postmaster at Fond du Lac, where he proved a constant support for the Oblates. Fond du Lac had drawbacks, however, which outweighed these considerations. It was far from the regular transportation route and a resident priest would have no contact with the Caribou-Eaters for most of the year. A provision post such as Fond du Lac required only a very small staff; there would be no opportunity to develop a small Metis parish as was done by the missions at many larger posts. Seven Sorrows could only remain an outstation of Nativity with an annual visit from a priest. The Oblates hoped to maintain the allegiance of the Athabasca Dene by their resident mission at Nativity, by annual visits to Fond du Lac, and by visiting camps whenever possible. They also planned to extend quickly into

•POLICY AND - P R A G M A T I S M

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the Mackenzie District. Just as the lie a la Crosse mission had proved a launching pad for the Athabasca missions, so they hoped to leap forward from the Athabasca into the Mackenzie District. In this move, they again owed much to the initiative of the Dene and to Colvile's favour. The Great Slave Lake people who saw Tactic at Fort Chipewyan in 1848 asked for a priest, just as did those from Fond du Lac. In response to this, with the recommendation by James Anderson that this was a suitable site for a mission, and with the gift of free room and board from Governor Colvile, Faraud visited Fort Resolution in the spring of i852.30 Faraud was the first priest to reach the Mackenzie District,31 and this was only five years after the establishment of the first northern Catholic mission at lie a la Crosse. The people he saw were most enthusiastic about his message, and he entered 169 baptisms and 25 marriages in the Register of the mission he named St. Joseph.32 Encouraged by this reception, Faraud planned to build a permanent mission to solidify the Church's presence and to serve as a springboard for a further extension of the Oblate missions into the Mackenzie District. The rapid expansion of Catholic evangelization and Colvile's support for it worried Governor Simpson, who feared that the Roman Catholics intended to claim the whole Mackenzie River district. He suggested that, where possible, the Hudson's Bay Company preferred to support Church of England missions.33 James Anderson, who had recommended Resolution as a possible site for a mission when it was outside his jurisdiction, changed his mind quickly when he assumed the charge of the Mackenzie District.3^ He insisted he had been mistaken about the fishery at Fort Resolution and that it was, he had discovered, too precarious to support a mission and a post. Anderson also claimed that the HBC staff, all of whom were Protestants, would oppose a Roman Catholic mission. On the other hand, a Protestant mission would require far too much in supplies, putting an intolerable strain on an already-overburdened transport system. Anderson concluded that "all idea of a mission in this poor country should be abandoned. "35 He refused to allow Faraud to build a mission at Resolution unless he produced explicit permission from the governor. Anderson's nationalistic, religious, and economic opposition to Roman Catholic missions collided head-on with Faraud's highly-developed ultramontanism, which accepted no legal or political barriers to the spread of his faith. Faraud questioned whether Anderson could prevent his mission, as the divine right he leaned

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on was superior to the civil authority of the HBC. In the end, he told the trader that Bishop Tache would settle the matter with him.36 Anderson, when he met Tache at La Loche, threatened that if Roman Catholic missionaries extended into the Mackenzie, he would ask for a Protestant mission, although he opposed the intrusion of any missions. He claimed that a Protestant company should not support a Catholic mission, and that the priests should submit to the Company as the sole government of the country. Tache, who had previously enjoyed a cordial relationship with the HBC men, was amazed at Anderson's reaction and objected to Simpson that impelled by some kind of vertigo, Mr. Anderson spoke to me about Napoleon III and of an invasion of French in this country, only because some of our missionaries are French.37 Since almost all of the Oblates came from France, Anderson had more grounds for his statement than the bishop seemed willing to allow. Tache responded that all the Mackenzie Indians asked for missions.38 This factor, to him, outweighed any others which might motivate the HBC. But his attention to a grass-roots religious movement caused Anderson to conclude that the bishop was "a rebel at heart and no friend of ours. "3^ Tache, not shy about using the political power accruing to him from the Metis, remarked that the Red River Metis boatmen, present during Anderson's tirade, might infer that the Company itself was hostile to Catholic missions. This could cause difficulties between the HBC and its essential labour force. Tache combined his veiled threat of possible consequences to the Company with a reiteration of his desire to conform as much as possible to its views. He would not, however, give up his missions. That, he said, was the most sacred and imperious of his duties, imposed on him by God Himself, and he could not subject it to human control.40 Simpson had no way of enforcing his own or the Company's views against this ultramontane view of church-state relations. He recognized that both the Anglican and Roman Catholic bishops were "indiscreetly zealous in the spread of their missions"41 and inclined to an independence of action that was unacceptable to the HBC. Simpson also knew, however, that if any charges of thwarting the missions were brought against the Company in England, it would do serious harm to hopes of a renewal of the License to Trade.

•POLICY AND -PRAGMATISM

4!

-r- Good Hope Mission. Sketch by Emile Petitot, OMI. [PAA OB-iii4i]

In these circumstances, Simpson had little choice but to produce the requested letter of approval for a priest to visit Fort Resolution, though he pointedly reminded Tache that he had not yet sought permission for any of his missions in the Athabasca or Mackenzie Districts.42 Armed with Simpson's permission, which overruled Anderson's objections, Faraud returned to Fort Resolution in the spring of 1856.^ He began to build a mission house on Moose-Deer Island, near the site of the old North West Company post, though Anderson continued to protest vehemently against a permanent mission. This forced Tache to appeal again to the governor. Simpson claimed that, in his original letter of permission, he had only intended to secure Faraud a hospitable reception at Fort Resolution and to have the Company officers ease his contacts with the Indians. A permanent mission in a separate establishment required a further authorization from Simpson, which the governor was then prepared to give.44 In 1858, the mission of St. Joseph was definitively established. From St. Joseph, the Oblates made frequent visits to the small winter post of Fond du Lac (Great Slave), where they formed the mission of St. Vincent de Paul, devoted primarily to the Yellowknives. They made annual trips to Fort Rae, where they established St. Michael's Mission for the Dogribs. From this mission also they began their Mackenzie River mis-

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sions, making annual visits to Sacred Heart Mission at Fort Simpson and St. Raphael's at Fort Liard. The Oblates anticipated reaching the Dene who lived farther north on the Mackenzie River, but St. Joseph was too far from them for that purpose. In 1857 Tache met in London with Colvile, who was then on the HBC board, and secured authorization to found a Roman Catholic mission at Fort Good Hope, far down the Mackenzie River. This gesture derived, at least partially, from reaction to the current anti-HBC publicity in England, which Colvile blamed on Anglican reports. This was doubly upsetting because the HBC was then facing a parliamentary inquiry into whether to renew its License to Trade. Tache had travelled to Europe on a ship with Simpson in 1856, a journey on which they settled many matters about missions, perhaps including this decision.45 It was not until 1859, however, that Grollier could take up this gift, naming his new mission Our Lady of Good Hope.46 The HBC fulfilled Colvile's promises by giving free passage and a room for the winter at Fort Good Hope. This project, owing much to Colvile, secured for the OMI a very important central post on the northern reaches of the Mackenzie River, one which the local officers of the HBC would have prevented, if given the opportunity. Once in this residence, the Oblates could secure the attachment of the many different peoples who came in contact with the post. They could deploy their priests to Fort Norman, Fort McPherson, and Great Bear Lake. The church they built and decorated became a landmark which is still preserved.47 The missions of Nativity, Seven Sorrows, Good Hope, and St. Joseph were all based on the official compliance of the HBC, if offered sometimes reluctantly and after the fact. When the British government did not renew the License to Trade, however, the HBC no longer had even the semblance of control over the extension of missions. Beyond the chartered territories, that is, in the Athabasca and Mackenzie Districts, the Company was a private subject and not the governing body. The missions were "a necessary evil to which they must submit, for the sake of the benefits the Indian population may derive from the spread of civilisation among them."48 The Company thenceforth adopted a policy of impartiality, ordering its personnel not to interfere on one side or the other in the religious disputes that were to invade the Mackenzie after 1858.

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4 RIVALS IN TAITH: OBLATES VERSUS ANGLICANS

rom their base missions at Nativity, St. Joseph, and Good Hope, the Oblates hoped to secure the allegiance of all the Dene to the Roman Catholic Church. They stationed two priests at Nativity, two at St. Joseph, and one to open the newly-approved mission at Good Hope. The plan was that this small number of clergy would spread the Gospel and begin the initiation of the Dene into the Church. Within a few years, as the numbers of Roman Catholic Dene increased, the Oblates hoped to bring in more fathers and brothers and increase the total of resident missions. 45

The extension of Anglican missions into the Mackenzie District, however, altered the Oblate strategy. The HBC, with the cooperation of the CMS, had brought the Anglicans to Red River in 1820 and had assisted in the foundation of the bishopric of Rupert's Land in 1849. Despite these official steps, the Company did not regard the Anglicans as an established church in their territories. They had urged the Wesleyans to begin missions in 1840 and had, at times, assisted the Roman Catholic Church. The Oblate missions at Fort Resolution, Fond du Lac, and Good Hope were sanctioned by the Company, which had assisted in their foundation. Local assistance was also given at Nativity, though no official authorization preceded this foundation. The addition of Anglican missions in the Mackenzie District arose, not from Company policy, but from the actions of individuals in the higher ranks of the HBC in the district. They reacted to the approval of the Roman Catholic missions at Fort Resolution and Fort Good Hope by asking the Bishop of Rupert's Land, David Anderson, to send them an Anglican clergyman.1 Bishop Vital Grandin was convinced that many of those who signed this petition did so reluctantly, having been pushed into it by James Anderson.2 Bishop Anderson hastened to respond to their plea, hoping to prevent the Oblates from fulfilling their hopes of securing the adhesion of all the Mackenzie Dene. He sent Archdeacon James Hunter to Fort Simpson in i858 to assess the possibilities for the CMS. The Oblates then became embroiled in an intense religious controversy, which, for a while, resembled the earlier competition between the HBC and the North West Company, though without the attendant violence. This time the rivals vied for the souls of the Dene, rather than their furs. Wherever one faith threatened to gain a foothold, the other hastened to contest it. Nor was it only religious rivalry; elements of nationalism and class distinction were introduced which were totally alien to the Dene. William West Kirkby reflected on "the social difference between the two great classes into which the colony is divided, Protestant and Roman Catholic. "^ This class distinction, based on religion, now extended into the Mackenzie. The Oblates had come originally at the invitation of the Dene. They also had links to the Metis, who formed the bulk of the HBC labouring class. The CMS missionaries, on the other hand, owed their arrival to the influence of the higher ranking officials of the HBC in the Mackenzie. Hunter returned to Red River in 1859 and was replaced by Kirkby. The HBC higher ranks, now led by Chief Trader Bernard Ross, continued their pro-Anglican4 stance. They subscribed £300 for a church at Fort Simpson 46

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^n C.P. Gaudet with his wife and daughters Christine and Marie, c. 1892-94. Photograph by Dr. George Camsell. [PAM, Hudson's Bay Company Archives, James McDougall Collection, 1987/13/204 (NSp/pJ

and agreed to pay for a mission house^ in the hope that this considerable financial investment would gain the approval of both Governor Simpson and Bishop Anderson for a permanent Anglican mission at Simpson. Furthermore, they recommended that only Anglican missions should be allowed in the Mackenzie District.6 Faced with this formidable array of Church and local state authority, Grollier hoped that God and Mary would come quickly to the aid of the Oblates and, in doing so, show that they were not Protestants.7 On a more practical level, he recommended that Bishop Grandin should move his headquarters to the Mackenzie. The presence of a "bishop-king" in the immense kingdom of the Great River would, he thought, impress the Dene and reverse the effects of the Archdeacon's presence, aided as he was by the HBC.8 Fort Simpson was the headquarters of the Mackenzie District and offered the CMS an ideal opportunity to contact many HBC employees and their families. In summer it was the rendezvous for all the servants of the district, many of whom worked on the boats, while their wives and families lived at Big Island supported by the fisheries. These boatmen, the H I V A L S IN TAITH

47

clerks of nearby posts, the families of the HBC servants, and many Natives, formed a polyglot population of English, Irish, Scots, Canadians, Norwegians, Orcadians, Metis, English Metis, Sauteux, Swampy Cree, Cree, Chipewyans, Slaves, Dogribs, Yellowknives, Hareskins, Letanais, Secanais, and occasionally a few Inuit. France was represented by the Oblates.9 One of the supporters of the Anglicans at this early stage was Charles P. Gaudet.10 Gaudet had been the only Catholic, and the only FrenchCanadian, in the upper ranks of the HBC of the Mackenzie District. Upward mobility in the Company seemed to demand acceptance of the anti-Catholic and pro-Anglican stance of those in charge of the district. Archdeacon Hunter received Gaudet into the Church of England in 1858; Mr. Kirkby performed his marriage service at Fort Simpson in 1859.^ While stationed at Peel's River, Gaudet vehemently opposed Grollier's presence and favoured Kirkby, in accordance with directions from Bernard Ross.12 Gaudet's wife, Marie Fisher, however, remained committed to Catholicism, even influencing some Loucheux at Peel's River to favour it too. When he was stationed at Good Hope, with its Catholic mission, Gaudet returned to his earlier faith,13 and he and his family proved invaluable supporters of the mission there. Gaudet's actions illustrate the discord caused between the demands of his career and his family obligations and traditions. His change of course was eased, however, by the fact that the adamant opposition to the Oblates by the higher HBC ranks faded when James Anderson and Bernard Ross were replaced. Later officers also followed the new HBC policy of impartiality and often supported the convent schools that provided education for their children. The entrance of the Anglicans into the Mackenzie spurred the OMI to increase their commitment and solidify their presence. When Grollier, stationed at the new mission of St. Joseph at Fort Resolution, learned that Archdeacon Hunter was on one of the boats going to Fort Simpson in 1858, he exerted himself to make sure that Hunter would not have a clear field.14 He asked Ross for a passage on the boat to Fort Simpson for himself, so that he could baptize the children of the Catholic employees. Ross, aware of the conflict that would ensue, and supportive of the Anglican cause, would only permit Grollier to go as far as Big Island, where he said Grollier would find all the Metis children. But Grollier convinced Bouvier, the guide of the boat brigades, to intercede for him with Ross. Faced with boatmen who demanded that the priest be allowed to bring spiritual help to their wives and children at Fort Simpson, Ross had little choice but to

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Roman Catholic Mission at Fort Norman, 1921. [NAC'PA 1000402]

relent and provide passage for Grollier. On his way to Fort Simpson, Grollier stopped off at Big Island and initiated the mission of Immaculate Heart of Mary there. Grollier, with his knowledge of the language and people added to his enormous competitive zeal, provided strenuous opposition to Hunter from the time of their arrival at Fort Simpson. In view of the combination of Anglican and HBC authority over these people, however, Grollier placed this unstable foothold of his Church under the powerful protection of the Sacred Heart of Jesus on 16 August 1858. When Kirkby reached Fort Simpson in August 1859 to replace Hunter, he, too, faced the combative Grollier, then on his way to Good Hope. Several of the approximately 140 Chipewyan, Loucheux, Hareskin, Slave, and Dogribs at the fort wore crucifixes around their necks, showing some attachment to Catholicism.15 Grollier was soon engaged in conversation with them, a great advantage which Kirkby, unable to speak their language, very much envied. In 1860, Grollier again visited Fort Simpson, this time from Good Hope. Kirkby was away and Grollier had the field to himself, managing to win over some of those baptized by Kirkby.1^ Grollier's zeal often embroiled him in controversy with those whom he viewed as obstacles to his mission work, whether they were HBC men, Anglican ministers, or Dene leaders. His disregard for any restrictions on

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his activities enabled him to found many northern Oblate missions, often in an attempt to thwart the Anglicans from making first contact. The mission he began at Fort Simpson continued its tenuous existence, sustained through annual visits by the Oblates from St. Joseph and later Providence. Grollier campaigned vigorously to have an Oblate bishop in the Mackenzie, which he thought was the only way to overcome the Anglican alliance with the local HBC. Tache agreed to this proposal and, in 1861, sent Bishop Grandin to supervise the area until the new bishop could take possession.17 Grandin selected an episcopal centre at the Rapids of the Mackenzie, about thirty miles in from Great Slave Lake, a site suggested by Grollier.18 He named this new mission Providence, since it was to sustain the rest of the Mackenzie missions. This was an unusual beginning for a mission, at a spot where there was no trading post. The site, however, freed the bishop from having to seek authorization from the HBC and from accusations of interference with the CMS mission at Fort Simpson. Eventually the HBC moved its post of Big Island to Providence; this was one of the few occasions on which a mission predated a post. Grollier continued to combat the CMS everywhere it gave opposition. On his way to found Good Hope Mission, he passed through Fort Norman on 29 August 1859, at the same time as Hunter, and named his prospective mission there Ste. Therese d'Avila. When Kirkby visited Fort Norman in 1860, hoping to begin a school there, Grollier reappeared, trying to keep the Natives from going over to Anglicanism. His visit, which overlapped briefly with Kirkby's, evoked the usual divided allegiances of the employees of the Company. Anglican services were held in the Big House (the postmaster's), while Grollier's took place in the Mens' House (for the minor servants of the HBC). Most of the men attended Kirkby's prayers and all the women went to Grollier's. According to Postmaster Nicol Taylor, the wives did not like Kirkby, because he was too small;19 the Oblates seem to have shared this view, since they usually referred to Kirkby as "le petit ministre." The extremes of competition between Grollier and Kirkby angered Taylor, who wanted neither priests nor parsons at his fort to trouble his Indians.20 The Oblates hastened to establish a foothold wherever the CMS went, preferably preceding them. At Fort Liard, they visited each year, securing the attachment of many people. When the CMS attempted to establish a resident mission there, the Oblates countered with their own residence. Similar actions were taken at Hay River, Fort Norman, and Fort Wrigley. In

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Roman Catholic Mission at Arctic Red River, 1020. [NAC PA witfS]

Group of Loucheux with Father Lecuyer, OMI, at Arctic Red River. [AD]

•RIVALS IN T A I T H

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their own residential missions, whenever the CMS threatened to attract adherents by their schools, the Oblates hastened to offer rival classes. The only real check to OMI expansion came at Peel's River (Fort McPherson). This also prevented them from success in their attempts to found a mission in the Yukon. Though Grollier initiated the mission of Holy Name of Mary at Fort McPherson in 1860, the CMS sent Kirkby there and to the Yukon in 1861. When Robert McDonald (later archdeacon), replaced Kirkby, he won over the Peel's River Loucheux. The overwhelming success of the CMS at Fort McPherson owed much to the influence of the Loucheux wives of HBC servants Andrew Flett and James Flett, at Fort McPherson and Lapierre's House respectively.21 Because these posts had few, if any, Metis servants, the Oblates lost one of their most valuable advantages. The HBC men had been warned to maintain impartiality but these restrictions did not apply to their wives, who were free to hold services for the Indians and warn them against "Popery."22 McDonald also gained an impressive advantage over the Oblates when he married Julia, who was related to all the Peel's River Loucheux and some Mackenzie River Loucheux. This woman, "wily, politic, and very generous like all Indian women, was endowed with a tongue that never rested."23 With these gifts, she kept her Peel's River relatives faithful to Anglicanism. The Oblates secured the allegiance of the Mackenzie River Loucheux. Abandoning the field at Fort McPherson in 1895, they moved their mission of Holy Name of Mary to Arctic Red River. Since there was no post at Arctic Red River, Father Giroux offered to take the Loucheux furs to trade at Herschel Island, until a post was established. This move completed the religious division between the two bands of Loucheux, the one oriented to the Mackenzie River, while the other centred on Peel's River. The rivalry between the CMS missionaries and the Oblates was one between "ultras" on both sides. The CMS believed that the Church of Rome was the "Man of Sin," and that its adherents were just as "pagan" as the unconverted Dene. The Oblates regarded the Anglicans as "heretics," just as much in need of salvation as the Dene. Their beliefs coincided with those of that unecumenical era, running from Pius IX (1846—78) to Pius XII (1939—58), when "confessional barriers were at their most impermeable ever as far as the Roman Catholic Church was concerned. "2^ Yet, in many ways, the personnel of the CMS and of the Oblates shared similar backgrounds and expectations. They came from working-class or petit bourgeois origins, and received their education at the expense of their 52

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respective society or order. Often they were sent to mission fields with sketchy preparation and expected to learn on the job. Both the CMS and the Oblates sent missionaries to Africa and the Far East, and gave these missions a precedence over their northwest missions. Both had quarrels with local bishops, and often regarded bishops as obstacles rather than supervisors. In the case of the Oblates, the fact that their bishops were also Oblates did not lessen the tension. The Oblate bishops often felt that their Congregation could not accept their two-fold responsibility of financing and maintaining both Oblate missions and their diocesan needs. Both the CMS and the Oblates expected their bishops and missionaries on furlough in Europe to give sermons and raise money. Both emphasized spirituality over theology.2^ They shared similar problems with financing educational institutions as a tool of evangelization, since this was contrary to the stated purposes of each of their societies. Both the Oblates and the CMS had to seek funding for education from separate charitable societies and eventually from the Canadian government. The differences between the two groups, however, were extreme. The CMS emphasized individual conversion and commitment to Christ as priorities over the sacraments and communal aspects of the church. The Oblates regarded the sacraments as central to Catholicism, and quickly included the Dene as full lay members of the community and organization of the Church. The fact that all the Oblate priests in the Mackenzie, except Hector Zephirin Gascon and Constant-Alarie Giroux, were from France exacerbated the divide, when pride of nation was added to religion in influencing those on both sides. The link between language and religion in the Athabasca-Mackenzie was so close that the Chipewyan called Catholicism the French religion, and Protestantism the English religion.26 Irish brothers, who were both English-speaking and Catholic, were a novelty when they appeared on the scene. The Oblates perceived the Anglicans as seeking to extend English domination along with their missions, not an unlikely conclusion for them to draw.27 On the other hand, the CMS and HBC viewed Catholic opposition to the spread of Anglicanism among the Dene as an anti-English activity. If not opposed to English sovereignty, the Oblates were certainly pro-France. The Catholic bishops usually flew the French flag on their boats and at their missions, asserting their homeland even in the far reaches of the British dominion. The rivalry of the Anglican and Roman Catholic missions in the north was a protracted struggle for religious supremacy with overtones Of national's. I V A L S IN T A I T H

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ism. It was marked also by apocalyptic statements on both sides, each believing that events showed that God was on their side. The CMS ministers spread word that God had rejected the Oblates, as proven by the fires which destroyed the cathedral at St. Boniface in 1860 and lie a la Crosse Mission in i86y.28 Grollier, always an extremist, believed the end of the world was near, the time of the anti-Christ, whom he identified with the Anglicans;2^ he sought to hide his interpretation from the other Oblates, apparently aware it would be unacceptable. William Carpenter Bompas thought God had shown his favour by the victories of Protestant Prussia and the defeats in the Papal States; these providential acts encouraged the Anglican missionaries in the Mackenzie in their conflict with the "Man of Sin."30 Many years later, Bompas urged the Canadian government to be sure to appoint a Protestant governor for the north "or else the whole of this vast territory might fall entirely under the influence of the Jesuits and become a hotbed of rebellion, with British interests completely forfeited."31 Rumours played a large part in the controversy between the denominations. The priests spread reports that Queen Victoria had become a Catholic, that her mother had died a Catholic, and that her daughter, the Queen of Prussia, had become a Catholic.32 Robert McDonald countered these stones by telling the Loucheux that the Queen was a Protestant, Governor Dallas of the HBC was a Protestant, and almost all the officers of the HBC were Protestants. He insisted that Dallas did not want Roman Catholic priests among the Indians, but favoured the CMS.33 The Protestants at Peel's River told the Mackenzie River Loucheux in 1869 that the Catholic religion was dead and that all the priests had left on the HBC boats, adding that from then on only Protestant ministers would be in their country.34 The conflict led to many accusations of unfair practices, such as buying "tobacco Christians"3^ or seducing the weak with gifts of tea. There is some evidence that the presence of conflicting Christianities caused some Natives to view conversion in very materialistic terms. One man told Grouard that he hoped the minister would come to Liard, for he would bring them useful gifts of tea, sugar and tobacco, whereas the priest gave them nothing.36 Some Dene were concerned that those who prayed with the priest were poor, while those who prayed with the minister were rich.37 Faraud claimed that the CMS missionaries exhorted the Dene to believe that the poverty of the Oblates proved the falsity of their religion.38 Each denomination envied the other its advantages. The Oblates saw the support given to the Anglican cause by the HBC higher ranks; the

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CMS missionaries knew the strength given to the Oblate cause by their close relationship with the Dene and Metis, augmented by their linguistic ability. Each begrudged the other financial means and personnel which they thought were at a much higher level than their own. When the Anglicans used magic lantern shows to attract the Dene,39 the Oblates struggled to match this technique. When Bompas undertook an itinerant ministry, visiting camps as the Oblates did, Petitot claimed he was just a tourist, not an apostle!^0 Even at the height of religious rivalry, however, individual priests and ministers could correspond with each other, help each other out in time of shortage, and respect the individual, if not the church to which he belonged. When Tache told Robert Hunt that they should rejoice in each other's success, however, Hunt thought he was being "too catholic to be Catholic," though "He is certainly a gentleman in manners as I suppose he is in family & property; and I think him an opponent of no small ability & influence."41 Bishop Breynat corresponded with Rev. Mr. Lucas about papal decrees, which he insisted were mistranslated and misunderstood. He asked if he could borrow Fox's Book of Martyrs and Bishop Porteus' No Popery, to improve his understanding of the Reformation.^2 This represents a marked change from earlier years, when neither side would acknowledge the other's literature. The HBC was in the uncomfortable position of being caught in the middle of this conflict. It tried to prevent rival missions at any post and ordered its men not to show bias to either party. But it was not an era of ecumenism and each side was equally convinced of its own messianic purpose in the Mackenzie, a design which could admit no opposition or even toleration. Each tried to forestall the other all the way down the Mackenzie River and into the Yukon. In their rapid extension of missions down the Mackenzie and its tributaries, the Oblates were motivated by their intense rivalry with the Anglicans to gain the souls of the Dene. They were convinced, by their solid experience, that the first missionary in the field was most likely to win the adherence of the Natives. They made great efforts to be the first, whether this meant pulling a priest away from a locality where he knew the people and language and sending him to a place where both were unknown to him; whether the priests remained without any companion for many months, in contradiction of their rule; whether they had to provide their own transport and food or whether they were able to secure passage with the HBC boats and lodging at the posts. Whatever the difficulties, the

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priests suffered them gladly, impelled by the deep-seated conviction that the only salvation for the Dene, as for all other peoples, lay within the bosom of the Roman Catholic Church, and that their own salvation depended on their carrying out the task of evangelization with all the fervour and stamina they had. Their efforts were so successful that, in 1891, Bishop Bompas warned his successor that the district was a "hotbed of Popery. "43

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5 STRUCTURES AND INFRASTRUCTURE

.artnership with the Dene was the central element in the task of evangelization which the Oblates had assumed. Their relationships with the HBC and CMS were also vital aspects in the placement and initiation of their missions. To secure the stability of those missions, however, the Oblates had to provide clergy and diocesan structure that would place the Dene firmly within the organization of the Roman Catholic Church, linked directly to the pope in Rome. This structure was superimposed on the Dene, as it was in other mission areas, and indeed throughout the Roman Catholic world. There was no question of the Dene having any choice in this matter.

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Boundaries ofVicariate of Athabasca and Vicariate of Mackenzie in 1001. [AD]

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The clergy were the key to the formation of the Church structure in the Athabasca-Mackenzie. Since the OMI dealt with English-speaking Protestant HBC officers, who held civil authority in the districts, and could do much to further or hinder the cause of the Oblates, they needed amenable personalities, who were able to subdue their nationalist and religious differences with others.1 Because their missions included all the many groups of Dene, the priests required good memories and linguistic abilities to learn the various languages. Though they had not lived in luxury in Europe, the north brought them new kinds of hardships, such as walking great distances on snowshoes, travelling in blizzards, and eating only fish or meat for months at a time. Some were not in good health when they arrived. Others developed illnesses, such as rheumatism, characteristic of their northern life. Many of the Oblates, however, were impressed by their relative good health compared to priests in other mission fields. Some suffered severely from the frequent months of solitude, when they were stretched to the limit to preserve the tenuous allegiance of the Dene at many posts in the face of Anglican opposition. Though they were all members of one religious congregation, individual Oblates varied widely in personality. Grollier was very abrasive and antagonized many other Oblates, HBC staff, and the Dene. On the other hand, his great zeal and unwillingness to let the opposition gain the upper hand empowered him to found many Oblate missions, despite the severe asthma which was to cause his premature death. Grandin's amiability, especially in contrast to Grollier, endeared him to both HBC staff and Dene. Nevertheless, he proved unwilling to compromise on church discipline.2 Petitot's curiosity, romantic zeal, and robust physical health enabled him to travel to far distant camps where no other missionary had been. Faraud in his early years was an indefatigable builder of missions who tolerated no hindrance from HBC men in his designs. As the bishop of the AthabascaMackenzie, he proved to possess sound money management skills and devoted himself to securing the stability required by his Oblates, occasionally at some cost to Tache's finances. Each Oblate brought his own gifts, quirks, and foibles to the missions. But all shared the same conviction that they were God's messengers to the Dene. Their zeal to convert the Dene and to forestall the Anglicans caused them to accept living alone for months at a time, though their rule required them to live in community. One priest would provide religious services to the Dene in the area surrounding their residence, while another would

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travel for months at a time to maintain the presence of the Church and gain adherents at other posts by annual visits. Mazenod recognized the advantage that a knowledge of the English language would give his Oblates and included English in the course of studies at the seminary in Marseilles. He hoped that his priests could spend a year in England or Ireland improving their knowledge of the language before entering the mission field. Often, however, the demands of the missionary bishops for immediate help forestalled these efforts. Some Oblates studied English with the help of the HBC men, or exchanged lessons in French for lessons in English. Occasionally the Oblates had enough knowledge of English to understand comments made by the HBC men which were not intended for their ears! No special training was given in the seminary for those who hoped to go to the foreign missions. In fact, the foreign missions were not recognized as a separate field of endeavour for the Oblates until 1909. Evangelization was not regarded as culture-bound in any way. The Oblates believed that the same Gospel and teaching of the Church could be taught to those unaware of it, all over the world, in the same way. The real essential, Mazenod thought, was that his Oblates be well-grounded in their faith, since they would have little opportunity for reading or reflection. They also needed training in the communication of that faith and how best to present it, but this did not involve attempts at inculturation as we would recognize it today. The study of other cultures in a scientific way (anthropology) did not develop until the late nineteenth century, and the science of missions (missiology) lagged even further behind. The OMI were not unusual in their inability to recognize how the culture affected the transfer of the Gospel message. In most of their missions, they worked in areas under British sovereignty. The Oblates were proud of their French origins but thought that nationality should not interfere with their missionary task, wherever that drew them. Just as they conceived it possible to communicate the Gospel to those of another culture without changing it in any way, so they thought it possible to spread the Roman Catholic Church independently of sovereignties. Only Grandin seems to have thought of changing his citizenship, primarily due to a suggestion by Mr. Clarke of the Company.3 The First World War posed difficulties for later missionary Oblates who had kept their French citizenship, and were subject to calls to serve in the French army. Bishop Breynat hastened to Montreal to get permission for his

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fathers and brothers to be excused because of the great distance and lack of communication involved.4 Those who were in France on leave at the start of the war were called up and served; one priest, Bocquene, suffered severely from the effects of the poison gas attacks. In their northward expansion, the Oblates soon recognized the paramount importance of brothers. Without their help, the priests were compelled to do much manual labour themselves, detracting from their work of evangelization. They hired Metis or Indian families to hunt, fish, and labour for the missions, but this proved expensive and not very reliable. At various Chapters-General, the missionary bishops constantly reiterated their need for more brothers. Their demands were greeted with sympathy but never received an adequate response. The increasing secularization of France and the obligation of military service meant that the few men who did enter the Oblates as brothers were older and unwilling, or unable, to undertake the arduous labour of the foreign missions. Those bishops who visited France often sought to find brothers on their own and developed a roster of the best areas to canvass. Some brothers came from Ireland, notably Brother Kearney at Good Hope, and by the late nineteenth century, more of the brothers came from Quebec. Bishop Bompas greatly envied the advantage given the Oblate priests by the aid of the brothers, both at their missions and as companions on their travels to visit Indian camps.5 The bishops also had to provide housing, food, and transport for their clergy and support for the schools. These heavy expenditures were subsidized in part by contributions from Propagation de la Foi and L'Oeuvre de la Ste. Enfance, but the bishops and priests also made separate appeals for funds. In the first days of missions, bishops such as Tache, Grandin, Faraud and Glut preached in Europe to gain funds and attract vocations. The response at first was excellent. In later years, however, some French bishops objected to this draining of funds and men. The expansion of missions also involved the bishops in negotiations with the HBC and the Canadian government for financial support. Their drive to the north demanded great commitment from the priests and brothers, who were always too few for the tasks assigned to them. As part of the missionary endeavour of the Roman Catholic Church, their work also had to be organized under centralized direction from Rome. The task of establishing, supervising, and maintaining the missions to the Dene fell to the bishops, who were in turn responsible to the pope through the Propaganda. The duty of evangelization could only be carried out within this structural framework. This might appear as an alien imposition on the 62

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world of the Dene Catholics, but it was the usual and only way to incorporate them into the universal Church, with the same status and government as Roman Catholics all over the world. The missions of the Athabasca-Mackenzie in the early period came under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of St. Boniface. Initiated under Provencher, they began with Tache's visit to Fort Chipewyan in 1847. When Tache, chosen to be Provencher's auxiliary and successor, was consecrated Bishop of Arath6 by Bishop de Mazenod in 1851, the Founder also appointed him religious superior of the Oblates in his diocese. Then the new Canadian Oblate bishop assumed a two-fold authority over the missionaries of the north, authority which some older Oblates from France accepted with a marked lack of grace. They accused him of being more Canadian than Oblate, a charge which Mazenod rejected as unfounded.7 As auxiliary bishop stationed at lie a la Crosse, Tache continued the northward expansion of missions, a commitment which he maintained when he succeeded to the see of St. Boniface in 1853. In 1858 Vital Grandin, named Bishop of Satala, became his auxiliary, supervising the northern missions, again from lie a la Crosse. The Athabasca and Mackenzie districts were so remote, however, that he could give little direction to the Oblates there. The arrival of the Anglican, Archdeacon Hunter, in the Mackenzie in 1858, at the instigation of the HBC traders, demanded a much more effective strategy. Grollier called long and loudly for a roi-eveque (a Bishop-King) for the Great River (Mackenzie) and received the support of all the other Oblates of this district. Tache, very ready to divide his diocese in this way, conferred with Grandin at lie a la Crosse in the fall of 1860. They decided that the new vicariate should include both the Athabasca and the Mackenzie missions. Grandin preferred to remain as Tache's auxiliary; consequently, the two bishops recommended Henri Faraud for this onerous duty, despite his frequent complaints of ill-health. Faraud became Bishop of Anemour, in charge of the new AthabascaMackenzie Vicariate, in May 1862, though he did not learn of it until the spring of 1863. He was also the religious superior of the Oblates in his vicariate, as Tache was in St. Boniface. Faraud insisted on being consecrated in France, as Grandin and Tache had been, to raise funds and appeal for more fathers and brothers to sustain his new responsibilities. At that time, the vicariate included four resident missions—Nativity, St. Joseph, Good Hope, and Providence—served by ten Oblate priests and six brothers.

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The fact that this was the first division of St. Boniface highlighted the emphasis given to the northern missions in the first years of the Oblate experience in the west. A few years later the expansion of settlement across the plains led to a further division, when Grandin assumed the charge of the vicariate of St. Albert in 1868. In 1871 Tache became Archbishop of St. Boniface, with Grandin and Faraud as suffragans. When Faraud saw the pope, he obtained the very unusual permission to choose and even consecrate his own auxiliary bishop, pleading his poor health and the difficulties which would result if he died with no replacement available. In 1867 he consecrated Isidore Glut as Bishop of Arindel, to be his auxiliary and supervise the missions from Providence. Faraud soon stationed himself at Lac La Biche to ensure the transport of mission goods, so vital to their survival. Glut's hasty consecration, carried out at Nativity by Faraud, aided by two priests instead of the usual two bishops, raised doubts in Glut's own mind and in that of many Oblates in the vicariate as to the validity of his status as bishop.8 Faraud continued to govern his huge vicariate from his headquarters at Lac La Biche, while Glut travelled extensively to supervise the northern missions. Just before he retired in 1889, Faraud thought he had solved the vexatious problem of transporting supplies to the Athabasca and Mackenzie by an arrangement made with the HBC. He therefore ceded Lac La Biche back to Grandin, ending the many years of controversy over this mission.9 Soon after he retired to St. Boniface, Faraud died, and was succeeded by Emile Grouard, Bishop of Ibora, who maintained the ailing Glut as his auxiliary. The vicariate at that time had 52 Oblates (two bishops, 25 fathers and 25 brothers), in 15 resident missions, scattered over the three vast districts of Peace River, Athabaska, and Mackenzie.10 Grouard was overwhelmed by the needs of his vicariate, especially those of the Peace River District, where increasing numbers of settlers were moving in. He proposed at the 1898 chapter that his vicariate be divided. The Klondike gold discoveries increased his concerns because he had not yet been able to establish any missions in the Yukon, which had been added to the vicariate in 1872. He would now have to spread his personnel even more thinly to provide spiritual help to the miners. If the OMI did not undertake the Yukon missions, the Natives might go over to the Protestants—or to the Jesuits from Alaska, which Lecorre seemed to feel would be almost as bad!11 Grouard suggested that he keep the Athabasca and Peace River districts; he thought that the Yukon and Mackenzie should form a separate vicariate, using the Yukon gold mines to support the poor Mackenzie mis64

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sions.12 Archbishop Langevin of St. Boniface, on the advice of Lacombe, insisted that Gabriel Breynat was the best choice as bishop for the new vicariate, though he was not on Grouard's list.13 Grouard had to agree, though he had hoped to keep Breynat in reserve to succeed to his portion of the divided vicariate. In the division of 1901, Grouard kept the Athabasca and Peace River regions, where much of his attention centred on the burgeoning settlements of that area. Breynat's new Vicariate of Mackenzie extended from the sixtieth parallel north to the pole, east to longitude 102 degrees, and west to the frontier of Alaska, to include about 889,000 square miles. Scattered over this vast territory were twelve missions, staffed by twelve Oblate fathers and thirteen Oblate brothers. Each mission served from 200 to 800 Indians. The support of these missions cost at least 40,000 to 50,000 francs each year.1^ Four missions—St. Joseph, Providence, Ste. Therese, and Good Hope—had a church, while the others had only a house-chapel.15 There was one boarding-school, at Providence, for about forty children. There was no hospital. Almost immediately, Breynat attempted to sever the Yukon from his area of responsibility and, in 1908, he succeeded.16 Despite this, Breynat's obligations continued to increase. He began new initiatives to convert the Inuit, which required more clergy, and resulted in the murder of two of his priests, Rouviere and Le Roux, in 1913.17 Another priest, Frapsauce, drowned while attempting a resumption of this work in 1920. In that year the vicariate still had only eleven resident missions. The question of dividing the vicariates again came up during the First World War. Grouard thought Breynat should take back the Athabasca District missions, but Breynat was reluctant to do so. Finally, in 1927, he accepted the reunion of the Athabasca missions with those of the Mackenzie, aided in his tasks by his auxiliary, Bishop Falaize. The vicariate then returned in size to what it had been when first established in 1863. The unsung heroes of this expansion and solidification of the Church presence in the north were the brothers. The first Oblates who visited posts to contact the Indians usually received shelter and sometimes board from the HBC, if their visit had been authorized by the authorities. At other times the priests provided their own transportation and tents or lodged with Metis employees of the Company. Any more permanent presence, however, demanded a separate house, even if the priests only visited the post once or twice a year. In part, this derived from their need to show their independence of the Company. The priests also found it difficult to conS T R U C T U R E S AND I N F R A S T R U C T U R E

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-*"> Fathers Houssais andSeguin and Brother Kearney in front of Oblate house, Good Hope, [PAA OB 11138]

duct their mission work from HBC houses. They had little opportunity for privacy or room to give the necessary instruction and to preach to the Dene. Often the Company men gave dances into the late hours of the night, which disturbed the priests' sleep and made it impossible for them to hold services in the morning. Some castigated these dances as occasions for immorality. At first the priests did much of the hard labour of cutting and hauling logs for building the houses, and also did some of the carpentry. Originally inexperienced, some, for example Faraud, became very good carpenters. But the time consumed by these tasks detracted from the priests' ability to minister to the Dene. Hiring Metis or Dene labour was expensive and their work was not very consistent. The HBC was willing to allow its employees to work for the missions during the off-season, if the bishops provided them with food and lodging. This was not very effective, and the bishops tried to secure enough Oblate brothers for the continuity of the missions. Occasionally, a brother who had not made his final vows left the congregation and entered the service of the HBC or joined the freetraders, who welcomed them for their ability to work hard. Very few at the beginning 66

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Roman Catholic sawmill at Fort Resolution. [NAC PA 14680]

Oblates and fields at Fort Providence, n.d. [NAC PA 101541]

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and never enough for the task, the brothers laboured devotedly to sustain the missions by building, gardening, and fishing. Everyone in the north who spoke about the brothers always added a comment about how hard they worked. They built the large wooden churches and schools, using long-saws; this was very arduous work, eased only when they obtained steam-powered saws in the early twentieth century. They even built the first steamboats and piloted them, learning on the job. They planted and tended the gardens which augmented country foods. They learned to hunt and spent much time in fishing to provide the vast quantities needed to sustain the schools and missions. These Oblate brothers toiled in relative obscurity, compared to the priests. Their work justified the title given them by Father Duchaussois ofApotres Inconnus; their hidden labours gave the priests the freedom they needed to preach the Gospel. The Oblate bishops also sought to lessen the costs and difficulties of transport, which were the chief burden they imposed on the HBC and a major financial cost of their missions. When the missions began, the HBC had the only transport network in place and the priests had to use it, or face prohibitive costs in arranging for their own boats and labour. They had to import not only for their own needs, including Mass wine and liturgical articles, but also had to bring in goods to pay their engages. Imported goods arrived at York Factory on Hudson Bay by ship from England. From there they were carried by boat brigades to Norway House, where they remained for the winter. In the spring, the Red River boat brigades picked these up and carried them to Portage La Loche. An arduous twelve-mile portage brought them to the Clearwater River and the Arctic drainage system. Midway on this portage the boat crews who had left the Mackenzie with the year's collection of furs exchanged them for these goods, which they carried back to the Mackenzie.18 Provencher asked Simpson to make some definite arrangements so that the absolute necessities of his missions would reach their destination and not be left behind at Norway House, as too often happened. He reminded Simpson that if he were forced to provide his own transport, that would open the way for the freetraders, since he would have to hire Red River Metis for such work.19 This was something the HBC was very anxious to avoid. Accordingly, Simpson made an agreement with Tache in 1853 by which the Company would guarantee to carry a certain amount of mission goods to each post, at an agreed-upon price.20

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Tache, however, wary that the HBC might renege on this arrangement, looked for alternative means of supplying his missions. He initiated a new mission at Lac La Biche, to serve as a depot and transportation centre for the missions of the Athabasca and Mackenzie.21 His investigation of the La Biche (Athabaska) River in 1856, however, convinced him that it would not be a dependable alternative route. The project of making the Lac La Biche mission a central depot was postponed for some years, while the bishop continued to use the HBC transport. In 1868, however, the Company would no longer take responsibility for transport of mission goods. This transport was so essential to the northern missions that Faraud moved his headquarters to Lac La Biche. He intended to make it the entrepot for his vicariate and manage his own transport from there. After further study, he decided that the water route to the north was so undependable that he should open a cart-road between the mission and the Athabasca River. Although he and his Oblates and Metis laboured mightily, they were unable to finish the road in 1869. In the i86os the HBC began to import its merchandise by way of New York or Montreal, rather than York Factory, to take advantage of cheaper transportation by railway to Minnesota and down the Red River by steamboat to Fort Garry. Strikes by the Red River boatmen in the late 18605 helped convince the Company to extend its steamboat service to Lake Winnipeg and the Saskatchewan River. These eclipsed the Portage La Loche route and soon the Red River boat brigades disappeared, taking with them the wage-labour on which many Metis and Indians had come to depend. In 1867 the Company began to ship the Athabasca District freight across the plains by cart to Green Lake, then down the Beaver River and thus to La Loche; by 1877 the Mackenzie District pieces were also sent this way. Although the Mackenzie boats continued to go to La Loche to pick up their outfits, the many diseases which afflicted the Dene decreased the number of men available for the boats and reduced their health and strength in comparison to their parents.22 The introduction of steam on the Mackenzie meant that, in 1886, the Good Hope Indians crewed their boats to La Loche for the last time.23 In 1888 Faraud thought he had a promise from Commissioner Wrigley for the HBC to take charge of all the mission transport as far as Peel's River at a very reasonable price. On that basis, he agreed to return Lac La Biche Mission to Grandin in 1889.24 But Inspecting Chief Factor McDougall was so impressed by the mission buildings and gardens in Faraud's vicariate that

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Boilerfor Mission Boat brought by scow down the rapids at Fort Smith, 1893. Photograph by J.B. Tyrrell. [Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto]

he convinced Commissioner Wrigley that the bishop could well afford to pay the high costs of HBC transport.2^ When the promised lower costs did not materialize, Bishop Grouard set to work to build his own steamboat. He raised money in Quebec and France, bought the machinery in Montreal, and built new sawmills at Nativity and St. Joseph. He assigned his brothers, completely untrained in the work, to build the steamboats. When the first boats failed to pass inspection, he brought in an engineer and managed to complete the task successfully. The St. Joseph served the Athabasca while the St. Alphonse traversed the Mackenzie. In 1895 Grouard took the Oblate Visitor, Father Antoine, on a triumphant tour of his missions on his new boat, flying the French flag.26 The savings from using his own steamboats enabled him to open more missions and schools. The steamboats also allowed the bishop to visit the many missions of his vicariate more often, giving the sacrament of Confirmation more frequently, and keeping in closer touch with the needs of his Oblates and the Dene whom they served.

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-*"• Bishops Glut, Grandin, Tache and Faraud, 16July 1889. [La Societe Historique de Saint-Boniface, GFi$]

Steamboat transport also brought many freetraders into the region. Some used their own steamboats and eventually formed trading companies, which severely eroded the HBC trade. As more traders flocked in, they hired more Metis to help them, decreasing the pool of labour for both the HBC and the missions. Their presence also encouraged the Dene to increase the trapping of fur animals, rather than supplying provisions to both HBC and missions. Coupled with the depletion of large game animals for local food, this transition accelerated reliance on imported food by missionaries, traders, and Natives. This in turn further strained the transport system. It also increased the need for Oblate brothers to carry out the many tasks necessary to provide subsistence and transport for the missions. When Bishop Breynat assumed charge of the vicariate, he strengthened the infrastructure of his northern missions laid down so many years before by Faraud and Grouard. He began a farm near Fort Smith to keep the oxen and horses required to cart mission goods across the portage road, and to supply meat, butter, and produce for the northern missions. Finding this area unsuitable, he moved the farm to a site on Salt River, named St. Bruno after Father Bruno Roure.27 He built a new steamboat, the Ste. Marie, on which he carried Interior Minister Oliver on his tour in 1910, when the HBC steamboat Wrigley was

STRUCTURES

AND INFRASTRUCTURE

unable to accomplish tli«? trip in time. Breynat's boat was so successful that Hislop & Nagle asked if he could carry their trade goods. Instead, the bishop, who did not want to be involved in a transport business, enlarged the boat and sold it to Hislop & Nagle in 1912. He replaced it with a smaller gas-boat, which he named "Doctor Rymer." The HBC in 1913 lamented that Breynat's system of transport had proved so successful that its opposition had been enabled to trade more than the Company.28 Morris Zaslow called Breynat's tenure of the vicariate a classic illustration of how to adapt a religious organization to local conditions and opportunities. Along the Mackenzie waterways he developed an integrated system of churches, schools, and hospitals, sawmills and farms, linked together by boats and aircraft into a system worthy of Sir George Simpson. His sawmills and farms supplied other stations, even in the Arctic; his series of improved boats carried his missions' freight and even earned some revenue in the process. His system, marshalling the labour of priests, lay brothers, nuns, and pupils, was largely self-sufficient, while the bishop himself was untiring in securing funds from government agencies and private sources to promote the work of his church.29 This is an incisive description of the many-faceted organization of Roman Catholic missions in the north. It should be noted, however, that Breynat built on an infrastructure already well-developed by Faraud and Grouard. That infrastructure was essential to the formation and perpetuation of the missions of the Athabasca-Mackenzie. It was a task which the first bishops viewed as essential to the completion of their primary purpose, the evangelization of the Dene. While their priests laboured to accomplish that major objective, the bishops spent much of their time and energy in securing the financial and religious foundation necessary to maintain their personnel, and to secure a place for themselves and the Dene in the world of the Roman Catholic Church. Although this struggle accompanied the task of evangelization, and was essential to it, their primary purpose remained that of messengers of the Good News.

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p

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hile the Oblates interacted with the HBC, the CMS, and Rome, to establish the framework of their missions to the Dene, their labours would have been pointless if they had not, at the same time, preached their message to the Dene. Conversion of the Dene to Roman Catholicism was their fundamental principle and aim. Though Oblate and Dene approached each other with very different categories of thought and belief and misunderstanding was inevitable, yet mutual appreciation also developed. It was then that their true dialogue with the Dene could take place. The Oblates came to the Dene expressly to convert them to Catholicism, not to change their culture into that of "civilized" Europeans. They could not conceive of their bringing the Good News as harmful to the Dene culture or to individuals, but as offering them the most valuable of gifts. The doctrine they preached was, they were convinced, the only way 73

to salvation for all humanity. The Oblates did not think it possible, or desirable, to adapt that doctrine to different cultures. Catholicism was, in their view, a universal religion; Catholics all over the world held the same tenets, whatever their specific cultural practices. Unaware of how much of Western European culture had become embedded in the theology they taught, they did not recognize to what extent the nineteenth-century Church was itself a culture. Equipped with a firm and structured system of belief, with techniques of evangelization that had proved their worth in France, they expected to use the same ways with the Dene to achieve the same results. They hoped to incorporate the Dene into the Roman Catholic Church, to share with them the same faith and the same baptism. They soon acquired at least a limited understanding of Dene culture and beliefs, using this to aid them in evangelization. Their task might have been easier if they had been able to foresee the Vatican II concept of the Church as "the people of God." This was closer to the Dene idea of themselves as "the people" than was the very ecclesiological perception which dominated the nineteenth century and was so remote from Dene experience. Imbued with these highly centralized, hierarchical and uniform notions of faith, Church, and society, the Oblates viewed Dene religious beliefs, customs, and society as chaotic: Nothing there is followed through or coordinated in such a way as to show a complete society, with its own autonomy, an established and reasoned religion, or any form of government whatever. Everything is abbreviated, confused, scattered, and misshapen.1 There were enough similarities between Dene beliefs and customs and those of the Roman Catholic Church, however, to encourage the Oblates in their conviction that they could teach all people the Good News. Though they did not accept the validity of Dene beliefs, they used any parallels they found to help them explain corresponding doctrines of Christianity. The Chipewyan believed, like Moses, in a race of giants; they also had a tradition of a great flood, of the dispersal of humanity over the world, of fire falling from heaven, and of the burning earth. Instead of Noah's Ark, however, a small floating island proved to be the refuge for humanity.2 Some Oblates viewed Dene beliefs of this kind as remnants of Biblical revelation, clouded by the mists of centuries of oral retelling, which they could clarify by their teaching.

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A fundamental principle for the acceptance of Christianity, the Oblates thought, was belief in a Creator, which they hoped to transform into belief in the Christian God. Tache thought the Chipewyan creator, Ni-ottsi or Yeddariye (Powerful One) was as close to the concept of the Christian God as a people could come who used only their own reason and their observations of nature. Like the Christian God, the Powerful One was monotheistic, the creator and conserver of all life, the rewarder of virtue and avenger of crime, and eternal in existence. The Chipewyan envisaged the Creator in human form, though gigantic in size to correspond to his absolute power3—an image not entirely alien to representations in European art. From his dwelling in the height of the sky, the Creator could see all and hear all on earth.4 The OMI found some variations in this belief in the Creator as they developed their knowledge of other groups of Dene. The Hares and Loucheux, according to Petitot, considered the Supreme Being to be a triad of father, mother and son; the father lived at the zenith of the sky, the mother at the nadir, and the son travelled the sky between them. One day the son took pity on the Dene he saw on earth and asked his father to send them celestial fire. 5 The Christian concept of the Trinity might allow some transposition of this belief, though it would be difficult. The priests found the lack of ritual devoted to the Creator quite contrary to the central role this had in Christianity. At feasts, an old man would urge all the people to recognize the generosity of the Creator and avoid evil, lest the Creator rescind his care. This exhortation would be followed by a fervent prayer to the Creator asking for health, success in the hunt, and all the other needs of life. Some portions of food were thrown in the fire or outside the door as a sacrifice and offering to the Creator.6 At Fort Norman in the late nineteenth century, this custom continued among the Catholic Dene, who offered grease, or a bit of any new kind of food, by throwing it on the fire to ask for God's blessing.7 The Dene, very pragmatically, paid more immediate attention to the actions of evil spirits in their lives than they did to the Creator. Their Supreme Being was neither omnipotent nor omnipresent like the Christian God. On the contrary, the Creator was so isolated from the world that he could not prevent the actions of the evil spirits.8 Evil spirits could harm humans by making them sick or causing their early death and the Creator was powerless to intervene. In the Dene world there was no such thing as random bad luck or sheer accident; everything had a cause and nothing was

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accidental.9 The Dene solution to the problem of evil in their world was to make medicine to overcome the actions of the spirits who harmed them. This occupied so much more time and ritual than was devoted to prayers to the Creator that many Oblate observers thought jonglerie or medicine was their only religious act. The Dene concept of religion, in turn, led them to view the priests us jongleurs with exceptionally strong medicine powers.10 The Chipewyan believed that these evil spirits only appeared after the flood. They were closely linked to animals, such as serpents, who were viewed by humans as enemies or objects of horror. They took great care not to say anything against these animals, for they did not want to antagonize them; such irreverence, equivalent to blasphemy among Christians, could only harm them.11 Petitot was most impressed by the Dene belief that serpents were evil, though, according to him, there were no snakes in their country.12 They also believed the serpent and the woman had produced a fearful race of cannibals, that was later destroyed.13 Tactic also noted the Chipewyan theory that woman had caused the fall of man.14 The Oblates could easily associate such beliefs with the contemporary Christian interpretation of the story of Adam and Eve. At times the "bushman" or evil spirit of aboriginal thought seemed almost identical with the Christian devil. In 1867 at Good Hope, at a time of great suffering, when Native and Oblate medicine had both proved ineffective, many men and women saw a black man who hid his horns while he was with them, but showed them on leaving. They were so afraid that they would not go into the woods; they thought they saw death and sickness, as a person, everywhere. They even stopped their children from sleeping for fear that death would take them.15 Sightings of the evil spirit as a black and frightful being appeared to predominate in summer, when he roamed in daylight through the woods like the noonday devil of Scripture.16 The belief in the visible presence of evil spirits, sometimes identified as bushmen, continued in Dene society despite many years of missionary teaching. In 1885, at Good Hope, a reported sighting of Denedjere with a bonnet on his head upset all the Indians, who came asking for ammunition for their self-defence. They kept watch, the makers of medicine struggled to deal with it, and parents had their children sleep in the bottom of canoes on the water so they could escape.1'7 The Dogribs also kept their ancient fear of nak'a or the enemy, never seen but always feared. During the First World War, the chief of the Bear Lake Dogribs expected the Germans to bomb Fort Rae at Christmas and kill all who gathered there. As a result, many Dogribs came to the mis76

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sion before Christmas for confession and communion, preferring not to run the risk of attending at Christmas.18 Dene belief in the immortality of the soul also provided some basis for Oblate teaching. After death, the soul entered the spirit country of the ancestors by a tree that formed the entrance in the southwest above the sky. In this country were immense hunting-grounds where the souls lived as they did on earth. There, too, the thunder and feathered game found refuge in winter.19 Not all souls could enter this afterworld, however. Those people whose bodies were burned by their enemies, or who were not buried, remained outside the entrance as incomplete souls. The Aurora Borealis was the dance of these incomplete souls, whose whistling voices caused the sounds which accompanied this phenomenon.20 Probably it was these incomplete souls that the Dene feared. They thought that all the white chiefs in this country were very foolish, because they do not believe that the spirits of the deceased have the power of doing harm or good to the living.21 These beliefs were not entirely incompatible with Christian faith in immortality, nor with many folk-beliefs that had persisted among Europeans. They provided some ground for the acceptance by the Dene of the sacrament of Extreme Unction as a giver of peace to the dying soul. Alexander Mackenzie told of another belief in immortality among the Chipewyan. According to this story, when people died, they passed immediately into another world. In that world they came to a large river and embarked in a stone canoe which carried them across a large lake to a beautiful island. When they came in sight of this island they were judged for their conduct during life. If they had been good, they landed on the island and lived the good life forever (which Mackenzie characterized as "eternal enjoyment of sensual pleasure, and carnal gratification").22 If they were judged as bad the stone canoe immediately sank, leaving them up to their chins in water, forever in sight of the reward they could never attain. This belief bore strong parallels to the Christian faith in a last individual judgment. It also appears to relate very closely to life near a Great River. The Dene also believed in the reincarnation of souls, especially when a child was born with teeth; these babies were the reincarnation of the last person to die within the group. Humans could also be reincarnated as animals.23 Christianity did not dispel these beliefs. Petitot told of a baby born at Bear Lake to a family who had been Christian for some time. The father

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wanted the child to be baptized but the mother refused, insisting it was not her child but the reincarnated son of a well-known jongleuse. This medicine-woman had announced when her son died the previous year that he would be born again; she claimed this child as hers. All the people were ready to believe this and accept it as a miracle of medicine; their convictions were so strong that even the threat of excommunication did not shake them.24 The priests tried to eradicate these beliefs as irreconcilable with Catholicism, but they have survived to the present.2^ Building on whatever parallel beliefs they could detect, the Oblates concentrated on transferring their knowledge of Christianity to the Dene, intending to replace Dene aboriginal beliefs with those of Catholicism. Their mission was to bring the Good News to the poor, by which they meant any people deprived of Christian revelation and of the ministry of the Roman Catholic Church. They considered the Dene the poorest of the poor and therefore chosen especially for them—chosen by God and the Church and even by the Dene who had asked them to come. To fulfil this duty, the Oblates first had to communicate with the Dene. That communication was not simply by language. The priority, Tache insisted, was that the priest must love the Natives to whom he was sent. They would listen and learn from those who liked them, but avoided and distrusted those who seemed to dislike them, thus negating any prospects of conversion.26 The observance of this admonition, of course, varied greatly with the individual characters of the Oblates. When the Dene gathered to trade, the Oblates held missions similar to those of Restoration France. They employed their whole range of audiovisual techniques to communicate the Gospel. They gave instructions each day, heard confessions, and taught prayers and hymns. A cross was planted to signify the arrival of a new force in the life of the Dene, marked by the changes in belief and behaviour resulting from the mission. It also served as a rallying point for prayers by the Dene after the mission was over, just as it had in Restoration France. The priest shook hands with each person on arrival, just as in France he had made sure to visit each house. For the Dene, as for other Native groups, handshaking was part of the formal ritual of establishing a relationship, just as it was for Europeans. It also signified that each party accepted the rights and duties of that relationship.27 To refuse to shake hands was a great insult and denied the possibility of a friendly relationship. When the rivalry with the Anglicans was at its height, the Dene opposed to Catholicism would refuse to shake hands with the priests, while those in 78

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favour of it would refuse to shake hands with the ministers.28 The Oblates also refused to shake hands with any of their excommunicated converts. This repudiation was not seen by the Dene or the Oblates as a simple social insult; it was a religious act, comparable to the practice of shunning in some faiths. As they had done in Provence, the Oblates emphasized the communication of the Gospel to the Dene in their own languages. It was expensive to hire interpreters and sometimes their translations proved quite faulty. One sermon encouraging the Indians to "la chastete" (chastity) was expressed with great enthusiasm by the interpreter as "la chasse d'ete" (the summer hunt).29 The study of the Dene languages was the principal occupation of the Oblates' first years in the north. It was an arduous task, since each mission station demanded a knowledge of more than one language; a priest was often moved to a new station with one or more languages different from the one he had just learned. A.K. Isbister thought it impossible for a European to master the Chipewyan tongue, it was so harsh and guttural and difficult to enunciate. These difficulties were compounded by the fact that they used the same word for kettle, stove, spade, spoon, and tin dish, because they were all made from iron.30 Most of the Oblates proved to be good linguists; those few, such as Germain Eynard, who found it impossible to learn the languages, suffered great personal anguish at their inability to preach missions. Knowledge of the language was not only essential to communicate the Gospel to the Dene, it was also a way for the Oblates to reach a better understanding of Native culture. Petitot claimed that through his study of the Dene languages he had arrived at "a world of logic, metaphysics and philosophy,"31 quite distinct from his own. Few would make that claim, but most did increase their sensitivity and alter their perceptions to varying degrees. The Dene ascribed outsiders' knowledge of their language to magic or medicine.32 In their view, such knowledge was a gift from the spirits, not the result of an individual's studiousness; it was a manifestation of spiritual power, not of intellectual aptitude. To some extent the Oblates shared this view of language as power, for it gave them the edge over the Anglicans. Petitot refused Bompas's request to teach him the Chipewyan language.33 Grollier refused to send some Chipewyan words to Bernard Ross to give to the naturalist Kennicott34 for fear that Ross might also give them to the Anglican minister.35 He was appalled to learn that Grandin had shared his vocabulary with Ross and Kennicott.36 •WHEN TWO W O R L D S MET

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Father Dupont, OMI, teaching catechism. [AD]

The production of books in the Native languages followed quickly on the acquisition of the language. The OMI adapted the syllabic alphabet of the Wesleyan missionary Rev. James Evans to the Dene languages, using a somewhat simpler form than did the Anglicans. Their books were also a more convenient size, suitable for the Dene to hang around their necks or inside their coats.37 These "noiseless emissaries"38 of the Catholic faith enabled the Dene to learn their prayers, hymns, and catechisms very quickly. The first to learn to read, in conformity with their own traditions, taught the rest. Readers served as lay missionaries of the new faith, augmenting the brief periods of instruction by the priests. By the end of the nineteenth century, however, the syllables fell into disuse; the Roman alphabet was used in religious books and in the schools.39 But as late as 1935 some of the most remote Slaveys took pride in learning and teaching the syllables to each other.40 It was, however, through the dictionaries and books issued by the

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Oblates in various Dene languages that some knowledge of the spoken language was preserved.41 The faith was taught to the Dene by means of the catechism, as it was throughout the Church. The rote learning of questions and answers was a very appropriate method for those used to an oral tradition with its emphasis on memory. The Oblates used the Quebec catechisms or composed simple ones in the Native tongues. Metis assistance was vital in the production of these catechisms; Baptiste St. Cyr was the primary source for the first small Chipewyan catechism prepared by Faraud and Tache at Nativity.42 Tache soon realized, however, that this work needed revisions. On his visit to Nativity in 1853, he and Grandin met with some Natives to correct the prayers, catechism, and hymns, before arranging to have it published in Montreal.43 Much rivalry developed when individual Oblates prepared differing translations, each prepared to claim his was the most accurate.44 That some words were acceptable to one group of Natives and unacceptable to others was a further challenge.4^ These difficulties were compounded by the cost and inconvenience of printing syllables in Montreal or France, where no one could proofread the results. Many Oblates sought government subsidies to cover the cost of the publication of their books.46 The bishops eventually secured their own printing presses. These too presented difficulties; Grouard spent almost two years producing books in Chipewyan, Beaver and Hare at Lac La Biche, with much hard labour, since the press had to be operated by hand.47 As they had in Restoration France, and perhaps with more force on the Dene, who were so often close to death during these years, the Oblates stressed the last judgment of the individual, which determined whether he went to heaven or hell. The Dene were familiar with the necessity to live a good life to ensure prosperity on the earth and a dwelling-place in the sky after death. The terrors of the last judgment, of hellfire and brimstone, however, were new and frightening to them. Hymns were an important way to convey the Good News, as they had been in the home missions of France. The teaching of songs derived from dreams was customary for the Dene. The Oblates' emphasis on hymns expressing their religious teaching was readily identified by the Dene with the dream-songs of the makers of inkonze, thus obscuring the distinction between priests and powerful makers of medicine. Roman Catholic hymns using French tunes and Native words became very popular, especially when

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the priests wrote them in syllabic characters to teach the Dene to read.48 They also taught them some of the Latin hymns that were sung throughout the Catholic world. When the participants in the Denendeh Seminar visited Fort Rae in 1987, they found that the elders still sang these hymns at Sunday Mass, unwilling to lose this part of their heritage. Mournful dirges such as the Requiem or the Dies irae, however, were feared asjonglerieby the Natives in the early days of missions.49 Both the Oblates and the Dene prized priests with good singing voices; Tache's inability to sing caused the Chipewyan at lie a la Crosse to prefer Lafleche's ceremonies.5° Musical instruments were much in demand; harmoniums and concertinas were transported with much difficulty (and vociferous complaints from the boatmen!) to help in the work of the missions. The Oblates did not attempt to incorporate drumming into their music, however, partly because of its close connection to Native jonglerie, and partly because it was not customary in France or Quebec. Holy pictures were also essential teaching aids. As improvements were made in the printing process, these became cheaper and easier to obtain. Most were printed in France, another manifestation of the French influence in Catholic foreign missions. European holy pictures were another way by which to immerse the Dene in the devotions of the Church and its European culture. But they were also adaptable to Dene life and piety; the pictures, which they hung in their tents, served as a focus for their prayers. From the early days of missions, however, the Dene were as selective about these holy pictures as they were towards all the trade goods they accepted. Many preferred the products of Epinal because their paper did not tear as easily as the others,51 or because of the bright colours.52 They favoured pictures with flowers and with persons dressed in red or blue.53 These were all European representations, accepted by the Dene apparently without questions as to their appropriateness. Seguin, however, had to add culottes (trousers) to the figures in some pictures before giving them to the Hares, whom he thought would have been scandalized at this particular European representation.54 The Dene also refused to accept pictures with serpents in them. This posed some difficulties, since pictures of Mary treading on the serpent were among the most popular elsewhere in the Catholic world, and especially so with Oblates dedicated to Mary Immaculate. Some Dene met this challenge by cutting the serpent out of the picture.55 The teachings of the Oblates could not replace the Dene conviction that representations of evil were in themselves evil. 82

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Father Xavier Ducot, OMI, painting chapel at Fort Norman. [PAAAjti/o]

Interior of Roman Catholic Chapel at Liard, 5 August 1892. [PAM, Hudson's Bay Company Archives, James McDougall Collection, 1987/13/217 (N8p8i)J

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Several priests, including Petitot, Ducot, and Grouard, devoted their artistic talents to embellishing the early chapels and churches with religious art in the European style. Often the relatives of the priests sent statues from France; later in the century some of these came from Quebec. Some indigenization occurred at Good Hope, where Bella and Dora Gaudet made decorations for the chapel. The Oblates gave rosaries and medals to the Dene to aid them in demonstrating and preserving their Catholicism. The rosary, and many medals, were connected to the devotion to Mary so prominent in nineteenth-century France and especially among the Oblates. Their usage in the Athabasca-Mackenzie conformed to practice in the universal Church. But they were especially useful with people who, with their strong oral traditions, could easily learn the repetitive prayers of the rosary and the special significance of each medal. James Anderson, noting the attraction these held, asked for cheap Roman Catholic rosaries and silver crosses to trade at Fort Chipewyan.56The rosaries entwined around the crosses in northern cemeteries always draw the attention of outsiders. Sometimes, even today, children put the rosary they receive at First Communion on the grave of their grandmother or other close relative. This continuity of affection and belief represents one way in which Catholicism has become integrated into the offerings which marked traditional Dene life and culture. The medals, crosses, rosaries, and holy pictures were physical reminders of particular facets of belief. They can be considered as the technology of religion—and technology is said to be the easiest aspect of culture to change.57 Just as the Dene were quick to adopt new European tools for trapping and hunting without a fundamental alteration of their culture, so they could readily accept the new objects and rituals of religion. The technology of religion could improve the spiritual contact that was so vital to them, just as the technology of the fur trade had improved their ability to hunt and trap. Yet the adoption of such new technology, in religion as in trade, did not immediately alter their fundamental cultural outlook. Medals and crosses also served another function—that of differentiating the Catholic Indians and preventing them from attending the Anglican services. This double use, as reminders of the teachings of the Catholic faith and as warnings against Protestantism, distinguished the nineteenth-century missions of the Church. Denominational rivalry then reached an unprecedented level in foreign missions, perhaps never more fierce than in the Athabasca-Mackenzie. The Anglicans often sought to remove these medals and crosses from people they sought to convert. 84

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Norbert Blanchet, a secular priest in Oregon, developed a new technique of evangelization, known as the Catholic ladder. The Oblates used Albert Lacombe's adaptation, to such an extent that it is more usually called Lacombe's Catholic ladder. It portrayed the history of the Old and New Testaments and that of the Church. Forty bars represented the four thousand years from the Creation to the birth of Christ. Dots marked each century. Pictures alongside the bars and dots illustrated the Ten Commandments, the Seven Sacraments, the Flood, the Garden of Eden, the Reformation, and so on, at the appropriate time. The Protestant churches were represented as diverging from the path at the time of the Reformation. If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, the priests could feel complimented that the CMS missionary, Kirkby, adopted it to his use, showing the Catholics diverging from the true path and going down to hell. 58 By using this ladder, missionaries could teach a great deal about their religion, even when they had little knowledge of the local language. The Catholic ladder, like the small books of hymns and catechisms, was a teaching instrument that could also be used by lay spiritual leaders in the camps. 59 Encouraged by the priests, the Dene soon altered their seasonal round to attend the great feasts of Christmas and Easter at the various missions. This affected their trading patterns and economy, often inducing them to move their winter camps closer to the post and to trade more frequently. Economic factors sometimes increased their attendance at the mission. As the number of caribou declined through the i88os, the Hares spent more time in summer fishing on the Mackenzie River. They could come to Mass each Sunday, though this often meant a walk of four or five hours. This increased reliance on fishing extended throughout the fall, so that the women began to come in for All Saint's on November i, which became known as La fete desfemmes. Another feast which gained great importance for whole families was that of the Assumption (August 15). By the early twentieth century devotion to the Sacred Heart and the First Fridays gained in prominence among the Dene, as it did elsewhere in the Catholic world.60 New Church teaching advocating the more frequent reception of Communion was transmitted to the Dene. The faith preached to them by the first Oblates was amplified by later developments in theology and devotion and the Dene continued to be a part of the changing universal Church. As their familiarity with the north progressed and their ability to travel increased, the priests of each mission began to make regular visits to winter •WHEN TWO W O R L D S MET

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camps in their vicinity. There they instructed the people more thoroughly and brought them the sacraments. They formed a kind of itinerant parish, which augmented lay leadership in the camps and ensured a close conformity to the practices of the universal Church. Often they found these visits more productive than the preached missions, which had to compete with the attractions of trade, hand-games, and treaty payments. When the Dene had received sufficient instruction, the Oblates admitted them to the sacraments of the Church: Baptism, Penance, Holy Eucharist, Confirmation, Matrimony, Holy Orders, and Extreme Unction.61 These were the visible signs and channels of grace, of a share in God's life, and of membership in the Church, extending from birth to death. Thus, they nourished the individual and the community at once. Many Dene considered the sacraments to be God's spiritual gifts to strengthen them.62 Communion and Confirmation were often translated as "making the heart strong." The attitude of the Dene to baptism, the primary rite of Christian initiation, was at first ambivalent. At Fort Chipewyan during Tache's first visit in 1847, the Chipewyan were eager to have their children baptized, but two Cree refused. One of these children was sick. The father protested that he wanted his son to be cured by means of Native medicine and songs which, he thought, would be ineffective on a baptized child. This is an early example of an opposition between Native and Roman Catholic religious beliefs. Formerly Native tradition had welcomed new and productive ways of contact with the spirits. Now some people feared that belief in Catholicism would destroy that contact with the spirits, which was so essential to Native life. They suspected that these new teachings could not be merged with former beliefs, but would obliterate them. Ambiguous reactions to the new teachings appeared in most of the missions. The fact that the priests baptized those in danger of death, even if they were not instructed in the faith, led many to blame baptism for causing them to die.63 Others feared that baptism would affect their ability to hunt by detracting from their medicine powers; Lenoir at Providence failed in the hunt after his baptism, asserting that he still saw the animals and followed them, but they only laughed at him.6^ Some were afraid that they could not use their curing medicine if they were baptized. In a time of serious illness at Liard, even those interested in Catholicism refused to be baptized. They preferred to use their traditional ways of hand-games and medicine; the drum sounded all during the mission and five even gambled their rosaries,6^ displaying a level of adaptation unacceptable to the

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priests.66 In every way baptism seemed opposed to traditional medicine as a way of ensuring good hunting and good health, a situation made more frightening in that time of repeated and mortal epidemics. These fears sometimes appeared even before direct contact with the priests. In 1858 Grollier sent down some books and crosses to the Good Hope Indians, whom he hoped to see the next year. When many of their people died during the winter of 1858—1859, they blamed Grollier's books for causing their deaths. Lecore, their leader, told Archdeacon Hunter that wherever the priests went among the Indians baptizing, whether at lie a la Crosse, Athabasca, or Great Slave Lake, the Indians died. Hunter attempted to distance himself from this by telling Lecore that very few of the many people he had baptized over several years had died.67 Many Dene, however, sought baptism, displaying their traditional readiness to accept new ways of belief and ritual. They also demonstrated a mixture of motives. Some were anxious to be baptized before death, baptism becoming for them "the springboard of salvation."68 Some regarded baptism as good medicine, which would ensure their health and prosperity, like that of the priests, who did not suffer from the diseases which killed the Dene. Others, such as the three chiefs of the Bear Lake Dogribs in 1864, who had been baptized, wanted all their kin to be baptized so they could all be reunited in heaven.69 This belief corresponds to that of many Hurons in the seventeenth-century Jesuit missions of New France, for whom separation from kin, even though in heaven, was inconceivably painful. The priests readily baptized the children of "infidels," yet these children often received no further instruction. The mortality rate meant that many died before maturity. The Oblates considered it their duty to baptize them, even though some would be Christian in name only when they grew up. A further incentive was that after their children were baptized, the parents considered themselves too as belonging, to some extent, to the Roman Catholic Church and refused to join the Anglicans. If the priests did not baptize their children, the Anglicans would, and then they would refuse Catholicism.70 Confession, which had many parallels in Dene beliefs, was more generally attractive to the Dene than was baptism; they were usually very eager to confess even before they were baptized. In later years, even the makers of medicine sought confession,71 suggesting an increasing willingness to combine Catholicism with some aspects of Native beliefs. Traditional Native culture encouraged public confession to rid a person of guilt and of the consequences of that guilt on the individual, the hunt, or the welfare of the • W H E N TWO W O R L D S M E T

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whole community. Their concept of guilt, however, was quite different from that inculcated by the Catholic doctrine of sin. In Native society, guilt could be incurred even when the person was unaware of doing wrong, whereas sin for the Catholic was the choice of an errant free will. In Native medicine, the sufferer, prodded by the maker of medicine, sought to recall the act itself, and in so doing to rid himself of guilt. By his sin he had upset the sacred order of things. By recalling and expressing the evil done in words, the person could get rid of it and restore order.72 One might think that some rules of the Church, such as those requiring abstinence from meat, would be viewed as similar to Native taboos and that breaking them would evoke similar feelings of guilt. This does not seem to have been the case, perhaps because abstention from meat was almost impossible in the north for many months of the year. Grandin learned not to check on this in confession; when he had done so, the Metis and Indians simply avoided the sacraments.73 Some converts were puzzled and sought advice from the priests about whether it was all right to eat tripes and fish eggs, dog or crow,74 evidencing some connection in their minds between the rules of the Church and those of aboriginal food taboos. The priests spent hours in the confessional at the times of missions, directing and encouraging a lifestyle suitable to Roman Catholicism, even before the penitents could be baptized. The privacy of confession required by the Catholic faith, however, was a new factor to the Dene, and not always welcomed or understood. The Dene detailed everything in confession, as they were accustomed to doing when receiving medicine. To be sure they did not forget anything, they wrote their sins down on paper, bark, or little boards, using devices customary to aid memory in oral society. One old woman came with a long string of different-shaped knots on a string, resembling a rosary, which was her way of remembering each of her faults. This method had been used by the Incas many centuries before.75 The Dene were deeply hurt when the priests occasionally refused to hear their confessions, as was customary with the incorrigible in Europe. One man, who had rejected his wife, stripped a big tree, opposite Grandin, of its bark and began to write his sins on it with charcoal so that the priest would be forced to see them. The public recognition of his sins by Grandin would satisfy him. Grandin, however, refused to look at the tree and made him erase what he had written. He would not hear his confession until he had taken back his wife.76 Infrequent Communion was still customary in the mid-nineteenth-century Church, especially in areas influenced by Jansenist teaching. There was 88

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-*"• First Communion at Fort Chipewyan, 1930. Fathers Laferte and Coudert and unidentified Grey Nun with children. [PAA OB 10701]

added hesitation in the north, because of cultural differences and uncertainty about procedures in these new missions. When Tache was in France for his consecration, he told Mazenod that he had not thought it proper to admit the Indians to Communion. Their infrequent contact with the priests gave little hope of instructing them to the same level required in Europe before reception of the sacrament. Mazenod, however, urged Tache to make it a policy to give Communion as soon as possible to the Indians. The Oblates praised the results of this new policy. Grandin said those who received Communion understood religion better and had more courage to observe it, while those who had not been admitted to Communion tried to earn it by good behaviour, calling it the sacrament which made their hearts strong.77 Perhaps the Dene envisioned Jesus' self-sacrifice, constantly repeated in the Eucharist, as similar to that of the animal spirits, who gave of themselves so that the Dene might continue to live. Ritual action and proper behaviour encouraged the continuity of this gift, whereas failure to do so meant retribution in illness and possibly even death.78 Such an expectation was consonant with Dene beliefs before the Oblate missions and would be a natural result from their initial conversion. Confirmation too was a sacrament "which makes the heart strong."79 When transport improved, the bishops made more regular visits to each mission and Confirmation became a more usual practice. There was no WHEN TWO -WORLDS MET

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hesitation about conferring this sacrament as there had been with Communion. The Church rules on monogamous lifetime marriage presented the most problems to the missionaries as they sought to integrate the Dene into the life of the Church. The other sacraments did not require such deeprooted personal and public cultural changes. The Oblates struggled both with the prevalence of polygamy in Native society and with the Dene attitudes to women, which were at variance with those recommended by the Church. Tache thought Chipewyan wives were virtual slaves, with no rights, not even that of choosing their husband. He was appalled that their husbands, usually so gentle, treated their wives so severely.80 Grandin suspected that the Chipewyan wives of converted men took advantage of the fact that the priests would not pray with their husbands if they took new wives. They became much more difficult to live with, avenging themselves for the treatment they had received before the arrival of the priests.81 Good hunters usually had several wives, since it was a woman's task to prepare the skins. If they moved camp, the man carried his rifle and blanket and the wife took everything else. He chose the new site and the wife set up camp; she cut poles for the lodge, spread the skins, cut wood for the fire, cooked the meal, set up the blankets, and did all the other chores. The husband watched her while he smoked his pipe; to help her would be to dishonour himself. The priests tried to persuade the Christian men to help their wives, but it was very difficult for the men to change the ingrained habits of a lifetime.82 They regarded their wives not as companions but as their property or servants, bought, loaned, or sold at will.83 The marriage ceremony was simple and separation, if it occurred, came only at the husband's initiative.84 Alexander Mackenzie noted that although women were much in the power of men, they were always consulted and had considerable influence over trade with Europeans and other important matters. Chief Trader Bernard Ross observed of the Dene that: The custom of robbing one another of their wives, or of fighting for them, the facilities for divorce, and the inferior estimation in which women are held, combine to produce a very lax condition of the marriage ties.8 5 The Chipewyan woman with whom Ross lived had run away from him and taken shelter with Beaulieu; Ross pursued her and, in the presence of the crews of five boats, took her from Beaulieu's lodge, forcing her to return 9O

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to him.86 Later, he arranged to have her marry one of the HBC servants, Jean-Baptiste Davis, so that he could marry Christina Ross, daughter of Chief Factor Donald Ross,8^ so there was a high degree of hypocrisy in his remarks. These observations on Dene marriage and the role of women were all made by outsiders, and men at that, and perhaps should be discounted. Yet, their views are supported in reports of female infanticide, in which the mothers justified their deed because it saved the baby from the hard life of a mature woman. Mission literature nevertheless presents many instances of strong-minded women who aided the priests by their words and example, and sometimes with their fists. These women challenge the supposition that Dene women were always submissive and subordinate. Those men with more than one wife faced a heart-wrenching decision if they desired to join the Church. Often, they had children to look after and were unable to provide for them in any other way than by continuing their marriages. Those who did leave their wives relegated them to the inferior status of dependent widows or servants. Some men feared reprisals by the women's relatives if they rejected them.88 Even after conversion, many men wanted to keep their old customs of changing wives, practising a kind of serial monogamy rather than polygamy, but this too was unacceptable to Catholicism. The priests excommunicated these people, refused to shake hands with them, and imposed other public penances. Such exclusion was very painful to those affected. The patriarchalism of the Church also had its effects on the role of women. The Oblates opposed the Dene practice of female seclusion at the time of menstruation and encouraged its abandonment. They regarded this central ritual of female Dene as superstition incompatible with Catholicism. The priests used the devotion to Mary, so prominent in the contemporary Church and so dear to their own religious congregation, to induce a higher respect for all women, and to celebrate virginity as an ideal. The stringent Catholic rules against premarital sex probably motivated women to claim virgin births, as they did at Good Hope in 1868—1869.89 In another case, the exaltation of virginity merged with spiritual revelations and messianic hopes. A young Hare woman, who had been baptized as a child and brought up and married in the Church, separated almost immediately from her husband. She claimed that God had revealed to her that she would be the mother of his son, Jesus, reincarnated again for the salvation of the world.90 Her father believed that she had seen the Blessed Virgin and would W H E N TWO -WORLDS MET

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replace her soon for the greater glory of the Dene, more particularly the Hares. She died less than a year later, without giving birth to the promised reincarnated messiah, but also without forsaking her doctrine. There is a strong element of nativism in this conviction that Mary and her son, Jesus, as taught by the Oblates, were intended only for whites, not for the Dene. A new messiah would be born of a new Dene virgin mother for the salvation of the Catholic Dene. The appearance of a Native messiah had also been expected in other regions of Native North America. Some followers of Wovoka, leader of the Ghost Dance, claimed that he was the new messiah, coming to Natives, since Jesus' appearance to the whites had led to his death.91 In the Good Hope case, the belief in a new messiah showed the influence of Oblate teaching on the importance of Mary's role in that incarnation. The support given this woman by her relatives represented the lasting influence of Dene traditional acceptance of new revelations given to their own kindred. Kinship rules also made it difficult for the priests to impose Church regulations on marriage. Native terminology, with the same words to signify brother and cousin, a natural son and an adopted son, a son and a nephew, made it almost impossible to decide degrees of consanguinity. When a man married, his wife's relatives became his relatives, adding to the confusion. The small number of inhabitants of the north and their intricate web of relationships caused enormous difficulties for the Oblates.92 By 1890, at Good Hope, Ducot traced the genealogy of some families and found that the descendants had married within the forbidden degrees and were sometimes related in several ways. He decided he could do nothing about this, especially since by that time they were opposed to marriage within the Church, claiming that it caused death.93 Although such references are common regarding baptism, this is the only one which associated Catholic marriage as a cause of death. Marriage cases also brought some conflict with the HBC because its Chief Factors could perform civil marriages. A long list of complaints and counterclaims arose from the marriage of Jean-Baptiste Boucher dit Lamalice to Nancy Brough, daughter of Colin Hoole. Both had been married previously by HBC factors. Faraud and Grandin took depositions from witnesses, as James Anderson had requested them to do, and then publicized their opinion that neither previous marriage was binding. Anderson exploded in rage at the affront to the authority of the Company.94 He warned Simpson that if Tactic did not "put a stop to such

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hasty, ill advised and illegal proceedings neither I nor any one else will be able to maintain order in this District."95 Another motive for disagreement between the HBC and the Oblates over marriage was an economic one. Robert Campbell, in charge of Fort Chipewyan, tried to prevent the Oblates from performing the marriage ceremony for any of his servants, unless they first received his permission, because the "overhead" cost of supporting wives and children of employees was becoming too heavy. The priests, however, insisted that good morality was more important than economics. They agreed to advise the young people to ask Campbell's permission, out of politeness, but would go ahead and marry them if Campbell refused.9'' All efforts to gain indigenous vocations to the priesthood in these early years failed, thus denying the sacrament of Holy Orders to the Dene. Tache and Grandin sent some boys to Quebec for training; a few died there, and the rest found seminary life too difficult and confining. Training in the north was unavailable; in fact, Grandin believed that the Natives would not have confidence in these boys unless they were taken away for training.97 This ran counter to the CMS practice of ordaining Native ministers in the field. It was one situation in which the CMS held the upper hand. The fact that boys, in general, spent less time at the residential schools than did the girls precluded giving them the groundwork necessary to pursue seminary training, even when it became available in western Canada. A more important drawback to indigenous vocations was the rule of celibacy, which proved an insuperable obstacle to many young men. The OMI insisted that the Dene did not want married men as their priests;98 they regarded the celibacy of the priests as miraculous,99 perhaps even as another sign of their great spiritual powers. Their CMS opponents often denigrated Roman Catholic celibacy, spreading rumours that in other countries the priests had wives. Kirkby, however, thought the rules on celibacy showed a certain "worldly wisdom" by the Roman Catholics, since the priests were spared all the extra expense and cares involved in transporting wives and children to a mission field. On the other hand, the Oblates recognized the superior ability of the Anglicans to gain indigenous vocations, since they did not demand celibacy nor send boys away for training. It was not until the twentieth century that the first indigenous Oblate priests from the Athabasca-Mackenzie were ordained. These were Napoleon Laferte, son of Antoine Laferte and Madeleine Beaulieu, from Fort Providence, in 1923, and Patrice Mercredi at Fort Chipewyan in

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1934-10° Some have objected that this practical exclusion of the Dene from the priesthood denied them real integration into the Roman Catholic Church. This argument presupposes that only the clergy can serve as exemplars and that faith is centred on the hierarchy; on those grounds it is patently false. Certainly Catholic women would deny this and the Dene Catholic elders to whom I talked never mentioned it as a barrier to their status as Catholics. Participation in the hierarchy through an ordained position was a facet of the institutional church as foreign to Dene traditions as was the system of Western education in residential schools. They were accustomed to leadership based on individual contact with the spirits, with authority derived from that contact. Undoubtedly, the fact that there have been so few indigenous priests has excluded them from the power and authority structure of the Church, just as their inability to vote until recently has left them on the fringes of political power. Bishop Denis Croteau, OMI, has recently recommended to Rome that there should be some relaxation of the rules against married clergy in the north. Only married men were accepted as leaders among the Dene and Inuit. By marrying and raising a family, they proved that they were elders and men of experience who deserved respect.101 A more mundane and pressing reason for a change is the severe shortage of priests and the urgent necessity to provide spiritual leadership in the scattered communities, many of which no longer have a resident priest. Married Dene priests would serve an intermediate role between the lay spiritual leadership of the early days of missions and the authority wielded by white priests for most of this century. Extreme Unction, the last sacrament, could only be given to those few people the priests saw when they were near death. Others were buried in the woods by their relatives, who marked the spot, so that when a missionary passed by, he could give them the last blessings of the Church.102 This was in accord with aboriginal belief in the importance of proper burial for the final rest of the soul. Inclusion in the sacramental life of the Church carried with it the possibility of exclusion. Excommunication separated people from the community of the faithful by prohibiting them from sharing in the life of the Church, especially through the Eucharist. This was singularly painful for the Dene, to whom community life was so essential. Most excommunications occurred because individuals were unwilling, or unable, to conform to the rules of monogamy and to stay with one spouse until death. In the early years of missions, the priests refused to shake hands with excommuni94

TROM THE CJREAT -RIVER TO THE 'ENDS OF THE T A R T H

cates. Some employed ruses so that they could receive a handshake from priests who did not know them or their marital history.103 Others moved from one mission to another in the hope of avoiding detection.10^ On occasion, excommunicates threatened priests who refused to pray with them or to shake their hands.10^ In some missions, habitual hand-game players were excommunicated, primarily because of the bad consequences of their gambling on their families. The Oblates were also irritated because the players devoted all their time and attention to the games, instead of listening to them preach.106 Trained in the methods of evangelization that had proved useful with the poor of Provence, the first Oblate missionaries applied the same techniques to teach the Dene. They shared with them the same faith, the same sacraments, the same devotions, and the same discipline that prevailed for all members of the Church. In what they taught, they made no adaptation to Dene beliefs. Their use of the Dene languages indeed induced a measure of adaptation and sometimes more than was intended. The Oblates taught the Dene to read in syllables and they made catechisms and hymn-books for them to take to their camps. They made their religious ceremonies as attractive as possible to the Dene, leading some to alter their seasonal routine so that they could attend the missions at Christmas and Easter. But the faith adopted by the Dene did not demand major changes to their economic life. The Oblates were convinced that the Dene way of life could be as Christian, perhaps more so, than that led by literate agricultural and urban peoples. Those Dene customs and beliefs which had some parallels to Christianity could lead to acceptance of Catholicism, though not always in the way that the Oblates expected. Those who were eager for baptism, confession, and communion, though they accepted what the priests taught and believed in the Christian God, often viewed their new faith as similar to, but more potent, than their previous medicines. They could not be expected to abandon all their traditions immediately and adopt a new way of understanding the world along with their new faith.

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7 XAY L E A D E R S H I P A M O N G THE T>ENE

JL n evangelizing the Dene, the Oblates were aided by Dene and Metis leaders who accepted Catholicism and spread the word among their kin. The Oblates depended on these lay assistants, much as Dene spiritual leaders depended on acceptance of their revelations by their relatives. The new doctrine demanded followers, just as aboriginal teachings had. When the Dene first met the priests, they viewed them as persons of great spiritual power, sometimes as the Son of God, who could prolong life and cure illness.1 The actions of the priests were comparable in many ways to those of traditional Native spiritual leaders. As their own spiritual leaders did, the priests claimed to teach them the right way to pray, often in a ritu-

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alistic fashion, and tried to cure them in times of illness. The divine revelation which the Oblates preached must, to Dene minds, have been derived from their dreams; because they had so much to tell, the Dene naturally thought of them as powerful medicine-makers.2 The priests attempted to deny any parallel with Dene makers of medicine. They claimed a much more authoritative and compelling role. They based their status not on their own individual spirituality, but on their defined role as ordained ministers of a highly-structured church with a very specific body of theological doctrine. The priests saw the Dene for short periods of time each year and could not impose their teachings and authority. The priests were so occupied during the mission in hearing confessions, settling quarrels, and sometimes in constructing their houses, that they could give only a very basic explanation of Catholicism. Though their missions were similar to those carried out in Restoration France, any lasting results depended on the Dene understanding and accepting what the priests taught. They differed from the people of Provence in that all the Oblate teachings were new to them, whereas in France the people had a tradition of Catholicism and were surrounded by church buildings, shrines, and crosses. But the Dene proved very ready to adopt the new teachings. Their traditional method of learning gave them an insight and comprehension that would astonish those unused to Indian ways, as Tache observed.3 Dene ways of learning proved very effective for the spread of the Oblate message. Just as they needed to understand all the circumstances of the hunt, so they wanted to know all about the new religion. They questioned the priests about the exact meaning of what they said, and wanted to know why God had said certain things. Once they clarified it in their own minds, they shared their understanding with their kin,4 for these novel and exciting doctrines were a major topic of discussion in their winter camps. Their thoughtful approach contradicts any suggestion that they only accepted Catholicism for reasons of strategy or convenience. The Dene also practised their new faith during the long periods of time away from the priests. On Sundays and special occasions, they gathered in a lodge, where they sang hymns and said the rosary; then, sitting in a big circle, the leaders repeated the instructions they had heard at the mission—a process known as "making Mass" (faire la messe).^ These words, still in use today, denote an accepted parallel in Dene thinking between the role of the priests and that of their own spiritual leaders. In this way, the people integrated Catholic teaching into their lives to a much greater extent than

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would have been possible for the priests acting alone. At the same time, because that integration was done on their own terms and according to their own understanding, the final result was bound to vary considerably from the way in which the Oblates understood Catholicism. Spiritual activities that blended traditional customs with Roman Catholicism were central at many camps well into the twentieth century. John Blondin6 told of how the person who knew the syllabic Bible used to read the Gospel and talk to the people. The weekly church service was always followed by a communal feast.7 Many Dene proved very enthusiastic proselytizers for the new religion. A few Caribou-Eater families persuaded their relatives, some from as far away as Churchill, to come to Fond du Lac in 1856 and hear the priest.8 While visiting in their camps they had already taught them the Catholic prayers and how to read, so well, that some were ready for baptism, though they had never seen a priest. Emmanuel, an old man, was their spiritual leader, whom they considered almost as their priest, and whom the Oblates accepted as an informal catechist.9 Emmanuel died in 1866, still encouraging his numerous descendants to be good Christians.10 Such evangelical activities by these new Christians contradict the notion that Catholicism was always imposed on them or was totally alien to their traditions. One of these early apostles at Nativity was Clemence Thanizeneaze, the "grandmother" of the mission, who died 14 September 1866.n She taught the Chipewyan language to the priests and, when necessary, acted as interpreter. Sometimes, on her own initiative, she gave reprimands or good advice to the rest of the Chipewyan, incorporating the moral teachings of Catholicism into the traditional guidance given by elders to the community. The Oblates considered her a model of piety, a good example to her people, and a considerable asset to their initial mission. Pierre Dene-gonouzie gathered together the Chipewyan of Fort Resolution at their camps, taught them Catholic prayers and hymns, gave instructions, and prayed over the dead. He obtained a small bell from Petitot so that he could call the Chipewyan to prayers on Sunday, as the priests did. Some of them resented this, claiming that he had no authority to do so. He then asked the priests to give him one of their old skullcaps to wear, to give him the requisite prestige.12 This appears more an attempt to imitate the official authority of the priest, perhaps required by his use of the new technology of the bell, than to renew the more traditional leadership derived from direct contact with the spirits. Gascon, fearing that this man wanted to be recognized as a priest, refused to give him medals and crosses

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to distribute. In turn, Pierre Dene-gonouzie complained to Bishop Grandin that Gascon was not like the other priests.13 Evidently Dene lay leaders did not lose their autonomy when they adopted Catholicism. Some makers of medicine also imitated some rituals of the priests, attempting to integrate the new ways of spiritual contact without embracing celibacy or abandoning their traditions. A Dogrib man made crosses and medals from old copper kettles and distributed them with solemnity.14 Some Yellowknives imitated the ceremony of the Mass and wore a sort of chasuble like the priests. They also imitated the ritual with which Grandin had planted the cross at the end of the mission.15 The line between Native lay leadership in support of the Church and an effort to assume the hierarchical role of the priests among their own people was sometimes very fine. Cecile Uzpichi"e,1^ who first learned about Catholicism from Mme Gaudet at Fort McPherson, was one of the first Loucheux to be baptized by Grollier. She immediately threw her weight and influence (which were considerable) to the Oblate cause. She was a very large, haughty woman, with a vocabulary of stinging words, backed up, if necessary, by her fists. Since she helped compose the first Loucheux catechism and knew it by heart, she preached when the priest was absent. She also settled questions of conscience, and her decisions were accepted as the final word.17 Her authority illustrates the adaptation by the Dene of the teachings of Catholicism to the moral guidance traditionally given by the elders. Such public preaching by a woman, even by one with such physical force to support her moral authority, would have been inconceivable in European Catholicism. Other early leaders of the Dene, though willing to accept much of Catholicism, also asserted their own revelations and authority. A dene yalt'iyi, or prophet, at Fort Nelson who may have acquired a minimal knowledge of Catholicism from the two visits the Oblates had made to Fort Halkett, made the sign of the cross and preached like the priests. In closer conformity with Native traditions, he claimed to have seen God, a vision which empowered him to perform miracles and know the inmost secrets of the people.18 The prophet came to hear Grouard, though more as a judge than as a disciple. Grouard preached against him, insisting that no one could see God, not he, nor even the bishop, and still less this visionary. Finally, he told those present that they should not listen to this man nor follow his teaching. Nevertheless, when he distributed medals, the prophet asked for some, for himself and his children. Grouard refused to give him any unless he promised to renounce preaching his dreams. Perhaps because he considIOO

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ered it vital that he and his children have the same medals as the rest of the band, or because he feared excommunication, the prophet acceded to Grouard's demands. This episode is an example of the attempts by Native leaders to syncretize Catholicism with their own spirituality to form a new faith that would be more independent of the priests, while still accepting the bulk of Oblate teachings. They were glad to have the priests pray for them and with them, and to get the medals, crosses, and rosaries distributed by the priests. Their teachings were a blend of old and new, as they adopted new methods of contact with the spirits without entirely abandoning the old. They displayed little of the anti-white sentiments that marked some other leaders. Similar leaders appeared in succeeding years at Liard. According to reports, in 1880, after a winter of illness,19 a man claimed to have risen from the dead.20 He said that the priests' religion was partially true but that the only useful prayers were the sign of the cross and short prayers. As a result, his followers stopped reciting the rosary on Sundays. This prophet's influence extended as far as Fort Rae and had comparable results there. No more references were made to him; perhaps he died soon after this report, or lost prestige. Others converted to Catholicism because of their own visions or dreams. The epidemic of 1865, which caused 67 deaths21 at Fort Norman, caused an adamant opponent of the priests, Ella-odeniha, a renowned medicine maker, to convert to Catholicism in November 1866. In his dream, he was in a canoe on the Great River with many of his kin. Suddenly, an abyss opened before them and a cataract appeared, impossible for them to cross. Many went to their deaths but, as he was expecting to follow, he saw a small island with a large white cross on it like the mission cross. Standing at the foot of the cross, a man dressed in an alb called them to come to him if they were to be saved. He did so, and persuaded several others to follow. When he awakened, he was sure this dream could not have come from his own imagination, for he hated the priests, but must have come from God or one of his angels. His dream convinced him that the priest's words were true and he promised to abandon the making of inkonze?^- Petitot baptized him Raphael in December 1866. Petitot also encountered a prophet, Eleazar Ni-denichye (La Terreplantureuse), who assured the priest that he was not opposed to the Catholic faith, but allied to it. He persuaded his relatives to pray the rosary and sing hymns, spoke to them of heaven, and gave them his blessing. Petitot could accept this kind of leadership but told him to forget the dreams, visions,

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trances, simulated resurrections, and reported appearances of angels. These facets of his leadership show that this man was a maker of medicine of considerable renown, who used Catholic teaching as an addition to, not a replacement for, his Native beliefs. Petitot shrewdly suspected that Eleazar would soon lose his following, whereas, if the priest had fought against him, their hearts would have hardened against Christianity.23 Other leaders also combined their status as powerful makers of medicine with their advocacy of the new teachings of the Oblates. In 1862, only two years after Grollier's first visit to Peel's River, five visionaries arose, each of whom claimed to have seen God during the winter. One was Nitte, a powerful medicine-man, whom Seguin met at the fort in 1863.24 At this post, where the conflict between the CMS and the Oblates was most bitter, these leaders, with their combination of Christian and Loucheux elements of belief, often claimed to espouse Catholicism and oppose Anglicanism.25 They knew the Bible, chiefly the Gospels, and were well-versed in the story of St. Paul's vision on the road to Damascus. Seguin thought this was the source for their claims of seeing God, though these owed just as much to Native traditions of direct contact with the spirits. They composed prayers and hymns that all their followers recited.26 This conformed to Native traditional ways of communicating messages from the spirits but also bore some resemblance to Oblate methods of evangelization. The more nativistic elements of the teachings of spiritual leaders declined as the presence of the priests became more prolonged and their teaching more effective. Some lay leaders at Peel's River espoused the CMS cause and opposed the Oblates and their "French" religion. Mrs. Andrew Flett, wife of the HBC Postmaster at Fort McPherson, explained to the Loucheux her version of how that faith began. At the beginning of the world, the English and French lived happily in a garden with one religion. One day, however, the French went away and found some grains. They cultivated these and made chapels from them. When they returned to the garden, they no longer wanted to pray with the English, and made a separate religion for themselves.27 This unusual version of church history enabled her to convert several of her relatives to Anglicanism, though they had previously been somewhat attached to Catholicism. One of the Peel's River prophets, who had agreed to accept Anglicanism, told the minister of his vision of God and heaven. When he had offered to shake hands, God had told him to wash his hands first. This was apparently the result of the Anglican missionaries' habit of handing out cakes of

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soap to their potential converts, showing graphically the belief that cleanliness was at least next to, if not before, godliness! [An interesting comparison could be drawn between these opposing technologies of religion, between the Anglican gifts of soap and the Oblate custom of handing out crosses and medals to their prospective converts.] After the prophet had washed his hands, God had told him to teach his people to observe the Lord's Day and to be kind to each other. They should not set fire to the woods, since the angels, who did not like smoke, would be visiting them. God also predicted that the end of the world would come in five years. The Almighty had also volunteered the information that the Oblates were demons, but that the ministers taught His word.28 This spiritual revelation, merged with rules of behaviour, displayed a very strong amalgam of Native traditions and customs with the new Anglican faith, including a pronounced component of anti-Catholicism. Other prophetic appearances favoured the Oblate cause over the CMS. The Loucheux boatmen returning from La Loche in 1867 told of how Christ had appeared to a few Indians beyond the Portage and stayed with them about thirty days. They fasted during that time and afterwards He fed them with bread from heaven. Christ also assured them that if He did not come that year to judgment, He would the next year. These revelations were hidden from the Protestant Indians, the boatmen said, and they would be unprepared when Christ came.29 This combination of Christian teaching, millennial dreams, and religious rivalry provided some temporary support for Seguin's efforts, though not enough to overcome the strength of the CMS at Peel's River. Some strong elements of Native curing and prophecy survived within those who adopted Catholicism, a mingling which became singularly evident at Fort Nelson. Honigmann cited their definition of a prophet as a "fellow who dreams ahead of time."30 This role of foretelling was blended with the curing role, both evidencing strong supernatural power. Some prophets mingled these aboriginal components with some activities corresponding more closely to those of a priest. One spoke to the people about God at feasts that he arranged and to which all contributed food. The men went on special hunts to get meat for this feast, which the prophet distributed. Old Matoitwore a garment like the priest's alb, with a cross on the back. He also prophesied the future from his dreams. While Afatoitwas speaking, the people sat still and quiet. Adults warned the children that, if they misbehaved, the prophet might kill them by swallowing their shadow. He held

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up a large map with many trails; one trail, the good one, had plenty of moose and bear, while the bad ones that diverged had few animals. Matoit sang and preached, urging the people to follow the good trail.31 There is some parallel here to both aboriginal hunting medicine and to the Catholic ladder. Robin Ridington32 recounted a similar story of a Fort Nelson prophet named Decutla who lived in the early twentieth century. He had a moosehide with a picture of heaven; Ridington interpreted this as a replacement of the lineal, chronological depiction of the Catholic ladder by a rendition of the dreamer's shamanic flight to heaven. Decutla taught from his moosehide, just as the Oblates did from the Catholic ladder. When the bishop wanted to buy it, however, Decutla refused to sell it, saying that if he did so, no more animals would be given for the hunt. As with the OMI holy pictures, so here also, a real power was considered to inhere in the religious artifact. The influence of the Fort Nelson prophets on behalf of Catholicism extended far beyond the post. In 1908 the Fort Nelson prophet sent word to Chief Sunrise of Hay River that, if his people prayed with the Anglican minister, they would all die. Believing this, they refused to attend the Anglican services.33 This brought considerable weight to bear in favour of the Oblates, for Chief Sunrise, previously regarded as implacably antiCatholic, converted to Catholicism in 1909. His influence was so great that five other families soon followed him. This solidified the previously tenuous hold of the Oblates on the people of their mission of Ste. Anne at Hay River. Ayah of Fort Franklin, a prominent spiritual leader of the early twentieth century, was about twelve years old when the first missionary arrived.34 George Blondin thought he was born around 1850; he died in 1941, after living his whole life in the Fort Franklin area. He was born with medicine to help others. When he was young he had a vision and learned that the vision would return, if he were a good man and taught his people.3^ When he was forty years old, the voice told him to get "words written on paper" from the priest for his marriage. Ayah already had a rosary, even before the priests came. After his marriage, he began to teach the people about God. Though he had no formal education, he could read all the stories in the Bible. The people who only saw the priest once or twice a year at Fort Norman travelled great distances to hear him. Ayah combined his teachings with emphatic moral directives against drinking alcohol and

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gambling, foreseeing a future of much pain for the Dene who ignored these precepts.36 His age and wisdom gave him real authority, which he used as a Catholic spiritual leader in much the same way as had the first lay leaders in the various Oblate missions. Cecilia Tourangeau remembered how he would tell everybody "we'll have prayers in my house."37 The women sang hymns in Slavey, then said the rosary for their dead, and sang more hymns. Afterwards, old Ayah would talk to the people. He would take his prayer book, written in Slavey syllables, and recount what God told them in this book. More than fifty years later, she still remembered what he taught and how he danced with her at her wedding. Dependence on priests and the rituals of the Church to preserve Catholicism in the north was impossible when the people spent so much of the year without seeing priest or chapel. Their circumstances, however, were not so different from those of the Provencal people during the Restoration, who received intensive periods of instruction, followed by many months without contact with priests. In the north, the Oblates were forced to conform, to some extent, to Dene society. They recognized the traditional respect given by the Dene to spiritual leaders within their community and the novelty, to them, of the central role of the ordained Catholic priest in the Mass and the sacraments. Though they refused to accept the assumption of a priestly role by Dene laymen, the Oblates recognized the value of lay spiritual leadership in the camps. This leadership continued to be an integral element of Dene Catholicism, up to and beyond 1921. As was true for their aboriginal spiritual leaders, these lay Catholic leaders owed their position, not to ordination, but to personal qualities of spirituality, accepted as such by those around them. Many had been makers of inkonze before the Oblates came. Those who became lay leaders agreed to reject their old practices in favour of the new. But the new lay leaders relied on revelation in the syllabic written word rather than solely on individual messages from the spirits. This new type of revelation came to the Dene from Scripture, mediated through Oblate teaching. It interposed a new medium of spiritual contact—the Oblates and their books—as spiritual messengers to the Dene. The Oblates could not have succeeded in evangelizing the Dene without the help of these lay leaders. Their efforts to understand the teachings of the priests, their acceptance of Catholicism, their exhortations to others to follow their example, their devotion and preaching through the winter, all

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helped to preserve the impact and extend the reach of the Oblates. At the same time, these leaders did much to indigenize Catholicism, adapting its teachings to their own life and culture, while preserving the essential unity of doctrine. Finally, it was the adoption of Catholicism by their own spiritual leaders that motivated many Dene to retain their original interest in the novelty of the missions so that they eventually became deeply-committed members of the Roman Catholic Church.

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8 METIS AUXILIARIES

.he Metis, offspring of European or Canadian traders and their Native ihe wives, proved another invaluable asset to the Oblates in their drive to the north. In the Athabasca District, many of these people were the descendants of eighteenth-century voyageurs engaged by the North West Company or the Hudson's Bay Company. They were primarily of FrenchCanadian descent on their father's side and Cree or Chipewyan on their mother's. Some of these voyageurs had remained in the Athabasca after their term of employment was up, living as "freemen," unconnected to the fur trade companies, in a manner very similar to the Dene. Other freemen moved to the Athabasca from the Lake Winnipeg area as early as 1808,1 when the fur trade there diminished from overexploitation. These Metis already had a long history of independent employment by the time the Oblates arrived in the district. 107

In the northern part of the Mackenzie District, most of the mixed-blood population, descended from Scots or English traders and their Dene wives, emerged only in the later nineteenth century.2 The Protestant mixed-blood people, however, were few in number; their influence at many northern Mackenzie posts was offset by that of Metis interpreters and their wives, the natural associates of the Oblates. It was in this northernmost area that the Oblates experienced their only lasting setbacks, which they blamed on the fact that there were no Metis, only Protestants, at Fort McPherson.3 When Grollier had first visited this post in 1860, he had been aided by the interpreter "Blondain" (Blondin) whom he described as a "sauvage francise."4 Unfortunately, Blondain and his wife drowned soon after their baptism by Grollier and the new interpreter was not inclined to Catholicism. In the southern Mackenzie region, a Metis society of descendants of the voyageurs was a well-recognized entity. They spoke French, were Roman Catholics, and considered themselves a distinct social group.5 Their daughters often married the Red River Metis who came into the Mackenzie in the 18305 as skilled boatmen for the expanding boat brigades.6 Their long presence in the north, their mobility from one post to another, and their intricate web of relationships gave them a familiarity with the region as a whole which was uniquely Metis.7 Their Native heritage and widespread family relationships, added to their knowledge of the Dene languages, made them most useful as contacts and exemplars to the Indians. The priests sometimes referred to the Metis at the posts as "whites" in these early years, presumably because of their faith, language, European descent, or more settled lifestyle.8 The prolonged contact with the Metis fort families by contrast with the intermittent visits by the priests to the Dene made it easier to instruct them and to form small parishes wherever there was a mission residence. The priests could ensure that the post Metis observed the rules of the Church in their marriages, attendance at Mass, support of the missions through financial donations and labour, and so serve as a model to the Dene. Even when the Metis did not conform to all the rules of the Church, they usually upheld Catholicism and influenced the Dene to do so as well. Little survives to reveal the extent of Metis knowledge of the Catholic faith before the arrival of the Oblates. The priests considered that they had at least a basic notion of the faith, on which they could build more easily than they could with the Dene who had no such knowledge. Some more recently-arrived Metis in the Athabasca had received some Roman Catholic instruction at Red River before moving north and, as the missions develIO8

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oped, Tache sometimes sent Metis from Red River as employees for the missions. Those with longer residence in the north sometimes acquired their knowledge of Catholicism from their contacts with the Red River brigades at Portage La Loche, not always considered good examples to follow! Some descendants of earlier traders heard stories from their fathers or grandfathers about priests and Catholicism, as did Mme Hoole (Elize Taupier9) at Fort Liard. She was a very strong, muscular woman, who was employed by the HBC as a "bully" on the boats between Liard and Simpson, where she stood at the front and scolded the boatmen. When she heard of Thibault's preaching at La Loche, she travelled to St. Boniface to be instructed and baptized. She returned to Liard, ready to put all her formidable powers at the service of the Church. In proof of her conversion, she became a model of "conjugal fidelity and maternal tenderness," though she still kept her dagger handy!10 Mme Hoole's life and family illustrate the widespread network of Metis influences in favour of Oblate missions in the Mackenzie, and the often commanding physique and presence of Metis women. The Metis also shared a linguistic tradition with the French-speaking Oblates. Their French, however, was a trade jargon, mixed with many Cree and Chipewyan words.11 The priests differed on its value for their purposes. Grandin thought the trading Indians at Good Hope spoke French as well as the Red River Metis and that the priests could use it instead of the Native languages, easing the missionary's task.12 Grollier, however, despised this jargon and refused to reply to Natives who used it. Grandin's approach apparently triumphed, for French continued to be the primary language at Good Hope, although it included many English and Indian words and was accented in the Indian way.13 In many posts, Metis wives acted as interpreters for the priests or made the more negative contribution of refusing to interpret for the minister. Tissier, however, who spent a very short time at Nativity in 1865, claimed that the wives of the Metis men refused to reply when their husbands spoke to them in French.14 Perhaps these wives were Cree or Chipewyan, not Metis. One of the most prominent Metis allies of the Oblates was Francois Beaulieu15 of Salt River, usually referred to by the Oblates as "the patriarch," "Old Beaulieu," or "Le Bonhomme Beaulieu." His father, also named Francois, had come north from Quebec with his brother Jacques to work for the opposition to the HBC, the Company of the Sioux, in the late •METIS A U X I L I A R I E S

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eighteenth century,1^ and had accompanied Alexander Mackenzie in 1789 on his trip down the Great River which now bears his name. Beaulieu had taken Ethiba, a woman of Chipewyan and Cree descent, for his wife.17 His son, Francois was born in 1793,18 and brought up with his mother's people. Beaulieu pere probably returned to Quebec; his mother remarried and his stepfather was known as The Rat.19 Beaulieu spent much of his time with the Dogribs and Yellowknives north of Great Slave Lake. A good linguist, he spoke these languages and the French of the country. In 1808, as a boy of about fifteen, he wintered with John Clarke of the HBC. When Clarke reprimanded him, Beaulieu resented it deeply and returned to live with the Indians.20 In 1816 he was hired as an interpreter by the North West Company, then engaged in the last violent struggle for supremacy over the HBC. He was soon involved in a plot to kill his old nemesis Clarke, who had been taken a prisoner by the NWC; in payment for this, he was to receive Clarke's wife and property, and an annuity from the NWC.21 According to Governor Simpson, Beaulieu refused to carry out this crime.22 After the amalgamation of the two trading companies in 1821, the HBC frequently hired Beaulieu. He served as interpreter and hunter for the Franklin Expedition from 1823 to 1826. He was the best hunter for the expedition, and probably for that very reason he collected many followers, whom Franklin regarded as useless. Consequently, he did not try to retain Beaulieu when his term of employment was up in 1826. Beaulieu left with about seventeen men, intending to go to Marten Lake to fish until the spring.23 Probably this was the band of hunters who left the Fort Chipewyan area in 1825, partly from fear of the Beaver Indians, but also to seek better hunts on Great Slave Lake; they returned to Fort Chipewyan in I827.24

Beaulieu, with these same men, (and probably their wives and families, never mentioned in the documents) wintered over 1826-1827 near Willow Lake, east of the Mackenzie River. He antagonized the HBC management by bringing the furs they had obtained in the Mackenzie District out to trade at Fort Chipewyan in the Athabasca District. Trying to control this loss, the HBC hired him to work for the Mackenzie District from Lac la Martre and Willow Lake the following year. Beaulieu continued to reside in the Mackenzie District for some years; in 1831 he was credited with preventing the Slaveys from making reprisals on the Yellowknives.2^ He eventually settled at Salt River in the Athabasca District, where he controlled the supply of salt to both the Athabasca and Mackenzie districts. IIO

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There is some evidence that his father-in-law, Pierre St. Germain, also lived at Salt River.26 The ruins of Beaulieu's old house were still visible at Salt River in 1893 and the salt springs still supplied the Mackenzie District.27 With his three wives, whom Petitot listed as Metis, Cree, and Chipewyan,28 (though Grandin recalled that two of his wives were sisters),29 with his many children and his leadership of various branches of the Dene, with his farm and control of the salt supply, Beaulieu was a commanding force in both the Athabasca and Mackenzie. The appellation of "patriarch" was a natural one for this man, whose family life was similar in many ways to that of the Old Testament patriarchs. Although Beaulieu had no real knowledge of Catholicism, he brought his children to Portage La Loche in 1845 to see Thibault, "that man from the land of his father, who taught men to live well."30 The priest baptized his children but could not baptize Beaulieu until he conformed to the marriage rules of the Church. When Tache made his first visit to Fort Chipewyan in 1847, Beaulieu came to see him. Tache's very youthful appearance contrasted unfavourably, at first, with Thibault's mature and formidable presence, but Beaulieu was so awed by witnessing the young priest say Mass that he developed a great respect for Tache's spiritual powers.31 Beaulieu dismissed two of his wives, endowing them and leaving their children to support them.32 One wife continued to live at Salt River in a separate house, while the other returned to her people. Tache baptized him on 25 September 1848, at Nativity, when Beaulieu was 55 years old. At Christmas that year, Tache baptized Beaulieu's remaining wife, Catherine St. Germain, aged about 50, the eldest daughter of Pierre St. Germain and Thakaritthert. On December 30 they were married within the Church.33 Beaulieu and his wife, even at a very advanced age, travelled great distances in the depth of winter to attend the Christmas feast at Nativity. Beaulieu frequently asked for a resident priest to instruct his large extended family. Though the Oblates could not spare a priest for this small outpost, most priests travelling between Great Slave Lake and Lake Athabasca spent some time at Salt River. In 1856-1857, Grandin spent two months with the Beaulieus teaching the faith, while improving his knowledge of the Chipewyan language and translating Indian tales which Beaulieu and his wife told him.34 Gascon spent three months at Salt River in 1860, also ministering and studying Chipewyan. After Gascon left, Beaulieu kept his little house as a centre for family prayers and where visiting priests could say Mass. Every Sunday, Friday, and feast-day he gathered all his children, grandchildren, and the local

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Natives to sing hymns and recite the rosary. The patriarch, as was customary for Native elders, also gave advice and reprimands to the assembled people. Beaulieu was another example of the influence exerted by a devout Metis layman in support of the missionary endeavour of the Church. It was primarily his authority which kept Salt River a centre of Catholicism, despite the rare presence of priests. In 1866 Bishop Faraud decided to name this embryo mission St. Isidore3 5 in honour of the patron saint of Isidore Glut, his auxiliary bishop. Until his death in 1872 the patriarch Beaulieu continued to press, unsuccessfully, for a permanent mission at Salt River. Beaulieu's influence extended far beyond Salt River. He kept up his contacts with the Great Slave Lake area and spent the winter of 1861-1862 there hunting caribou, perhaps with the Yellowknives.36 In 1865-1866, he travelled to Providence to visit Faraud and to encourage the Indians in that new episcopal centre to listen to what the priests said about religion. Beaulieu had been their chief and still had considerable authority over them, according to Glut.37 Slobodin noted a tradition in the Mackenzie that the Beaulieu and Mandeville families, from Salt River and Buffalo River respectively, functioned as tribes. Intermittently, they would all pack up, go down the Mackenzie or up the Liard, over into the mountains, returning to their homes after three to five years. They trapped and traded over this great circular route.3^ Beaulieu was also the major source for the Dene legends and traditions recounted and published by Petitot. His daughter, Catherine Bouvier, continued this oral tradition by recounting many of these to Grouard at Providence.3^ Beaulieu also maintained his trading activities, vacillating between the new freetraders and the HBC. His prestige with the Natives was highly prized by both. The HBC followed the same pattern in its attempts to coopt Beaulieu as it had in the 18205. When Beaulieu collected furs and made a trip to Red River in 1857 to trade them, however, Bernard Ross blamed Grandin for inciting this move during his stay at Salt River that year.40 Given Beaulieu's track record, and his fondness for Tache, now Bishop of St. Boniface, this was a somewhat unfair assertion. The HBC at Fort Garry bought Beaulieu's furs at a higher price than he would have obtained in the north, to prevent them from going to Red River freetraders. Beaulieu's trip was so profitable that he left Fort Garry with a boat, partially paid for by Tache, and £300 worth of goods to trade, accompanied by traders James Todd and Alex Wentzel.41

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Simpson feared this trip by Beaulieu would encourage freetraders to follow his route and urged Robert Campbell in Athabasca to try to prevent any more such trips.42 When Beaulieu continued his trading at Salt River in the winter of 1857—1858, Simpson recommended that an outpost be established beside him.43 An effective supervision of Beaulieu's activities, however, demanded cooperation between the Athabasca and Mackenzie Districts, something that was not always possible. Campbell managed to make an arrangement with Beaulieu in 1858 which made it unnecessary as yet to set up a post at Salt River. In 1863, however, the HBC set up a temporary trading station at Salt River to guard the Mackenzie District from an invasion of freetraders. Since the HBC feared, with good reason, that Beaulieu would aid and abet its opponents, the Company assigned Beaulieu to look after its interests in Salt River and hired his son Francois as middleman on the boats.44 This proved an insufficient incentive to deter Beaulieu permanently from an alliance with the freetraders. In 1866 he planned to go to Red River to consult Governor William Mactavish, to see if the HBC could match the lucrative offers made to him by the freetraders; he intended asking for a pension and security of control over his salt supply. When he stopped off at lie a la Crosse, however, Grandin persuaded him not to make the long journey to Red River, assuring him that he would consult the governor for him. Grandin was well aware of the threat posed to the Company by the great authority Beaulieu held over the Chipewyan of Athabasca and lie a la Crosse, and even more so over those of Great Slave Lake and Fort Rae.4^ Given this state of affairs, he thought the governor would agree to give Beaulieu what he wanted. Grandin was also aware of the threat posed to the Roman Catholic missions by any perceived alliance of Metis, freetraders, and Oblates, and was anxious to ensure that no such opinion would be formed by the HBC. Though Beaulieu returned to Salt River, he did not wait for Grandin's talks with the governor to bear fruit. He took employment with the American Peace River traders who were beginning to move into the Athabasca. After he had collected some furs for them, however, the HBC again lured him away and he began to visit the Indian camps to collect furs before the traders could get there.46 To the end Beaulieu remained an independent operator. In the winter of 1871—1872, just before he died, he tried to persuade the Indians of Fort Rae and Providence to give him their marten to trade at Lac La Biche to his son Joseph.47 His close relationship

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with the Oblates always caused some suspicions at the HBC that the priests supported his freetrading. In 1874, soon after Beaulieu's death, the HBC moved its post from Salt River to the east bank of the Slave River, at the foot of the rapids, to connect with its new steamboats. This became a permanent post called Fort Smith, which was much more important as a transportation centre than as a fur trade post. The mission of St. Isidore, no longer primarily required for the Beaulieu family, also moved to Fort Smith. There it served the local population, but it too derived its importance as a transport centre for the other missions of the vicariate. It also supplied much food for the northern missions from the farm of St. Bruno on Salt River, using its resources much as the patriarch Beaulieu had. Beaulieu's widespread network of relations also helped the Oblates in many other missions. His grandson, the young boy Jean-Baptiste Pepin, accompanied Grandin on his journeys, when the bishop oversaw the Athabasca-Mackenzie Vicariate. Grandin hoped this youngster would become a priest but, as with all his other indigenous prospects, Pepin did not pursue this vocation. Joseph Bouvier, born at Red River, married the patriarch's daughter Catherine, thus linking the old eighteenth-century Metis of Athabasca with the new nineteenth-century influx from Red River. Bouvier was the guide of the Mackenzie boat brigade. It was his intervention with Ross which made possible Grollier's visit to Fort Simpson in 1858 to combat the arrival of Anglican Archdeacon Hunter.48 The Bouviers continued to aid the mission enterprise. With Chief Trader Hardisty's consent, the Bouvier and Forcier families wintered at Providence in 1863—1864 to help Grandin build the new bishop's residence. In succeeding winters the Bouvier family continued to reside at Providence, instead of wintering at Big Island as they had previously done. They were among the first people to take advantage of the new school opened in 1867. Their son, Jean-Baptiste Bouvier, who attended that first year, was present at the Golden Jubilee of Providence School held 3-6 July 1917.49 When the HBC moved its post from Big Island to Providence in 1868, the HBC Postmaster, John Reid, and his wife, a former maidservant of the Kirkbys, exhibited a high degree of anti-Catholicism. A battle between two strong-willed women ensued when Mme Bouvier spoke out to the Indians in favour of the mission and against Reid, so successfully that the Indians gave all their grease and good meat to the mission. William Hardisty then

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-r> Mercredi family at Fond du Lac, 1893. Photograph byJ.B. Tyrrell. [Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto]

withdrew his recommendation that a pension be awarded to Mme Bouvier following the death of her husband. 5° Some other first-generation Metis, such as Old Cayen (Louison Cadien), born in the Great Slave Lake region,51 proved formidable opponents of the Oblates. According to Petitot, Cayen spoke better French than most, owing to his having a Parisian father; unfortunately for the Oblates, he had also inherited from his father a skepticism which dominated his outlook, and he even resembled Voltaire in appearance. He had white hair and an intelligent but deceitful face; he was cunning and sardonic. He was obsequiously polite, but had the cheeky smile of a street urchin.52 Although he was ostensibly Catholic, the priests claimed Cayen would sell his soul for tea. He took employment as interpreter for the CMS and attempted to convince the Dene to espouse Anglicanism. At one point, he blamed the rosary, holy pictures, confessions, and Communion for making him sick.53 Though twice excommunicated, he confessed his sins and received Extreme Unction before he died in the great epidemic of 1865.5^ Cayen's brother-in-law, Baptiste Le Camerade de Mandeville, whose father came from Normandy and whose mother was Dene, was quite different from Cayen. He proved to be a staunch upholder of the Oblates, as

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were his five sons. Mandeville interpreted for Franklin on his first expedition. He helped build Fort Reliance at the east end of Great Slave Lake for the Back expedition of 1833.^5 Some twenty-five years later56 he established an outpost for the HBC at that spot, where the Oblates formed the mission of St. Vincent de Paul.57 King Beaulieu, son of the patriarch, later took charge of this post where he too helped the Oblates keep their contacts with the Yellowknives. The Mercredis, a family with nineteenth-century connections from Red River to Athabasca, proved of great help to the Oblate missions. Joseph Mercredi accompanied Tache to Fort Chipewyan in 1847 and served as his altar assistant. Thirty years later he wrote and thanked Tache for opening the road to heaven to so many in Athabasca.58 Mercredi was assigned as postmaster to Fond du Lac (Athabasca). For a time he preferred to be called McCarthy;59 perhaps he was related to Julie McKarthy St. Cyr at Fort Chipewyan. There is some speculation that McCarthy was the original family name, changed by the French priests to Mercredi because it sounded the same to them and was easier to pronounce. 6° Mercredi's sons worked at times for the HBC, but more often for the freetraders, responding to the new employment opportunities of the later nineteenth century. His wife was also a convinced supporter of the mission at Fond du Lac. Their daughter Anne, who taught Breynat the first elements of the Chipewyan language at Nativity school, entered the Grey Nuns.61 Many Metis had large families, which proved a burden on the HBC economy. As early as 1860 the Company sought to replace these Metis with single men, whether Scotsmen, Canadians, or Iroquois.62 In 1875 W.L. Hardisty planned to send the Metis boatmen with large families out of the district as their contracts expired. This was not entirely an economizing move. Hardisty feared that the Metis with their intricate web of relationships, would "join in plotting mischief against the Company or their Officers,"63 or intrigue with the Indians, or join the opposition freetraders. The Metis who remained in the north after leaving HBC employment became independent hunters and trappers. Several put their knowledge and expertise to the service of the freetraders who soon flocked into the area. Since the Metis discharged by the HBC had to provide for their own subsistence, some conflict also resulted over the use of local resources such as the fisheries. Some formed small settlements with gardens to augment their country provisions. This gradual growth of settlements, often around the missions, helped the Oblates to stabilize their faith and eventually to form small parishes. At Fort Chipewyan in 1906 about thirty families of Il6

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Metis formed such a small parish. Many of them descended from the eighteenth-century voyageurs, such as the Lepines, Tourangeaus, and Villebruns.64 In their different ways, the many strands of Metis origins combined to favour the Oblate enterprise. The oldest generation, those born from the unions of late eighteenth-century voyageurs with Dene women, were often brought up by their mothers in Dene traditional ways. Yet, they preserved some folk-memory of Catholicism, passed on in some way from their fathers, perhaps in tales and stories, perhaps in some ritualistic actions. With this background, and with the impact of the incoming missionaries in the mid-nineteenth-century, they attributed great spiritual power to the priests, power which they were anxious to share. Though their knowledge of the faith was limited, their traditions prepared them for easier reception and adherence to the rules of the Church. Their spoken French, though it may have been on a par with their rudimentary comprehension of Catholicism, also simplified their contact with the Oblates. Many of the newer generation of Metis who served the HBC in the nineteenth century moved to the Athabasca and Mackenzie from Red River. They had learned something of Catholicism there, either at St. Boniface, or St. Fra^ois Xavier on White Horse Plains, or from the itinerant missions around the Interlake region of Manitoba. Several of these people were among the first baptized by Tache at Fort Chipewyan. Many boatmen who moved from Red River married Dene-Metis women who were descendants of the earlier voyageurs. The different generations' familiarity with Catholicism and the French language combined in favour of the Oblates over the Anglicans in almost every case. Sharing the same language and faith, if only to a small extent in both instances, the Metis were natural allies of the French Catholic Oblates. "A people between," they demonstrated the value of their combined heritage, melding aspects of European and Indian faith and language, to broker the exchange of views between Oblate and Dene. They also exerted considerable influence with the HBC. Their labour was essential to the Company; withdrawal of their services would have destroyed the vital transport system. Their marriages and relationships to various branches of the Dene assured them of a hearing for their opinions on religion and trade. Their activity on behalf of the Catholicism preached by the Oblates was vital to the initiation and perpetuation of the missions. Equally important to the priests, they usually served as a formidable barrier to any success by the Church Missionary Society.

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fl WEALTH AND 'WELL^'BEING: MEDICINE AND MISSION

.ealth and faith were closely linked for both Oblate and Dene, making medical care an integral part of evangelization. The priests sought to show the Dene the way to the Christian heaven and rejoiced that those who died soon after baptism would attain that goal immediately. They also used their medical skills, trying to save the people from death and to alleviate their suffering. This was, for them, also a religious duty. To the Oblates, as to other Europeans, disease was a physical event, to be opposed by all the techniques of modern medicine. To some extent, this notion of health as centred on the body contrasted with the Dene idea of health as the well-being of the individual and community. Yet the Oblates

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also had a holistic view of medicine, for they considered good spiritual health to be integral to good physical health. Their mainly secular view of medicine combined with a tendency to blame illness on the sinfulness of the individual or community, imbuing the art of physical healing with a theological component.1 This view was similar in some respects to that of the Dene. According to Petitot, the Dene did not blame God for their illness but took the blame on themselves for having done something wrong.2 Such beliefs accorded with what they knew about illness and the need for medicine. Ways of dealing with illness, for both Oblate and Dene, were not completely detached from faith and morality. Physical healing, the focus of medical techniques, had to be accompanied by some degree of spiritual healing. Both the Oblates and the Dene, then, ascribed ill-health at least partially to moral faults and sinfulness. Each sought to counter the effects of disease with medical antidotes and with calls for spiritual intervention. These two concepts of health combined and conflicted in the Oblates' mission to the Dene. Indian susceptibility to European diseases became apparent soon after Columbus arrived in the "New" World. Its population, never exposed to them, had had no opportunity to develop antibodies as the Europeans had. No wars of invasion or large population interchanges had marked the history of these relatively peaceful continents, nor contributed to the spread of epidemics that contributed to an ensuing immunity. Nor had they developed similar diseases, in part because they had no domestic animals to provide a source of key disease organisms shared with humans.3 The Natives of North America usually lived in widely-scattered small communities without contact with the diversity of diseases that marked the large urban settlements of Europe. The subarctic environment favoured the Dene even more by preventing the survival of many pathogens over the winter. They told Petitot of their good health before the arrival of the whites, when the only diseases they had were those caused by the cold climate, such as deafness, rheumatism, or inflammation of the eyes.4 The arrival of fur traders irrevocably altered this healthy situation. The men of the boat brigades, who interchanged the furs of the Athabasca and Mackenzie for imported goods and transferred personnel at Portage La Loche, brought epidemics to the Dene, just as Columbus's ships brought unknown diseases to the American Indians of the south. Though the boat brigades did not bring massive colonization, they were equally deadly to the Dene. Almost every year the boatmen suffered from illnesses, described as influenza or grippe. These spread among the people gathered at the posts I2O

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HBC Steamer Grahame delivering cargo at Smith Landing, 24 June 1892. [PAM, Hudson's Bay Company Archives,

and from them to other camps. Few were isolated enough to escape. The Dene were well aware of this correlation between transport and disease. When those at Fort Chipewyan heard of the Montreal cholera epidemic in 1833, they asked for large advances, so that they could go back to their lands and remain away from the fort until the following year in hopes of avoiding this sickness.5 After many died at Good Hope in the epidemic "nervous fever" of 1867, the survivors, aware that sickness arrived with the boats, did not want to go to the post for fear of death.6 Since Good Hope supplied many men for the boats, and only fourteen hired on in the spring of 1868, eight of whom deserted on the way,7 this posed considerable difficulties for the transport system of the HBC. Those at Fort Resolution took a different tack and refused to go to the Portage unless they had a priest with them because twelve of them had died on the trip in 1867.8 Though the large annual complement of boatmen had disappeared by the i88os, diseases spread among the people who gathered for the arrival of the steamboats with equally disastrous results. In 1902 measles spread northwards from Fort Smith, following the steamers, affecting every post on the way north to Fort McPherson, and causing hundreds of deaths.9 In 1928 the great flu epidemic spread by the Distributor caused the deaths of many elders, who had gathered as usual for the arrival of the steamboat, for a time of celebration and dancing. Three days later the flu broke out and soon all the older people who had been dancing were dead; seventy elders • H E A L T H AND

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died between Fort Norman and Fort Franklin.10 With them went much local knowledge of Native medicine, which they had used as a guide to help those who were sick or hungry. The suffering and deaths which followed so quickly at each post are still vivid in the memories of the elders of today. Listening to them speak so movingly of the loss of their relatives and friends, we can gain insights into the experience of the Dene in the century before. Recurring epidemics of measles, scarlet fever, and whooping-cough spread like wildfire, causing severe mortality among the Dene, who had little or no immunity to them. The after-effects of the widespread influenza epidemic of 1863—1864 contributed to the havoc caused by the deadly combination of scarlet fever and measles in 1865. When the boats arrived at Nativity in early August 1865 they reported much sickness at the Portage.11 Possibly the scarlet fever present at Nativity that spring was brought south with the boats, while the Red River boats carried the contagion that had raged there through the winter of 1864—1865.12 In any case, the interchange at Portage La Loche spread the combination of measles and scarlet fever to almost every post in the fur trade country. The disease also caused serious complications, such as dysentery, swollen throats, discharge from the ears, and general feebleness. Petitot estimated that seven to eight hundred, out of a population of four thousand, died in the space of three or four weeks in the Athabasca-Mackenzie.13 William Hardisty, in charge of the Mackenzie District, estimated that over one thousand people had died, more than in any previous illness.14 This devastating epidemic followed the trail of the boats like a miasma: "The Boats last fall were like angels of death going among the poor people of the respective Forts."15 The Dene gave up hope, convinced that the end of the world was near and that they were all going to die; as a result, they did not take the precautions that Hardisty thought would have mitigated the effects of the disease.16 No words can convey the anguish and desolation and fear experienced by the people who saw so many members of their families die. They could only attribute it to "bad medicine," perhaps used by the whites against them, or to some unknown fault on their part. Knowledge of many Dene traditions died with the elders who perished in these years. Among the survivors, wives were left without husbands to hunt for their families, hunters without wives to share the basic tasks of life. Children were orphaned and left to be cared for by relatives who were already overwhelmed with dependents. The loss of so large a proportion of the population made it impossible for extended families to embrace the 122

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care of so many orphans. Many of these orphans were taken into the new schools. This charitable work, though it preserved many lives, could not teach the orphans the traditional Dene knowledge or way of life. Another widespread epidemic in 1867, described variously as a severe cold with a headache or as a nervous fever, followed closely on the heels of the epidemic of 1865 and caused further deaths. The two epidemics of 1865 and 1867 carried off almost one-quarter of the best fur hunters of the district.17 A series of less-destructive ailments followed; they so weakened the people that any slight illness could cause their deaths. Faraud compared his missionaries to the gleaners coming behind the harvesters, picking up the few who were left of disappearing tribes.18 A fever and cough in 1872 caused several deaths, including that of the patriarch Beaulieu, who died after five days of sickness.19 Adding to the havoc caused by disease, recurring years of famine afflicted the Athabasca and Mackenzie Districts in the late nineteenth century. The journals and letters from various missions are filled with references to starvation, the disappearance of caribou, poor fisheries, and the cyclical decline of hares.20 These years of hardship caused many deaths and reduced the health and abilities of many survivors. Treaty gatherings, beginning in the early twentieth century, influenced the Natives to gather again in large groups, though at a different time from the former trading occasions. These crowds contributed to the spread of various illnesses; in 1900 and 1901 at Nativity epidemics of measles, scarlet fever, dysentery, and an unknown illness decimated the people, with fifty to fifty-five dying in 1901.21 Endemic diseases also took a toll on the Dene, one of the most prevalent being tuberculosis. As early as 1864 Petitot had noted the prevalence of pulmonary diseases and scrofula ulcers, with the young being more likely to die from these.22 Viral infections, including influenza, tend to activate the tubercle bacilli in persons who have latent tuberculosis; since the Dene were exposed to influenza and grippe nearly every year, this could explain some of their susceptibility to tuberculosis. Faulty or weak immunological processes, poor hygiene and sanitation standards, semi-starvation over a long time, or sudden severe food deprivation, also increase the likelihood of this disease.23 All these conditions applied to the Dene for much of this period and may account for the widespread tuberculosis. June Helm contended that the cessation of female infanticide offset any population losses due to disease among the Mackenzie Dene and that, as a result, no long-term population losses occurred.24 Her census figures show HEALTH

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that the population of the Upper Mackenzie posts actually increased slightly between 1829 and 1951. Shepard Krech III, however, argued that the population would have increased more if the cessation of female infanticide had been accompanied by years of good health. Krech documented the spread of epidemic diseases in the years 1800-1860, before the missionaries arrived.2^ (The chart in Appendix B, p. 195, continues this documentation, from Oblate sources, up to 1921.) These sombre accounts reveal why the Dene were convinced that "We are not like the whites, death is strong against us, it does not let us have slight illnesses."26 Though any population estimates may be suspect, the Oblates were among the most interested participants in Dene life. They were very concerned about the numbers of souls to be saved, of people to be restored to health, and of possible losses to their Anglican rivals. The Canadian government relied on missionary figures for estimates of the population to be treated with in the Athabasca in 1899 and in the Mackenzie in 1921. Thus the many references to deaths and debilitating diseases mentioned by the Oblates at different posts must be taken seriously. They may not be entirely accurate, but they are the best available means to measure the immediate consequences of epidemics. Permanent depopulation may not have occurred, but the immediate effects of imported diseases after the arrival of the Oblates were prominent in their writings. During these years of epidemics and suffering, the Oblates attempted to help the Dene with physical medicine and spiritual healing. They wanted to help those in need; this was an integral part of their view of their mission. They were also convinced that their efforts to cure the sick would draw the Dene to the Catholic faith, which they were certain was tantamount to spiritual healing. The blend of spiritual and secular healing envisaged by the Dene and expected from the priests came to the surface in different ways. In the early twentieth century rumours spread that the pope was going to send a doctor to the Mackenzie to cure all the sick and raise the dead.27 For the most part, the Oblates relied on the system of homeopathic medicine developed by Hahnemann in Germany in the late eighteenth century. This system became very popular in France for self-help medicine. Kits were made up for the most common illnesses, with the appropriate remedies numbered and prescribed in the accompanying booklet. Doctor Constantine Hering, a German who worked for some years in Guiana as a missionary, adapted this system to the illnesses most prevalent in the foreign missions. Homeophathic medicine, as it had proved itself both in 124

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France and in the foreign missions, influenced many Oblates to adopt it for use in North America.28 Tache had apparently learned of the homeopathic system, or of a similar approach, when he lived in Quebec, for he had a reputation for handing out pills.29 Faraud was a foremost exponent of these medicines, so useful in the missions for those with no real medical training and so easy to transport. The priests also treated HBC men and their families, who proved very grateful for the assistance.30 To practice medicine was to draw the Dene and, once there, they were more willing to listen to the preaching of the Gospel. If the homeopathic medicines proved successful or the patients were cured, their attachment to Catholicism was cemented. The very small doses of the homeopathic medicines ensured that enthusiastic amateurs could do little harm, while any good that resulted was a benefit to their religious cause. Many CMS missionaries, such as Robert Hunt at Lac la Ronge, also adopted the homeopathic system.31 Other missionaries, both Anglican and Oblate, opposed its use, claiming it did little or no good, and could, in fact, end up harming the mission enterprise. Bompas recognized the value of some basic medical training for missionaries, since the Natives came to him more readily for "physics" than for instruction. He was not prepared to accept the homeopathic system used by the Oblates, however, "which in my view is as deceptive as their religion but of course some people think otherwise."32 Medical care also entered into the intense rivalry between the Oblates and the Anglicans for the souls of the Dene. Kirkby knew that: should his [Faraud's] entrance into the district be accompanied by illness among the people it will go far to destroy his pretensions as the poor Indians have been told he can do what he pleases even to healing the sick with a word."33 Since Faraud did return as bishop in 1865 with the boats carrying the epidemic of that year, and then applied his medical skills whenever possible, he may have lost some ground. But Kirkby did not gain any, since his remedies also proved useless; according to Faraud, the Dene concluded that Kirkby's religion would be equally ineffective.34 These homeopathic remedies, of course, proved inadequate in the face of the many epidemics of catastrophic proportions that afflicted the Dene. The fact that the priests gave out medicines sometimes led to accusations of •HEALTH AND W E L L ^ ' B E I N G

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sorcery, even when the Natives had asked for the pills. At Good Hope, in 1865, the priests exhausted their stock of homeopathic medicines but were unable to halt the devastation of the disease. Seeking an explanation for why only one small child at the fort died, while the Natives were decimated, the Hares claimed that Faraud made them die by the homeopathic book of medicines he brought to Good Hope.3^ This belief in the malevolence of the whites persisted. When Petitot, on his return from Fort Anderson, visited the gens du large in November 1865, one young man accused him and the other whites of causing the disease.36 These beliefs were shared by the Inuit. At Fort Anderson, the Inuit chief whom Petitot first met in March 1865 regarded the priest as a kind of sorcerer and called him the son of God.37 When he returned in November 1865, Chief Kmnaktak and six other Inuit lay sick from the epidemic. The chief followed the procedures of his religion and promised Petitot, if he cured him, two magnificent black foxes, valued at 1,920 francs. Although Petitot refused this offer, he gave medicine to Kmnaktak and advised the interpreter at the fort to baptize the chief if he were in danger of death. The chief died, having been baptized, shortly after Petitot left the fort. Petitot's action was very dangerous, for the Inuit accused him of killing their chief.38 Their conviction that sorcery, by the Loucheux or by the whites, had caused their deaths, forced the HBC to abandon Fort Anderson for fear of reprisals. It also contributed to Petitot's fear of the Inuit, which paralyzed his later attempts to reach them from Peel's River. The Oblates also helped the HBC to vaccinate the Dene. In 1871, Petitot went from Good Hope to Portage La Loche with the boats, vaccinating the men and the people of various posts against smallpox, which had been raging on the plains that year. In total, he vaccinated 844 people, including almost all the clerks and their families, while Seguin vaccinated 860 at Good Hope.39 This forestalled an outbreak in the north. One reason for bringing in the Grey Nuns in 1867 was to improve the health care offered and, in this way, advance the prospects for the spread of Catholicism in a district which, at that time, had no real medical care.40 The Metis women had high hopes of the nuns. Mme Filion, one of these women, convinced the Natives that the nuns would be able to put a stop to the many deaths in the district.41 Unable to live up to these expectations, the nuns did, however, provide much of the care of the old and sick, as well as for the orphans. In the early twentieth century, hospitals were built at Fort Smith and Fort Simpson, staffed by the Grey Nuns, but financed by

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the federal government, and these replaced the early attempts at medical care. By that time, the Dene apparently considered that some diseases could only be treated by Western medicine. Paramount among these was tuberculosis. Even the most powerful Hare maker of medicine at Good Hope received treatment at Camsell Hospital in Edmonton. For the most part, though, they thought that Western secular medicine could be combined with Native medicine. Also they were inclined to blame Christianity, not doctoring, for causing the decline in powers of their own makers of medicine.^2 The Dene seemed willing to accept the remedies and antidotes offered by the priests when they served a purpose similar to their own physical cures. George Blondin told of the survival of Native medicine in the bush until at least the 19208. They had many kinds of herbs to help and special medicine people for specific diseases. The homeopathic medicines given by the Oblates therefore paralleled this aspect of their traditional medical care. They appeared willing, even eager, to accept the homeopathic medicines from the priests together with their religious teaching, perhaps viewing them as different aspects of the same powerful medicine. In Dene tradition, however, inexplicable illness showed that an enemy sorcerer had used "bad medicine" against them, or that the sick person had offended the spirits in some way. The Dene blamed the great flu epidemic of 1928 on a conflict between two powerful medicine men.43 Whether the fault lay with someone making bad medicine or whether they had offended the spirits, they needed the services of a person with inkonzeto right the situation. They viewed their priest as a person of great spiritual power, sometimes as the Son of God, who could prolong their life and cure their ills.44 It was natural for them to equate the Oblates' instructions on how to live a good life and secure salvation in heaven with the teachings of those who "knew something" from their contact with the traditional spirits and used that knowledge to help their community. As their own spiritual leaders did, after receiving messages from the spirits, the priests claimed to teach them the right way to pray.45 They thought the priest's teaching derived from his dreams, though they were amazed by how many he had. Naturally enough, they called Petitot a great medicine-maker.46 The position of the priests was comparable in many ways to that of the Native spiritual leaders. They could do little to counter the identification made by the Dene of Catholicism and homeopathic medicine with inkonze

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or what the Oblates called jonglerie. Prayers, curing, and jonglerie were, to the Dene, one religious reality. The Oblates, on the other hand, viewed them very differently, seeing the first as true religion, the second as the secular art of medicine, and the third as evil sorcery. They sought to emphasize the unique character and claims of Catholicism and of its clergy. Dene healing involved interaction between the patient, the community, the medicine-man, and his guiding spirit. The sick person could only be cured and have his own position in the community restored by confessing all he had done. Through leading questions, the medicine-maker urged the patient to remember any taboos he had broken, even if he had been unaware of them at the time.^7 This evocation of his wrongdoing was the only way to restore a proper relationship to the supernatural, as the Roman Catholic sacrament of Confession also aimed to do. This parallel explains the eagerness of the Natives to confess, even before baptism or reception into the Church. For the Natives, however, the consequences they suffered did not arise from a deliberate choice of evil, equivalent to sin in Catholicism. The afflicted person might not even remember what he had done, nor have done it consciously, yet he had to make amends before healing could occur. This recovery was then not only individual but social, returning favour to the whole community. Any church that hoped to replace these indigenous religious beliefs had to provide some substitute for this integral connection between illness, guilt, and ways of healing, or it would be abandoned by its new converts in times of illness and calamity.^8 After the patient had confessed all his faults, the jongleur drummed, sang, and gestured. Then, while breathing and sucking over the patient, and aided by his guardian spirit, he took the fault in its physical form from within the body of the patient, and threw it away. This physical reality of sin sometimes appeared as a snake. George Blondin recounted how a medicine-man, with the help of ravens, removed serpents from the body of a sick woman to heal her.^9 At Good Hope, where Petitot painted serpents among the decorations in the chapel, the Hares were scandalized. They asked why he put in God's house these reptiles, whom their medicine-makers drew out of the bodies of the sick.50 The Dene often sought help from the priests, instead of from their own makers of medicine, to survive the devastating new illnesses which left white people unharmed. When twelve people died in May 1864 near Fort Chipewyan, after the passage of the Peace River boats,51 the people begged Glut: "have pity on us and all our relatives; your prayer is strong with God: you can cure us; a fever, a cold, are nothing for you."52 This plea for the 128

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priest to use his powerful prayers to intercede for them to God and their conviction that a fever or a cold could be easily cured by him, and that he should act on behalf of their community, indicates a very strong parallel in their minds between the Oblates and the makers of inkonze. Glut, however, was powerless against this illness.53 When the great epidemic of 1865 reached Nativity, few of those at the post or mission were affected. On 13 September 1865, when the wife of an HBC employee at the fort died, she was the first white (Metis) to do so. An old man questioned why so few whites died, claiming there must be a secret reason.54 With no understanding of the immunity acquired by the EuroCanadians, and with the entrenched view of inexplicable illness as being caused by "bad medicine," his suspicions were justified. It was natural to seek the help of the whites to avert the illness, as they had previously sought the services of stronger makers of medicine to combat sorcery. Some turned with increased fervour to the Christian faith, as well as taking whatever pills the priests could give them. Though they thought it useless to persist in their own prayers for recovery, they did put some hope in the prayers of the priests.55 For many recently-converted Dene, however, these diseases discouraged them from following their new faith. They had thought that baptism, in curing the soul, ought also to extend their lives. When this proved a false assumption, some reverted to their traditional beliefs, hoping to prolong their lives thro ugh jonglerie, since baptism had failed them.56 On occasions the Dene thought their medicine was stronger than that of the priests. Grollier was a harsh taskmaster and refused baptism to many people whom Grandin thought should have received it. When Grollier died 4 June 1864, some Hares claimed they did not need the priest's prayers, that they were stronger, and that their medicine had caused Grollier to die.57 They were suffering from illness at that time and may have been making medicine in hopes of curing themselves, but forty-four of them died in the first six months of 1864.58 By the following year, however, Faraud attributed much of their now favourable attitude to Catholicism to the influence of Grollier, whose tomb they frequently visited.59 Their opinion of Grollier appeared to have altered in the year since his death, perhaps owing to their own increased mortality, to their hope that he could intercede for them in heaven, or to their fear of his departed spirit's powers. The Good Hope people, who gathered in 1876 waiting for the boats, became alarmed when the boats were very late. They all came to Confession and Communion and prepared for death in case the boatmen •HEALTH AND W E L L = ' ' B E I N G

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were bringing a new epidemic. Fortunately, this did not occur. But dysentery spread among those waiting and three or four children, who had been treated by Native makers of medicine, died. They claimed that it was the fault of the priest, a stronger sorcerer, who had removed the virtue from their medicine. Many were convinced that the priest had the power to make them live or die at will.60 When Faraud made his last visit to Good Hope in the fall of 1879, about ten people died, of whom Faraud had treated two. The Natives may have adopted a more secularistic outlook to Western medicine by then, for rather than accusing him of sorcery, they blamed Faraud for mixing up the medicines. At the same time, however, they still attached some spiritual powers to the Oblates' medications. Seguin gave castor oil to a woman who asked for it, afraid to refuse, because the Hares had said he was killing them by denying them his medicine. The woman died but her body stayed warm for several days, and none of the Natives would touch her, for fear of inkonze.^ The spiritual and physical means of attaining well-being were intricately bonded for both the Oblates and the Dene. The Dene readily accepted the homeopathic medicines of the priests and the hospital care given by the Grey Nuns. This treatment conformed, to some degree, to their own natural remedies for known illnesses. They hoped that physical curing by the whites would deal with the new, more dangerous types of maladies afflicting them. They were also willing to ask the priests for spiritual intervention, since they saw in their prayers and confession and rituals many similarities to the way in which their own makers of medicine dealt with the inexplicable. In awe of the great powers of the priests, they hoped their "medicine" would prove strong enough to stop the devastation of these diseases. When the Oblates' prayers and pills were helpless before this onslaught, however, many Dene turned with renewed faith to their traditional ways of seeking well-being, though they combined this with some aspects of the new teachings.

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.he combination of destructive epidemics, brief exposure to the priests' ihe teachings, and excommunication of those who did not obey the Church rules on marriage, contributed to the rise of Native prophets or spiritual leaders opposed to the religious authority and curing abilities of the priests. Though they usually included some elements of Christianity in their teachings, they were at the opposite end of the spectrum from those spiritual leaders who functioned as allies of the Oblates, even those who maintained many aspects of their traditional beliefs. From the beginning of the missions, many Native leaders accused the priests and ministers of causing the people to die. They were more afraid of the priests than of the ministers. 1 Whether this was because there were more of them, or because they baptized so many who soon died, or because the Dene had more respect for the medicine powers of the priests is a mat131

ter of conjecture. Just as the Jesuits of New France began their missions to the Huron at a time of catastrophic illness and warfare,2 so the Oblates in the north entered their field of missions when the Dene were experiencing a series of epidemics. The connection made between death and the arrival of the priests began immediately. The Chipewyan from lie a la Crosse, so enthusiastic about Thibault's teachings in 1845, went to Fort Carlton to trade in 1846. There a man predicted that, if they listened to Thibault, they would all die: "prayer is not made for you who are black, but for those whom God made with white earth."3 The Chipewyan, suffering from an epidemic that caused many deaths, believed this man, at least until he too died. This mingling of convictions, believing in the maleficent powers of the priests and the unsuitability of Christianity for Native peoples, marked many future leaders. The Oblates noted the first Chipewyan leader of this kind in 1859 at ^e a la Crosse, at a time of considerable illness.4 Known as the "Son of God," this young man described his revelations to Robert Hunt, the CMS minister at Rapid River.5 He told how, when he was alone one night, the heavens stooped down and the earth drew near, until the whole was within his tent. Then a voice revealed to him the will of God, which no human had previously known. This voice told the Son of God that eternal life for mortals was on this earth, contrary to what the OMI taught. To prove his point, the young man showed Hunt what he claimed to be the stigmata (the wounds of Christ on the cross), though Hunt dismissed these as scrofula scars.6 This combination of direct revelations as in their traditional religion, combined with some aspects of Christianity, convinced many to follow the "Son of God" and reject Catholicism. Following traditional means of appeasing the anger of the spirits, he convinced the Chipewyan to destroy or burn all they had. He intimidated those who would not follow him and even threatened the priests. The Oblates grew alarmed at the impact of this man and the decline in attendance at their mission.7 Grandin, who was just about to leave for France to be consecrated bishop, decided to discredit the Son of God with the other Chipewyan, and perhaps persuade him that he was wrong. When he met him, however, the young man kicked Grandin and ordered him to remove his black clothes.^ Such violence was unusual for the Chipewyan, who had a reputation for gentleness. It was especially unexpected when it involved Grandin, who was renowned for his amiability.

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No explanation was given for the leader's dislike of Grandin's black clothes. This is the more puzzling since the Oblates had been wearing their black habits for many years at this mission. Duchaussois speculated, in a later case, that black was associated with the raven.9 George Blondin told how raven, in the early days when people and animals could talk to each other, was respected as the most powerful of animals, who communicated with strong medicine people, who could foretell the future, and find game for the people. On the other hand, he could not be entirely trusted and often played tricks.10 This tradition, added to their perception of the priests' strong spiritual and medical powers, which they were apparently not using to prevent the illness and destruction of the people, made it reasonable for the Chipewyan to associate the priests with the raven of Native tradition. Grandin's courage and preaching against this spiritual leader had some effect on drawing his followers back to the mission at lie a la Crosse. The Son of God maintained his convictions, however, and held on to some adherents. Many were his relatives, as was customary with Native spiritual leaders. His father, his sister, and his aunt, although they had been considered excellent Christians at lie a la Crosse Mission, were convinced of his revelations. They renounced Catholicism, and later died still separated from the Church.11 His mother, known to the Oblates as "la pieuse Nannette," and one of his uncles, called "le petit saint" because of his deep faith, also became followers of the prophet. As often happened, however, the prophet's teachings did not relieve the Chipewyan of their sufferings. His followers then abandoned him to come back to the Church. "Le petit saint" returned to Catholicism in 1864 after the death of his wife and several relatives and the loss of all that he possessed. Nannette asked for a priest and Grandin, though sick himself, undertook the long and dangerous trip in early January 1865 to reconcile her with the Church. Soon the Son of God himself came to beg Grandin's pardon and to reconvert.12 Similar appearances followed at outstations of lie a la Crosse. In 1859 many Chipewyan north of Portage La Loche professed to have seen God. They wore large wooden crosses in their belts, perhaps in imitation of the Oblates. Despite the Chipewyan reputation for non-violence, they threatened to kill the whites.13 Though there were to be other movements with strong nativistic elements, this one was exceptional in the menacing tone taken against all whites. These Chipewyan may have been devotees of the

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Son of God, or perhaps there was a spontaneous outbreak of traditional religious revivalism among them. This is very likely because the expansion of Christian missions coincided with the outbreak of several epidemics. At La Loche, in 1860, Valentin Vegreville, an Oblate priest stationed at lie a la Crosse, attempted to counter the teachings of two more visionaries, the brothers Pierrish and Otthede, who claimed to have seen three gods— the Creator, Jesus, and Holy Mary.1^ They were sons of Grosse-Tete, a convert to Catholicism, who may have been a prominent medicine-man.15 This combination in their backgrounds could explain their mixture of some Catholic tenets along with what Vegreville described as "baroque" teachings, which caused the assembled Chipewyan to laugh at the two brothers.16 They were unable to win many followers and had no lasting influence. Native spiritual revivalist leaders quickly appeared in the Oblate missions in the Athabasca and Mackenzie Districts. The priests took these to be copy-cat phenomena, in imitation of the Son of God at lie a la Crosse. More probably they stemmed from a shared religious tradition at a time when illness called for spiritual intervention, and also from the conflict caused by the demands of the new Christianity. While these new leaders incorporated some teachings of Christianity, they rejected the overriding authority claimed by the priests in spirituality and moral behaviour, including the regulation of marriage. These directives were often diametrically opposed to their personal circumstances and traditional ways of making medicine. Two new spiritual leaders arose at Nativity by 1861, at a time when the number of cases of "concubinage" were increasing.17 Bekdettine, in conformity with traditional spiritual leadership, claimed to have direct messages from angels, which, he said, made him wiser than the priest. He opposed his direct contact with the spirits to that of the priests, mediated through the Church.18 His contact may have been with the customary Native spirits, translated by the Oblates as "angels" (messengers); perhaps Bekdettine adapted his dream revelations to the angelic spirits of the new Catholicism. Bekdettine soon began to see God directly and to contest the doctrines of the priests. In moral teaching, the prophet, who was apparently one of those who failed to conform to Church teaching on marriage in his own life, taught that polygamy was not sinful. To the chagrin of the priests, when Bekdettine became ill in the summer of 1861, he refused to be brought to the mission and appeared to die peacefully. Some Chipewyan, whom the priests had regarded as good Catholics, 134

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firmly believed his revelations. One of his followers, Et'ak'aile's wife, insisted that he was a saint who had died a saintly death, and that he would go straight to Paradise. She blamed Glut's preaching against him for causing his death, because he had become so upset that he had asked God to take him out of this wo rid.19 She was one of the women, seldom mentioned in the documents, whose adherence to customary leaders overwhelmed her surface acceptance of Christianity, and whose regard for Native leaders superseded her initial esteem for the priests' powers. After Bekdettine died, these people coalesced around the teachings of Urbain Tutsiye, a well-known maker of medicine, who had also been excommunicated from the Church because of his marriage.20 His rise to prominence coincided with a terrible grippe that ravaged the north through the winter of 1861—1862, persisting into the early summer and causing great mortality among the Indians.21 Convinced that the end of the world was near and that they had only a little while to live,22 they were ready to believe what their spiritual leader taught, based on his own revelations, as their custom had been in previous crises. Tutsiye proclaimed that his constant messages from the angels made him wiser than the priests.23 He buttressed his authority by fasting for eight days, apparently in a trance, and woke up prophesying. These marvels convinced many to follow him.2^ Glut, also impressed, interpreted the prophet's actions consistently with his own beliefs and traditions; he was convinced that he was facing combat not just with a Chipewyan man, but with the devil acting through Tutsiye.^ In conformity with his own experience, Tutsiye taught that every man should have two wives; if one bothered him, the other could console him and make his days happy. Tutsiye also assumed the power of confessing in private, as the priests did, instead of using the traditional public confessions of Native medicine. The OMI viewed this as a heretical imitation of the sacrament and accused him of immoral behaviour and threats against women in his confessional.2^ This is a reversal of sorts, since Native opponents of the priests frequently accused them of immorality in the privacy of the confessional, which was so alien to Dene traditions. Tutsiye challenged Glut to a public discussion in the spring of 1862, to prove that his messages from spirits made him wiser than the priests.27 This was strong opposition by the usually docile Chipewyan to the priest's attempt to dominate their spiritual leadership. Glut was unwilling to yield any ground and spoke out in chapel against Tutsiye. YatieNitsan, a brother of Tutsiye, then left in anger to get his gun and kill Glut.28 When Glut •PROTEST AND T R O P H E C Y

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heard knocking at his door, he thought it was YatieNitsan. In fact, it was Tutsiye, whom Glut feared to be threatening his life. Glut picked up a stick to defend himself and, with several blows of his fist, threw Tutsiye out, spraining his thumb in the process. The Chipewyan were so appalled at this violent action by the priest that they refused to come to the mission ceremonies.29 Although there were often murmurs against whites, including priests, at times of widespread disease and death, this was one of the few times when a priest was actually threatened (though the only violence that occurred was caused by the priest!) Glut later realized he had over-reacted and should have followed Faraud's advice not to inflate the importance of the prophets by treating them as a major obstacle.30 He readmitted Tutsiye to church in the fall of 1862, after he had lost much of his following. Tutsiye was not entirely reconverted, however, and kept asking Glut to engage in a public discussion of his teachings. Glut, unwilling to give him this degree of recognition, refused to argue the case. Tutsiye's wife, one of his strongest supporters, threatened Glut with a large pair of iron pincers, though apparently she did not actually use them.31 The return of the prophet to the Church did not indicate his or his followers' complete submission to the teachings of the Church, nor abandonment of his own revelations. When the Chipewyan and Cree came in to Nativity at Easter in 1865, scarlet fever was already raging in the fort and mission, and Glut advised them to leave immediately after Easter to avoid the epidemic. Tutsiye spread the word that Glut had only said this because he knew that those who entered the church would die.32 Many accepted this reasoning and did not visit the mission but, as it turned out, more of Tutsiyes adherents died than did those who stayed at the mission.33 At the other end of Lake Athabasca, at Seven Sorrows, the CaribouEaters suffered high mortality in 1858—185934 and again during the winter of 1859-1860.35 By April 1862 two prophets, one from Reindeer Lake and one from Churchill, had shaken their weak adherence to Catholicism.36 Both claimed to be priests who had received direct messages from God in their visions; these enabled them to replace both the office and the teachings of the Oblates. The prophet from Churchill claimed that the priests' religion caused death to the people. He exhorted them to abandon Catholicism in favour of his dreams, saying that those who listened to him would not die. Unfortunately, this proved untrue. Many of his followers died; he may have died as well, since no further mention was made of him. 136

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The other prophet, from Reindeer Lake, was a noted deneyaltiyi (medicine-man),37 named Tscheth eldel OY Eater of Ducks. He had also been a Catholic catechumen at lie a la Crosse and at Lac Caribou (Reindeer Lake), but had been excommunicated because of concubinage.38 Tscheth eldelz^&o blamed the Catholic religion for making the Chipewyan die and persuaded the Caribou-Eaters that, if they accepted his teachings, they would not die. He did not follow the Dene tradition of combining new teachings with old, but urged his followers to reject all their religious gifts from the priests. Many burned their books, pictures, and rosaries; others kept them but made little use of them; still others displayed considerable syncretism by making their rosaries into pipe-chains.39 The Oblates took these teachings as evidence of a new anti-Catholicism derived from the prophet's contacts with the CMS missionary at Lac la Ronge. The predictions that Tscheth eldel made, however, destroyed his credibility at Fond du Lac. He said the winter would be warm; it turned out to be extremely cold. He taught that Indian chants were the best way to avert death; these proved ineffective against the illness. He foretold that his followers would live in abundance, with plenty of caribou and muskox. Many from Reindeer Lake, Fond du Lac, lie a la Crosse, and Churchill4°accepted this teaching and formed a big band for the winter of 1862-1863. They saw no musk-ox, and the caribou did not follow their usual route, but went instead to unexpected places, such as Nativity. In these circumstances, a large band faced more severe conditions than did the usual small bands. Near starvation, they had to separate into small groups to survive. Perhaps most upsetting was his teaching that dogs came from the evil spirit. The followers who accepted this belief rid themselves of their dogs. During the summer, their loss was not very noticeable. When dragging their own sleds in winter, however, they missed their dogs and became angry at their prophet.41 The call to destroy dogs had been a prominent feature of a very early prophetic movement among the James Bay Cree in 1843,42 and may be connected to the traditional destruction of property to appease the spirits in times of death. John S. Long has suggested that they thought they had gained access to hymns so powerful that hunting dogs would not be needed.43 On the other hand, the destruction of dogs is difficult to explain for a people like the Chipewyan, who believed that they descended from the union of a primeval woman with a dog. The hardships, deaths, and nonfulfilment of his prophecies motivated most of the Caribou-Eaters to abandon Tscheth eldel and return to •PROTEST AND "PROPHECY

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-v Roman Catholic Mission, Good Hope, 1892. [PAM, Hudson's Bay Company Archives, James McDougall Collection, 1987/13/203 (N8p/8)J

Catholicism. Glut excommunicated all those known to have followed the visionaries. All who had destroyed their books and rosaries, in fulfilment of the prophet's revelations, had to buy new ones.44 Tscheth eldel, after fasting, went to the CMS minister, perhaps hoping to get approval of his teachings from the Anglicans. Such searches for acceptance of their revelations from either denomination recurred in later movements. The leaders may have tried to buttress their authority, based on personal contact with the spirits, with that of the European churches, where authority derived from ordination to office. In this way, they could augment, rather than replace, their own spiritual powers. Tscheth eldel's prestige waned further after the disastrous epidemic of 1865 when almost half the people from Churchill and Reindeer Lake who had followed his teachings died. This convinced the surviving CaribouEaters that it was not baptism or Catholicism that made them die.45 The priest assumed, or was assigned, more authority, probably because of the deaths of many of their leaders in the epidemic. Other leaders, at many separate missions, blamed their illnesses and deaths on the presence of the priests and turned, with increased fervour, to the practice of their traditional religion, abandoning their interest in Christianity. The chief at Good Hope, who promised in 1859 to live as a Catholic, reversed his position during the winter.46 He hunted on Sunday and ordered all his band to do so. He spent almost all he had on inkonze to cure his sick wife. When many of his followers died, he did not conclude, as

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Grollier did, that this was a punishment from God for his abandonment of the new faith. Instead, he attributed the deaths to the presence of the priest in their lands. This belief that the priests caused them to die resurfaced at Good Hope during the 1865 epidemic.^7 In an effort to live, the people resumed their traditional practices. Many men, women, and children saw visions of God and walked in heaven. Each asserted that his revelation was the truth; the others were liars, as were the priests, when they did not agree with the new revelation. This exclusivity appears more derived from Catholicism than from Native traditional beliefs. The intimidation of opponents, however, was common to both Catholic and Dene spiritual leaders. One of the greatest makers of medicine in the country, after having travelled to heaven, threatened Seguin with death if he did not believe his visions. The priest told him it was he who would not see another spring. When the man died that fall, the Hares naturally regarded the priests as making stronger inkonze.^ One of their medicine-men, reputed to have caused the death of Chief Echo of the gens du large by his inkonze, brought his wife to confess to Seguin, and then accused the priest of immoral behaviour with her. These rumours spread like wildfire. Soon those in the camps accused the priests of making everyone die, said all their words were lies, and that they had no God.^9 A real ambiguity was still evident for, when Seguin refused to pray with them, they begged him to change his mind. When he relented and began the preached mission near the end of May, they all came and appeared committed to Catholicism. The Dogribs at Fort Rae, especially those who hunted to the north around Great Bear Lake, were famed as makers of inkonze. Grollier initiated a mission to them in 1859. It coincided with severe illnesses and high fatalities at Fort Rae.5° According to Petitot, a strange epidemic, known as Mai du Fort Rae, afflicted these people and reduced the population from about twelve hundred in 1859 to 788 in 1864.5! It is not surprising that the Dogribs would connect the appearance of this disease with the arrival of the priests. On the other hand, the 280 men, women, and children who gathered for Gascon's spring mission at Fort Rae in 1860 were eager for baptism and feared to die without it.52 Perhaps they had heard enough of the stories of the everlasting fires of hell to outweigh their fear of death in this life. Probably they hoped that baptism would cure them. In 1861 a nativistic reaction to the Oblate instructions began among the Bear Lake Dogribs who had had limited contact with the priests. One man •PROTEST AND T R O P H E C Y

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claimed to be Jesus Christ or his prophet, saying that his people therefore did not need the priest.53 His followers converted their rosaries into chains for their pipes. Whereas the Oblates tried to get the Dene to discontinue their use of the paraphernalia of medicine, their drums and medicine bags, when they converted to Catholicism, the traditional Dene, even when reasserting their own medicine powers, appeared willing to include some of the material aspects of Catholicism. Petitot encountered about sixty makers of inkonze on his visit to the Dogribs of Great Bear Lake in 1864. In addition, four men and one old woman wanted to be recognized as priests. The distinction he made between these two factions, between traditional makers of medicine and those few who aspired to priestly functions, may have been a new kind of syncretism, whereby some of the Dene adapted the idea of an ordained position into their egalitarian society. On the other hand, it may simply reveal Petitot's incomplete understanding of their beliefs. These spiritual leaders claimed personal revelations from God. One leader told Petitot that he believed in the Trinity, Jesus Christ, the Blessed Virgin, and the saints, but he denied the validity of Communion and the Mass. 54 This combination of beliefs neatly dispensed with the need for the office of the priest. They promised their followers three heavens, one black, one grey, and one white, according to the degree of sanctity; this division may be related to the Oblate teachings on heaven, hell, and Purgatory. They rejected Mass and Confession as useless, urging their followers to use the prayers and songs revealed to them, in line with traditional customs. Oddly enough, however, they sought baptism for themselves and their children, and had much faith in the prayers of the priest. No one dared contradict these leaders and all the Dogribs followed their direction.55 Intimidation of opponents, or fear of their leader's powers, was a prevailing component of these movements. When Petitot spoke against these leaders, one threatened him with a gesture, saying "Who are you to come and trouble us? You don't see God yourself, and we see him face to face, we don't need your baptism."56 The dependence of these Dogribs on medicine at this time, either from their Dogrib prophets or through Petitot's baptism and prayers, was probably based on the prevailing epidemic of fever and influenza, from which forty-four of them died.57 In all likelihood, they hoped that a combination of both "medicines" would be most helpful to them. Some Dene opponents of the priests rejected Oblate teaching altogether and tried to preserve their spiritual traditions unaltered by Christianity. I4O

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-T> Roman Catholic Chapel and Mission House at Liard, 5 August 1892. [PAM, Hudson's Bay Company Archives, James McDougall Collection 1987/13/216 (N6969)]

The great epidemic of 1865 caused the death of about sixty people at Liard, including four of their principal jongleurs. Papy, an eminent maker of medicine, was most feared because of his claims to power over humans, animals, and the elements. He had worked some marvels that Grouard could not explain: he had himself shot in the chest and took the bullet out of his body; he had taken a stone and stretched it like wax. These evidences of his powers and their effect on his people, added to his hostility to Catholicism, caused great anxiety to the priests. But Papy was stricken with the fever after he returned from a successful hunt announcing that he would cure his relatives; he died on the third day, "full of rage and despair."58 Sometimes, the Oblates blamed the appearance of opposing spiritual leaders on the presence of the CMS missionaries, who preached a Christianity antagonistic to that advocated by the priests. The Oblates claimed that this confusion of beliefs caused what the priests called "indifference" to all Christianity, and contributed to the renewal of traditional beliefs. Some Dene leaders favoured a coalition with one of the branches of Christianity, usually advocating a high degree of opposition to the other denomination. A representative of this was the Fort Nelson prophet who gained prominence in the late 18705. He claimed that he was sent by God to show the Indians the road to heaven.59 The CMS minister at Fort Simpson, William Spendlove, gave a detailed account of this prophet, one of the few such in CMS literature.60

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After a four-day trance, the prophet awoke and began to tell of his visions. Day after day, the Natives gathered to listen to what he taught about the unseen world and about what happened to people after death. They soon ignored the priest and listened only to their prophet. He also convinced some white men who heard him that he was telling the truth, that he really had a vision of the future, or of the present unseen world. According to Spendlove, the "Romanists" threatened the prophet's life but still could not win over his followers. The prophet and his followers favoured the CMS and asked that they be the missionaries at Fort Nelson, though the Oblates managed to circumvent this by securing the post of schoolmaster there for Father Lecomte. In 1879 the prophet declared that he was about to die. He would, however, leave something with them by which they could teach each other his message. This documentary legacy was a very elaborate painting on deerskin with coloured bark, on which he depicted the future world and all the leading doctrines of .Christianity. In the spring he died as he had predicted. His chart was brought to the Anglican mission at Fort Simpson. The Oblate priest who had given missions at Fort Nelson, Nouel de Krangue, claimed that this man, who was very quick to understand the symbols of the Catholic ladder, had dreamed too much on the two roads traced there.61 In his dreams, he had seen the priests, since they were all dressed in black, going to hell, while the disciples of Luther, dressed in various colours, travelled the good road to heaven. This connotation of "blackrobes" with evil had been seen at lie a la Crosse, when the Son of God told Grandin to remove his black cassock. Though perhaps derived in part from Native beliefs in the trickster Raven, in both cases it also displayed the leader's absorption of Anglican preaching against Catholicism. Other leaders wavered between Dene traditional beliefs and acceptance of Catholicism. One of these was a man named Little Pig,62 a noted maker of inkonze at Good Hope. Although his wife had wanted him to accept baptism in the early days of the mission, he refused, afraid that his medicine powers would fail him and that the spirits would be angry with him and not listen to him if he did. After five or six years, perhaps motivated by fear of losing his wife, he asked Seguin to baptize him. The priest accepted him into the catechumenate on condition that he stopped invoking his spirits, but when he returned to the woods, Little Pig resumed his inkonze. He was exercising a dualism in religion, with one faith for his time at Good Hope, and the other for his life in the bush. Seguin, aware of his continued

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medicine-making, refused to baptize him. Petitot, less stringent, or perhaps unaware of this, baptized Little Pig at Christmas in 1865, naming him Noel. In the fall of 1867, when a serious epidemic struck Good Hope, Little Pig became ill. He made medicine for himself, but fell into a delirium, and said God was letting him die because he had made medicine. He then called for the priest to pray over him. He soon reversed his position, however, and resumed invoking his spirits, but he died soon afterwards.63 Little Pig's actions display the very strong ambivalence of those who, before the coming of the Oblates, had exerted great spiritual power, but with baptism found that both their old powers and their new appeared to fail them. The conflicting claims of Native and Catholic beliefs continued to sway the people of Good Hope. In 1873 the Hares were much influenced by tales of resurrection brought to them by the boatmen on their return from La Loche. A man there claimed to have died in the fall of 1872 and risen again in the spring after spending the winter with God. God had sent him back to earth to tell the people that the priests were giving Him too much work by making everyone die, so much so that God had no time to light his pipe or sleep. He also declared that it was a sin not to work on Sunday, that they should work harder then than on other days. God was also upset that when the priests said Mass during the night, the sky became black.64 Other things he said were more closely associated with traditional Native beliefs. He predicted that one of the Good Hope people would die and spend the winter with God, as he had done, and that he would tell them the same things in the spring. They should listen well to him, in order to learn all they needed to know to go to heaven. He taught that it was a sin to have four dogs to haul when one would do. If a dog jumped over a sleeping person, that person would soon die and go to hell. This represents some continuity with previous teachings about dogs, though less severe, since he did not call for their destruction. It may indicate a belief in a spiritual power intrinsic to dogs which could be harmful to humans. This prophet was very thin and never looked directly at anyone. When he was hungry, he only had to look under his blanket to obtain food. These marvels supported his claim to spiritual authority and convinced many to accept his teachings. When the boats arrived in the fall, the Hares kept all this from the priests, preferring to keep their options open. Back in the woods, the gens du large followed his teachings, and hunted only on Sundays. They also refused to come to Good Hope at Christmas for Midnight Mass, so that God would not have to light the lamps in the sky.

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When one of their old makers of medicine died, they hoped he would prove to be their promised resurrected prophet. The Portage visionary had told them that the truth of his revelation would be proved by a winter with plenty of caribou. In the event, though some bands found many caribou, two bands almost died of hunger, including one made up of the people who went to the Portage and who had been his most fervent followers.65 A similar tale of resurrection was told at Reindeer Lake in 1874, perhaps connected to this story of the Portage visionary. Two excommunicated men from Fond du Lac travelled to Reindeer Lake, where they claimed that a man at Fond du Lac had died and then lived again.66 After his resurrection, he persuaded his followers to abandon the rosary, saying it was an evil thing, condemned by God. The Caribou-Eaters at Lac Caribou were willing to follow this teaching, just as in the early i86os they had followed the excommunicated visionary from lie a la Crosse. After they lost faith in their Portage prophet, the Hares came to the spring mission at Good Hope in 1874. Many had died during the winter, despite intensive use of Dene medicine. The priest blamed their reliance on Native medicine on their mixing with the people of Fort Rae,67 though it appears more likely to have been motivated by their prevailing sickness. In the fall of 1874 fever and whooping-cough caused twenty-five more deaths. Rather than flocking to the mission, however, the Natives used their own medicine all winter and denied the Christian God. Instead of blaming the priests directly for their deaths, as they had in the past, they held that their abandonment of Native medicine since the arrival of the Oblates was causing them to die. The young people dreamed of being great makers of inkonze, to prolong their lives. They mocked those who prayed and observed the Catholic religion, making a noise outside their lodge to prevent them from praying.68 Opponents of Catholicism always chose Sundays to move camp, forcing the Catholics to work on that day.69 To avoid these difficulties, the priests made some effort to induce their own converts to live together in the woods;70 this proved futile, probably because the small hunting groups were based on kinship rather than religion. Nativistic leaders also appeared among the Loucheux, whom the priests from Good Hope sought to evangelize at Fort McPherson. The rivalry between the OMI and the CMS, mingled with traditional elements, was especially evident at this post. In 1864 two men claimed to have been sent by God to teach the Loucheux.71 This was apparently a nativistic reaction to the arrival of outsiders, Anglican and Roman Catholic, with their claims 144

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to exclusive revelations applicable to all humanity. These Native leaders demanded that all the people confess their sins, so that they could give them absolution and baptism.72 This demonstrated an integration of Catholic teachings with traditional methods of healing to a considerable degree. The traditional leaders of the Loucheux often hindered the efforts of the priests, even while displaying a surface conformity to Oblate teachings. In 1870 Petitot hired a Loucheux interpreter, Rat musque, whom he thought was a convinced Catholic. But he overheard him say "What do you want with this priest? He doesn't like you. All his affection is for the Inuit. Besides, why do you need a priest, am I not enough for you? Don't I pray for you every spring when I come here?"73 Only then did Petitot discover that Rat mustjuewas a "visionary" who had received revelations for the previous two or three years. He also claimed to be a priest, and prayed and chanted for the Loucheux each spring. Another Loucheux wavered between combining his visions with the Anglican teaching or with that of the Oblates. Though he had at first welcomed Catholicism, he later travelled to heaven, where he saw God honour the English Protestants and scorn the French Catholics. This convinced him to join the Anglicans. By 1870, however, he had become disenchanted with both branches of Christianity—a change which Seguin attributed to the fact that McDonald did not give him enough gifts. In 1877, when the Anglican minister married a daughter of the country, this leader decided he was a Catholic, and followed Petitot's teachings. Then, excommunicated by McDonald, he faltered because he feared this would cause him to die. When the priest assured him he was a catechumen in the Roman Catholic Church, however, the man overcame these fears. He continued to be the fisherman for the minister, but refused direct contact with him. He put the fish outside the house, called in that it was there, and sent one of his Protestant relatives to collect his pay.7^ Another Loucheux leader stopped talking of his visions until he was baptized. Then he renewed his medicine and revelations, but included many elements of his new faith. He baptized and confessed his followers and threatened those who did not accept his teaching with death and damnation. The Loucheux esteemed this man's powers so highly that they feared he might cause Seguin's death.7^ Another Loucheux prophet tried to hide the fact that he was a visionary and asked for baptism, which Seguin refused. This man, though he knew his own prayers and hymns and taught them to others, said it was impossi-

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ble for him to learn the Catholic prayers. This was not an unusual reaction. A similar story was told in the twentieth century about a man at Reindeer Lake, who remarked on how difficult it was to remember the Scripture readings, though he read them often; yet he found it easy to remember the traditions of his people which he had heard only once or twice in his youth.76 Perhaps the repetition method of oral tradition did not function so well when applied to strange new teachings from books. There is evidence, however, that there was a decline in adherence to Dene spiritual leaders and the use of Native medicine as the missions spread northwards. No prophetic appearances were reported at Nativity after 1865. The widespread deaths in the epidemic that year and the lengthier exposure of the people to the Oblates' preaching contributed to this change. By 1872 the Hares and Slaveys of Good Hope, Fort Norman, and Bear Lake recognized that their medicine was not so strong as in the old days. Though they continued to use medicine when anyone was sick,77 they recognized how ineffective it proved in a year of starvation and disease which caused the deaths of several of the best hunters.78 In the early twentieth century several celebrated jongleurs told the priest at Fort Norman that, since the arrival of the missionaries, they could not get their spiritual guides to intervene directly for them.79 The priest s categorization of them as jongleurs, however, reveals that the practice of medicine still continued, even when it seemed futile. Probably medicine-making became more restricted to curing disease, with less opposition to Catholicism, even with closer links to Catholic practice, as the years passed and familiarity with their new faith increased. The older people believed that their traditional medicine was God's way of helping them before they knew about God or Christianity.80 Potential converts often said to the priest: "Father, let me keep such and such a custom and then you will pray for me, I will pray with you, I will convert."81 But the priest usually considered these customs contrary to Catholic beliefs and refused their request. Nevertheless, direct spiritual contact and teaching continued to be prized. In the 19305 a Hare man received a message from an angel that the best way to hasten the entrance of a dead person into paradise was to organize dances and games in his honour. The people spent three days dancing, drumming and playing hand-games around the corpse of the first person who died.8^ By the end of the nineteenth century few priests mentioned the practice of medicine by the Dene in their writings. The adoption of Catholicism, with its practices and beliefs, as their own religion, accounted for much of 146

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this. Then the increasing ability of the Oblates to provide their own subsistence and to travel on their own made them less aware of such practices. Probably the Dene no longer confided in the priests, fearing excommunication or ridicule. Another factor was a decreasing practice of medicine since so many traditions had died with the elders during various epidemics. The Dene may have felt more confident about a dualistic approach, using medicine in the bush for curing, but combining it with Catholic prayers for healing. Though some use of medicine among the Dene continued into the twentieth century, the emphasis appears to have shifted from attempts to form a syncretic Dene faith to the acceptance of a Dene Catholicism. Yet they preserved some elements of tradition even after absorption into the universal Church, inculturating Catholicism rather than accepting a wholly transplanted European faith. Evidence for this is given in June Helm's report of an extensive prophetic movement among the Dogrib from the years 1967 to 1971. Three prophets were prominent. Naidzo was the Bear Lake prophet; Jack was the prophet for Rae; and Chi was at Marten Lake. These prophetic movements were linked to Catholicism and in fact were accepted as basically Catholic. The movement at Rae originated in the Dogrib participation in the annual pilgrimage to Lake Ste. Anne in Alberta. It also was associated with their visits to prophets active among the Slaveys of the Hay Lakes-Meander River-Indian Cabins area of northern Alberta.83 The opening of the gravel highway to the south made it possible for the Dogribs of Rae to join in these summer pilgrimages and visits. All three of the prophets based their teachings on revelations received in their visits to heaven. Naidzo and Chi had received ink'on (the Dogrib word for inkonze) as youngsters, as was traditional in their society. Naidzo's gift made him a skilled hunter for many years, while Chi's powers were devoted to curing. Both ceased their activities in this realm of ink'on when they became prophets. They acted primarily as Christian prophets, preaching the necessity to lead a moral life and to avoid overconsumption of alcohol. They did not use rituals or dances, but did include their revealed sacred songs in their gatherings. Jack, on the other hand, included some elements of cult and ritual resembling those of the Slavey prophets. His preaching demonstrated some anti-white sentiments and he made some efforts to keep his teachings for the Dogribs only. He was also more authoritarian than was customary among the Dogribs; this may have led to some discounting of his message.

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Unlike their reaction to the earlier jongleurs, however, the Oblates of the twentieth century welcomed these Christian prophets and opened the pulpit to them at times. The morality they taught was that of Catholicism and they occupied a role very similar to that of the early lay leaders of the Dene Catholic church. Though only glimpses of Dene motivations and beliefs can be found at various stages in the years between 1847 and 1921, the very fact of the survival of very traditional spiritual leaders and their medicine well into the twentieth century, however dimly seen by outsiders, invalidates the hypothesis that Christianity and civilization overwhelmed and subjugated the people and their faith. Their efforts to survive religiously, as recounted by the early missionary Oblates, display diverse levels of the incorporation into their lives of some elements of Christianity. There were also variable elements in the opposition to the priests, who were, after all, hierarchical leaders of a religion alien at first to the Dene. Some Dene leaders tried to replace (and exclude) the priests. The intimidation of non-believers by threats of dire consequences, though very rarely marked by physical violence, characterized these movements. Such actions could be traced both to traditional leadership and to the new Catholicism preached to them. In almost all cases, these spiritual leaders had been gifted with inkonze and recognized as powerful makers of medicine before the arrival of the Oblates. They had also been at least interested in the new faith preached to them. Often they had been baptized by the priests, occasionally being recognized as very devout Catholics. In many cases they had, however, been excommunicated from the Church because of their marriages. Their reactions to disease and to new Catholic doctrine and rules of behaviour, particularly regarding marriage, displayed both traditional and syncretic ways of exerting spiritual power to cope with crisis. Similar actions took place all over the world where European colonizers and evangelizers encountered diverse peoples. Scholars have made many attempts to systematize Native responses. No single theory is adequate to explain the Dene experience, though many give insights into the unique combination of character and circumstance exhibited by the Dene. Because these movements arose in situations of European-Native contact, they can readily be viewed as evidence of nativism, defined as "any conscious, organized attempt on the part of a society's members to revive or perpetuate selected aspects of its culture."84 This natural desire to maintain their culture under siege from outside forces, was also a revitalizing movement, an attempt to breathe new life into it. Faced with new conditions, 148

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including declining health and a deteriorating economy, added to a strong missionary presence, Dene leaders were bound to be affected by both their old and their new beliefs. Unable to keep either system in its pristine purity, they had a strong incentive to teach a new faith that combined selected elements of both, in a form that the people could adopt, and which would empower them in their new situation.8^ The amalgam of their traditional belief in direct contact with the spirits with their new understanding of the Catholic God, saints, and angels, and often associated with acceptance of the sacraments, given either at the hands of the priests or the new prophets, revitalized their religious life. They could also be considered as what Bryan Wilson86 calls thaumaturgical movements, which commonly arose when Christianity and aboriginal cultures met. They prescribed new ritual practices, similar to those of their traditional religion; they also included elements of the wonders described in the Bible. This was most prominent when the Christianity presented to them emphasized miracles. This would be a logical consequence in the Athabasca-Mackenzie, where the Catholicism preached by the Oblates included much emphasis on contemporary apparitions in France. The mixture of old and new beliefs responded to the new situation that faced the Dene, when their familiar need of medicine to secure health and subsistence met newer, more formidable challenges. Their blend of elements from both Native and Christian teachings and rituals forms a recognizably new movement, even though it displays many traditional ways of religious response. Vittorio Lanternari in Religions of the Oppressed explains these movements as rising from "relative deprivation," that is, the conviction that one's condition had worsened in relation to others or to one's past well-being.87 Dene circumstances in the last half of the nineteenth century had deteriorated from their previous state; they also lived in less favourable conditions than did the Oblates and other whites in the north. Their health and economy were devastated by repeated illnesses, the failure of the hunt with consequent famine, while the Oblates, Anglicans, and fur traders preserved their health and displayed their power. The traders and missionaries developed a way of life which was increasingly independent of the Dene. They used their gardens and farms to supply much of their food and augmented this with higher levels of imports; this made them less dependent on country provisions brought in by the Dene. The Dene, on the contrary, could not obtain either food or furs; as their fur resources became depleted, large game animals also became scarce, raising the spectre of starvation. •PROTEST AND - P R O P H E C Y

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The fact of relative deprivation, however, does not necessarily lead to solution by prophetic, messianic, or millenarian movements. A precondition for this development is that the culture must have a tradition of invoking spiritual help. The Dene customarily called on the spirits to help them with every major aspect of their lives. To these spiritual allies they owed good health, good hunting, and the general well-being of individuals and their community. Dene prophetic or millenarian movements were a natural consequence of this coming together of belief and a crisis of wellbeing with a time of intense religious and economic change. Many of these movements, if they have an apocalyptic vision of a future world, are termed millenarian, "those collective endeavours to anticipate, produce, or enter a realm of human perfection."88 In other words, they sought a new heaven on earth, to be attained by observance of new teachings and rituals. In this, they corresponded closely to the hopes held by the Oblates in their evangelization of the Dene. Both the Oblates and the Dene believed that religion should be active in changing the world. Both accepted the presence of evil in the world, but not with complete passivity. Both sought to counter disease and to restore good health and spiritual well-being to the people. The small scale of Dene society meant that when epidemic diseases, famine, or loss of trade struck them, all the people were affected. When many of their traditional leaders and some of their ancestral way of life disappeared, so too did their customary explanations and ability to endure. Faced with conditions they could not explain nor change, they were predisposed to seek a new, more certain, explanation of life. They could find this in Christianity, whether Catholic or Anglican, or in a renewed traditional religion. Often, the people attempted to combine Christianity with a new traditionalist interpretation, doubling their prospects of achieving wellbeing. With a charismatic leader these new movements can be called messianic. This, however, denotes a more formally organized and long-lived movement than any of those among the Dene of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The small size of their society, the frequent deaths of these leaders and their followers, the individualism and pragmatism of the Dene, prohibited such a messianic formation. Their spiritual leaders are commonly referred to in Western scholarship as "prophets," not messiahs. They bear many similarities to the prophets of the Old Testament, with their direct revelations and attempts to convince their people to amend their ways to

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appease the anger of the spirits, but their appearance also conformed to Dene thought from long before the arrival of Christianity or their acquired knowledge of the Old or New Testament. Thomas W. Overholt in Channels of Prophecy prepared a model of specific components of prophetic activity that could be used in cross-cultural comparisons. This would include the essential social interaction that went on between prophet, deity, and audience, a process which profoundly affected the theological message presented by the prophet. The model includes revelation from direct contact with the deity proclaimed by the prophet. His teaching had to include enough familiar ideas to be recognized by his community as typical prophetic behaviour, but it also needed innovative elements to deal with new problems. An audience was essential; its reaction, whether positive, negative, or indifferent, affected the subsequent behaviour of the prophet. These three factors of revelation, prophet, and audience are essential components of the model for prophecy. Less essential, but generally present, were the continuing interaction among prophet, deity, and audience; the prophet brought to the deity the reaction of his people to the first message, received more revelations, and conveyed those to his community. If he could support these with some kind of marvellous actions, his role would be assured. Then he would gain disciples, without whom he could not function. The various Dene prophets fit this model. Direct revelations were characteristic of Dene society and familiar to the audience, as was the absolute necessity to teach from that direct spiritual experience. Each spiritual leader included some new ideas, often derived from Christianity, to deal with new circumstances. Each attracted followers, who were necessary to authenticate a Dene spiritual leader, before and after the arrival of Christianity. These followers were usually their kin, again in conformity with Dene practice. Proofs of the validity of their message were expected; the Dene customarily refused to follow those whose predictions failed. Their leaders attempted to reshape old ideas and blend them with some new understanding at a time when they were suffering severe stress, in order to show the road to salvation to their community. Their culture provided fertile ground for the growth of such movements. The prophetic character of many of them is clear: some promised a new life free of hunger or disease if the followers adhered to the instructions of the prophet; some thought that their brief acceptance of Catholicism had angered the spirits and that only a return to traditional medicine would

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restore their well-being; some demanded the destruction of property, occasionally even their dogs, as sacrifices to restore a balanced relationship with the spirits. Patricia Pessar noted that millenarian movements generally have developed when centralization in political and economic life has been imposed on a people accustomed to autonomous, charismatic leadership, and to an economic order characterized by communalism and self-sufficiency. At the beginning of this process, when the new order has not yet been consolidated, these millenarian movements are seen as a real threat by those assuming power. Attempts are made to coopt or destroy them. Once the dominant group has consolidated its control, however, millenarian activity is tolerated as a religious phenomenon, not a political one.8^ This interpretation explains the Oblates' reaction to the new spiritual leaders among the Dene. They fought vigorously against them in the early days of their missions, disputing with and ridiculing their teachings. If the teachings conformed closely to Catholic doctrine, the priests sought to win over the prophets as lay spiritual leaders within the Church, forcing them to abandon their claims to direct revelation. As the Oblate missions became more secure, however, the attention paid to these leaders faded and eventually all comment upon them disappeared from the Oblate documents. An important agent in the formation of these new doctrines, which has not been noted in previous discussions, was the inability of many couples to conform to Church rules on marriage. This turned some leaders away from at least a surface acceptance of Catholic doctrine, towards a new syncretism that allowed them to combine some Christian teaching with their own choices in marriage. They were shaped by Dene culture, where religion informed the whole of life, where spiritual contact was essential to health, subsistence, and general well-being of the community, and where good and proper behaviour ensured the continuance of that spiritual benevolence. They were affected by the teachings of the priests and were attracted to many teachings of Catholicism. They were awed by the manifest spiritual power and relative good health of the Oblates. They were also shaped by the circumstances of their time, by the destruction of their health and the increasing scarcity of food, and by the failure of traditional medicine to alleviate their distress. The Oblates often blamed the appearance of these prophets on the confusion caused by exposure to the rival creeds of Anglicanism and Roman Catholicism. The confessional barriers between Oblates and Anglicans account for at least some of the anti-Catholicism. The conflict between the 152

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two denominations probably also encouraged those who wanted to find a new religion solely intended for the Dene, despite the fact that such exclusiveness was alien to the traditions of the Dene. In the final chapter of my thesis, entitled "Athapaskan Adaptations," I analyzed these movements as "primarily religious, syncretic attempts to combine the most appealing aspects of the new religion with those of the aboriginal religions, and to adapt it thus to Athapaskan life and culture."90 John Webster Grant concluded that "in their own way these movements were calls for an indigenous Christianity."91 This is evidenced in those movements which sought to replace the Oblates and their sacraments with Dene priests and with their own administration of baptism and confession, but it does not give enough weight to the traditional and nativistic religious elements that were opposed to Christianity. Kerry Abel, on the other hand, has argued that, because these leaders sometimes opposed the priests and used the Christian vocabulary for traditional concepts, they were not syncretic but primarily traditional, viewing the priests as shamans of another religion, with new opportunities for spiritual power.92 This was certainly true of many. Such views, I think, reflect but another level of syncretism, which covers a wide spectrum of options for the mingling of Christianity and Native religions. These were syncretic movements—a word which better reflects their religious character than does the word adaptation, with its anthropological and cultural overtones. Syncretism means the mixing of the elements of two religious systems to the point where at least one, if not both, of the systems loses its basic structure and identity.93 Even within that definition, there are different ways of syncretism and different proportions of old and new. Dene leaders attempted to mould a new faith, combining aspects of both their traditional and the Christian religion, along a continuum from an almost complete rejection of Christianity to an incorporation of many of its elements. The Oblates and the prophets attempted to shape a new community of faith but the ties that bound their adherents differed and excluded each from the other. Both used new rituals and new ways of community to attract converts and maintain them. Both used all their powers of medicine to restore well-being to the Dene through proper alignment with the spiritual. Neither could overcome the effects of disease and famine. Since many Dene leaders opposed to the Oblates died in these epidemics, while the Oblates survived and flourished, the attraction of Catholicism increased, while the authority of Dene leaders waned. The decline in the influence of •PROTEST AND

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the Native prophets accelerated as the priests increasingly used education as a tool to evangelize the Dene. The lessons of the Roman Catholic faith underlay the system of secular education and produced a new generation more familiar with Catholicism than with their traditional knowledge and ways of relating to the spirits.

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11 'EDUCATION AND 'EVANGELIZATION

JLt was the entrance of the Church Missionary Society (CMS) into the Mackenzie with its emphasis on schools that was the catalyst forcing the OMI to offer a formal education to the people. Education was not regarded by either branch of Christianity as morally or theologically neutral. It was most assuredly, for both Anglicans and Roman Catholics, a tool of evangelization and a way in which each hoped to triumph over the other by winning the hearts and minds, as well as the souls, of the Dene. The establishment of a network of Catholic schools was just as much a hallmark of the nineteenth-century Church in North America as was the expansion of missions. Segregated education was designed to preserve the

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Catholic faith in a pluralist society. It was a type of endeavour which applied a particular combination of Christianity and civilization, similar in some respects to that practiced in the missions. This school policy became practicable owing to the marked increase in female congregations in the nineteenth century, especially in France. These nuns were devoted to the practical works of schools, hospitals, orphanages, and the care of the elderly. They worked for little more than their board and room. Their commitment, numbers, and financial contribution made it possible for the Church in North America to provide the Catholic education it considered so essential. The Oblates could not be indifferent to these developments. Mazenod, however, did not want his Oblates to be directly involved in teaching. In cases of necessity, he authorized the establishment of schools, including the first junior seminaries in France. He also approved the opening of the University of Ottawa because it would draw vocations to the Oblate priesthood from the local community. Nevertheless, these exceptions only proved the adaptability of the Oblates; they did not display a change of direction. Their calling was to be missionaries, preaching the Gospel; education was not within their mandate. When the Oblates entered the Athabasca and Mackenzie Districts, however, they came to an area which had no educational institutions. Their situation was quite different from that of their counterparts in Europe or Quebec where there was no need for the Oblates to get involved in formal schooling. In carrying out their mission of preaching Catholicism, however, the Oblates had to teach the Dene to read the catechisms and hymnals. The syllabic system they adopted was ideally suited to this objective. During their brief periods of contact, the priests taught syllables to a few Dene, and gave them copies of the small religious books. These people taught others how to read syllables in their winter camps, or used the books to conduct and teach their prayer groups. This type of literacy, however, served primarily to perpetuate the teachings of Catholicism. It had little to do with the inculcation of Western secular civilization and did not provide a Western type of education. On the other hand, any degree of literacy introduced some element of change into Dene society, even when designed only to replace its religious faith, not its culture. At the resident missions the Oblates also gave some instruction in reading, writing, and arithmetic to the children and adults at the post during the winter. Their teaching centred on reading based on religious texts. They

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made their own school books, often using the Native language and syllables, and they sometimes taught in French. These sporadic teaching efforts varied in their results. Some Oblates were more interested than others, some had more time to devote to it, but all were subject to calls to travel to other duties, including visiting the sick or a faraway winter camp. Their success also depended on the sustained interest of the employees at the HBC posts, whether for themselves or for their children. These attempts at schooling continued intermittently at various posts, depending on whether the people were interested and whether a priest was available, but most importantly, on whether an Anglican school threatened the mission's hold on the people.1 The initial schools in the north were destined primarily for the Metis allies of the Oblates. These parents were so anxious to secure education for their children that the Oblates feared that they would send them to the CMS schools, despite the strong condemnations of the priests. In that case, the Metis would inevitably be lost to the Roman Catholic Church. Grollier was convinced that James Anderson, when he asked for Anglican missions in the Mackenzie District, had intended to alienate the Metis from the Roman Catholics by means of Anglican schools.2 If so, this scheme was effective; despite all the efforts of the priests, the Metis of Fort Resolution sent eight children to the school opened by Kirkby at Fort Simpson in i859-3 To gather children for a formal education required a commitment of time and expertise and a vocation which the priests lacked. The Oblates had called on the Grey Nuns to teach at lie a la Crosse and hoped to secure more of them to staff a school in the Mackenzie District. This use of nuns in isolated missions was a new factor in the nineteenth-century mission field. It offered a new opportunity for women to engage in the missionary activity of the Church, an opening which coincided with the increasing numbers of women engaged in the active orders, working in the world rather than in cloistered convents. It also marked a new stage in the missions of the Roman Catholic Church, as the provision of Catholic education assumed a prominent role in the evangelization of peoples, corresponding to the heightened emphasis on the need for "civilization" to accompany, or precede, the transfer of Christianity. In the north, nuns would be a priceless asset to the missionary effort of an entirely male clergy. Their CMS opponents usually had wives who proved invaluable auxiliaries to their endeavour. Grandin hoped the nuns

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Farewell at Providence, 1920. [NAC PA 101542]

Fort Resolution, View of the Mission. [PAA OB 767]

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would also offset the activities of some of the wives of HBC servants who spread CMS teachings antagonistic to the priests, a role denied to their husbands by Company directives to maintain impartiality. ^ The Oblates could not reach the Dene women so directly as nuns could. Though women lay leaders were of great service to the spread of their message, nuns could provide a more official presence in their function as dedicated virgins within the Church. Only nuns could teach young girls, the future mothers of the people. These young women, brought up in the faith, would bring civilisation chretienne to their families, securing the future well-being of their people through the survival and increase of the Catholic faith.5 The fact that many more girls than boys received their education at the schools, and for a longer period of time, supported this view. The nuns could also teach the wives and children of the HBC clerks while the men made the long summer trip to Portage La Loche. Many HBC men who hoped to retire outside of the Mackenzie District valued the prospect of some Western education for their Metis or Dene wives, since this would ease their transition to life in Red River or Europe. A convent school was more prestigious than the CMS schools, which in the beginning were often put in the hands of untrained men. The nuns could provide an education both academic and practical, including domestic skills like sewing and cooking. Since many Grey Nuns were also proficient in medicine, they would soon become the doctors for the whole district; the close connection between good medicine and good religion in the minds of the Natives was bound to win some to Catholicism. The fact that some Grey Nuns were English-speaking would give them another way to counter the Anglican schools. In every way, the Grey Nuns would improve the evangelization efforts of the Oblates. Grandin, while he was in charge of the vicariate, strongly advocated that Faraud establish a convent boarding school as soon as possible, and chose Providence as the most suitable place for such an undertaking. Although cool to this idea at first, Faraud accepted it when he learned that the upper ranks of the Company would prefer their wives and children to be taught by the nuns.6 When he arrived back in his vicariate in 1865 he laboured to finish the convent and school, making tiers of bunk beds, like bookshelves, in which the children slept until 18997 Faraud could not bring the nuns to Providence until 1867 when Sacred Heart School opened. Within a year he realized that "to have a good school and the reputation of all-around skills, that is the way to make our sacred cause triumph."8

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Other schools opened as the Grey Nuns responded to further appeals for help from the Oblates. In 1874, Isidore Glut, Faraud's auxiliary bishop, persuaded the nuns at Providence to send two sisters to open a school at Fort Chipewyan, where the CMS intended to begin one. This hasty establishment, without the authorization of either Faraud or Mother Dupuis, Superior of the Grey Nuns, earned Glut rebukes from both. Mother Dupuis relented, however, and eventually agreed to send three nuns to staff the new Holy Angels School at Nativity. In 1903 the chiefs of Fort Resolution asked for a Catholic school, according to the provisions of Treaty 8; Bishop Breynat obtained the further help of the Grey Nuns to begin St. Joseph's Hospice there. This completed the chain of residential schools established by the Oblates in the Athabasca and Mackenzie Districts.9 It was the Grey Nuns who made it possible for the Oblates to stabilize their educational endeavour in the north. The nuns exemplified the new role of women in the missions of the nineteenth century, their function closely linked to that of the Virgin Mary in the life of the Church. The Grey Nuns, moreover, came from Quebec and represented the largest contingent of Canadians; their presence improved prospects for fund-raising in Quebec, just when contributions from France were declining. The purpose of education, for the early Oblates, was to instruct the children in the Catholic faith, to give them the benefits of civilisation chretienne. The Grey Nuns shared this outlook, as did the bishops of Quebec, who urged their parishioners to support the Indian schools in the west because it was a work that was simultaneously patriotic, civilizing, and Christian.10 Secular civilization was not the main objective of the nuns' teaching, though they did impart some level of literacy, numeracy, and household skills. They were the congregation of nuns best-suited to the north, for they combined medicine and education in their vocation. Since these were integral components of evangelization, the Grey Nuns considered themselves to be missionaries, seeking the salvation of souls (their own and the Dene) through their efforts in the north. * 1 The fact that all the Metis children of the Mackenzie spoke French, whereas elsewhere they only spoke Cree,12 aided the nuns. Because the nuns also taught the children of HBC personnel, English soon became a language of instruction as well.1^ The sisters taught reading, writing, and the catechism in French and English; much emphasis was placed on the study of music and singing. Visiting dignitaries were treated to a recitation by the children and gave a kind of inspection of the teaching. While the l6o

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Boys at play, Providence. [NAC PA 101654]

Grey Nuns and girls preparing fish for the winter. [AD]

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schools were financed by the bishop, some use of Dene languages continued outside of class. ^ Oblate priests gave catechism lessons in Dene languages to children who did not know either French or English.15 Not many nuns became fluent in Dene but strictures against any use of the Native languages in the schools were not yet in place. Due to the prevailing mortality among the Dene, the nuns soon took in orphans whose extended families were unable to care for them. This breakdown of the traditional kin network, and the assumption of the care and direction of the lives of many children, began the long process whereby educational policy, evangelization, and social welfare intersected, and the missionaries assumed a greater control over the lives of the people. Some Dene spent most of their childhood at the schools, cared for by the nuns until they were old enough to marry. Only a minority of Dene and Metis children, however, attended the schools in these early years. Of that small group most, especially the boys, attended for only four or five years. The difficulties of attempting to teach these children, who spoke several different languages, were compounded by the fact that they varied considerably in age; many also had physical disabilities. Of the eleven orphans at Providence in 1871 (six boys and five girls), one Chipewyan girl was only two years old and one Mountain Indian boy was only four. Another orphan was a blind Dogrib boy.1^ The support of these orphans posed an enormous challenge, especially when animals for food became so scarce in the north in the late nineteenth century. The children spent much time labouring, along with the priests, nuns, and brothers, to secure subsistence for themselves; they hoed potatoes, sewed, and cleaned enough whitefish in the fall to furnish a year's meals. The nuns protested against the amount of manual labour Faraud demanded from the children, insisting that they must be given three hours of class in the morning and two in the afternoon. If they cut back these hours, they would contravene government regulations and lose their stipend. They were also upset that Faraud maintained control of this government money and did not hand it over to the nuns to use for the school.1'7 Manual labour continued to be demanded of the children, however. As late as 1920, Father Duport suggested that the reason why more boys than girls were discharged from the Fort Resolution school lay in the fact that their work in preparing wood for fuel was much too heavy for them. He asked a friend in France to supply a round-saw to ease this task.18 In their contacts with adult Dene, the Oblates saw no contradiction between Catholicism and the continuance of the Dene commitment to l62

TROM THE CJREAT H I V E R TO THE TNDS OF THE "EARTH

hunting and trapping. They did not try to induce the Dene to adopt a settled agricultural lifestyle, though this was ruled out as much by the environment as by their philosophy. Often they viewed life in the bush as an opportunity for the Dene to live their faith more purely than was often the case at large treaty gatherings. In these circumstances, they saw little need for much formal education, nor for attempts to extinguish Dene languages. Faraud thought that once an orphan girl knew her catechism and a little reading and writing, she had sufficient education and could be useful elsewhere.19 When they assumed responsibility for Dene children, neither the Oblates nor the Grey Nuns foresaw that these children would be unable to readapt to Dene life nor be equipped for any other kind of life. It took some years before this recognition became widespread. Even when the acknowledgment took place, school policy still held that it was better to attempt to inculcate a Western type of education than to adapt the school to Dene culture. H.B. Bury, who inspected the schools on behalf of the Department of Indian Affairs in 1913, reported that this system either went too far or not far enough, depending on the objective. If intended to mould the children into a "prototype of the present day product of civilization," it did not go far enough. If intended only to give them sufficient education "to fear God, honor the King, and respect the laws of the country," it went too far.20 The mixture of motives and objectives, shared by all who attempted to devise a suitable education for the Dene without consultation with the people, ensured confusion. The children brought up in the residential schools were not educated to be Christian trappers, but had no other employment opportunities open to them. The girls, trained in household skills as well as in Catholicism, could readjust more readily to Dene life in the bush than could boys with no training in hunting. For both boys and girls, the loss of family life during the years they spent at school was keenly felt and had enduring effects, even if the number of children at any of the schools was never very large. Holy Angels school, up to 1923, never had more than eighty pupils at a time, and this included day students.21 Nevertheless, the effects spread like ripples in a pond, reaching out to many who had not experienced the system themselves. The Dene found it extremely painful to be separated from their children, and recognized the inadequacies of the school system to prepare their children for the life they would lead. They also feared that, during their long absence from home, the children might die in some epidemic. The -EDUCATION AND " E V A N G E L I Z A T I O N

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Grey Nuns nursed many through whooping-cough, influenza, measles, and so forth, but many also died. Several children were tubercular, and this increased the mortality rate, though the Oblates tried to avoid taking them into the schools. The expense and difficulties of obtaining sufficient provisions at any one place for a prolonged residence made the task of providing room and board for children seem insurmountable. In 1865 Tache managed to convince the Company to allow rations for the children of HBC servants attending mission schools near the posts; the amount they would have received had they remained with their parents would be transferred to the mission. This, however, was only applicable when the school was near the post where the parents were living and did not apply to children brought from one post to attend school at another post.22 It had a minimal effect on the support of the children at the widely-scattered schools. The shortage of brothers made it very difficult to carry out the many duties of sustaining the mission. The competition for food resources from the HBC exacerbated the suffering. Only one year after opening Providence school, provisions were so scarce that the nuns had no meat, no flour, no potatoes, no butter, and no grease, either for themselves or for the children in their care.23 These hardships led to rumours among the Metis that their children were not getting enough to eat.2^ The continuing hardships caused poor health among the fathers, brothers, and nuns, as well as the children. The Mother Superior of the Grey Nuns was so appalled at their living conditions that she intended to recall her sisters in 1870. Faraud sought financial help from the diocese of Montreal, but received only £200, inadequate for his purposes.2^ The Oblate bishops financed the schools primarily with funds from L'Oeuvre de la Sainte-Enfance in France. Faraud continued to fret over the tremendous expense of Providence, which absorbed so much of his finances that it detracted from all the other mission work. In 1881 he decided he could no longer keep the school open, and sent orders for the nuns to prepare to leave in 1882. The fathers and brothers all protested that this would destroy their mission enterprise. Father Xavier Ducot, who had inherited a considerable sum, offered to give money and to ask his relatives in France for more. Auguste Lecorre, another priest, who was going to France on family business, suggested he would solicit funding in France for the school if Faraud would promise to keep it open. Lecorre persuaded the Propagation de la Foito allow 15,000 frs. to Providence, besides the usual allocation to the vicariate. Archbishop Tache agreed to pay the travel costs 164

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of the two nuns required in 1882. He also sought a promise from the Canadian government to pay a subsidy to the support of Providence and Holy Angels, and to remove the customs duties on clothing, new and used, sent to the missions.26 Julian Camsell, in charge of the Mackenzie District, also agreed to make the HBC parents of children pay more than in the past for their schooling.27 These temporary infusions of funds did little for the long-term stability of the schools, however, and their situation remained precarious.28 Faraud attempted to secure government support for both Providence and Holy Angels but was turned down because the schools were situated outside of treaty limits.29 Tactic urged very strongly that the government, although not bound by treaty to advance the Indians of the Athabasca-Mackenzie, should nevertheless realize that their country was part of the Dominion of Canada and that the federal government should provide for the education of its inhabitants.30 His argument was ignored, though Faraud soon received an annual grant from the Lieutenant-Governor of the North-West Territories for the schools.31 When Grouard became bishop, he continued to press the federal government for increased funding for his schools. He insisted they should be treated as well as the Anglicans were, asking the Minister of the Interior "to show us what we call British fair play."32 Only with Treaty 8 in 1899 did the government accept responsibility to support the schools at Fort Chipewyan and Fort Resolution. Even with this step in place, Grouard felt it necessary to write directly to Prime Minister Wilfrid Laurier to ask for prompt support for the new school at Fort Resolution. Laurier recommended the grant, but was annoyed at Grouard's threat to seek funding and publicize government inaction if his request were not allowed.33 This was, however, a customary way for the bishops to be sure that their influence was felt in government circles when decisions were being made. Providence, however, remained outside of treaty limits. Breynat resumed the task of trying to convince the Laurier government to fund this school. He emphasized the contribution the Oblates and Grey Nuns had made to the government, as well as to the Dene, by looking after so many Mackenzie River orphans for nearly forty years. In 1903 he organized a petition, signed by almost all the whites of the Mackenzie, many of them Protestants, asking for support for his schools,34 but was again denied. Frank Oliver, Minister of the Interior, planned to visit the Mackenzie in 1910 on the HBC steamboat, the Wrigley, but this was not ready at the appointed time. Breynat offered to take him on the Ste. Marie, an offer

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which the Minister accepted with gratitude, for otherwise his planned meetings could not take place. Oliver had previously been opposed to residential schools but this visit, in the company of the bishop, changed his mind. On his return to Ottawa, he called a meeting in November, 1910, attended by all the denominations charged with these schools, and agreed to raise the government subvention.35 The government also appointed a superintendent of Indian education, Duncan Campbell Scott, who worked closely with the missionaries in the field of education.36 With the signing of Treaty n in 1921, Providence School at last qualified for the usual government support given to schools. The signing of the treaties accomplished the objectives of the Oblate bishops in their many years of pressuring for federal government financing of their schools. The Dene too demanded government support of denominational schools before they would accept treaty. Both Anglican and Roman Catholic missionaries urged the government to adopt this system, pushed by the needs of the schools they had already established, and by the precedent of churchrun schools in other treaty areas. In the end, the economic savings to the government carried the most weight. The few years of experience with providing the education mandated by the treaties had convinced the Department of Indian Affairs that it could not establish schools, pay for teachers, and provide all that was needed for the children nearly as economically as could the various denominations that had already begun schools. Consequently, government policy centred on placing the management of all schools in treaty areas into the hands of whatever churches had been active there. It was only when the treaties made it mandatory for the government to provide schooling for the Dene that the policy of "aggressive civilization" was promoted, using the denominational schools to accomplish this aim more economically than the government could. Thus, even if the Oblates and Grey Nuns had had any different notions of education, they would have had to conform to government regulations in order to obtain vital financial support.37 The Oblates had previously left the choice of curriculum very much to the Grey Nuns, except for the manual labour they expected from the children. They provided some religious education at the schools, but their primary involvement had always been economic. It was not new for them to leave curriculum requirements to the government, while the government recognized and accepted the religious teaching which accompanied the secular in these schools.

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It was the government which enforced policies of assimilation, which imposed rules that only English or French should be spoken. This had a devastating effect, causing many children to lose their knowledge of their Native tongue. When the children returned to their home communities incapable of speaking their Native language, they were unable to join in prayers with their community. This separated them from the religious life of their families as well. They also could not read the syllabic books, which were still in use at many missions. These barriers to the practice of Catholicism, which the schools had been supposed to implant so deeply in the children, led some Oblates to urge that the schools use the Dene languages, at least for prayers.38 Bishop Breynat, though unable to change the curriculum, was aware of the harmful results of trying to erase their language and traditions from the memories of the children: "They should be encouraged to retain their old customs and dialects. They should be taught pride of race and history."39 With children of different languages and ages in the schools to be educated, fed, and clothed, the rules and regulations were necessarily stringent—and painful to those subjected to them. No matter how wellintentioned or loving some of those in charge could be, they could not adapt the school to the indigenous culture; this would have been outside their mind-set, and incomprehensible to them. Equally, this type of institutionalized Western education was so alien to Dene traditional education and family life that they could not integrate it into their culture. The clash of cultures became much more evident in the field of education than it had ever been for the preaching of the Gospel. It is impossible to say what would otherwise have happened to the orphan children who spent their growing years at the schools. It is probable that this made the difference between life and death for them. Some adapted to school life and enjoyed the routine and security. Although they found it difficult to readjust to the Dene way of life when they grew up, they did so, and still brought up their children in the Catholic faith. Elizabeth Yakeleya40 and Cecilia Tourangeau,41 sisters of the Blondin family, who spent many years at Providence in the early years of this century, valued that experience, though they found the discipline sometimes difficult to accept. They worked hard, helping the nuns with all the work required for the upkeep of all the children. They also enjoyed much of the school life, especially the singing. Both women sang a hymn to me at the end of our interviews (hymns which I, too, had learned as a child but could not sing in

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their entirely now). This feat 01 memory illustrates both the strength of their oral tradition and of their training in Providence school. Both can speak English, French, and Slavey (the latter relearned after they left school). Both married and brought up large families within the Catholic faith. Their experience should be included as one of the strengths of the Grey Nuns' schooling, offsetting some of the negative results in other accounts. Students who were at various residential schools have told of their suffering, some from abuse, some from the alien system.42 The Oblates, in July 1991, apologized for the abuse caused to the Natives by the very existence of the residential schools, their attempt to assimilate aboriginal peoples, and the important role played by the Oblates in carrying out that purpose. They also apologized for all instances of physical and sexual abuse at the schools, acknowledging that they were "inexcusable, intolerable and a betrayal of trust in one of its most serious forms."43 Although unable to undo these past injustices and injuries, the Oblates hoped to help the Dene and themselves in the necessary healing process, the first step in any new beginning. Each school established by the Oblates responded to the varying needs of the time and place. Providence was intended originally to provide an education for the Metis children, to secure the continued adherence of their parents to Catholicism. It was designed also to educate the children (and wives) of the upper ranks of the HBC in the district, to help secure the necessary approval and assistance of the Company to this very expensive undertaking. The Oblates did not, initially, plan to have many Dene children in school, since their way of life precluded this. Within a few years, however, many Dene orphans had to be taken in by the schools, which then became their home as well as their educational training ground. The total support of so many children severely shook the financial underpinnings of the vicariate and imposed serious hardships on fathers, brothers, nuns, and children. Holy Angels began as a counter to the Anglican school at Fort Chipewyan, and continued to maintain the adherence of the Catholic inhabitants of the Athabasca District. Fort Resolution school continued the teaching efforts begun by the priests at that mission. It was the first school founded by the Oblates after the negotiation of the treaty and therefore was financed primarily by the government. The takeover of finance and direction of the schools by the federal government marked the beginning of a new phase of relationship between Oblate and Dene through education policy. The Roman Catholic schools still considered Catholicism the fundamental element of education and l68

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civilization. But government financing and control of the curriculum brought a stronger emphasis on the more secular aspects of "civilization," more stress on Dene culture, and less willingness to visualize the ideal Dene Roman Catholic living in the bush after graduating from the schools. The system of Western education in schools was totally alien to Dene culture, impossible for them to adapt to their own lives. Like other institutions, it was offered, or imposed, in a form which was not at all malleable. Richard Slobodin has defined the system of federal education as an agent of change, whereas the schools of the mission era were stabilizers, fostering an equilibrium characteristic of the mission-fur trade era.44 In fact, however, though the early schools did not attempt to enforce massive change, they did introduce a new element into Dene society, one which could not but be destabilizing to that society. The adoption by the Oblates of Western education as a tool of evangelization was not integral to their own role as missionaries to the Dene. The initiation of their schools, in the beginning, was grounded in Oblate interaction with the CMS, the HBC, and the Metis, not on any commitment to Western education as essential to the Christianization of the Dene. From the opening of Providence school in 1867 to the negotiation of Treaty n in 1921, the Oblates played a peripheral role in the field of education. Their primary function was to construct the necessary buildings, obtain the required financing, and secure the Grey Nuns to staff the schools. They had no philosophy of secular education and, though they soon recognized the deficiencies of the residential system, could not foresee any alternative. They would not, in any case, yield the field to their denominational rivals, for education continued to be a vital tool of evangelization, even when wielded indirectly by the Oblates. The early development of taking in so many Dene orphans altered their position, though not their outlook on missions. The overwhelming difficulties of supporting these orphans, with minimal assistance from either the HBC or the parents of some children, increased the financial burden of the bishops. They required much manual labour from the Oblate brothers and fathers, the Grey Nuns, and the children, to maintain even basic subsistence. Subject to the vagaries of the fisheries and hunt, subject also to fluctuations in their financial base caused by events in France or Quebec, the Oblates and Grey Nuns faced a constant struggle to keep the schools in existence. The search for a more secure financial base preoccupied the bishops and contributed to their advocacy of the treaties as the only way to insure government support of their schools.

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12 OBLATES; DENE; AND THE CANADIAN GOVERNMENT

here the Dene and Metis had often acted as intermediaries on behalf of the Oblates with the HBC, the situation was reversed when the Canadian government assumed sovereignty over the land and peoples of the Athabasca-Mackenzie. The HBC had developed a thorough knowledge of the country and a working relationship with its inhabitants after centuries of trade. The Ottawa-based government had no such tradition on which to draw and, for many years, had no direct contact with the people of the north. The Dene were represented to them through the filter of the perceptions of missionaries, traders, and explorers. Since the Dene, like all other Indians, did not have a vote at this time, their direct relationship to

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the Canadian government was carried out only through the treaties. The assumption by the Oblates of the position of brokers for the Dene, given this set of circumstances, was inevitable. They acted on behalf of the Natives, interceding for them in many cases with the remote and uninformed government in Ottawa. Simultaneously, the Oblates also negotiated with the Canadian government to improve the state of their missions. The imposition of customs duties on mission goods in 1879 threatened the fragile financial structure of the vicariate. Tache protested to the newly-returned Conservative government, whom he termed "our friends," that this took away a considerable part of what the missions received in charity each year, to the benefit of the public treasury. In a veiled threat of political fall-out, he hoped the Conservative government would relieve this distressing situation, so that the Oblates would not have cause to regret the former Liberal government.1 In 1880 Faraud threatened to close Providence school because of the added costs caused by this duty.2 Glut complained again in a personal interview with Prime Minister John A. Macdonald in 1888 and eventually some exemptions were made in favour of the missions.3 The interaction between government, Oblate, and Dene became most evident in the negotiation of Treaty 8 in 1899 with the people of the Athabasca and Treaty u in 1921 with the people of the Mackenzie.4 The series of numbered treaties with the Indians of the west between 1871 and 1877 had paved the way for white settlement and railways across the western plains. In exchange, the Natives were given reserves, held in trust for them by the Crown, a small annuity, and provisions for medical care and schools. They were soon brought under the authority of the Indian Act, which regulated the most intimate aspects of their lives. But the government resisted any thoughts of extending treaty to the northern Indians, whose lands were not of immediate interest to it. The worsening condition of the Athabasca and Mackenzie Natives in the i88os, however, as their food and fur resources declined or disappeared, causing poverty and hunger, motivated the HBC and missionaries to bring their plight to the attention of the government. Game, both large and small, was disappearing, and this affected Native food and clothing. Their dogs were also dying, compounding the misery. The fisheries at Lake Athabasca and several other lakes had failed. Some Natives died from starvation and rumours of cannibalism spread.5 Although the Company had in the past assisted Indians in time of want, it insisted this was now a government responsibility. The HBC had changed its way of business owing to 172

TROM THE (JREAT •RIVER TO THE 'ENDS OF THE T A R T H

new transportation routes and this meant that it no longer kept the same large stock of provisions on hand and had no surplus to distribute.6 Bishop Glut suggested that the government might relieve the starvation by supplying him with $500 to buy net, twine, and hooks to distribute to the Indians.7 The government acceded to this request but did not yet accept any further responsibility for the welfare of the Indians.8 A more pressing motivation for the government to make treaty came when hopes of developing the petroleum and other valuable minerals of the area surfaced. In response, the Superintendent-General of Indian Affairs recommended that negotiations with the Indians of the Athabasca and Mackenzie be opened in the summer of 1891.9 No further steps were taken, however, until 1898, when the discovery of gold in the Klondyke made a treaty imperative. Miners flocked into the country, disrupting and destroying Native resources. White trappers spread poisoned bait, which sometimes killed the dogs belonging to the Indians. A treaty was perceived as the only way to control the influx and protect both the miners and the Indians from each other. By 1899, when the treaty was actually negotiated, the government had decided to deal only with the Natives of Athabasca as far as the south shore of Great Slave Lake. This would take in a total Indian population of 2,700; about 1,700 Metis would receive scrip at the same time. Oblate participation in this process was evident, since these figures were obtained from Bishop Grouard and Father Husson. It was Grouard who insisted that the government must deal with the Metis as well as with the Indians, fearing that otherwise the Metis might sway the Indians to reject the proposed treaty.10 Clifford Sifton, Minister of the Interior, expected both the Indians and Metis to cause a great deal of difficulty for the Treaty Commissioners.11 The Metis were not satisfied with the recognition given them, while the Indians were suspicious of government interference and antagonistic to the incoming whites, fearing the destruction of their hunting grounds. Because of this hostility and the lack of knowledge in Ottawa of the customs and characteristics of either the Indians or the Metis, Sifton recommended that Father Lacombe be asked to assist the Treaty Commission.12 David Laird, Commissioner and Superintendent-General of Indian Affairs, also invited Bishop Grouard to accompany the treaty party. These steps made clear the degree to which the government recognized the Oblates as essential allies in the treaty process. The Commissioners noted "a marked absence of the old Indian style of oratory."13 Only the Woods Cree made any formal speeches and these were DELATES, DENE, AND THE C A N A D I A N G O V E R N M E N T

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brief, while the Chipewyan spent their time cross-examining the commissioners. They wanted to receive as "liberal" terms as those of the Plains Indians, including relief for the indigent, medical care, and education—all aspects of their lives in which the Oblates had endeavoured to supply help for many years. They all feared losing their hunting and fishing rights; several were afraid that treaty would make them subject to taxes and military service. They also refused to be confined to reserves. Grouard was most keenly interested in their request that the government provide their children with education which would not interfere with their religious beliefs. Part of this anxiety for schools of their own denomination arose from the urging of the priests and bishop, who wanted to maintain church direction of education for their own Dene membership. Here, as in the signing of the earlier treaties, Natives had always proved eager that the government guarantee them education and health care. Although they recognized the benefits, they could not foresee the detrimental effects of a Western type of education for their children, who faced a very different future under the aegis of the federal government. Father Lacombe acted as intermediary and advisor regarding the Metis scrip payments. Lacombe, anxious to persuade the Indians to accept the treaty, knew that Metis advocacy was crucial. Since the Metis could not obtain scrip until after the treaty was signed, they were more likely to recommend treaty if their own interests were satisfied.14 Only after the treaty could the Metis assert their identity as separate from that of the treaty Indians, to whom they were closely related in both inheritance and lifestyle. After the treaty, according to David M. Smith, Metis identity became associated with the older notion of "freeman" status.15 It is probable, however, that those who first identified themselves as Metis were descendants of the earlier generation of post Metis, those whom the first Oblates identified as "whites," who had led a life more aligned to employment with the HBC or the freetraders than to hunting, and to living as individuals rather than members of a band. Many Me"tis, however, lived lives very similar to those of the people recognized as Indians by treaty. For all purposes, they are pure Indians, having the same language the same mode of living, shifting camps, hunting, fishing, etc.: in fact no difference at all can be made and they form a homogeneous population.16

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Many of these people, urged by the Oblates, took treaty in 1899. Shortly after the treaty and scrip arrangements were made, however, several asked to be removed from the band lists and be recognized as Metis. Grouard objected to this and encouraged the government to keep them in the treaty wherever possible. Those who withdrew from treaty no longer had the right to have their children at the boarding schools subsidized by the government for the children of Indians, yet they had no other alternative for education of their children.17 The provision of education in the treaty was a dominant consideration for the bishop, both for the future benefit of the people and as a financial and stabilizing force for the Roman Catholic schools. Although the Oblates had helped in the making of this treaty, they supported the Indians and Metis in protests against the increasing intrusion of government into their lives through hunting regulations and the setting up of game preserves. When the chiefs became intercessors for their bands with the whites, rather than leaders in an independent society, the moral authority of the priests began to replace that of the traditional leaders.18 As early as 1904 Dupire drew up a petition for the Metis against the government regulations regarding hunting by whites and Metis.19 Again, in 1920, Breynat protested that the enforcement of the International Migratory Birds Convention Act abrogated the rights recognized in Treaty 8.20 He insisted this act would cause great hardship to both Indians and Metis who depended on the spring arrival of birds to tide them over for food. He reminded the government that he had been present at the signing of Treaty 8 and had heard the promise that Native hunting rights would be respected—a promise that had gone by the boards when this international agreement was made. Surely there should have been some one in Ottawa to look after the interests of these Indians, wards of the government, when this act was drawn up, and some exceptions made for these people, who will either have to break the law or starve in a large majority of cases. If some of the men who frame these game laws had to put a winter in this country, and had to starve towards spring, as is often the case with the natives, such laws would not be passed.21 Breynat, in a manner reminiscent of Tache's dealings with the government, intended to support a newspaper campaign to protect the Dene against this

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law, again using the pressure and prestige of his office as bishop to exert political influence on the federal government. Despite the difficulties experienced with Treaty 8, Breynat began to press for an extension of the treaty to the Mackenzie Dene, to remedy their extreme destitution in the early years of the century. Sickness, famine, a very severe winter, and a critical shortage of fur-bearers took an enormous toll among the Natives of the southern Mackenzie region in the winter of 1906-1907. Every band required assistance from the HBC and missionaries just to survive.22 But the government continued to accept only the limited responsibility of providing some relief to the indigent, through the agency of the HBC or the missionaries, and giving a small measure of financial support to the schools which took in orphans. Although the Mackenzie Natives were themselves divided over the question of treaty, Breynat was convinced that a treaty would be the best way for the government to do something to help "the most disinherited in the Dominion."23 With no fur animals or rabbits on which to live for the past several years, the Natives died even from minor illness. A minimal first step, Breynat urged, was for the government to allot a certain sum of money for buying net thread and ammunition, which would at least help the Natives to supply themselves with some food. Though still unwilling to make treaty with the Mackenzie Indians, the government established Indian agencies at Fort Smith and Fort Simpson in 1910 to deal with relief, and to carry out experiments in farming to illustrate the possibilities for agriculture in the north.24 Breynat recommended the settlement surveys of 1913 to secure title for church property and for the Dene who lived in the villages of the Mackenzie. These surveys, however, led to rumours that the Dene would lose their land to an influx of strangers. The unrest made Indian Agent Thomas Harris at Fort Simpson think it was time to make treaty to prevent trouble.25 Any plans for this, however, were shelved because of the outbreak of war in 1914. In any case, the Dene were not eager to make treaty at this time, though Father Andurand thought the economic difficulties they experienced during the war would encourage them to accept it.26 The oil boom at Fort Norman after the war triggered action by the government. The northern chiefs, aware of their advantage, claimed that until the government made treaty with them they should not be expected to observe Canadian game laws or to part with their oil lands.2? Convinced by these arguments, the government appointed H.A. Conroy to conduct treaty negotiations in 1921. Bishop Breynat accompanied him and proved

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-*•> Visitors and Natives at Providence, 1921. [NAC PA 18640]

very helpful in the negotiations. Conroy assured the Dene they would maintain their liberty to hunt, trap and fish; in fact, it was in the government's interest that they should continue to support themselves as they had done in the past.28 He also reassured them that they would be exempt from military service and could choose their own reserves where they would be free to come and go as they pleased. Almost all the bands wanted more medical care at each post, schools for their children, and supplies for the old and destitute. Although some bands were reluctant to sign, these advantages, and Breynat's recommendation, led them to agree, though misunderstandings at the time have caused many to deny the validity of the treaty. Breynat, who was present throughout the 1921 treaty-making process, and for some of that for Treaty 8 in 1899, insisted that these treaties were not negotiated\yf the government. Some discussion was conducted but the text had already been printed in Ottawa. In other words, these were nothing but ultimatums by which the Indians, like Esau in the Biblical story, were deprived of their inheritance.29 Unable to foresee any other option, he encouraged the Dene to take treaty. He continued to press the government to improve the life of the Dene after the treaty. His lack of success spurred him to publish a lament, entitled "Canada's Blackest Blot," in the Toronto Star Weekly, in 1938; he called

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Canada's occupation of the Northwest "A story of greed, of ruthlessness and broken promises ... the story of the degradation of our Northwest Indians."30 Breynat, who had assumed the role of broker for the Dene, was unable to use that position as effectively as he had hoped. He had hoped to secure the well-being of the Dene by treaty, ensuring government aid in time of need and education for the future. Both aspects also helped the Oblates by relieving them of some of the financial burden of providing assistance and education. Yet this treaty, however vital it was to sustain both the missions and the people, distanced the Oblates from the Dene. From that time on, both had to act through and with the government, rather than interacting directly with each other in these fields. In many ways the relationship with the government in the treaty process and its aftermath was as alien to the Dene as was the Western education and way of life presented to them in the residential schools. Insofar as the treaties and residential schools represented the Oblates' social policy, they marked the nadir of Dene participation in shaping that design. Neither education nor government social and treaty policy offered any scope for adaptation or inculturation by the Dene. Basing their policy on premises of Western society and progress, the government, through the residential schools, attempted to mould the Dene to fit a pre-defined institutional model, which had been fashioned without any participation by the people most involved. The inflexibility and outlandishness (in a very literal sense) of this concept was bound to fail.

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§R E A T 1UVER TO THE T N D S OF THE - E A R T H

13 A 'NEW H E A V E N AND A 'NEW ' E A R T H

first Oblate missionaries to the Dene, products of the nineteenthcentury Church, sought to include the Dene within a community of believers, a people of God, which, to them, was identical with the Roman Catholic Church. They also sought to improve their mutual community life on earth, through medical care, help in time of need, and, eventually, insistence that government take responsibility for social policy. They joined the Dene in their journey towards the apocalyptic vision of a new heaven and a new earth, the place of salvation for both. The Oblates were messengers, believing themselves called by God, and sent by their superiors to preach the Good News to the Dene following

179

Christ's admonition to go forth and teach all nations. Their ultramontane views gave no scope to state control of their expansion. They were indifferent to the fact that, though they were all from France or Quebec, they toiled in areas of English-speaking sovereignty. The French priests and nuns who dispersed to every corner of the world were convinced of the primacy of the Gospel message and of the need to incorporate all the nations of the world into the Roman Catholic Church. Their mission gave them rights, they thought, far superior to those of any secular power. They also believed that their faith entitled them to make every effort to replace indigenous beliefs. Europeans after the "discovery" of the "New" World justified their occupation of the continent by saying that it was empty of meaningful use or large numbers of people. The belief that the Natives had no authentic religion was similar in its effect. Just as secular colonization extinguished many Native populations, so too did new religious teaching attempt to replace local religions. Conversion necessarily meant change and changes in belief cannot be separated from changes in earthly life, especially with a people like the Dene, for whom religion and culture were inextricably intertwined. Alterations in belief meant changes in their culture, society, and understanding of themselves and their place in the world.1 Purposefully and unintentionally, Christianity did undermine their indigenous culture. Although the objective of the missionaries was to convert nations, not to change cultures, their eagerness to convert others overwhelmed any respect for indigenous cultures.2 The Gospel preached by the Oblates had been influenced by many centuries of Western European experience and their theology was expressed in Greek and Roman categories of thought. Unconscious of their own identification of religion and culture, the missionaries of the nineteenth century thought they could transmit the essence of the Gospel, without its cultural attachments, to peoples of widely-varying cultures. Centuries earlier Pope Gregory the Great had urged the missionaries he sent to the Anglo-Saxons not to interfere with the customs of the people, except for those opposed to Christian teaching. He encouraged them to adapt customs, wherever possible, to the meaning of Christianity. This was not, by any means, an acceptance of the intrinsic cultural values of "the others;"3 the pope hoped his missionaries could use this adaptation as a way to Christianize customs and institutions, as well as people. Even on that level, most missionaries judged cultures and customs to be inimical to Christianity if they diverged from the European norm that was their standard of judgment.

l8o

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Of R E A T - R I V E R T O T H E

" E N D S OF THE

"EARTH

This was especially evident in the realm of moral theology. The missionaries wanted to spread not only a knowledge of the faith but the practice of that faith with its accompanying rules of behaviour. Customs such as polygamy or changing wives were contrary to Christian morality and the theology of marriage. It was here that belief and practice collided most severely for the Dene. The catechism taught that humans were made in the image and likeness of God, but missionaries perceived that likeness as exemplified in a European model. The Natives of North America could attain this likeness only through acceptance of European Christianity and some amount of Western "civilization." A measure of Europeanization was thus involved both in the preaching of the Gospel and in the level of acculturation seen as essential to accompany that preaching. Integration into "civilization" and into Catholicism necessarily meant radical changes for the Dene. The civilization the French missionaries wanted to spread was the civilisation chretienne of France. Imbued with pride in French language and technology though they were, they considered Catholicism the cornerstone of true civilization. They expressed this ideal as "making men of the inhabitants of the forests,"4 for true humanity was limited to true Christians. To lose that religion was to lapse into savagery: it seems to me that the people in France have become savage; in travelling one sees that religion is a stranger to most of the people one meets.5 In the foreign missions the reverse happened; "our dear neophytes are almost no longer savages, but good and perfect Christians."6 This identification of civilization with faith ensured that the Oblates did not attempt to change the Dene way of life to conform with contemporary notions of civilization based on agriculture and commerce. This option, of course, was not available in the north. More important to the Oblates' mission methods was their conviction that the Dene could, by adopting Catholicism and leading a good moral life both at the mission and in the bush, be shining exemplars of true Christian civilization and of Oblate evangelization. As with secular civilization, however, civilisation chretienne depended on education as a tool, more particularly in the north, where it became vital as a way to counter Anglican inroads with the Metis and Dene. Though it was peripheral to the Oblates' concept of their mission, they became agents of cultural change by establishing schools staffed by the Grey Nuns. The pres-

A N E W " H E A V E N AND A "NEW ' E A R T H

l8l

ence of women religious in the foreign missions was a natural consequence of the emphasis given by the Church to active works of charity, in foreign missions, education, and health care. It was also due to the tremendous growth of female congregations, many of them devoted to health care and teaching. The Grey Nuns who staffed the schools and hospitals of the Athabasca-Mackenzie had originated in seventeenth-century Quebec, devoting themselves to health and education long before the vast expansion of the nineteenth century. They were uniquely Canadian, and readily accepted the call of the Oblate bishops to extend their services to that far mission field. The Oblates faced the further problem of absorbing their converts into the highly-institutionalized structure assumed by the Church in Europe over the centuries. The faith they sought to transfer to the Dene necessarily involved their incorporation into the institution, which meant following the rules of the Church and being subject to the authority of the pope. Only through the medium of the Church and its sacraments could salvation be attained. To achieve this end, clergy and hierarchy were essential. Though the Oblates sought to form an indigenous clergy, their quest was not successful. The very outlook of the Church, however, with its emphasis on salvation through participation in its sacraments and devotions, which were the same all over the world, and necessarily administered by priests, made it appear irrelevant whether the priest was European or Dene. The Church in the Athabasca-Mackenzie continued to be controlled by bishops from France and staffed by French and Quebecois priests, aided by brothers from France, Belgium, Ireland, and Quebec. Since the Oblates formed almost the entire clergy of these missions, the bishops were chosen from their ranks. For many years the bishops were also the religious superiors, combining their supervision of the Oblates with their jurisdiction as diocesan ordinaries. The Oblate bishops of the Athabasca-Mackenzie, in common with other missionary bishops, received direction from the pope through the agency of the Sacred Congregation of the Propagation of the Faith (Propaganda). Improvements in transportation enabled missionary bishops to make frequent visits to Rome and to carry on a voluminous correspondence with the Propaganda. Questions which arose in the mission field were referred to Rome for decisions and the advice from Rome was accepted to ensure orthodoxy and fidelity to the teaching of the Church. There was no scope for individual decisions on such matters, nor any need for them in the view of the missionaries. This coordination was further

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TROM THE CJREAT H I V E R TO THE "ENDS OF THE 'EARTH

cemented by close supervision over individual missionaries by the bishops. Such an institutional framework imposed a uniformity on the newly-converted which disregarded cultural variations and gave little scope for inculturation. In the first years of missionary effort among the Dene, the Oblates attempted to translate the Catholicism they knew into Dene language and thought. Though this was essential on first contact, it had serious drawbacks. It presupposed that foreigners could quickly understand cultural patterns and meanings and select appropriate parallels for Christian terms and theology.7 This was unlikely to happen. Later missionaries were forced to revise and edit the earliest catechisms and lessons. Even with the deeper understanding of more prolonged contact, there could be no assurance that the Dene understood the terms in the same way as the missionary using them. The Oblates who acquired the Dene language did not assume the same thought system nor the beliefs which ordered their universe. The Metis, who shared the language and faith of both Oblates and Dene, who were related in marriage to many different groups of Dene, and in paternal heritage to the French, proved invaluable auxiliaries and intermediaries for the Oblates. They aided the priests by their labour, by interpreting for them, by putting them in touch with Dene and recommending their message. On several occasions they intervened with the HBC to secure passages or hospitality for the priests. The value their labour held for the Company ensured that the HBC would not disrupt their alliance with the Oblates. Many Metis women exerted considerable influence and persuaded their relatives to accept the Catholic faith. They helped the priests compose their first catechisms and hymn-books. The Oblates encouraged the post Metis, over whom they could exert a closer supervision, to conform to all the rules of the Church and serve as examples for the Dene and Metis who had a more transitory contact with the mission. Though the OMI did not attempt to change the content of their theology, they did adapt to the Dene ways of learning, using methods originally developed to reach the poor of Provence. The lengthy preached missions, the catechism they taught using oral instruction and pictures, their explanations of medals and holy pictures, all conformed to the type of education traditional to the Dene. These methods accomplished, to some degree, the inculturation favoured by theologians of today. German theologian Johann-Baptist Metz has suggested that one way to bridge the intercultural divide in theology would be to use memory and retelling, as we do in the Eucharist.8 This was what the Oblates and the Dene did to bridge their cul-

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tural divide. Following the missions, many lay leaders taught their communities what they had learned from the priests and adapted the new doctrines to their traditional ways of learning and spirituality. The Oblates did, however, also teach the Dene to read, seeing this as essential to propagating the Gospel, but the syllabic alphabet they used in their books was a uniquely Native form of literacy, a half-way step between oral learning and the books in the Roman alphabet so prized by Europeans. If literacy causes a fundamental shift in thought and outlook on the world, perhaps the use of syllables eased that transition. The Oblates also had to adjust to life in the Athabasca-Mackenzie, which was so different from that of their home regions. They had to provide shelter and subsistence, finance schools and orphanages, care for the sick, even develop their own transportation system. In the process they acculturated to the Dene way of life to varying extents. Most learned to travel on snowshoes, often at the cost of severe pain and frequent snowblindness. Some learned to hunt for food and build with logs. They soon abandoned the tonsure and clean-shaven requirements of priests in France; luxuriant beards were a source of warmth and kept off mosquitoes in summer.9 They learned to drink tea and smoke. They could not, however, wholly adopt the Dene way of life and they imposed some measure of Europeanization on their homes, gardens, and boats. The brothers developed fruitful gardens in even the most northern missions, fished for the enormous quantities required to sustain the schools and missions, and built the very large structures which dotted the north. The fathers and brothers, with the Dene, struggled to form new communities of believers, living an ideal Christian life on earth in preparation for existence in the new heaven with Christ. This community of faith in search of salvation could not be achieved in a short time. It required many years for both the Dene and the Oblates before they could reach an understanding of each other and of the faith which bound them together. Nor were the Oblates indiflferent to the conditions of Dene life before that new Jerusalem could be reached. The priests helped those in need as much as they could. They provided medical care and prayers in time of illness. The bishops interceded on behalf of the Dene, attempting to improve their conditions whenever possible. These social aspects of their mission policy proved so expensive that the Oblates sought to secure government assistance to replace their efforts.

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T R O M THE Q R E A T "RIVER TO THE "ENDS OF THE "EARTH

The Oblates reshaped the earth they shared with the Dene. The presence of the imposing mission structures, built in imported style and decorated like the churches of Europe or Quebec, staffed by priests and nuns from Europe and Quebec, and incorporated into the institutional and hierarchical structure of the Church, the schools and hospitals with their imported medicines, teaching methods, and curriculum, the farms, gardens, and steamboats, all added physical as well as ideological features to share the space previously occupied only by the Dene and traders. Though they suffered many deprivations from hunger, frostbite, loneliness, illness, and even murder, the Oblates quickly grew attached to the north and its people. Faraud, noting this attraction, said that only in the north did he consider himself "at home as the English say."10 Brother Alexis wrote: I am become so fond of it, that, would I, hardly I could leave it for another country, so that the more I grow old, the more clearly I see that it is the best place for working to one's salvation.11 This is a particularly poignant statement, coming as it did from a man who ended his labours in the north tragically, killed by his Iroquois travelling companion.12 The first missionaries expected to spend their lives in the north; the Oblates made no provision for return visits to France nor for annual holidays. The founder severely judged those who did dream of returning to France after some years of service in the field as "apostates." Though the impetus for these missions lay entirely with the Oblates, religion was essential to the Dene and they were anxious to tap into the new sources of spiritual power. They welcomed the coming of the Oblates and flocked to hear their message. They had already been exposed to Europeans for a century before the arrival of the Oblates and had made many changes in their lives because of that contact. The proselytizing zeal of nineteenth-century Christianity was as impelling as the economic drive of the traders. The Dene could not be immune to either. Dene tradition taught that their own spiritual and earthly life formed one integral functioning unit. They could readily adopt a Catholicism that tied spirituality to practice of the faith. The spiritual teachings, the prayers and rules of behaviour, the liturgy and sacraments, the hymns and catechisms, the holy pictures and medals, spoke very clearly to many Dene, who adopted Catholicism as their faith.

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For many peoples it [religion] is a way of being and living so tied up with being part of a particular culture that it is impossible to imagine living that way outside the culture. When Christianity comes into the situation, Christianity is not seen as replacing that way of living in the culture, but as enhancing it, giving it a link to the larger world, enhancing access to the sources of divine power, providing better insight into what one has been doing already.13 Yet they did not accept wholeheartedly all the rules and regulations of the Church, including attendance at Sunday Mass; these were much less adaptable to their freedom of action than was the spirituality taught by the Oblates.14 Conversion would have been impossible if Catholicism had been totally opposed to Dene traditions and beliefs. All the efforts of the OMI to preach and teach a universal Catholicism could not have overcome that. Some Dene rejected Catholicism altogether, maintaining their traditional religion. Others became Anglican Christians, sometimes more opposed to Catholicism than the traditionalists. Among those who accepted Catholicism, the response still varied. Some eagerly adopted the new faith, convinced of its truth and validity for them. They listened attentively to sermons and instructions, and sought all the sacraments of the Church. They lived in monogamous marriages and brought up their children in the faith. Whenever possible they attended the great feasts. In their camps, guided by their own spiritual leaders, they observed Sundays and feasts, sang hymns, and said prayers with great fervour. The fact that they were eager to learn about Catholicism illustrated the traditional readiness of the Dene to incorporate new means of contact with the spirits, new ways to seek health and well-being, none of which could be obtained through human efforts alone. They held the spiritual power of the priests in great awe, interpreting their sermons and sacraments as evidence of the fact that the priests were great makers of medicine.15 This was even more compatible with their beliefs because the first Oblates usually combined physical healing with their preaching. The conjunction of the inauguration of Oblate missions with a series of disastrous illnesses among the Dene deeply affected their initial reaction to Catholicism. Many accepted it as their best hope in that time of crisis. Others rejected it as inimical to their own survival; they blamed their mortality on the whites, sometimes on the baptism administered to them by the priests. They thought their own prophets offered them the best hope l86

T R O M THE Q R E A T -RIVER TO THE T N D S OF THE T A R T H

for survival and well-being. These leaders were often jongleurs who had received some instruction in Catholicism but were excommunicated because of their marriage arrangements. They proposed new rituals and ways of life, made known to them through dreams, as was customary, but permeated with some elements of Catholicism. Some claimed that theirs was the only way for the Dene; they fused an untraditional exclusivity with a nativistic response to the crisis of health and faith which beleaguered their community. Their ways, too, often failed and the people were left without any authority, Native or Catholic, to defend them. Some then looked to Catholicism to provide ways of dealing with unfamiliar problems created by the intruding whites. And, when traditional leaders died, as they so often did in these early epidemics, the Dene assigned more authority and power to the priests. Others adopted Catholicism for the times when they gathered to trade and receive instruction, but did not abandon their own traditions in the bush. They exercised a dualism in religion, where the two faiths coexisted in the same individual, in separate spheres. This does not mean they did not accept Christianity; aboriginal and Christian beliefs had their own time and place.16 Ake Hultkrantz noted a similar reaction among the Shoshoni, where the new religion was added because it corresponded to a new dimension of existence. Just as they had used the vision quest, Sun Dance, and mythology to conform to different times and situations, so they used Christianity for Sunday church attendance, weddings and funerals, and joint occasions with whites, especially in school.17 These people contextualized Christianity for a part of their life but found it impossible to do so for the whole. This dualism was shown in the early years of missions, when many Dene proved eager for baptism, yet were equally convinced that they must use medicine in the bush. Perhaps this was especially true for a people who had long considered the Creator as remote from the harmful activities of evil spirits in the world, a people who depended on their own intimate spirit guides to secure their well-being. They could not easily abandon that stronghold of their faith. One baptized chief at Good Hope made medicine in the bush to secure food for his people. When the priest reproached him, he replied that he could not see his relatives suffer from hunger and do nothing when he knew that with his incantations he could make the caribou appear when he wished.18 The Catholicism he had adopted at the mission could offer no alternative way to secure a good hunt.

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l8y

Other Dene showed a more syncretic approach. Sometimes Christianity and old traditions formed a new reality with the old tradition providing the basic pattern, while, at other times, Christianity provided the framework. The first type of syncretism was evident in the many prophets who appeared in the early stages of the Oblate missions. Most were noted makers of inkonze, who were initially eager to accept the new religion preached to them. Many were baptized or had received some instruction at the missions. In nearly every case, their rise as alternative spiritual leaders of their people, opposed to the authority of the priests, coincided both with their own difficulties with Catholicism over marriage and with a crisis in health among their kin. They then proposed a new religion, based on tradition but mixed with elements of Catholicism, as the solution to the crisis of their communities. The second variety of syncretism was displayed by those who accepted some components of Christianity as similar to, but more powerful than, elements of their own culture. The sacraments of baptism and confession were, for them, comparable to traditional methods of righting their relationship with the spirits. They could use Christianity as the framework, but with a significant infusion of Dene traditions. Missionaries accepted this initial enthusiasm and apparent acceptance of Christianity, not realizing that the understanding by the Dene of Christian beliefs and practices was different from that of those who preached to them. In the early years of contact the Dene adopted varying combinations of traditional beliefs with Catholicism, dualistic or syncretic. By 1921, however, they had developed a Catholicism which conformed to the norms of the universal and uniform Church of that period. Yet it was also a uniquely Dene Catholicism, just as there existed uniquely Irish, French, Polish, and other strands of Catholicism within the unity of the Church. Dene spiritual leaders combined the teaching of Catholicism with a continuing use of Native medicine, and transformed these into new ways of contact with the spirit, new ways of reaching that state of balance and order and well-being sought by their ancestors. Those living at Fort Resolution in 1971 were convinced that their predecessors adopted Catholicism as an adjunct to, not a replacement of, traditional beliefs. They thought that only in the twentieth century did their new faith become really disruptive of the old, a change attributed to the influence of individual priests who undermined traditional beliefs and leadership, rather than to the Catholic faith itself.19 To some extent, this is a valid interpretation, but it neglects the impact of other circumstances l88

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which also damaged the foundations of Native religion, as well as the economy and health of the people. The many epidemic diseases that struck down Native spiritual leaders and the elders who were the depository of their traditions, the loss of country food and consequent decline in diet and morale, the switch to trapping rather than making provisions, with subsequent more frequent camp visits by the Oblates—all these must also be considered as contributing to the replacement of Dene traditional religion by Catholicism. None of these contributing causes, however, can offer a complete explanation for the acceptance of Catholicism and none should detract from the real conversion of faith. The Catholic religion took root among the Dene after the fur trade economy was firmly implanted, but before the imposition of centralized government. Like the fur traders, the missionaries depended on the Dene for many necessities of their subsistence—food, transport, and labour—as well as for the conversions so essential to any mission endeavour. Their relationship was for many years based on interdependence in the teaching of religion, in trade, transport, and subsistence. The missions joined the fur trade in encouraging the Dene to continue their hunting life, which could coexist with Christianity as it had with European economic demands in the fur trade. By 1900, however, Oblate fathers and brothers had learned to hunt and to travel with dogs and canoes; they had developed gardens and farms, crafted steamboats, built large schools, churches, and houses. The interdependence which marked the early years of missions gave way to an increasingly separate life-style. Despite this detachment, the bishops assumed more authority to speak on behalf of the Dene to the government, while at the same time seeking support for the survival and perpetuation of their own missions. Father Lacombe and Bishop Grouard had considerable influence in the making of Treaty 8, as Bishop Breynat did with Treaty n. They hoped, by encouraging the Dene to accept the treaties, to secure funding for their schools, and to benefit the Dene by government assistance to face the economic changes which threatened their survival. The trend to separate lives meant that the Oblates knew little about the survival of Dene medicine in the bush; the solidification of government in church and state pushed such practices to the periphery of white awareness and concern. The Oblates intended to persuade the Dene to accept Catholicism and reject their Native religion, including those customs which the priests considered incompatible with Christianity. They were unaware of the

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ramifications that even apparently minor changes could have on a people whose culture and religion were a unified whole. It is only now that the Church has come to recognize that evangelization cannot begin with the teaching and whole-hearted acceptance of a religion already inculturated into another milieu. The Oblates from 1847 to 1921 could not be expected to share this understanding of the evangelization process. They were culture-bound to the dominant ecclesiological concept of the Church and to an extremely proselytizing mission endeavour. They, like most of their contemporaries, were unaware of cultural values and viewed some cultural changes as a necessary precondition to real evangelization. The history of the Oblate missions to the Dene is one of enormous zeal, of caring and suffering, of incomprehension and understanding, of sorrow, pain, and joy on both sides. That past influences their present and future, while the present state of our knowledge contributes to a better insight into the past, its causes and effects. With a better understanding and evaluation of the past, the OMI and Dene look to a very different future. The Dene no longer live in camps for most of the year but in settlements. The ideal of the Christian Dene trapper, living apart from the pernicious influences of "civilization," can no longer be held. The one hundred or so Oblates and an equal number of Grey Nuns present in 1960 have dwindled to about ten or less of each. Many missions now receive a visit from a priest only once or twice a month. The residential schools closed in the 19605 and have been replaced by day schools in the villages. The structure and infrastructure of missions, which absorbed so much of the attention of the early bishops, was essential to the stability of the Oblate endeavour. Now, however, there are not enough fathers and brothers to maintain that framework. The Oblates must seek another way to perpetuate their mission. The Dene now face social problems much more massive than those encountered at their first contacts with the Oblates and act for themselves in relation to the federal government, seeking ways to secure their own well-being. The old way of "doing" missions, by charitable work combined with evangelization directed by bishops and clergy, must be replaced by a new way. This cannot be imposed on the Dene by the Oblates, nor by the government, nor by any outside force. Bishop Denis Croteau, OMI, aware that the old ways are no longer viable, is seeking to help the Dene form a new northern church, an "Accompanying Church."20 If the Roman Catholic Church is to survive among the Dene, it must be a cooperative effort between priests and people. The Catholic Dene must again assume I9O

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the role of lay apostles to their own people, as many of their ancestors did in the first days of Oblate missions. The original visit planned by Pope John Paul II to Fort Simpson in 1984, postponed because of fog, displayed the devotion of the Roman Catholic Dene and their ability to conduct their own religious services, when the pope failed to appear. When John Paul II did come in 1987, he proclaimed to them: "my coming among you looks back to your past in order to proclaim your dignity and support your destiny."^ That recognition of Dene history, including their joint life with the Oblates over the course of close to 150 years, acknowledged the perseverance of Dene life and culture, within and outside the Roman Catholic Church, to be maintained and honoured in the years to come.

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APPENDICES

193

APPENDIX A

Dene Population Statistics 1881

1897

750

414

641

150

233

260

FORT SMITH

"5

280

FORT MCMURRAY

IOI

150

Place

1856-58

FORT CHIPEWYAN FOND DU LAC

1864-67

1871

1920

250

FORT RESOLUTION

469

577

320

230

503

550

FORTRAE

657

788

508

615

800

800

HAY RIVER

149

PROVIDENCE

440

456

582

300

383

500

199

450

205

400

FORT SIMPSON

745

FORT LIARD

397

500

FORT NELSON

286 253

IOO

216 209

FORT WRIGLEY

172 280

IOO

FORT NORMAN

363

272

303

254

324

450

FORT GOOD HOPE

467

422

519

583

570

500

FORT McPnERSoN

337

550

164

351

430

250

2-55

250

ARCTIC RED RIVER FORT HALKETT

332-

FORT YOUCON

842

131

Figures taken from: HBCA Ei8/8 fo. 40, information from Sir George Simpson to Parliamentary Inquiry re establishments of HBC in 1856 and number of Indians frequenting them; NAC MGigAzj vol. I fo. 282-83, James Anderson Papers, Census of the Population of McKenzie's River District 1st June 1858; HBCA 872/2/1 Fond du Lac fo. 2-3, Census of the Indian Population of Fond du Lac, 13 December 1857; HBCA 8200/2/2, "Statement of the Indian Population McKenzie River District According to Census taken Outfit, 1871"; Canada Census 1881; E. Petitot, "On the Athabasca District...," p. 653 (Figures range from 1863-64 to 1879); HBCA 839/6/11, Athabasca District Report, Roderick McFarlane, 1885 (Figures from census of 1881); HBCA 8200/6/15 fo. 5, Mackenzie District Report, J.H. Camsell, 1885 (Figures from census of 1881); Canada Sessional Papers (No. 14), Vol. XXXI No. u (1897), "Census Return of Resident and Nomadic Indians; Denominations to which they belong, etc."; NAC RGio vol. 4042 file 336,877, population given by Kitto and by Conroy 1920. 194

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APPENDIX-B

Sickness and Medicine

Spiritual leaders

Year

Type of illness

18 56

At Nativity. Heavy cold;! famine

18 59

At Fond du Lac. Great mortality.2

At lie a la Crosse. Appearance of the "Son of God." 3 North of Portage La Loche. Many anti-white, syncretic visionaries.4 At Good Hope. Hares blamed books sent by Grollier for causing their deaths.5

1860

At Fort Rae. Mortality continued; 30-40 died winter of 1859-1860; sickness still prevailed at the fort in June.6 At Fond du Lac. Many died during the winter of i859-i86o.7 At Good Hope. Sickness and many deaths.8

At La Loche. Pierrish and Otthede, two brothers, who claimed to have seen three gods (the Creator, Jesus, and Mary). At Nativity. Bekdettine and Urbain Tutsiye.9 At Good Hope. The Chief spent all his money on inkonze for his sick wife. He hunted on Sundays and ordered his followers to do the same. They blamed their deaths on the arrival of the priest.10

1861

At Big Island. Indians sick with blisters of blood and pus.11

At Fort Rae. Many Dogribjowgleurs, both male and female. One made crosses out of kettles to distribute with ceremony. At Great Bear Lake. One Dogrib man claimed to be Jesus Christ or his prophet.12

APPENDICES

195

Year

Type of illness

Spiritual leaders

1862

Terrible grippe or catarrh has ravaged the north this winter.^ At Liard. Boatmen going to Liard in fall 1862 had heavy cold, with headache, aching teeth, ears, chest, sides. Ten Thekenes died, including two of the chiefs wives.14 At Nativity. Great mortality among Indians. A kind of cold, spreading in June among those who escaped it in winter.15

At Liard. Hand-games and medicine-making,16 drumming and gambling, even of rosaries during the mission.1? At Fond du Lac. In April 1862, Tscheth elder from Reindeer Lake and an unnamed prophet from Churchill, is At Fort McPherson. Five Loucheux visionaries.19 At Nativity. Indians think end of world is near.

1863

Grandin and boatmen going to La Loche. All stricken with a heavy cold, high fever and chills. Several Providence Indians dying in June of epidemic cold.20 At Liard. Several died without baptism.21 AtFortRae. Number of young people died 1862-1863. Many sick with sores and scrofula and VD. Starvation because caribou took different route in winter of :862-i863.22 At Great Bear Lake. Epidemic thefallofi863;44died.23

At Fort McPherson. The Loucheux leader, Nitte, and two Mackenzie River Loucheux prophets.24 At Fort Resolution. Yellowknives imitated ceremonies of Mass and of Bishop Grandin planting a cross.25

1864

At Nativity. Peace River boats brought epidemic causing high fever, congestion, cough, sore neck, ears, head and eyes. Twelve died; two went blind.26 By December, 42 people had died.27 At Good Hope. Much sickness. Stomach-aches. 44 dead since winter.28 At St. Joseph. Influenza29 which appeared immediately after the boats left for La Loche. Many Indians were very sick and 6

At Fort McPherson. Continued activity of Loucheux visionaries, with more nativist reaction to both Anglicans and Roman Catholics. At Fort Resolution. Some Chipewyan want to pass for priests.33 At Lac Klerit'ie. Petitot encountered about sixty Dogrib makers of inkonze and four men and one old woman who wanted to be recognized as priests.

196

T R O M THE CJREAT -RIVER TO THE "ENDS OF THE "EARTH

Year

Type of illness At Fort Rae, Mai du Fort Rae reduced the population from about 12,00 in 1859 to 788 in 1864. 31

At Fort Youcon. Indians sick.32

1865

Scarlet fever and measles. About 780-800 Indians of Mackenzie District died in 3-4 weeks. At Grand Portage 20, Athabasca 120, Slave Lake 60, Ft. Simpson 44, Good Hope 69, Ft. Anderson 69, Peel's River 100, La Pierre's House 30, Yukon zoo.34

At Nativity. Tutsiye spread word that those who entered the church would die.35 An old man wanted to know why almost no whites died and said there must be a secret cause.36 At Liard. Papy, a prominent medicine-maker, died in epidemic.37 At Good Hope. In the spring of 1865 many voyants. Indians claim Faraud made them die by the book of medicines he brought.38 Others blamed the priest.39 At Fort Anderson. Inuit blamed whites for causing their deaths. The Loucheux destroyed their property in this time of sickness.40

1866

At Good Hope. Boats arrived in fall with new epidemic, a heavy cold.41

At Fort Rae. One of the makers of inkonze made crosses from copper kettles and distributed them.42 At Good Hope. Many men, women, and children saw visions of God during the winter of 1865-1866. They blamed Faraud for causing their deaths by the book of medicines he brought.43 Others blamed the priest.44 At Great Bear Lake. Eleazar Nidenichye(la Terreplantureuse) acted like a priest but remained

APPENDICES

197

Year

Type of illness

Spiritual leaders Catholic.45 Ella-odeniha, a renowned medicine maker, converted to Catholicism in November 1866, partly on the basis of his own dream.

1867

At Fort Simpson. More than 70 died in epidemic.46 AtFortRae. By March 1867, people were dying by the dozen. Nine able-bodied men, as well as some women and children, had died.4? At Fort Resolution. Twelve boatmen died at the Portage. Most of the people at Fort Resolution, including Gascon, had the cold and headache. 92 had died in 15 months.48 At Providence. Indians afflicted by colds.** At Good Hope. In 1867, 36 died, most of them in their prime and good hunters. Illness spread among gens du large."*® At Fort McPherson, Peel's River. Epidemic of typhus. In the Athabasca and Mackenzie districts. Mortality among the Indians and fall in trade. 5' In the Mackenzie District. Sickness among the Indians in District winter of 1867-1868, especially at Good Hope, Bear Lake, Fort Resolution, Fort Rae and Fort Nelson; upwards of 250 men, women and children perished. 52

At Good Hope. Some elders murmured against God and Catholicism. They attributed all their evils to the presence of the priest among them. 53 They turned again to jongleurs. Visions of God, Blessed Virgin Mary, and angels; or of demons, a black man who hid his horns.54 One of those who died was a man named Little Pig, a noted maker of inkonze. At Fort McPherson. The Loucheux who went to La Loche said that Christ appeared to some of the Indians beyond there and stayed about thirty days with them. At Liard. One prophet made crosses from pieces of copper kettles and distributed them to his followers.55

1868

Indians sick with influenza and VD.56 At Nativity. Many Indians died57 in Mackenzie District.

At Fort Nelson. A deneyalt'iyi or prophet made the sign of the cross and preached like the priests.

198

TROM THE Q R E A T -RIVER TO THE -ENDS OF THE -EARTH

Year 1869

Type of illness

Spiritual leaders

Sickness among Indians still terrible.58

1870

At Fort Resolution. Fevers and cough caused several Indian deaths, 10 since New Year's.5?

At Fort McPherson. Rat musque

At Fort McPherson, Peel's River. Smallpox or something similar broke out, first among the fort

sought help from their own medicine-makers.62

rivalled priests. At Great Bear Lake. Many

people and then spread rapidly among Indians, five of whom died.«> At Great Bear Lake. Indians decimated during the winter of 1869-1870 by epidemic grippe brought by boats and famine due to disappearance of caribou.61

1871

Good Hope, Fort Norman, and Great Bear Lake. Indians suffered from starvation and prevalence

At Good Hope, Fort Norman and Great Bear Lake. Medicinemaking in the bush for the sick

of disease; several of the best hunters died.63

of these posts.64 At Good Hope. Seven or eight women claimed virgin births.65 One young woman claimed revelation that she would be the mother of Jesus, reincarnated again for the salvation of the world.66

1872

At Fort Chipewyan. Epidemic of fever particularly bad.67 At Fond du Lac. Twenty-three died of epidemic and two of starvation.68 Fever and cold caused many deaths, including the patriarch Beaulieu.69 At Great Bear Lake. Many deaths.70

At Arctic Red River. A Loucheux visionary baptizes and confesses.71

APPENDICES

199

Year

Type of illness

Spiritual leaders

1873

At Liard. Illness and death among the Frances Lake Indians.72

At Good Hope. The boatmen on their return from Portage La Loche told the Hares a story of resurrection.73

1874

At Good Hope. Heavy cold which changed a week later to whooping cough.74 By spring 25 deaths.7? At Fort Norman. Hares, from contact with the Bear Lake people, have succumbed to the malady of the Dogribs of Fort Rae. Several died this winter; three or four are not able to walk. They say it is a violent headache.76 At Providence. Epidemic of whooping cough. Several children died.77

At Fonddu Lac. Two excommunicated men claimed that a man at that mission had died and then lived again.78

1875

At Good Hope. In fall of 1875, boats were late and brought a heavy cold, people sick for two months. No caribou all fall.79

At Good Hope. In their distress, some called on God, others on sorcerers. The young people dreamt of being great makers of inkonze, so as to live long on this earth. They mocked those who prayed and observed the Catholic religion.80

1876

At Good Hope. Dysentery attacked all the Indians but not the whites. Three or four children died after treatment by medicine-makers.8'

At Good Hope. The sorcerers claimed that if their medicines did not work, it was the fault of the priest, a stronger sorcerer, who had removed the virtue from the medicine.82 At Liard. Prophet saw priests, dressed in black, going to hell, while disciples of Luther, dressed in various colours, went to heaven.83

ZOO

T R O M THE

g R E A T H I V E R TO THE

" E N D S OF THE

"EARTH

Type of illness

Spiritual leaders

1877

At Fond du Lac. Famine during 1877-1878. More than 45 died.

At Fort Nelson. A prophet said he was sent by God to show Indians the road to heaven.

1879

At Good Hope. In the fall of 1879 about ten died, adults and children.

1880

At Liard. Illness during 1879-1880.85 In Mackenzie District. Starvation increasing.86 At Providence. Great cold and shortage of food.87

1881

1882

At Liard. Prophet active for previous two or three years claimed to have risen from the dead. He preached that long prayers were useless.88

At Fort Norman. Chief Soldat.

At Liard. Thirty-five Indians out of 210 died. Only five births.89

At Arctic Red River. About 15 Loucheux died, five from famine.90

1886

At Nativity. Whooping cough epidemic, no deaths.91

1887

The late i88os saw a severe decline in both large game animals and fur animals and subsistence from the hunt became increasingly difficult.

At Fort McPherson. Five (Anglican) visionaries. At Good Hope. A baptized maker of medicine claimed he had to continue his practice in order to find caribou for his people.92

APPENDICES

201

Year

Type of illness

Spiritual leaders

At Nativity. Extreme famine. Whole camp of Crees at Little Red River died.93

At Nativity. In 1888, 42 deaths, 24 of these from hunger and cold.'4 At Good Hope. Whooping cough epidemic among children. Adults suffered from a kind of epidemic cold of which ten elders died.95 At Fort Smith. Four adults died in one week in December.96

At Fort Smith. In February 1889, five adults and one child died within two weeks. They had been sick since they had all gathered at Christmas.97 At Nativity. Epidemic of cold and fever during the spring of 1889. Several died at Lac Brochet, Pointe de roche, and at Pointe Labri. Famine in winter of 1889-1890.

1890

At Nativity. Many sick with grippe or influenza but no deaths.98

At Arctic Red River. Nine Loucheux died of famine.99

1892

2O2

At Good Hope. Twenty-eight or 29 young people died, as well as some elders. Only ten births. Since 1888 population had diminished by 60, from sickness

T R O M THE CjREAT -RIVER TO THE -ENDS OF THE -EARTH

Year

Type of illness

Spiritual leaders

or hunger. Grippe reached Good Hope by August.100 At Arctic Red River. Influenza or grippe, several died since spring.101

1893

At Fort Resolution. Unknown malady afflicting almost all the Indians. Two died.102

1894

At Fort Smith. Scarlatina caused 18 deaths (adults and children).1(» AtFortRae, Much sickness. Many children died.104 At Fort Resolution. Epidemic carried away many of the Indians, in some cases the whole family of children.

1895

At Providence. Influenza, five children at school died, 26 people dead by end of year.105 At Good Hope. Influenza came with fall boats. In OctoberNovember about ten died, almost all adults.106

1896

At Arctic Red River. One illness after another for several years. Too many young men have died, and now can't find husbands for girls.107 At Fort Norman. Sixteen died in first six months.108 At Good Hope. Influenza in summer and fall.109

APPENDICES

2O3

Year

Type of illness

1897

At Arctic Red River. Typhoid and scarlet fever in the spring, many died.110 Famine.11'

Spiritual leaders

At Good Hope. Steamboats brought influenza or grippe. Everyone sick. It lasted several months and five died.112

Athabasca-Mackenzie Vicariate. Universal famine.113 At Providence. Grippe.114 At Fond du Lac. Epidemic of influenza through all the country, 17 hunters died. At Fort Wrigley. Dysentery. 115 At Good Hope. About thirty deaths.116 At Arctic Red River. Same sickness as at Good Hope and many Loucheux died, as well as five or six gold-seekers. ! 17

1900

2O4

At Nativity. Epidemic of grippe; many deaths.118 At Fort Simpson. A sort of cholera or dysentery; 16 or 18 deaths.119 At Providence. Dysentery and influenza; several died. Nuns and brothers also affected.120 At Fort Resolution. Grippe in June. At Fort Wrigley. Thirty died. At Fort Norman. Influenza followed by dysentery caused 24 deaths; affected whites and Indians.121

T R O M THE §R EA T H I V E R TO THE - E N D S OF THE T A R T H

Year

Type of illness

1901

At Fond du Lac. Grippe in July caused seven deaths.122

1902

At Fort Smith. Measles in June; six deaths in one week. At Fond du Lac. Measles in September; no deaths.123 At Nativity. Measles broke out i June 1902. Soon complicated by scarlet fever and severe dysentery.124 At Fort Resolution. Measles caused 60 deaths in one month among the Metis; mostly children who died.125 Epidemic followed steamers all the way north to Fort McPherson, causing a number of deaths at each post along the river. No exact count was ever made but there must have been hundreds of deaths in the district that summer.126 At Fort Liard. Measles came with the boat. All the young caught it. Two of the young men who worked on the boats died.127

1903

At Arctic Red River. Death of most of the Inuit from measles.128 At Hay River. Many deaths from measles.129 At Fort Norman. Measles caused some deaths among newborns. Followed by influenza but no deaths.130

1905

At Good Hope. Whooping-cough and heavy cold; 34 deaths.131

Spiritual leaders

APPENDICES

2O5

Year

Type of illness

Spiritual leaders

1907

At all posts on Mackenzie River, sickness and famine.132 At Providence. Grippe at school.133 At Arctic Red River. People of Good Hope who came with traders' boats brought colds with them.13-*

Treated by the famous Kinadh, HBC interpreter, whose medicine made them sick.135

1908

At Providence. Starvation among Indians.136

Prophet of Ft. Nelson sent word that if Hay River Beavers prayed with minister they would all die.

1909

At Fort Resolution. Epidemic, described as cerebro-spinal, among Indians and Metis; many deaths.13? At Arctic Red River. HBC steamer Mackenzie River brought colds, affecting all the Indians.138 AtFortRae. Seventeen deaths in summer.139 Starvation because of lack of caribou.140 At Fort Smith, Providence and Fort Resolution. Many deaths.141

1910

At Fort Rae. Indians who came for Christmas caught grippe. Four adults and three children died.142

1911

AtFortRae. Several deaths in camps at edge of woods.143 At Fort Norman. Indians sick with cold and lack of food or furs.144

1912 (approx.)

2O6

At Fort Nelson. Old Matoit. Decutla.

TROM THE (JREAT H I V E R TO THE 'ENDS OF THE "EARTH

Type of illness 1913

At Nativity. Epidemic of grippe caused nine or ten deaths.145 At Providence. Dysentery at school; one girl died.146 At Fort Rae. Famine; no caribou.147 At Fort Norman. Several deaths from unnamed illness.148 At Arctic Red River. Much illness; six deaths, some from typhoid, others perhaps from tuberculo-

1914

At Fort Resolution. School-child died of tuberculosis.150 Grippe affected whole population.151 At Nativity. Starvation.152 At Fort Norman. Twenty deaths.153 At Fort Rae. Fifteen deaths, mostly young or adult men.154 At Providence. Whooping-cough among children.155 At Arctic Red River. Sickness and deaths.156

1915

At Fort Simpson. Grippe; two or three deaths. Hunger.157 At Fort Resolution. Famine.15

1916

At Fort Smith. Grippe affected whites and Indians.160 At Fort Resolution. Grippe.161

1917

At Fort Rae. Grippe among Easter attenders who took it back to their camps.162 At Fort Resolution. Grippe.163

Spiritual leaders

At Great Bear Lake. Sorcerer Tapiye from Fort Rae made medicine and was refused sacraments. Spread stories about priests.159

APPENDICES

207

Year

Type of illness

1918

At Great Bear Lake. Eight people died within three weeks.164

1919

At Providence. Children all sick with whooping-cough, five of the 86 at school died and another six at the fort. Dysentery and jaundice also.165 At Fort Simpson. Whoopingcough; twenty died.166 Athabasca District. Spanish flu; 42 deaths and a great many children orphaned.

1920

At Fort Resolution. Whoopingcough. Four children at school died.167 At Fort Rae. Whooping-cough caused death of some children.16 Four children died of diarrhoea. Adults suffered from a kind of measles.169

1921

At Fort Smith. Smallpox from June to end of August. Came with two young men from Fort Chipewyan.170 At Fort Resolution. Smallpox and diptheria; 32 deaths.171

1922

At Fond du Lac. Spanish flu affected Father Riou as well as the Chipewyan and Metis. More than eighty died in this epidemic.172

2O8

T R O M THE

g R E A T - R I V E R TO

Spiritual leaders

THE

"ENDS

OF THE

•£ A R T H

Year

Type of illness

1928

In 1928 the great flu epidemic spread by the HBC steamboat Distributor caused the deaths of many of the elders. Seventy elders died between Fort Norman and Fort Franklin.173 At Arctic Red River. Seven died in one week. At Fort McPherson. More than thirty deaths. AtAklavik. Twenty deaths.174

Spiritual leaders

APPENDICES

2O9

APPENDIX C

Oblate Missions to the Dene Name

First Visit

Residence

NATIVITY

1847 Tache

1849 Faraud

ST. JOSEPH

1852 Faraud

1858 Faraud & Grollier

FOND DU LAC

1853 Grollier

1881 De Chambreuil

ST. ISIDORE

1856 Grandin

1888 Joussard

SACRED HEART OF JESUS

1858 Grollier

1894 Brochu

ST. MICHAEL

1859 Grollier

1872 Roure

OUR LADY OF GOOD HOPE

1859 Grollier

1859 Grollier

STE. THERESE

1859 Grollier

1876 Ducot

HOLY NAME OF MARY

1860 Grollier

1889 Giroux

ST. RAPHAEL

1860 Gascon

1894 Brochu

ST. VINCENT DE PAUL

1862 Eynard

PROVIDENCE

1862 Grandin

1862 Grandin

ST. PAUL

1868 Grouard

1878 Lecomte

STE. ANNE

1868 Gascon

1900 Gouy

IMMACULATE HEART OF MARY

1881 Ducot

1897 Vacher

210

T R O M THE

§ R E A T ft I V E R TO THE

" E N D S OF THE

'EARTH

hOTES

INTRODUCTIon

1. Ultramontanism ("beyond the mountains" seen from the perspective of northern Europe) began in the seventeenth century with the exertion of papal authority over that of the various national branches of the Roman Catholic Church. In the nineteenth century, with the rise of the liberal secular states, the claim to primacy of papal authority in matters that concerned church and state was emphasized as well. 2. James Axtell, "Some Thoughts on the Ethnohistory of Missions," p. 36. 3. Cf. Philip Goldring, "Religion, Missions, and Native Culture," p. 46. 4. Julie Cruikshank, Reading Voices, p. 145. 5. Dene Cultural Institute, Dehcho: Mom, we've been discovered!, p. 7.

211

1

WORLDS APART: THE OLD WORLD

1. I have not included the Peace River missions, which were initiated by the Oblates of the Athabasca-Mackenzie Vicariate, but were separated from them in 1901. Theirs is a very different history, marked by their bishop's concern for the many white settlers as well as for the Natives of the district. They would require a separate book. 2. Dene Cultural Institute, Dehcho: Mom, we've been discovered1.-, p. 7. 3. Christopher Vecsey and Robert W. Venables, eds., American Indian Environments— 4. For a more detailed analysis of the background of nineteenth-century French mission thought in general, and of the Oblates more specifically, see Martha C. McCarthy, "The Missions of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate...," pp. 28-106. 5. R. Hoffman, "Missionary," New Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. 9. 6. Luke 4:18 7. Jean Leflon, Eugene de Mazenod, I, p. 409. 8. Vicomte de Guichen, La France morale et religieuse a la fin de la Restauration, p. 200. 9. K. Abel, Drum Songs, p. 114, states that Mazenod founded the Oblates of Mary Immaculate in 1826. Though this is true of the name, the usual interpretation is that he founded the congregation in 1816 when he formed Les Missionnaires de Provence. 10. Les Missions des Missionnaires oblats de Marie Immaculee (hereafter Missions), 70 (1936), 502-3, Mazenod to Cardinal (unnamed) n.d. [1825]. n. R. Aubert, Lepontificat de Pie IX, p. 457. 12. Annales de la Propagation de la Foi, IV (1830-31), p. 719, Provencher to two priests in Paris, i August 1829 and 23 October 1830. 13. AASB Too98, Grollier to Tache, 20 July 1860. 14. "Les pays que nous evangelisons ne sont pas peuples comme la Chine et le Japon, nous ne pouvons vous parler de nombreuses conversions, nous pouvons nous mourir de faim et de froid, mais nous n'avons pas la chance de mourir martyrs, nos pauvres missions n'ont pas m£me cette poesie la.. .Le martyr que nous souffrons est un martyr long un martyr tout a fait prosai'que. Annales de la Propagation de la Foi, 40 (1868), p. 251. Excerpt from a letter of Bishop Grandin to the Propagation de la Foi, 4 January 1868. 15. "Mourir une et mille fois sous le fer homicide du persecuteur me paraitrait moins dur qu'un martyr lent des corps, de 1'esprit et du coeur qui dure sans fin." AD G-LPP 1633, Faraud to Fabre, 25 November 1868. 16. AD, Lafleche to Cazeau, 12 June 1854. 17. Georges Belcourt, Edouard Darveau, and J.B. Thibault were exceptions to this rule. But Belcourt quarrelled with Provencher and left St. Boniface in

212

TROM THE CjREAT H I V E R TO THE TNDS OF THE 'EARTH

1847; Darveau had died in 1844, probably killed by a Cree who accused him of sorcery; Thibault led the westward expansion of missions and initiated contact with the Chipewyan. Cf. Martha McCarthy, To Evangelize the Nations. 18. Provencher was named Bishop of Hudson's Bay and James Bay in 1844. This was changed by Rome in 1847 to Bishop of the North West—a title which Provencher detested. In 1852 he and Tache managed to persuade Rome to name him Bishop of St. Boniface. 19. French terminology for these Ojibwa was Sauteux, because they had first met at Sault Ste. Marie. Many of these Ojibwa moved west with the expanding fur trade. By the nineteenth century they occupied much of southern Manitoba, and also mingled with the Woods Cree. Many English-speaking historians refer to them as Saulteaux, but I have chosen to use the spelling of the contemporary Oblates.

•WORLDS APART: THE "TsTEW" WORLD

1. 2. 3. 4.

Petitot, "Etude sur la Nation Montagnaise," p. 493. Petitot, Grand Lac des Ours, p. 371. Petitot, "Etude sur la Nation Montagnaise," 487-88. Cf. Robin Ridington, "Knowledge, Power, and the Individual in Subarctic Hunting Societies." 5. Arthur}. Ray, "Periodic Shortages, Native Welfare, and the Hudson's Bay Company 1670-1930," p. 2. 6. The term "Montagnais" appears to go back to the early French traders and was in use long before the missionaries arrived. Petitot ("On the Athabasca District," p. 649) attributed this designation to the fact that they had previously lived along the Peace River, after crossing the Rocky Mountains, their primeval home. James G.E. Smith ("Chipewyan," in Handbook of North American Indians, 6 The Subarctic, p. 271) discredits this interpretation, showing that the Chipewyan moved west to Great Slave Lake and Lake Athabasca and south to the lakes of the Churchill River drainage. Smith, however, deals with the historical period, whereas Petitot retold Native traditions of their origins in the far distant past. It is unlikely, however, that the fur traders who applied the name "Montagnais" would have been familiar with this ancient belief. It is more likely that they simply used a name familiar to them from Quebec. 7. James G.E. Smith, "The Chipewyan," Handbook of North American Indians, 6. 8. David M. Smith, Moose—Deer Island House People, p. 7. 9. Michael I. Asch, "Slavey," in Handbook of North American Indians, 6, p. 338.

NOTES

213

10. Cf. R. Janes, Archaeological Ethnography..., p. 10. 11. A.K. Isbister, "On the Chipewyan Indian." 12. Ibid. 13. Beryl C. Gillespie, "An Ethnohistory of the Yellowknives: A Northern Athapaskan Tribe." 14. Missions 6 (1867), p. 481, Petitot to Fabre, 11 November 1864. 15. HBCA B8o/e/i, Fort Good Hope [1826]. 16. Missions, Dec. 1931; Michel to Breynat, 8 February 1931. 17. English-speaking anthropologists have usually referred to these people as Kutchin. Some refer to themselves as Gwichin. When I was at Arctic Red River, the people I spoke to called themselves Loucheux. It was also the expression used by the Oblates. For these reasons, I have kept this usage. 18. Isbister, "On the Loucheux Indians." 19. Cf. Leslie Roberts, The Mackenzie, for a description of the vast empire drained by the Mackenzie. 20. Dene Cultural Institute, "Deh'cho Mom, we've been discovered? p. io. 21. Thomas Berger, Northern Frontier, Northern Homeland, pp. 118-19. 22. PAA 71.220/7344, Seguin to mother and sister, 15 December 1868. 23. Paul Wright, Interview with Martha McCarthy, Fort Norman, 2 September 1990. 24. Julie Cruikshank, Life Lived Like a Story. 25. Robin Ridington, "Knowledge, Power, and the Individual in Subarctic Hunting Societies," p. 105. 26. Rapports des Missions du diocese de Montreal (i%6i), pp. 38-39, Grollier to Leonard, 28 May 1860. 27. Sam Gill, Native American Religious Action, p. 84. 28. Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth, p. xvii. 29. Petitot, Monographic, p. 36. Petitot's views on this were shared by Henry R. Schoolcraft. Cf. Robert E. Bieder, Science Encounters the Indian, 1820—1880, p. 188. 30. Missions, 6 (1867), p. 370, Petitot to Fabre, September 1863. 31. George Blondin, When the World Was New, Stories of the Sahtu Dene. Yellowknife, NWT: Outcrop, 1990. This book is an incomparable reference for Dene history, known from oral traditions, now available in written form for the first time. 32. AD G-LPP 1625, Faraud to Fabre, 15 November 1865. 33. Paul Wright, Interview with Martha McCarthy, at Fort Norman, 2 September 1990. 34. Ake Hultkrantz, Native Religions of North America, p. 15. 35. Elizabeth Colson, "Power at Large: Meditation on 'The Symposium of Power'." 36. Paul Wright, Interview with Martha McCarthy, Fort Norman, 2 September 1990.

214

T- R O M THE

§ R E A T 1 U V E R TO THE

" E N D S OF THE

-EARTH

37- Sam Gill, Native American Religions, p. 36. 38. Almost all the primary references to these jongleurs are to males, which is why the male pronouns are used. According to Gascon, however, the Dogribs at Fort Rae had many female as well as male persons with inkonze. (ADM, Gascon to Faraud, 26 November 1867.) 39. Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth, pp. 99-100. 40. George Blondin, When the World Was New, p. 58. 41. David M. Smith, Inkonze: Magico—Religious Beliefs of Contact—Traditional Chipewyan Trading at Fort Resolution, NWT, Canada. 42. "[L]es pretres francais ne croient a rien et se moquent de toutes ces choses." Petitot, Exploration de la Region du Grand Lac des Ours, p. 381. 43. Henry S. Sharp "Shared Experience and Magical Death." 44. Petitot, "Etude Sur La Nation Montagnaise," p. 507. 45. Sam Gill, Native American Religious Action, p. 29. 46. Ridington, "From Hunt Chief to Prophet...," p. 14. 47. OAGP, Ducot, Notes [1878]. 48. F. Russell, Explorations in the Far North, pp. 70-71. 49. Breynat, I, p. 241 50. Cf. June Helm and Eleanor Leacock, "The Hunting Tribes of Subarctic Canada," in North American Indians in Historical Perspective, p. 353. 51. Arthur Ray, "Periodic Shortages, Native Welfare, and the Hudson's Bay Company 1670-1930," p. 9. 52. Calvin Martin, Keepers of the Game, hypothesized that the effects of contact diseases on Indians who had not yet had direct contact with Europeans led them to blame the guardian animal spirits for causing their distress and therefore to conduct a slaughter of all these animals, far beyond what was needed for their own survival.

•POLICY AND -PRAGMATISM: THE OBLATES AND THE -HUDSON'S -BAY COMPANY 1. AASB Ta3587, Provencher to Cazeau, 24 July 1840. 2. HBCA 04/25 fo. 69, Simpson to Provencher, 17 February 1840. 3. HBCA 05/6 fo. 123-24, Donald Ross to Simpson, 10 April 1841. 4. HBCA 04/78 fo. 859, Simpson to HBC London, 24 June 1858. From HBCA Search File, Fort Resolution. 5. John H. Lefroy, In Search of the Magnetic North, p. 100. 6. HBCA 05/19, fo. 75-76, Roderick McKenzie to Simpson, 14 January 1847. Robert Hunt at the Pas told McKenzie of the CMS intentions. McKenzie thought they would "spoil the Indians" and ruin the fur trade. 7. AASB, "Notes sur 1'etablissement de la Mission de la Nativite a Athabaska."

NOTES

15

Evans's daughter had married Chief Trader John McLean, then stationed in the Mackenzie District, who later became a bitter opponent of the HBC. Evans hoped to establish a mission at Fort Simpson to be near his daughter, and also to oppose the Roman Catholics. (Cf. Frits Pannekoek, "The Anglican Church and the Disintegration of Red River Society, 1818-1870," p. 9.) 8. HBCA 04/29 fo. 9-iod, Simpson to Evans, 29 June 1843. 9. HBCA 04/32 fo. 113-17, Simpson to Murdoch McPherson, 3 June 1845. 10. HBCA 05/14 fo. 112-13, McKenzie to Simpson, i July 1845. 11. HBCA 05/27 fo. 530-44, Hudson Bay House to Simpson, 25 March 1850. 12. AASB Ta3587, Provencher to Cazeau, 24 July 1840. 13. E.E. Rich, The Hudson's Bay Company, II, p. 793. 14. United Church Archives, Toronto, AB4OR736, Donald Ross to "My dear friend" [Alex. Christie], 9 April 1846. Ross remarked on the hostility to HBC interests among the Catholic population at Red River, and the effect that it had on the peace and welfare of the country. He was especially upset that this was fostered and encouraged by their religious teachers (referring here to Belcourt). 15. HBCA 04/43 fo. 64-6^, Simpson to Bishop Anderson, 20 April 1851. 16. HBCA D4/76a fo. 721, Simpson to Governor and Committee, 26 June 1856. 17. HBCA 05/12 fo. 174—77, Donald Ross to Simpson, 15 August 1844. 18. HBCA 05/32 fo. 397-98, Colvile to Simpson (private), 22 December 1851. 19. HBCA 05/31(2) fo. 55, Eden Colvile to Simpson, 14 July 1851. 20. HBCA 05/22 fo. 160—61, Hudson Bay House to Simpson, 21 April 1848. 21. "Nous faisons pine, car nous ne connaissons pas Dieu; mais nous desirons le connaitre, et nous voudrions aussi, quand nous mourrons, aller dans le beau pays oil Dieu place les bons vivants. Viens nous voir; fais-nous charite." Rapport sur les missions du diocese de Quebec (hereafter RMQ) 7 (1847), Thibault to Provencher, 27 December 1845. 22. RMQ 7 (1847), Thibault to Provencher, 3 June 1846. 23. The details of Tache's two visits to Fort Chipewyan are given in ADM. "Registre de la Mission de la Nativite Athabaska 1842-1849." 24. HBCA 05/29, fo. 341-43, James Anderson (a) to Governor Simpson, 14 November 1850. 25. HBCA B39/b/i2, p. 69, James Anderson to Donald Ross, 7 December 1850. 26. AASB Ti978o, Joseph Mercredi to Tache, 19 December 1877. 27. Their produce won a gold medal at the Centennial Exhibition in 1876. (William Ogilvie, "In North-Western Wilds," The Canadian Magazine, 1894, p. 530.) In 1883 at Fort Chipewyan the HBC harvested 400 bushels of potatoes; the "Episcopal" mission, from its small plot, got 30 bushels; the Roman Catholic Mission obtained about 500 bushels. Canada Sessional Papers, vol. 18 No. 7 (1885), Annual Report, Department of Interior, 1884, by William Ogilvie.

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28. HBCA Dy/i fb. 329d, HBC London to Colvile, 7 April 1852. 29. James Anderson had expected to have the Chipewyan build this post in the summer of 1851, and noted that they were very skilled at building houses. (HBCA 05/29 fo. 341-43, Anderson to Simpson, 14 November 1850.) The HBC had sent an interpreter there from 1849, probably for short periods of time, to collect provisions. See HBCA Post History, Fond du Lac (Athabasca). 30. The date 1851 is given in "Histoire de la Mission de St. Joseph. Grand lac des Esclaves" (AASB To952), Faraud's letter to Mazenod, 8 December 1856, printed in Annales, 31 (1859), pp. 272-91, states that he founded the mission four years previously. This accounts for the date 1852 used in most sources. 31. Kerry Abel mistakenly attributed the first entry of the Oblates into the Mackenzie District to Grollier's visit to Fort Simpson in 1858. ("The Drum and the Cross...," p. 19). Fort Resolution was transferred to the Mackenzie District in 1844 and back to Athabasca in 1878. (Cf. HBCA 639/6/11, District Report, Fort Chipewyan, 1885, by R. McFarlane). 32. AD HPK2O33. N82R96, Mission St. Joseph, Reponse au questionnaire du 10 juin 1935. 33. HBCA 04/43 f°- 75' Simpson to Governor Colvile and Northern Department Council, I May 1851. 34. Cf. NAC MGi9A29, James Anderson Papers. James Anderson to Eden Colvile, 16 March 1852. Also HBCA 05/38, fo. 403, Tache to Simpson, 21 December 1853. 35. NAC M&9A29 vol. I file i fo. 92, James Anderson Papers, Anderson to Eden Colvile, 16 March 1852. 36. HBCA 05/37 f°- 4J3> Anderson to Simpson, 12 July 1853. 37. "[PJousse par je ne sais quel vertige, Mr. Anderson me park de Napoleon III et d'une invasion des Francais dans cette contree et cela parce que quelques uns de nos Missionnaires sont Francais." HBCA 05/38 fo. 404, Tache to Simpson, 21 December 1853. 38. AD HE 2221 Ti2Li36, Tache to Maisonneuve, 27 July 1853. 39. HBCA 05/37 f°- 4I3' Anderson to Simpson, 12 July 1853. 40. HBCA 05/38 fo. 405, Tache to Simpson, 21 December 1853. 41. HBCA 04/48 fo. 43d~45d, Simpson to James. Anderson (a), 12 June 1854. 42. HBCA 04/48 fo. 46-47, Simpson to Tache, 12 June 1854. 43. HBCA 05/42 (2), James Anderson (a) to Simpson, 18 July 1856. 44. HBCA 04/54 fo. I4id-i43, Simpson to Tache, 17 April 1858. 45. HBCA 04/53 fo. 39, Simpson to Faraud, 28 June 1857. 46. PAA 71.220/8097, Grollier to Vegreville, 25 June 1859. 47. Cf. Janet Wright, Church of Our Lady of Good Hope. 48. HBCA 04/55 f°- I55d-i58d, Simpson to Bernard Ross, 15 June 1859.

NOTES 217

i

-RIVALS IN TAITH: OBLATES VERSUS ANGLICANS 1. 2. 3. 4.

HBCA 05/45 fo. 182, Bishop Anderson to Simpson, 3 November 1857. AASB 1*0852, Grandin to Governor, 20 September 1861. CMS A93, Kirkby Journal, 10 June 1859. I realize that many adherents of the Church of England prefer to be called Catholic. This was not the case, however, for the evangelical CMS missionaries, and consequently I have kept the designation of Anglican for these missions. 5. CMS Ap3, Kirkby to Chapman, 10 March 1859. 6. HBCA 05/48 fo. 353—56, Bishop Anderson to Simpson, n March 1859. 7. AASB Too6o, Grollier to Tache, 30 May 1860. "Si Dieu et Marie ne viennent a notre secours, tous est ici contre nous, puissent-ils 1'un et 1'autre montrer bien vite qu'ils ne sont pas protestans." (sic) 8. NAC M205O, Grollier to Vegreville, 19 February 1859. 9. Missions?, (1864), p. 226. Grandin, Journal, 26 August 1861. 10. George Mitchell (The Golden Grindstone, by Angus Graham, pp. 83-85) who passed through Good Hope in 1898 on his way to the Klondike described Gaudet as "a French-Canadian of the finest and oldest type.. .dressed in what had been the height of the Montreal fashion in 1850." His house was a replica of an old-fashioned manoir of Quebec. Mitchell thought the church at Good Hope was also French-Canadian in design and attributed its workmanship entirely to the HBC personnel, apparently unaware of the fact that the French Oblates designed, built, and decorated it. 11. CMS A93, Kirkby, Journal, 20 August 1859. Mme. Marie Gaudet was a daughter of Chief Trader Fisher. (NAC RG85 vol. 338 f. 1073, ref. courtesy of Rene" Fumoleau, OMI.) According to Petitot, she was of French-Irish-Beaver descent. (QuinzeAns...p. 35.) Father Xavier Ducot, on the other hand, referred to her as a daughter of Francois Hoole and Elize Taupier. (OAGP Ducot Notes). Elize Taupier, listed as the wife of Francois Hoole in a letter from Gascon to Tactic", 13 June 1861 (AASB To6c>4), may have married Hoole after Fisher left the country. 12. Gaudet had refused to give food to Grollier, who visited Fort McPherson unexpectedly and without the authorization of Ross. Grollier did not have enough food with him and was unable to catch enough fish. He was also hampered by his asthma. On the other hand, Gaudet entertained Kirkby at his post, since Kirkby's trip had been approved by Ross. Bishop Grandin protested vigorously to the HBC Governor against this abrogation of the traditional HBC hospitality. (AASB To852, Grandin to Governor, 20 September 1861.) 13. Frank Peake, From Red River to the Arctic, p. 41 cites Robert McDonald's

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TROM THE O f R E A T -RIVER TO THE T N D S OF THE

'EARTH

diary, 29 April 1872, stating that Gaudet had returned to "Romanism" within the past year. 14. K. Abel, Drum Songs, p. 116, writes that Archdeacon Hunter's trip to the Mackenzie was motivated by a desire to forestall Grollier. The primary sources, however, note that Hunter was on the way before Grollier's visit to Fort Simpson. Cf. Grollier, "Souvenirs," in Missions 24 (1886), p. 411, cited in M. McCarthy, "The Founding of Providence Mission," p. 41. In any case, Hunter could not possibly have reached the Mackenzie from Red River after learning of Grollier's plans in the same season. He did, however, leave on the boats for the Mackenzie before obtaining the governor's permission because he knew the Oblates had HBC authorization to begin a mission at Good Hope. (CMS A92, Kirkby to Venn, 10 June 1858.) 15. CMS A93, Kirkby Journal, 18 August 1859. 16. PAA 71.220/8097, Grollier to Vegreville, 3 September 1860. 17. For details on this cf. Martha McCarthy, "The Founding of Providence Mission." 18. PAA 71.220 #8098, Grollier to Faraud & Glut, 25 July 1861. Also cf. PAA 84.400/958, "Notes et souvenirs de Mgr Grandin," p. 143. The HBC men too were well aware of the advantages of the Rapids. In fact, James Anderson had hoped to move Fort Simpson there. They had also suggested it as the best site for the Anglican mission but Archdeacon Hunter and his successor, Mr. Kirkby, preferred to stay at Fort Simpson. 19. HBCA B2oo/b/34, p. 20, Nicol Taylor to Bernard Ross, 5 June 1860. 20. PAA 71.220/8098, Nicol Taylor to Grollier, 13 February 1861. 21. McDonald of the CMS reported that the officers at these posts, Andrew Flett and James Flett, along with their wives, "exerted themselves nobly" for his cause. Cf. CMS A93, McDonald to Dawes, 25 June 1864. 22. CMS A93, McDonald to Col. Dawes, 25 June 1864. 23. Codex historicus, Arctic Red River. 24. R. Aubert, The Church in a Secularised Society, p. ix. 25. Cf. Frank Peake, From Red River to the Arctic, pp. 44-45 re CMS thinking. 26. St. Paul's University, Grandin Postulation Documents 23, Grandin to his family, u July 1855. 27. AASB TOIOO-OI, Grollier to Tache, 20 July 1860. 28. AASB T6899, Faraud to Tache, 12 September 1869. 29. AASB Tii93-94, Grollier to Lestanc, 20 February 1862. 30. CMS A83, Bompas Report, 19 March 1867. 31. PAM MGi2Ei, Bompas to Schultz, 3 June 1892. Many observers confused the Oblates with the Jesuits, as Bompas did. He may have been thinking of the Jesuits in Alaska, fearing their intrusion into the Yukon. 32. NAC M2O5O, Lestanc to Vegreville, 14 November 1861. 33. CMS A93, McDonald, 17 October 1862.

NOTES 219

34- PAA 71.200 #7344, Seguin to mother and sister, i August 1869. 35. AASB Too97, Grollier to Tache, 20 July 1860; PAA 71.220/7343, Seguin to Mon cher Cousin, 20 October 1862. 36. AASB T2958, Grouard to Tache, 18 November 1864. 37. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 6 July 1862. 38. NAC M&7A22 F832 #9496, Faraud to Propagation de la Foi, 26 March 1864. 39. OAGP, Lefebvre to Glut, i February 1895. 40. AD Reel 46, Petitot to Faraud, 6 April 1867. 41. CMS A9O, Robert Hunt, Journal, 2 October 1854. 42. PAA 70.387 MR 231/3, Breynat to Lucas, 8 April 1912. 43. PAA 70.387 MR 181/1, Note for new Bishop by Bishop Bompas [1891].

)

STRUCTURES AND INFRASTRUCTURE

i. AD G-LPP1614, Faraud to Mazenod, 29 December 1855. Faraud outlined the qualities needed by a northern missionary in this letter. 2.-When he was a new young priest at Nativity, the Chipewyan kept asking him for permissions and dispensations which Faraud had refused. Grandin did not bend to this pressure, but maintained Faraud's rulings. (PAA 71.220/213, Raynard to Vegreville, 23 May 1856.) 3. AASB ^324-25, Grandin to Tache, 3 July 1862. Clarke had inquired of the HBC Fort Garry office as to what procedure would be necessary for Grandin. J. Black, Recorder of Rupert's Land, gave his opinion that no process of naturalization was available in Rupert's Land. This process was governed by statute law, which only applied either in London or in the British colonies, such as Canada. (AASB T4o69~7i, J. Black to James R. Clare, 30 June 1866.) 4. Breynat, II, p. 271. 5. CMS AiO9, Bompas to Secretaries, 12 December 1880. 6. Bishops in mission countries were given titles to defunct dioceses inpartibus infidelium until their region became part of the settled diocesan structure of the Church. This procedure developed in the seventeenth century when the Propaganda sought to establish bishops in the Far East who would be independent of the Portuguese Patronage claims to sovereignty. 7. Mazenod, Lettres II, p. 114. Mazenod to Guigues, 8 November 1855. 8. See M. McCarthy, "Glut, Isidore" in Dictionary of Canadian Biography, XIII. 9. Cf. Raymond Huel, "La Mission Notre-Dame-des-Victoires du lac la Biche...." 10. Grouard, SoixanteAns, pp. 280—82. u. AD G-LPP 2131, Lecorre to Antoine, 31 January 1898. 12. Breynat, II, p. 72. 13. Breynat, I, p. 265.

22O

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CJ R E A T H . I V E R T O T H E

" E N D S OF THE

"EARTH

14. Missions (1905). Breynat, report. 15. Breynat, II, p. 18. 16. The Yukon was combined with the part of British Columbia north of 53 degrees plus the Queen Charlotte Islands to form a new apostolic prefecture, which became an Apostolic Vicariate on 20 November 1916. (Breynat, II, p. 130.) 17. Cf. George Whalley, "Coppermine Martyrdom" for the story of the mission efforts and deaths of the two priests. Also George M. Douglas, Lands Forlorn, for a memoir by a man who spent much of the previous winter with the two priests. 18. The Mackenzie boat crews were staffed primarily by Native and Metis seasonal labourers by the 18305. (Philip Goldring, Papers on the Labour System of the Hudson's Bay Company, 1821-1000,1.) 19. HBCA 05/34 fo. 146-47, Provencher to Simpson, 27 July 1852. 20. AASB Toon, Simpson to Tache, 30 June 1853. 21. PAA 71.220/1049, Tache to Vegreville, 21 November 1854. 22. HBCA B2oo/b/39 v°l- 2 f°- 41' W.L.Hardisty to James A. Grahame, 19 August 1877. 23. OAGP, Codex historicus, Good Hope, 19 June 1886. 24. AD HEi82i F26K78, Faraud to Maisonneuve, 14 August 1888. 25. Breynat, I, pp. 83-87. 26. AD HEi86i G87C2O, Grouard to filleule, 10 October 1895. 27. M. Vacher, OMI, "La Ferme Saint-Bruno." 28. HBCA Ai2/FT 34i/[io], Memorandum re Northern Transport, 2 December 1913. 29. Morris Zaslow, The Northward Expansion of Canada 1914—1967, p. 158.

WHEN -TWO WORLDS MET

1. "Rien n'y est suivi, coordonne de maniere a presenter en eux une societe complete, ayant une autonomie propre, une religion etablie et raisonnee, une forme quelconque de gouvernement. Tout y est tronque, melange, diffus et difforme." Emile Petitot, Monographie des Dene-Dindjie, pp. 36-37. 2. AASB Taoioi-O2, Tache to his mother, 4 January 1851. 3. The human form in which the Chipewyan envisaged the Creator appears to be masculine, as it was for European Christians. However, the fact that the translation here was made by a priest from Quebec, grounded in western European thought and language, may have affected the meaning given to the Chipewyan term. 4. AASB Taoo99, Tache to his mother, 4 January 1851. 5. Petitot, Monographie des Dene-Dindjie, p.37.

•NOTES

221

6. AASB Taoioo, Tache to his mother, 4 January 1851. 7. OAGP, Ducot, Notes. 8. AASB Taoioo, Tache to his mother, 4 January 1851. 9. Ellen Basso, "The Enemy of Every Tribe...", p. 697. 10. AASB, Grandin to Sebaux, 9 November 1854. n. AASB Taoioi, Tache to his mother, 4 January 1851. 12. Petitot was referring here to the northern Dene. I have been told that there are snakes in the Northwest Territories, but the Canadian Encyclopedia states that their northern limit in Canada is around Fort Smith, where the common garter snake can exist. 13. Petitot, Traditions indiennes, pp. 31-32. 14. AASB Taoioi-O2, Tache to his mother, 4 January 1851. 15. Missions^ (1869), Petitot to Fabre, 29 February 1868, pp. 297-306. 16. Petitot, "Etude Sur La Nation Montagnaise," p. 504. 17. OAGP, Good Hope Codex 18 September 1885. 18. J. Serrurot, OMI, "Au pays des 'Plats-C6tes-de-Chiens'," p. 244. 19. Petitot, Monographic des Dene-Dindjie, pp. 34-35. 20. Tache to Mazenod, 4 April 1854. Cited in Dom Benoit, Vie deMgr. Tache, I, p. 274. 21. HBCA Bi8i/a/6 fo. 18, Fort Resolution Journal, 25 October 1825. 22. Alexander Mackenzie, Voyages, p. clxxiv. 23. Petitot, Grand Lac des Ours, pp. 276-77. Alexander Mackenzie also recounted this belief in the transmigration of souls. (Voyages, p. clxxiv.) 24. Missions, 8 (1869), p. 301-2, Petitot, Journal, 30 June 1867. 25. Cf. Goulet, "Religious Dualism among Athapaskan Catholics," pp. 9-10. 26. NAC M-2072, Tache to Vegreville, 4 December 1858. 27. Cf. Sam Gill, Native American Religious Action, p. 32. 28. At Fort Liard, Mr. Hardisty threatened to refuse to give the Natives any powder or shot or tobacco, if they refused to shake hands with the minister, Rev. Mr. Kirkby. (AASB To6o4, Gascon to Tache, 13 June 1861). Gascon took down this evidence, signed by J.-Bte Marsolais, Francois Hoole, and Elise Taupier, Hoole's wife, and sent it to Tache to use in case Hardisty complained to the Governor of the HBC about Gascon's activities at Liard. 29. G. Carriere, OMI, Le Pere du Keewatin, p. 65. 30. A.K. Isbister, "The Chipewyan." 31. AD Reel 46, Petitot to Faraud, 31 January 1868. 32. CMS A83, Bompas, Journal, 19 March 1867 (at Fort Rae). 33. AASB T40I3, Petitot to Tache, 31 May 1866. 34. Robert Kennicott (1835-1866). He collected specimens for the Smithsonian in the Mackenzie District 1859-62. Cf. "Journal of Robert Kennicott, May 19, i859-February n, 1862," in James Alton James, The First Scientific Exploration Chief Trader Bernard Ross also did much

222

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C J R E A T • R I V E R TO THE

•£ N D S O F T H E

'EARTH

collecting for the Smithsonian and thus had a natural affinity for Kennicott. 35. AASB Too6o, Grollier to Tache, 29 May 1860. 36. ADM, Grollier to Faraud, 28 May 1862. 37. CMS A93, Kirkby Journal, 17 May 1861. 38. CMS A93, Kirkby Journal, 1860. 39. Grouard prepared a Chipewyan language book for publication in syllables by the Lac la Biche printing press in 1886, but Grandin refused to purchase any of the books for St. Albert since he had decided to switch to the alphabetic characters. PAA 71.220/985, Grouard to Grandin, 30 June 1886. 40. AD HPK2033-N82R92, Reponse au questionnaire, A. Robin, 1935. 41. Cf. G. Carriere, OMI, "Contribution des missionnaires a la sauvegarde de la culture indienne." 42. ADM, Faraud to Glut, 20 May 1886. 43. PAA 84.400/957, "Notes et souvenirs de Mgr Grandin." 44. Grollier railed against the Chipewyan neologisms adopted by Faraud and Glut, which he claimed were masterpieces of vanity, not a word being understood by anyone. (AASB Tii78, Grollier to Tache, 14 February 1862). Perhaps he convinced Glut, who later criticized Faraud's book of hymns and Chipewyan grammar. (AASB T3637-39, Glut to Tache, 23 October 1865 and AD G-LPP 659, Glut to Faraud, 10 November 1866.) Faraud insisted that Legoff s translation, used in the St. Albert diocese, was faulty. (ADM, Faraud to Glut, 17 December 1889.) 45. AD Reel 47, Tache to Faraud, 3 July 1854. 46. Petitot was upset that the Minister of Agriculture allotted him the same amount for his polyglot dictionary as Lacombe had received for his bilingual one, while Petitot's was three times as large. Missions 12 (1874), p. 398, Petitot to Fabre, 8 August 1874. 47. AD G-LPP 1786, Grouard to Fabre, 16 June 1888. 48. PAA 84.400/923, Grandin to Glut, 26 November 1862. 49. Petitot, Les Grands Esquimaux, p. 142. 50. AASB Ta4583, Notes on Tache" s lectures, taken by G. Cloutier. 51. PAA 71.220/7345, Seguin to his sister, i July 1883. 52. OAGP, Ducot Notes, 7 January 1901. 53. St. Paul's University, Postulation 8, Grandin to M. Sebaux, 29 May 1855. 54. PAA 71.220/7346, Seguin to his sister, 10 February 1886. Seguin did not identify what was offensive; it may have been depictions of people in short robes. 55. AD G-LPP 633, Glut to Faraud, 16 December 1861. 56. HBCA 05/29 fo. 341, James Anderson (a) to Simpson, 14 November 1850. Simpson responded by sending four dozen silver crosses and four dozen rosaries from Lachine for the Athabasca District.

NOTES2

,23

57- Cf. H.G. Barnett, L. Broom et al., "Acculturation: an Exploratory Formulation," p. 37, re changes in technology in general. 58. AASB To575, Grollier to Tache, 8 June 1861. 59. AASB To669, Grollier to Tache, 18 July 1861. 60. OAGP, Duport to Breynat, i August 1904. 61. Since Vatican II, Confession has become known as the Sacrament of Reconciliation, and Extreme Unction as the Sacrament of the Sick. 62. "Je te vois enfin, mon cher Pere, c'est assez. Hate-toi et entends ma confession, fortifie-moi par la communion, accorde-moi toutes les medicines de bon Dieu, et je pars... Je crois et j'espere." AD G-LPP 1615, Faraud to Mazenod, 18 December 1858. 63. For examples, see AASB 10099, Grollier to Tache, 20 July 1860; PAA 84.400/912, Grandin to Tache and the missionaries of Athabaska, lie a la Crosse, St. Boniface and other missions, 25 April 1863; Missions 5 (1866), Grandin Journal, 23 June 1863. 64. Petitot, Autour du Grand Lac des Esclaves, p. 32. 65. PAA 71.220/8055, Gascon to Tache, 16 September 1862. 66. ADM, Gascon to Faraud, i December 1863. 67. CMS A9o, Journal, Hunter, n.d. [1859]. 68. "[L]a planche de salut." Rapports, Montreal, (1861), pp. 38-39, Grollier to Leonard, 28 May 1860. 69. Missions 6 (1867), p. 464, Petitot to Fabre, 30 September 1864. 70. OAGP, Faraud to Procurator in Rome, June 1869. 71. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 30 May 1882. 72. R. Pettazoni, "Confession of Sins: an attempted general interpretation." 73. AD Reel 48, Grandin to Tache and Faraud, 15 December 1863. 74. St. Paul's University, Postulation Documents 8, Grandin to Sebaux, 27 June 1857. 75. Annaleszo (1859), pp. 108-9, Grandin to his family, n June 1857. Weston La Barre, "Confession as Cathartic Therapy in American Indian Tribes," p. 38, noted the Inca use of a knotted string when going to their Native confessors. 76. Annaleszo (1859), PP-108-9, Grandin to his family, u June 1857. 77. Ibid. 78. Cf. Kenneth Morrison, "Sharing the Flower...". 79. Missions 39 (1901), p. 132, Grouard, Excursions au Mackenzie et au Klondyke." 80. AASB, "Notes sur 1'etablissement de la mission de la Nativite a Athabaska." 81. St. Paul's University, Postulation Documents, 8. Grandin to Sdbaux, 27 June 1857. 82. ADM, Seguin to his family, 1861. 83. Petitot, Monographic des Dene-Dindjie, pp. 34—35. 84. Alexander Mackenzie, Voyages, I, p. clxxix.

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' E N D S OF THE

TARTH

85. Bernard R. Ross, "The Eastern Tinneh," p. 310. 86. HBCA 04/53 f°- 39^-40, Simpson to Ross, 28 July 1857. 87. The story of Ross and Jean-Baptiste Davis and wife is related in AASB Toi83. Gascon to Tache, 15 November 1860; AASB Toi96-8, Ross to Tache, 30 November 1860. 88. NAG M-2090, Moulin to Fabre, 22 July 1862. 89. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 25 May 1869. 90. Petitot, Exploration de la Region du Grand LAC des Ours, pp. 333-34. 91. Overholt, Channels of Prophecy, p. 32. 92. OAGP, Faraud to Procurator in Rome, June 1869. 93. ADM, Ducot to Faraud, 3 May 1890. 94. NAG M&9A29, James Anderson papers, Faraud to Anderson, 14 February 1858; Anderson to Faraud, 22 March 1858. 95. HBCA 05/45 fo. 160-62, James. Anderson (a) to Simpson, 27 October 1857. 96. AD G-LPP 633, Glut to Faraud, 16 December 1861. 97. AD, Grandin to Cardinal [illegible], 12 March 1860. 98. ADM, Pascal to Faraud, 20 December 1889. 99. St. Paul's University, Postulation Documents 8; Grandin to Sebaux, 9 November 1854. 100. Zimmer, "Early Oblate Attempts for Indian and Metis Priests in Canada," PP- 33-34101. "Bishops seek married clergy." Western Catholic Reporter, 27 September 1993, p.i. 102. Missions39 (1901), pp. 117-41. Grouard, "Excursions au Mackenzie et au Klondyke." 103. St. Paul's University, Ottawa, Postulation Documents. Grandin to M. Sebaux, 16 December 1855. 104. NAG M-2O73, Glut to Vegreville, 17 June 1862. Some young couples "living in concubinage" had moved from Seven Sorrows at Fond du Lac to the new mission of St. Pierre on Lac Caribou. Glut promised to send Vegreville a list of these people, and asked for a similar list of excommunications of people from Lac Caribou who had come to Fond du Lac. 105. ADM, Ducot to Faraud, 23 June 1881. 106. Missions 5 (1866), Grandin Journal, 23 June 1863.

7

1AY 1EADERSHIP AMONG THE DENE

1. AD HPF 4i9i.C75Ri26. Grouard to Mme Cox, 9 December 1866. 2. Missions, 6 (1867) p. 460. Petitot to Fabre, September 1863. 3. Tache, VingtAnnees, p. 27. 4. Annales, 36 (1864). Faraud, Rapport.

NOTES2 25

5. Annales, 36 (1864), Faraud, Rapport. 6. John Blondin, interview with Martha McCarthy, Fort Norman, 31 August 1990. 7. Janes, Archaeological Ethnography, p. 81. 8. PAA 71.220/8097, Grollier (Fond du Lac Athabasca) to Vegreville, 10 April 1856. 9. AASB Too87, Glut to Tache, 30 June 1860. Glut again noted the good influence of Emmanuel in AD G-LPPd>46. Glut to Fab re, 9 July 1864. 10. AD G-LPP 657, Glut to Fabre, 23 May 1866. 11. AD LC24iMi4R3, "Journal de la Mission de la Nativite," 14 September 1866. 12. Petitot, En route pour la merglaciale, pp. 303-06. 13. PAA 71.220/8055, Gascon to Tache, i December 1864. 14. Missions*) (1870), Faraud, Report, 6May 1868. 15. AASB T2258, Petitot to Tache, 20 June 1863. 16. Codex historicus, Arctic Red River. (Copy used at Inuvik, courtesy of Father Ebner, OMI.) 17. Duchaussois, Aux Glaces Polaires, pp. 414—15. 18. AD G-LPP 1778, Grouard to Tache, 13 June 1868. 19. ADM, De Krangue to Faraud, 23 February 1880. 20. ADM, Roure to Faraud, 28 June 1880. 21. Missions 7 (1868), p. 294, Petitot to Fabre, 31 May 1866. 22. Petitot, Grand Lac des Ours, pp. 371-75. 23. Petitot, Grand Lac des Ours, pp. 98-101. 24. Petitot also met Nitte (le Marais-mouvant) on his trip back from Fort Anderson to Good Hope in 1865. He regarded him as a man of "gentle folly." At the time, Nitte was with a band of Mackenzie River Loucheux, though he was one of the Peel's River band. (QuinzeAns sous le Cercle Polaire, p. 186.) 25. ADM. Seguin to Faraud, i June 1865. Robert McDonald also attributed this "fanaticism" to those belonging to Romanism. (CMS A93. McDonald to CMS, 24 June 1863.) 26. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 6 July 1862. 27. AASB T2399, Seguin to Tache, 12 September 1863. 28. CMS A93, Fort Youcon, 18 November 1863. 29. CMS A94, McDonald, Journal, 17 December 1867. 30. John J. Honigmann, Ethnography and Acculturation of the Fort Nelson Slave, p. 133. 31. Ibid. 32. Ridington, "From Hunt Chief to Prophet...," p. 16. 33. OAGP, Gourdon to Breynat, 17 August 1908. 34. R.H. Cockburn, "To Great Slave and Great Bear...," pp. 330-35. Petitot made the first Oblate visit to the Bear Lake Dene in 1864.

226

T R O M THE

O j R E A T K . I V E R TO THE

•£ N D S O F T H E

"EARTH

35- June Helm, Prophecy and Power, p. 20, indicated that the dreams of youth were not publicized until the appropriate time in maturity. To speak too soon was to die young. 36. George Blondin, When the World Was New, pp. 239-41. 37. Cecilia Tourangeau, interview with Martha McCarthy, Inuvik, NWT, ii September, 1990.

8

METIS AUXILIARIES

1. HBCA B239/b/75 fo. 45, J. McNab to Wm. Auld, 23 July 1808. Cited in Marcel Giraud, The Metis in the Canadian West, I, p. 269. 2. Richard Slobodin, Metis of the Mackenzie. 3. AD G-LPP 2682, Seguin to Fabre, i June 1866. 4. PAA 71.220/8097, Grollier to Vegreville, 28 February 1861. 5. K. Coates and W. Morrison, "More than a Matter of Blood...," p. 255. 6. HBCA B20O/f/i fos. 3-7. This list of HBC boatmen and labourers for the 18508 in the Mackenzie District shows many with origins in Red River. 7. R. Slobodin, Metis of the Mackenzie, p. 164. 8. See for example AD, "Journal de la Mission de la Nativite 1864-1888," entry for 13 September 1865 which refers to the death of wife of an employee at Fort Chipewyan as the first victim among the whites (C'est la lere victime que la mort ait faite parmi les blancs). Also AD G-LPP 652, Glut to Faraud, n September 1865; Glut remarked that in this epidemic the whites were not spared and there was much illness at the fort and mission, though not among the Oblates. The assumption is that the Metis employees of the mission and post suffered. 9. Elize Taupier was the mother of Marie Fisher, who married Charles Gaudet. She probably heard of Catholicism during her marriage to Fisher, and later married Francois Hoole. (Cf. AASB To6o4, Gascon to Tache, 13 June 1861, where she is noted as the wife of Francois Hoole.) Mme Marie Gaudet was a daughter of Chief Trader Fisher. (NAG RG85 vol. 338 f. 1073, ref. courtesy of Rene Fumoleau, OMI.) According to Petitot (QuinzeAns— p. 35), Marie Fisher was of French-Irish-Beaver descent, which would indicate that Elize Taupier was a Beaver Indian. Father Ducot referred to Marie Fisher as a daughter of Francois Hoole and Elize Taupier (OAGP Ducot Notes). 10. Duchaussois, Aux Glares Polaires, p. 348. Grollier said she was baptized at St. Boniface by Pere Aubert, who accompanied Tache in 1845. [Grollier, Souvenirs, in Missions, 24 (1886), p. 417.] n. AASB To565, Grollier to Tache, 9 June 1861. 12. St. Paul's University, Postulation Documents, Grandin to Tache, 8 April 1864.

NOTES 227

13. OAGP, Michel "Soixante-cinq ans a Good Hope," p. 12. 14. AD, "Journal de la Mission de la Nativite 1864-1888," i October 1865. 15. See ADM, Father Louis Menez, OMI, "The Beaulieu Genealogy." 16. Petitot, En route pour la mer glaciate, p. 312. Another Beaulieu was a chief of one of the Dogrib bands, when Gascon visited Fort Rae in 1860. (Cf. PAA 71.220/8055, Gascon to Tache, i June 1860.) 17. Petitot, Traditions indiennes, p. 430. 18. In the registry of Nativity Mission, Beaulieu is recorded as about 55 years old when baptized in 1848, which would put his birth in 1793. John Clarke claimed Beaulieu was about 15 years old in 1808 when he first hired him. (HBCA B3p/a/io fo. I2b, 18 June 1817. "Journal of Occurrences in Athabasca" by John Clarke.") 19. HBCA B39/c/2ib fo. 3, Fort Chipewyan Journal, 15 June 1822, noted that "the Rat towards the Salt Plains to find his Stepson Beaulieu." 20. HBCA B39/a/io fo. I2b, 18 June 1817, "Journal of Occurrences in Athabasca" by John Clarke. 21. Cf. HBCA B39/a/io fo. 9b, "Journal of Occurrences in Athabasca" by John Clarke. Clarke was told on 16 June 1817 that the NWC planned to put him on an island, where Bouilieu (sic) would shoot him. On 18 June 1817, Clarke overheard Beaulieu talking to James Sutherland about being offered all Clarke's property if he killed him, and that the trader at Fort Chipewyan had already given him a set of clothes. Later that day, Clarke gave Beaulieu a glass of spirits; Beaulieu told him he had killed Indians but no whites as yet, and Clarke told him he hoped he never would. Beaulieu kept repeating that he knew something. 22. HBCA A39/a/i8 fo. 49, Simpson's Athabasca Journal, 23 November 1820; also PAM MG2Ai #15679, Selkirk Papers, Deposition of Francois Forcier, 8 July 1818. 23. J. Franklin, Narrative, p. 288. 24. HBCA 639/3/23 fo. 23, Fort Chipewyan Journal, 2 February 1825, and HBCA 639^/25 fo. 36b, 26 May 1827. 25. Shepard Krech III, "The Trade of the Slavey and Dogrib at Fort Simpson in the Early Nineteenth Century," p. 133. 26. HBCA B39/a/2ib fo. n, Fort Chipewyan Journal, i August 1822, noted that Beaulieu and P. St. Germain arrived from Salt Plains. 27. Frank Russell, Explorations in the Far North, pp. 65-66. Russell thought the house had been built by Beaulieu's father, which would have made it over 100 years old, unlikely for a log building. 28. Petitot, En route pour la mer glaciale, pp. 312-14. 29. PAA 84.400/957, "Notes et souvenirs de Mgr. Grandin," p. 85. 30. Annals of the Propagation of the Faith, 20 (1859), pp. 105-6. Grandin to his family, 14 June 1857.

228

T R O M THE CJREAT "RIVER TO THE "ENDS OF THE "EARTH

31. PAA 84.400/957, "Notes et souvenirs de Mgr. Grandin." 32. Petitot, En route pour La mer glaciate, pp. 312-14. 33. ADM, "Registre de la Mission de la Nativite Athabasca 1842-1849." 34. PAA 84.400/957, "Notes et souvenirs de Mgr. Grandin," p. 84. 35. Cf. AD G-LPP 656, Glut to Fabre, n March 1866. 36. AD G-LPP 638, Glut to Faraud, 20 December 1862. 37. AD G-LPP 656, Glut to Fabre, 27 March 1866. 38. R. Slobodin, Metis of the Mackenzie District, p. 153. 39. Grouard, SoixanteAns, p. 71. 40. HBCA 05/44 fo. 51-52, Bernard Ross to Simpson, 26 July 1857. "I strongly suspect that the Roman Catholic priests are at the bottom of this movement, as one of them passed last winter at Salt River, Beaulieu's residence, and now, even as far as Big Island, the Indians talk of yearly trips to Red River with their furs." 41. HBCA 05/44 fo. 172-73, William Mactavish to Simpson, 24 August 1857. 42. HBCA 04/53, Simpson to Campbell, n November 1857. 43. HBCA 04/54 fo. I78d, Simpson to Robert Campbell, 21 June 1858. 44. HBCA B200/b/34, p. 68, Christie to Hardisty, 17 September 1863. 45. AASB T3875, Grandin to Tache, 1866. 46. AD Reel 47. Tissier to Faraud, 10 March 1867. 47. HBCA B200/b/39, fo. 46. W.L. Hardisty to R. McFarlane, i April 1872. 48. Missions 24 (1886), p. 411. Grollier, "Souvenirs" (1858), found by P. Ducot at Good Hope, 19 February 1886. 49. Duchaussois, The Grey Nuns..., pp. 141—43. 50. HBCA B2oo/b/39 vol. 2 fo. 51, W.L. Hardisty to James. A. Grahame, 28 March 1878. Bouvier had died very suddenly in the summer of 1877, when he was almost 70, and still working as a guide. Cf. Missions, 17 (1879), p. 28, Lecorre Journal, 18 August 1877. 51. Cf. HBCA B20o/f/i fo. 5, "Register of engagements, McKenzie's River District, 1852." 52. Petitot, Autour de Grand Lac des Esclaves, pp. 76-78. 53. AASB T3265-66, Gascon to Tache, 15 May 1865. 54. AD, Gascon to Lestanc, 28 December 1865. 55. Petitot, Autour du Grand Lac des Esclaves, p. 78. George Back, a midshipman who accompanied Franklin on his first two land expeditions, was assigned to search for Captain John Ross. He wintered at Fort Reliance in 1833-1834 and later found that Ross was safely back in England. He travelled down the Back River in 1834 to the Arctic and was later knighted for his achievements. 56. Cf. HBCA Bi8o/a/i, "Journal of the Transactions of the Fort Reliance party during summer 1855" by J. Lockhart. This refers to the building of this outpost. PAA 71.220/8055, Gascon to Tache, 15 November 1860, refers to the staffing of this post and the need to visit it.

NOTES 229

57- AD LC38i.Mi4Ri, Eynard to Tache, 6 December 1862. 58. AASB Ti9779, Joseph Mercredi to Tache, 19 December 1877. (The letter was written by Pascal, at Mercredi's request, because Mercredi had never learned to write well.) 59. The Journal of Nativity Mission for 28 June 1865 noted the arrival of Joseph MacKarthy from Fond du Lac. Bishop Glut, asked to give evidence to the Senate Committee inquiry into the resources of the Great Mackenzie Basin, said that McCarthy, at Fond du Lac, told him he had discovered gold but would not show it to anybody. 60. Conversation with Rev. Gilles Mousseau, OMI, September 1990. This was also the conclusion drawn by Agnes Cameron who visited Fond du Lac in 1908. (The New North, p. 81.) 61. Breynat, I, p. 123-24. 62. AASB Toi07, Grollier to Tache, 20 July 1860. 63. HBCA 6200/6/14 fo. 3d, Mackenzie District Report, 1875. 64. Missions 46 (1908), Voyage au Fond du Lac du 2 au 27 avril 1906 [Grouard], p. 214.

y

"HEALTH AND 'WELL^'BEING:MEDICINE AND MISSION

1. When several people at the Liard mission died without baptism, Gascon reasoned that God had chastised these people as they deserved. At Fort Rae, deaths from illness and starvation led Eynard to conclude that this was God's warning to them because they continued to steal wives like booty and abandon the sick and infant girls at birth. ADM, Gascon to Faraud, i December 1863; AASB T2246, Eynard to Tache, 8 June 1863. 2. Annales, 37 (1865), Petitot to Faraud, 22 June 1864. 3. Richard White and William Cronon, "Ecological Change and Indian-White Relations." 4. E. Petitot, "Etude Sur la Nation Montagnaise," p. 489. 5. HBCA 639/3/29 fo. 62, Journal of Fort Chipewyan, 10 April 1833. 6. PAA 71.220/7344, Seguin to mother and sister, 30 May 1868. 7. HBCA Search File, Good Hope. From B2oo/b/37, pp. 56-57. McFarlane to Governor, Chief Factors and Chief Traders, 3 August 1868. 8. AASB T525I, Boisrame to Tache, 2 February 1868. 9. Camsell, Son of the North, p. 152. 10. Fred Widow, interview with Martha McCarthy at Fort Norman, i September 1990. 11. AD LC 24i.Mi4R3, Nativity Journal, 4 August 1865. 12. AD Reel 48, Tache to Faraud, 8 March 1865: "Our population is horribly stricken—I have to make unexpected expenses to prevent more from dying."

23O

T R O M THE

§ R E A T H I V E R TO THE

•£ N D S OF THE

TiARTH

13. AASB T40I2, Petitot to Tache, 31 May 1866. 14. HBCA Bioo/b/35 fo. I05d-i07, W.L. Hardisty to Governor, Chief Factors, and Chief Traders, 27 November 1866. 15. CMS A93, Kirkby, Journal, 29 March 1866. 16. HBCA B2oo/b/35 fo. 93, W.L. Hardisty to Governor, Chief Factors, and Chief Traders, 30 July 1866. 17. HBCA B/200/b/37, pp. 174-77, Roderick McFarlane to Governor, 24 July 1869. 18. AD HEi82i.F26C5, Faraud to R.P. Durocher, 16 October 1869. 19. AASB Tii274-76, Gascon to Tache, i December 1872. 20. AD G-LPP 1787, Grouard to Fabre, 26 November 1889. 21. OAGP, "Chronique de la mission de la Nativite depuis sa fondation en 1847," Livre premier, 1847-1912. 22. Annales, 37 (1865). Petitot to Faraud, 22 June 1864. 23. E.L.M. Thorpe, "The Social Histories of Smallpox and Tuberculosis in Canada (Culture, Evolution and Disease)," p. 48. 24. See June Helm, "Female infanticide, European diseases, and population levels among the Mackenzie Dene." 25. Krech, "The Influence of Disease and the Fur Trade on Arctic Drainage Lowlands Dene, 1800-1850." 26. AASB Taoi2i, Tache to his mother, 4 January 1851. 27. OAGP, Good Hope Journal, 2, 24 September 1909. 28. See Martha McCarthy, "The Missions of the Oblates...," pp. 271-74, for a discussion of this. Homeopathic medicine involves treating the patient with minute doses of drugs that would incite similar symptoms in a healthy person [i.e., treating like with like (homeopathic) rather than with contraries (allopathic)]. 29. AD Reel 47, Tache to Faraud, 29 July 1847. 30. Hardisty was so impressed that he asked Tache to send him a homeopathic box like the priests had, with Hering's book in English if possible. (AASB TooSi, Eynard to Tache, 18 June 1860.) 31. CMS A9O, Robert Hunt Journal, September 1860. Hunt had given Grandin some flour on his journey to lie a la Crosse. Grandin repaid him by sending the homeopathic medicines he needed to replace those he had used up. 32. CMS A83, Bompas to Secretaries, CMS, 9 December 1867. K. Abel in Drum Songs, p. 292 note 97 notes that Mrs. Bompas favoured homeopathic medicines by 1883 and that "Bompas may also have changed his mind" but gives no evidence of any such change. 33. CMS A93, Kirkby Journal, 25 August 1865. 34. AD HPF4I9I.L75R36, Faraud to Mme Cox, 18 November 1868. 35. PAA 71.220/7343, Seguin to mother and sister, June 1866. 36. Missions j (1868), pp. 282-92. Petitot to Faraud, 15 January 1866.

NOTES

231

37- AASB T334O, Petitot to Tache, 5 June 1865. 38. PAA 71.220/7343, Seguin to mother and sister, 5 August 1866. 39. AASB T9929, Petitot to Tache, 31 January 1872. 40. AASB To675, Grollier to Tache, 18 July 1861. 41. ADM, Grollier to Faraud, 9 September 1861. 42. Hiroko Sue Hara, "The Hare Indians and Their World," p. 225 and P- 4543. George Blondin, When the World Was New, p. 171. 44. AD HPF 4i9i.C75Ri26, Grouard to Mme Cox, 9 December 1866. 45. ADM, Ducot, Notes. 46. Missions, 6 (1867) p. 460, Petitot to Fabre, September 1863. 47. Jacob A. Loewen, "Confession, Catharsis and Healing," p. 65. 48. Jacob A. Loewen, "Confession in the Indigenous Church," p. 117. 49. George Blondin, When the World Was New, pp. 16-17. 50. Petitot, "Etude Sur La Nation Montagnaise," p. 505. 51. AD LC24i.Mi4R3, Journal, Nativity, 14 May 1864; AASB T289O-92, Glut to Tache, i July 1864. 52. "[A]ie pitie de nous et de tous nos parents; ta priere est forte aupres de Dieu; tu peux nous guerir; une fievre, un rhume ne sont rien pour toi." AD G-LPP 646, Glut to Fabre, 9 July 1864. 53. AD G-LPP 647, Glut to Faraud, 17 December 1864. By December 1864, 42 from Nativity mission were known to have died during that year and many more had no doubt died in the bush. 54. AD LC24i.Mi4Pv3, Nativity Journal, 8 October 1865. 55. AD LC24i.Mi4R3, Nativity Journal, 14 September 1865. 56. AD HEi82i.F26C5, Faraud to R.P. Durocher, 16 October 1869. 57. AASB T29O7-IO, Seguin to Tache, 29 July 1864. 58. Annales, 37 (1865), Petitot to Faraud, 22 June 1864. Seguin described this illness as a stomach-ache and asked for a homeopathic box to use in curing. (ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 25 July 1864.) 59. Missions, 6 (1867), Faraud, Report on Athabasca-Mackenzie Vicariate, 15 November 1865. 60. PAA 71.220/7345, Seguin to his sister, i August 1876. 61. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 4 February 1880.

10

-PROTEST AND-PROPHECY

1. AASB Too58, Grollier to Tache, 29 May 1860. 2. Cf. Bruce Trigger's magisterial assessment of the Jesuits and the Hurons, in The children ofAataentsic. 3. "[L]a priere n'est pas faite pour vous qui etes noirs, mais pour ceux que Dieu

232

T R O M THE OJREAT K.IVER TO THE -ENDS OF THE "EARTH

a faits avec de la terre blanche." RMQj (1847), Thibault to Provencher, 3 June 1846. 4. CMS Ago, Robert Hunt, Journal, 26 February 1859. The Chipewyan at the time suffered from an inflammation of the throat and chest. 5. CMS Ago, Hunt, Journal, 5 May 1859. 6. Thomas Overholt, Channels of Prophecy, p. 32, describes a similar belief among believers in the prophet Wovoka, in the Ghost Dance movement of the 18905, who saw the scars of crucifixion on Wovoka's hands and feet. 7. Tache, VingtAnnees, pp. 119-22. 8. CMS Ago, Hunt, Journal, 5 May 1859. 9. Duchaussois, Aux Glages Polaires, p. 354. 10. George Blondin, When the World Was New, p. 5. 11. Tache, VingtAnnees, p. 121. 12. St. Paul's University, Postulation Documents 9, Grandin to Tache, 30 May 1865. 13. CMS Ago, Journal, Robert Hunt, 30 April 1860. 14. AASB Ton6, Vegreville to Tache, 29 July 1860. 15. HBCA B8g/a/27 fo. igd, Isle la Crosse Journal, 22 January 1850, noted that Grosse-Tete, or the medicine man, had arrived. 16. AASB Toi2O-2i, Vegreville to Tache, 29 July 1860. 17. AASB Togg6~gg, Glut to Lestanc, 15 December 1861. 18. AASB ^527-28, Faraud to Tache, 23 May 1861. 19. AD G-LPP 633, Glut to Faraud, 16 December 1861. 20. AD G-LPP 633, Glut to Faraud, 16 December 1861. 21. AD Reel 43, Eynard to Faraud, 23 April 1862. 22. AD G-LPP 635, Glut to Faraud, 17 June 1862. 23. PAA 71.220/980, Glut to Vegreville, n.d. [1863] 24. PAA 71.220/981, Glut to Vegreville, 17 June 1862. 25. AD G-LPP 635, Glut to Faraud, 12 June 1862. 26. PAA 71.220/981, Glut to Vegreville, 17 June 1862. 27. AASB Ti409, Glut to Tache, 22 May 1862. 28. AD G-LPP 634, Glut to Faraud, 20 May 1862. 29. AD G-LPP634, Glut to Faraud, 20 May 1862. 30. AD Reel 43, Faraud to Glut, 24 January 1862. 31. AASB ^643-45, Glut to Tache, 14 September 1862. 32. AD G-LPP 649, Glut to Faraud, 26 May 1865. 33. Missions, 6 (1867), Faraud, Report, 15 November 1865. 34. PAA 71.220/213, Raynard to Vegreville, 8 May 1859. 35. AASB Too87, Glut to Tache, 30 June 1860. 36. The account of these prophets at Fond du Lac is derived from AD G-LPP 657, "Notice sur la Mission de Notre Dame de 7 Douleurs...," Glut to Fabre, 3 April 1866.

NOTES

2233

37- PAA 71.220/979, Glut to Tache, 2 July 1863. At St. Peter's Mission, Gaste referred to this man as Tchereddel but it is almost certainly the same person. His activities on Reindeer Lake are described in Martha McCarthy, To Evangelize the Nations, pp. 152-55. 38. AASB 11057-80, Gaste to Tache, [1862]. 39. AD LC 22i-Mi4R, Codex, Fond du Lac 1853-1900. 40. PAA 71.220/979, Glut to Tache, 2 July 1863. 41. AD G-LPP 640, Glut to Faraud, 2 September 1863. 42. John Webster Grant, "Missionaries and messiahs in the northwest," p. 125. 43. John S. Long, "The Cree Prophets...," p. 8. 44. PAA 71.220/979, Glut to Tache, 2 July 1863. 45. AD G-LPP 659, Glut to Faraud, 18 November 1866. 46. PAA 71.220/8097, Grollier to Vegreville, 4 June 1860. 47. ADM, Seguin to his family, June 1866. 48. PAA 71.220/7344, Seguin to mother and sister, 14 January 1868. 49. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 25 May 1866. 50. PAA 71.220/8055, Gascon to Tache, i June 1860. 51. Petitot, Autour du Grand Lac des Esclaves, p. 189. 52. PAA 71.220/8055, Gascon to Tache, i June 1860. 53. AASB To53O-3i, Eynard to Tache, 23 May 1861. 54. Missions, 6 (1867), p. 462, Petitot to Fabre, 30 September 1864. 55. Annalesyj (1865), Petitot to Faraud, 22 June 1864. 56. "Qui es tu toi pour venir nous troubler? Tu ne vois pas Dieu toi, et nous nous le voyons face a face, nous n'avons que faire de ton bapteme." ADM, Petitot to Faraud, i June 1864. 57. Missions 6 (1867), p. 464, Petitot to Fabre, 30 September 1864. 58. Missions*) (1870), Faraud, Report, 6May 1868. Also cf. AD HPF 4i9i.C75Ri26, Grouard to Mme Cox, 9 December 1866. 59. AD G-LPP 2014, Ladet to Fabre, i June 1878. 60. CMS AiO9, William Spendlove to Rev. H. Wright, 30 November 1880. Cited in Abel, "Prophets, Priests, and Shamans...," p. 218. Abel mistakenly attributes this case to Fort Simpson. 61. AD LC3.Mi4Ri6, de Krangue to Tache, 13 November 1878. 62. Petitot, QuinzeAns..., pp. 120-23, noted that the Cochons, Little Pig's family, formed a large band. Their chief was Gros Cochon, a noted hunter; his wife was Grosse Truie. 63. PAA 71.220/7344, Seguin to mother and sister, 14 January 1868. 64. PAA 71.220/7345, Seguin to his sister, 10 February 1874. 65. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 5 February 1874. 66. AD HEB6255A45CIO, Gaste to Maisonneuve, 19 January 1875. 67. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 2 June 1874. 68. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 25 March 1875 and 2 February 1876.

234

TROM THE CjREAT -RIVER TO THE TNDS OF THE T A R T H

69. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 23 May 1875. 70. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 2 June 1874. 71. CMS A93, McDonald to Col. Dawes, 25 June 1864. 72. CMS A93, Rob't McDonald to Mr. Long, 31 January 1865. 73. Petitot, Les Grands Esquimaux p. 301. "Que venez-vous faire aupres de ce pretre? II ne vous comprend pas, il ne vous aime pas meme; toute son affection, tous ses soins sont pour les Esquimaux, nos ennemis. Et d'ailleurs, avez-vous besoin du pretre? Est-ce que je ne vous suffis pas? Est-ce que je ne prie pas pour vous, moi, chaque printemps, quands je viens ici?" 74. PAA 71.220/7345, Seguin to his sister, 27 February 1880. 75. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 27 July 1872. 76. Missions, 50 (1912), Turquetil, "Chronique historique de la Mission SaintPierre du lac Caribou," p. 281. 77. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 28 January 1873. 78. HBCA B20o/b/39. i, fo. 102-3, W.L. Hardisty to D.A. Smith, 6 August 1872. 79. Petites Annales (1905), pp. 57-61, 93-96, Andurand to Dubois, n.d. 80. Fred Widow, interview with Martha McCarthy, Fort Norman, i September 1990. 81. Petites Annales (1905), p. 95. Andurand to Dubois, n.d. "Pere, laisse-moi garder telle ou telle coutume; et alors tu prieras pour moi, je prierai avec toi, je me convertirai." 82. OAGP. Michel, "Soixante-cinqans...," p. 7. 83. June Helm, Prophecy and Power Among the Dogrib Indians, pp. 12-14. 84. R. Linton, "Nativistic Movements," p. 230. 85. Michael Barkun, Disaster and the Millennium, p. 40. 86. B. Wilson, Magic and the Millennium, pp. 54-57. 87. See also David F. Aberle, "ANote on Relative Deprivation Theory...." 88. Michael Barkun, Disaster and the Millennium, p. i. 89. Patricia R. Pessar, "Millenarian Movements in Rural Brazil: Prophecy and Protest," p. 183. 90. Martha McCarthy, "The Missions of the Oblates...," p. 311. 91. Grant, Moon ofWintertime, p. 117. 92. K. Abel, "Prophets, Priests and Preachers...," p. 224. 93. Schreiter, Constructing Local Theologies, pp. 144—48.

11 "EDUCATION AND -EVANGELIZATION

i. PAA 71.220/7742, Audemard to Pascal, 18 July 1891. At Fort Resolution, when the CMS planned to open a school, Audemard began one at the mission. He had a total of 120 names on his list; in June about 85 of these came regularly to class, though the number fell to 15—20 in July.

NOTES

2235

2. PAA 71.220/8097, Grollier to Vegreville, 19 February 1859 [1860]. 3. PAA 71.220/8005, Eynard to Vegreville, 5 December 1859. This situation prevailed as late as 1891, when Bishop Grouard excommunicated Francois Beaulieu for sending two of his children to the Anglican school at Fort Resolution. Though Beaulieu removed them, he did not immediately reconcile himself with the Church; the priests were appalled that he was helping Rev. Mr. Spendlove build a church. Cf. PAA 7I.22O/ 7742, Audemard to Pascal, 18 July 1891. 4. AD Reel 48, Grandin to Faraud, 15 October 1863. 5. AD Reel 48, Grandin to Faraud, 31 March 1863. 6. OAGP, Faraud to Hardisty, 8 July 1863. 7. Duchaussois, Aux Glares Polaires, p. 129. Faraud reported that these bunks held 35 children, while the rest slept in the attic. (AD G-LPP 1643, Faraud, Report, 20 May 1873.) 8. "[AJvoir une bonne ecole et la reputation d'habilite en tout, c'est faire triompher notre sainte cause." AD HPF4I9I.C75R35, Faraud to Mme. Cox, i April 1868. 9. When the Grey Nuns opened hospitals at Fort Smith and Fort Simpson, they also began day schools. The children attending these were primarily Metis, not Dene. Since they opened in 1915, they had little effect on educational policy during the time-frame of this work. 10. Missions-, 21 (1883), p. 206. Pastoral letter of bishops of Quebec, n. AASB Ta377O, Sr. Lapointe to Durocher, 19 November 1871. 12. AD HPF 4I9I.C75R37, Faraud to Mme. Cox, 5 May 1865. See also AASB T4996, Sr. Lapointe to Tache, 23 November 1868. 13. AASB Tii2o8-9, Sr. Lapointe to Tache, 23 November 1872. 14. At Fort Chipewyan in 1908, Agnes Cameron noted that the children were taught in French one day and the following day in English, but spoke to each other in Chipewyan. Cameron, The New North, pp. 78-79. 15. OAGP, Le Guen to Breynat, 23 November 1916. 16. Extracts of letters of those at Providence to Mother Superior. In Rapports, Montreal, 1871, p. 22. 17. ADM, Pascal to Faraud, December 1882. 18. OAGP, Duport to Cure St-Sauveur, 25 May 1920. 19. ADM, Faraud to Glut, 27 November 1877. 20. NAC RGio vol. 4042 #336,877, H.B. Bury, Report, 1913. 21. R. Carney, "The Grey Nuns and the Children...," p. 294. The report for the Athabasca District, 1908-20, printed in Missions, September 1922, said that 90 Indian and Metis children were then at Holy Angels. 22. AASB T3439, W. McTavish to Tache, i July 1865. 23. AD Reel 90, Sr. Michel des Saints to Motherhouse, i December 1868. 24. AD Reel 44, Grouard to Faraud, 20 March 1868.

236

TROM THE OJREAT -RIVER TO THE -ENDS OF THE -EARTH

25. ADM, Faraud to Glut, 10 June 1872. 26. ADM, Tache to Faraud, 8 April 1882. 27. ADM, Laity to Faraud, 27 October 1881. 28. ADM, Faraud to Directors of L'Oeuvre de la Ste. Enfance, i October 1885. Faraud noted that 22 of the 35-40 children at Providence and 12 of the 30 at Holy Angels were orphans, maintained entirely at his expense. L 'Oeuvre de la Ste. Enfance allotted 3,000 francs to Faraud, only enough to pay for the board of three orphans at each of the three schools in his vicariate—Providence, Holy Angels, and Lac la Biche. Each school had outrun its allotment in 1884—Holy Angels by 14,000 francs, Providence by 15,000, and Lac la Biche by 8,000—expenses which Faraud had to make up from the general revenues of the vicariate and from the extra sums Lecorre had obtained. 29. NAG RGio vol. 3649 file 8185, Faraud to E.A. Meredith, Deputy Minister of Interior, 12 March 1877 and reply, n June 1877. 30. NAG RGio vol. 3578 file 508, Memo to Sir John from L. Vankoughnet, 20 February 1882. 31. ADM, Lecorre to Faraud, 24 March 1882. 32. NAG RGio vol. 3815 file 56,465, Grouard to Minister of the Interior, 9 September 1896. 33. NAG MG2,6iG #59114-17, Laurier Papers, Grouard to Laurier, 24 September 1901. 34. AD HEi68i.B84L29, Breynat to Laurier, 6 April 1904. 35. AD HEi68i.B84L29, Breynat to W. Laurier, 6 April 1904. 36. Cf. John W. Grant, Moon ofWintertime, p. 195. 37. Robert Carney, "The Hawthorn Survey (1966-1967), Indians and Oblates and Integrated Schooling." 38. OAGP. Michel, "Soixante-cinq ans a Good Hope." 39. Breynat, "Canada's Blackest Blot," in Rene Fumoleau, As Long as This Land Shall Last, p. 386. 40. Elizabeth Yakeleya, interview with Martha McCarthy, Fort Norman, 31 August 1990. 41. Cecilia Tourangeau, interview with Martha McCarthy, Inuvik, n September 1990. 42. In my interviews with elders, I did not ask for, nor did anyone volunteer, information of this kind. 43. Rev. Doug Crosby, OMI, Western Catholic Reporter, 26 August 1991. 44. R. Slobodin, Metis of the Mackenzie District, p. 118.

12

DELATES, 'DENE, AND THE CANADIAN QOVERNMENT

i. AD, from fonds Baby, University of Montreal. Tache to Baby, 31 October 1879.

•NOTES

237

2. AD HEi82iFi6K43, Faraud to Maisonneuve, 24 December 1880. 3. NAG RGio vol. 3708 #19,502 pt. i, Glut to John A. Macdonald, 18 May 1888. 4. My concern here is only with Oblate input into the treaty process. For a complete analysis of these treaties and the interaction between government and Dene, consult Rend Fumoleau, As Long as This Land Shall Last. 5. NAG RGio vol. 3708 #19,502, pt. i, Anglican ministers, Athabasca Diocese, to Sir John A. Macdonald, 6 July 1888. 6. NAG RGio vol. 3708 #19,502, pt. i, Armit to D.A. Smith, 15 May 1888. Cf. Arthur Ray, "Periodic Shortages " 7. NAG RGio vol. 3708 #19,502, pt. i, Glut to John A. Macdonald, 18 May 8. ADM, Faraud to Glut, 31 March 1890. 9. NAG RGio vol. 3848 file 75,236-1, Report of Committee of Privy Council approved by Governor-General in Council, 26 January 1891. 10. NAG RGio vol. 3848 file 75,236-1, Forget to McKenna, 16 April 1898. 11. NAC RGio vol. 3848 file 75,236-1, A.E. Forget to Secretary, Indian Affairs, 25 April 1898. 12. NAC RGio vol. 3848 file 75,236-1, C. Sifton to Governor-General in Council, 29 April 1899. 13. Canada Sessional Papers, vol. XXXIV Nol. n (1900), Report of Commissioners for Treaty No. 8, 22 September 1899. 14. NAC RGi5 vol. 771 file 518158, Lacombe to David Laird, 22 June 1899. 15. David M. Smith "Cultural and Ecological Change: The Chipewyan of Fort Resolution," p. 38. 16. NAC R&5 vol. 806 #590185, Grouard to Minister of Interior, 10 September 1900. 17. NAC RGio vol. 3952 file 134,858, Grouard to Laurier, i October 1900. 18. David M. Smith, "Cultural and Ecological Change...," p. 38. 19. OAGP. Dupire to Breynat, 26 June 1904. 20. See Dan Gottesman, "Native Hunting and the Migratory Birds Convention Act: Historical, Political and Ideological Perspectives." 21. NAC RGio vol. 6742 f. 420-6 pt. i, Breynat to D.C. Scott, 19 June 1920. 22. NAC RGio vol. 4042 file 336,877, Conroy, memorandum, 18 December 1907. 23. NAC RGio vol. 4042 file 336,877, Breynat (at Ft. Resolution) to Oliver, 27 December 1909. 24. NAC RGio vol. 4042, file 336,877, H.B. Bury report, 1913. 25. NAC RGio vol. 4042, file 336,877, Thos. Wm. Harris, report, 12 February 1914. 26. OAGP. Andurand to Breynat, i April 1915. 27. NAC RGio vol. 4042 file 336,877, Excerpts from Kitto's report, 22 December 1920.

238

TROM THE QREAT •RIVER TO THE INDS OF THE "EARTH

28. NAG RGio vol. 4042 file 336,877, Conroy to Scott, 12 October 1921. 29. Breynat, I, p. 205 30. Mgr. G. Breynat, OMI, "Canada's Blackest Blot," Toronto Star Weekly, 28 May 1938. Reprinted as Appendix XV in R. Fumoleau, As Long as This Land Shall Last, pp. 379-89.

13

A -NEW HEAVEN AND A TSTEW 'EARTH

1. Schreiter, Constructing Local Theologies, p. 150 2. Eugene Hillman, "Inculturation & the leaven of the gospel," pp. 21-23. 3. Aylward Shorter, Toward a Theology of Inculturation, p. 141. 4. AD, RRIII-IO3 (from Archives of Archbishop of Quebec). 5. "[I]l me semble qu'en France le peuple est devenu sauvage; on reconnait en voyageant que la religion est etranger a le plupart des ames qu'on rencontre." AD G-LPP 342, Bermond to Faraud, 16 March 1859. 6. "[N]os chers neophytes ne sont bientot plus sauvages, mais de bons et parfaits chretiens." AD G-LPP 1615, Faraud to Mazenod, 28 December 1858. 7. Cf. Schreiter, Constructing Local Theologies, pp. 6 seq. 8. Johann Metz, "Unity and Diversity...," p. 85. 9. AASB Too86-89, Glut to Tache, 30 June 1860. Some missionary bishops with their long beards drew unwanted attention in Paris in 1870, when they were taken for Prussians. (AASB T8O35-36. Sardou to Tache, 5 October 1870.) 10. ADM, Faraud to Sr. Charlebois, 7 December 1870. 11. PAA 71.220/213, Raynard to Vegreville, 20 October 1858 (written in English). 12. ADM, Faraud to Glut, 29 September 1875. 13. Schreiter, Constructing Local Theologies, p. 149 14. OAGP, Michel, "Soixante-cinq ans a Good Hope," p. 9. 15. St. Paul's University, Postulation Documents, 8, Grandin to Sebaux, 9 November 1854. 16. See Jean-Guy Goulet, "Religious Dualism among Athapascan Catholics." 17. Ake Hultkrantz, "Tribal and Christian Elements in the Religious Syncretism among the Shoshoni Indians of Wyoming," pp. 222-23. 18. AD G-LPP 2693, Seguin to Fabre, i June 1887. 19. David M. Smith, Moose-Deer Island House People: A History of the Native People of Fort Resolution, p. 72. 20. Bishop Denis Croteau, OMI, "The Northern Church of Tomorrow." 21. Assembly of First Nations, Bulletin [1987]. (Italics added.)

NOTES

2239

Appendix B: SICKNESS AND MEDICINE 1. PAA 71.220/213, Raynard to Vegreville, 23 May 1856. 2. PAA 71.220/213, Raynard to Vegreville, 8 May 1859. 3. CMS A9o, Robert Hunt, Journal, 5 May 1859. 4. CMS A90, Robert Hunt, Journal, 30 April 1860. 5. AD G-LPP 633, Glut to Faraud, 16 December 1861. 6. PAA 71.220/8055, Gascon to Tache, i June 1860. 7. AASB Too87, Glut to Tache, 30 June 1860. 8. PAA 71.220/8097, Grollier to Vegreville, 4 June 1860. 9. AASB, Glut to Lestanc, 15 December 1861. 10. PAA 71.220/8097, Grollier to Vegreville, 4 June 1860. 11. AASB, Eynard to Tache, 3 July 1861. 12. AASB, Eynard to Tache, 23 May 1861. 13. AD Reel 43, Eynard to Faraud, 23 April 1862. 14. AASB, Gascon to Tache, 16 September 1862. 15. AD G-LPP 635, Glut to Faraud, 17 June 1862. 16. ADM, Gascon to Faraud, i December 1863. 17. PAA 71.220/8055, Gascon to Tache, 16 September 1862. 18. The account of these prophets at Fond du Lac is derived from AD GLPP657, "Notice sur la Mission de Notre Dame de 7 Douleurs...," Glut to Fabre, 3 April 1866. 19. AD Reel 47, Seguin to Faraud, 6 July 1862. 20. Missions') (1866), Grandin Journal. 21. ADM, Gascon to Faraud, i December 1863. 22. AASB T224&, Eynard to Tache, 8 June 1863. 23. Missions 6 (1867), p. 464, Petitot to Fabre, 30/9/64. 24. AASB, Seguin to Grandin, 15 July 1863. 25. AASB T2258, Petitot to Tache, 20 June 1863. 26. AD G-LPP 645, Glut to Faraud, July 1864. 27. AD G-LPP 635, Glut to Faraud, 17 December 1864. 28. AD Reel 47, Seguin to Faraud, 28 July 1864; ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 25 July 1864; Annalesyj (1865), Petitot to Faraud, 22 June 1864. 29. Missions 6 (1867), p. 476, Petitot to Fabre, n November 1864. 30. ADM, Gascon to Faraud, i December 1864. 31. Petitot, Autour du Grand Lac des Esclaves, p. 189. 32. AASB T2643-45, Seguin to Tache, 29 February 1864. 33. AASB T2974, Gascon to Tache, i December 1864. 34. AASB T40I2, Petitot to Tache, 31 May 1866. 35. AD G-LPP 649, Glut to Faraud, 26 May 1865. 36. Nativity Journal, 8 October 1865. 37. AD HPF 4i9i.C75Ri26, Grouard to Mme Cox, 9 December 1864.

240

T R O M THE § R E A T "RIVER TO THE 'ENDS OF THE "EARTH

38. ADM, Petitot to Faraud, 15 January 1866. 39. PAA 71.220/7343, Seguin to his mother and sister, June 1866. 40. CMS A93, R. McDonald, Journal, Oct. - Nov. 1865. 41. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 13 November 1866. 42. Missions 9 (1870). Extract from letter of Gascon to Faraud, dated 26 November 1867, dealing with his visit to Fort Rae in 1866. 43. ADM, Petitot to Faraud, 15 January 1866. 44. PAA 71.220/7343, Seguin to his mother and sister, June 1866. 45. Petitot, Grand Lac des Ours, 98-101. 46. Missions 9 (1870), Extract from letter of Grouard to Faraud, 8 March 1868. 47. ADM, Gascon to Faraud, 26 November 1867. 48. ADM, Gascon to Faraud, 2 September 1867, and from Ft. Rae, 1867. 49. ADM, Faraud to Glut, 14 September 1867. 50. AD G-LPP 2685, Seguin to Glut, 15 February 1867. 51. HBCA DIO/I, fo. 39, Hudson Bay House to William McTavish, 16 April 1867. 52. HBCA B2oo/b/37, fo. 56, Roderick McFarlane to Governor, Chief Factors and Chief Traders, 3 August 1868. 53. Missions^ (1869), Petitot to Fabre, 29 February 1868. 54. AD G-LPP 2685, Seguin to Glut, 15 February 1867. 55. AD Reel 44, Gascon to Faraud, 26 November 1867. 56. AASB T6o89, Faraud to Tache, 26 September 1868. 57. AASB T6ii5, Eynard to Tache, 7 December 1868. 58. AASB T69oo, Faraud to Tache, 12 September 1869. 59. PAA 71.220/8054, Gascon to Vegreville, 7 December 1870. 60. HBCA B2oo/b/38 fo. 77, Andrew Flett to W. Hardisty, 19 January 1871. 61. Missions n (1873), Petitot to Fabre, 30 May 1870. 62. Missions n (1873), Petitot to Fabre, 30 May 1870. 63. HBCA B20o/b/39 vol. i fo. 102-3, W.L. Hardisty to D.A. Smith, 6 August 1872. 64. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 28 January 1873. 65. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 25 May 1869. 66. Petitot, Exploration de la Region du Grand Lac des Ours, 333-4. 67. HBCA B39/b/20 fo. 39d, Athabasca District Report, R. McFarlane, 16 July 1873. 68. HBCA B39/b/20 fo. 39d, Athabasca District Report, R. McFarlane, 16 July 1873. 69. AASB Tii274-6, Gascon to Tache, i December 1872. 70. ADM, Lecorre to Faraud, 29 July 1872. 71. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 27 July 1872. 72. HBCA B2oo/b/39 vol. i fo. 87d, Hardisty to D. Smith, 15 August 1873. 73. AD G-LPP 2686, Seguin to Glut, 4 February 1874.

NOTES

2241

74- ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 15 February 1875. 75. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 25 March 1875. j6. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 2 June 1874. 77. ADM, Brother Salasse to Faraud, 10 November 1874. 78. AD HEB6255A45CIO, Gaste to Maisonneuve, 19 January 1875. 79. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 2 February 1876. 80. ADM, Seguin to Faraud, 25 March 1875 and 2 February 1876. 81. PAA 71.200/7345, Seguin to his sister, i August 1876. 82. PAA 71.200/7345, Seguin to his sister, i August 1876. 83. AD G-LPP 2014, Ladet to Fabre, i June 1878. 84. AD G-LPP 2014, Ladet to Fabre, i June 1878. 85. ADM, De Krangue to Faraud, 23 February 1880. 86. PAA 71.200/984, Glut to Lacombe, 12 December 1880. 87. AD HEC 2i52.V64ci2, Ladet to R. McFarlane, 30 March 1880. 88. ADM, Roure to Faraud, 28 June 1880. 89. ADM, De Krangue to Faraud, 5 September 1882. 90. PAA 71.220/7346, Seguin to his sister, i July 1885. 91. ADM, Le Doussal to Faraud, 22 November 1886. 92. AD G-LPP 2603, Seguin to Fabre, i June 1887. 93. OAGP, Chronique de la mission de la Nativite. 94. ADM, Pascal to Glut, 13 July 1888. 95. PAA 71.220/7346, Seguin to his sister, 6 February 1888. 96. ADM, Joussard to Glut, 23 December 1888. 97. ADM, Joussard to Faraud, 12 February 1889. 98. ADM, Pascal to Faraud, May 1890. 99. AD G-LPP 2695, Seguin to Superior-General, 15 July 1892. 100. AD G-LPP 2695, Seguin to Fabre, 15 July 1892. 101. PAA 71.220/7346, Seguin to his sister, 18 July 1892. 102. OAGP, Dupire to Glut, 15 December 1893. 103. OAGP, Laity to Glut, 19 December 1894. 104. OAGP, Roure to Glut, 26 November 1894. 105. AD LC 26i.Mi5R, Journal de la Mission Providence, December 1895. 106. PAA 71.220/7347, Seguin to his sister, 20 February 1896. 107. OAGP, Lefebvre to Glut, 17 January 1896. 108. OAGP, Ducot to Glut, i July 1896. 109. AD G-LPP 2696, Seguin to Soullier, i July 1897. no. PAA 71.220/7347, Seguin to his sister, 16 July 1897. in. AD G-LPP 2168, Lefebvre to Glut, 25 May 1897. 112. PAA 71.220/7347, Seguin to his sister, 27 February 1899, 113. AD G-LPP 1787, Grouard to Fabre, 26 November 1889. 114. AD LC 26i.Mi5R, Journal de la mission Providence, August. 115. OAGP, Vacher file, 9 July 1899.

242

TROM

T H E ( j R E A T - R I V E R T O T H E 'ENDS

OF THE "EARTH

n6. PAA 71.220/7347, Seguin to Celine, 31 May 1899. 117. PAA 71.220/7347, Seguin to Celine, 31 May 1899. 118. OAGP, Chronique de la mission de la Nativite. 119. PAA 71.220/208, Le Guen to Ladet, 7 August 1900. 120. AD LC 26i.Mi5R, Journal de la mission Providence, July and August 1900. 121. OAGP, Ducot, Notes. 122. OAGP, Codex historicus N.D. de 7 Douleurs. 123. OAGP, Codex historicus N.D. de 7 Douleurs. 124. OAGP, Chronique de la Mission de la Nativite. 125. OAGP, Chronique historique, St. Joseph, August 1902. 126. J. Camsell, Son of the North, p. 152. 127. OAGP, Vacher to Breynbat, 10 September 1902. 128. OAGP, Codex historicus Arctic Red River, 8 July 1903. 129. OAGP, Gouy to Breynat, i December 1903. 130. OAGP, Ducot to Breynat, 13 February 1903. 131. OAGP, Ducot to Breynat, 26 July 1905. 132. NAC RGio 4042 file 336,877, Conroy, memorandum to Superintendent of Indian Affairs, 18 December 1907. 133. OAGP, Providence Journal, 25 November 1907. 134. OAGP, Codex historicus Arctic Red River, n August 1907. 135. OAGP, Codex historicus Arctic Red River, n August 1907. 136. OAGP, Providence Journal, 23 June 1908. 137. OAGP, Codex historicus, St. Joseph, March 1909. 138. OAGP, Codex historicus Arctic Red River, 13 July 1909. 139. OAGP, Journal de la mission St.-Michel. 140. OAGP, Journal de la Mission St.-Michel, 12 december 1909. 141. ADM, J.-M. Beaudet to Kearney, i January 1910. 142. OAGP, Roure to Breynat, 25 February 1911. 143. OAGP, Journal de la Mission St.-Michel. 144. OAGP, Ducot to Breynat, 23 March 1911. 145. OAGP, Codex historicus, Nativity, 14 June 1913. 146. OAGP, Providence Journal, 30 October 1913; 8 November 1913. 147. OAGP, Journal, St.-Michel, 1913. 148. OAGP, Ducot to Breynat, 16 January 1914. 149. OAGP, Lecuyer to Breynat, 18 November 1913. 150. OAGP, Codex, St. Joseph, 2 February 1914. 151. OAGP, Codex, St. Joseph, 12 April 1914. 152. OAGP, Codex historicus, Nativity, 25 December 1914. 153. OAGP, Ducot to Breynat, 19 July 1914. 154. OAGP, Laperriere to Breynat, 22 December 1914. 155. OAGP, Roure to Duport, 27 September 1914. 156. OAGP, Lecuyer to Breynat, 15 January 1915.

2.43

157158. 159. 160. 161. 162. 163. 164. 165. 166. 167. 168. 169. 170. 171. 172. 173.

OAGP, Andurand to Breynat, 15 December 1915. OAGP, Codex, St. Joseph, 5 July 1915. OAGP, Ducot to Breynat, 13 January 1915. OAGP, Mansoz to Dupont, 27 January 1917. OAGP, Codex, St. Joseph, 14 March 1917. OAGP, Laperriere to Breynat, 25 June 1917. OAGP, Codex historicus St. Joseph, 14 March 1917. OAGP, Codex historicus, Ste. Therese, 19 October 1918. OAGP, Journal, Providence. OAGP, Andurand to Breynat, 17 January 1920. OAGP, Codex, St. Joseph, 5 March 1920; 20 March 1920; n May 1920. OAGP, Laperriere to Breynat, 2 July 1920. OAGP, Laperriere to Breynat, 24 August 1920. OAGP, Codex, Fort Smith. OAGP, Duport to Breynat, 26 November 1921. OAGP, Codex historicus de la mission de N.D. de 7 Douleurs, 1922. Fred Widow, Interview with Martha McCarthy at Fort Norman, August 1990. 174. OAGP, Codex historicus, Arctic Red River. Entries from 3 July 1928 to 2 August 1928.

244

T R O M THE

§R E A T " R I V E R TO THE E N D S OF THE " E A R T H

BIBLIOGRAPHY

MANUSCRIPT SOURCES

.he Oblates' correspondence was vast and varied. It is now held in several different archives, some of it in more than one. Since my research extended over many years, my notes sometimes refer to a copy in more than one of the archives. I read the correspondence of all of the Oblates who worked in the Vicariate of the Athabasca-Mackenzie during the period of time covered in this study. Only a few of these are included in the notes for the book. The earlier correspondence is especially valuable for it includes much that was new to the writers about the customs of the Dene. Later writers, whether because they knew that their readers were already familiar with the previous Oblate writings, or because they were less interested in ethnographic material, or whether they were simply less inclined to write voluminous letters, are not so helpful. 2-45

More helpful information about the missions can be found in the reports made by the bishops and priests to their own superiors in the Oblate journal, Les Missions des Missionnaires oblats de Marie Immaculee (hereafter Missions) or in the journal of the Propagation of the Faith, Les Annales de la Propagation de la Foi (hereafter Annales). Some of this information can also be found in the journals of the Montreal and Quebec branches of the Propagation of the Faith: Rapport sur les missions du diocese de Quebec (1839-1874) (hereafter RMQ) and Rapport de ^Association de la Propagation de la Foi pour le diocese de Montreal (1839-1873) (hereafter Rapport, Montreal).

ARCHIVES DE L'ARCHEVECHE DE SAINT<"BONIFACE 151 CATHEDRALE, ST.-BONIFACE, "MANITOBA

Correspondence of Bishops Provencher and Tache; many letters by various Oblates in the Athabasca-Mackenzie to Tache. "Histoire de la Mission de St. Joseph. Grand lac des Esclaves" (AASB To95z). G. Cloutier. Notes on Tache's lectures (AASB Ta4583). A. Tache. "Notes sur 1'etablissement de la mission de la Nativite a Athabaska."

> ARCHIVES -DESCHATELETS 175 MAIN ST., OTTAWA, ONTARIO

Correspondence of many Oblates, copied from the Oblate General Archives in Rome, plus many other sources. "Journal de la Mission de la Nativite 1864-1888" (AD LC24i.Mi4Pv3). Journal de la Mission Providence (LC26i.Mi5R). I. Glut, OMI. "Notice sur la Mission de Notre Dame de 7 Douleurs" (AD G-LPP657). Codex historicus. Fond du Lac 1853-1900 (AD LC 22i-Mi4R). Annales de la Mission de N.-D. des Sept-Douleurs, Fond du Lac Athabaska 1853—1900. "Mission St. Michel Fort Rae N.W.T." by R.P. Laperriere.

- ARCHIVES -DIOCESE OF MACKENZIE^TORT SMITH YELLOWKNIFE,-N-WT

Oblate correspondence; baptismal registers. "Registre de la Mission de la Nativite Athabasca 1842-1849." Rev. Louis Menez, OMI. "The Beaulieu Genealogy." Annales de la Mission de N.-D. des Sept-Douleurs, Fond du Lac Athabaska 1853-1900.

246

TROM THE Q R E A T H I V E R TO THE "ENDS OF THE "EARTH

OBLATE ARCHIVES CjRANDIN "PROVINCE ST. ALBERT, ALBERTA

Correspondence of Oblate priests and bishops. Ducot, Xavier. Notes. Chronique de la mission de la Nativite depuis sa fondation en 1847. Livre premier 1847-1912. Codex historicus Nativity, Vol. II Codex historicus Sacred Heart Mission, Fort Simpson 1916-1929. Baptismal Register Sacred Heart Fort Simpson 17 August 1858-5 September 1872 (copy). Codex historicus de la Mission de N.D. des 7 Douleurs 1901-1964. Mission St. Raphael Fort des Liards Codex historicus 1905-1925. "Journal de la Mission St-Michel Fort Rae 1906-1915." "Journal des Faits et Gestes de la Mission Saint Michel Fort Rae (Mackensie) 1912-1927." Codex historicus resume Mission Ste Anne 1869-1914. Notes pour le codex historicus Mission St Jean-Baptiste Fort McMurray 1911-1936. Codex historicus de la mission St Joseph partir du mois d'aout 1902. Journal de la Mission de la Providence (1907-1936). Codex historicus Mission St Isidore Fort Smith. August i9O9-May 1926. Good Hope journal. Michel. "Soixante-cinq ans a Good Hope."

-NATIONAL ARCHIVES OF CANADA OTTAWA, ONTARIO

MGi7A22. Records of the Propagation de la Foi correspondence with North American missions. MGi9A29. James Anderson Papers. RGio series. Records of Department of Indian Affairs, 1677-1978. R&5 series. Records of Department of the Interior, 1821-1961. RGi8 series. Records of Royal Canadian Mounted Police. RG85 series. Records of Northern Affairs Program, 1890-1977 Microfilm of Edmonton Oblate Collection.

> -PROVINCIAL ARCHIVES OF ALBERTA -EDMONTON, ALBERTA

Archives of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, Province of AlbertaSaskatchewan. These are also on microfilm at the National Archives and at Deschatelets.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

247

Anglican Diocese of Mackenzie. (70.387 MR). "Notes et souvenirs de Mgr Grandin." (PAA 84.400/957).

•PROVINCIAL ARCHIVES OF MANITOBA •WINNIPEG; MANITOBA

Church Missionary Society (hereafter CMS) records on microfilm from National Archives of Canada. CMS A83- Bompas Journal, 1867. CMS Apo. Robert Hunt Journal, 1859-1860. CMS A93. W.W. Kirkby Journal and correspondence, 1859-. CMS A93- Robert McDonald correspondence. CMS AiO9. Spendlove correpondence. MGiAi #15679. Selkirk Papers, Deposition of Francois Forcier, 8 July 1818. i. Lt.-Governor John C. Schultz correspondence.

> -PROVINCIAL ARCHIVES OF MANITOBA HUDSON'S -BAY COMPANY ARCHIVES

WINNIPEG, MANITOBA Aiz/FT 34i/[io]. Memorandum re Northern Transport, 2 December 1913. B39/a series: Fort Chipewyan journals. B39/b series: Fort Chipewyan outward correspondence. B39/c series: Fort Chipewyan inward correspondence. 639/6 series: Athabasca District Reports [Fort Chipewyan]. B72/Z/I Fond du Lac fo. 2-3 Census of the Indian Population of Fond du Lac, 13 December 1857. B8o/e/i. Fort Good Hope District Report 1826. B89/a 727. Isle la Crosse Journal 1850. Bi8o/a/i. "Journal of the Transactions of the Fort Reliance party during summer 1855," by J. Lockhart. Bi8i/a series: Fort Resolution journals. B2OO/a series: Fort Simpson journals. B2OO/b series: Fort Simpson outward correspondence. B2OO/e series: Mackenzie District Reports. B2oo/f/i. "Register of engagements, McKenzie's River District, 1852." B239/b series: York Factory outward correspondence. 04 series: George Simpson correspondence outward. 05 series: George Simpson correspondence inward. 07 series: Eden Colvile correspondence. Post Histories and Search Files for various posts.

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ST.'PAUL'S UNIVERSITY OTTAWA, ONTARIO

Holds the volumes of Postulation Documents for Bishop Vital Grandin (writings collected for purposes of canonization).

UNITED CHURCH ARCHIVES VICTORIA UNIVERSITY, TORONTO, ONTARIO

The Donald Ross papers.

> THOMAS TISHER HARE "BOOK XIBRARY, UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO TORONTO, ONTARIO

J.B. Tyrrell papers and photographs.

Several journals used here are only available in various archives. L'Ami du Foyer (1905-1968) is an Oblate journal published in St. Boniface, Manitoba, available at Archives Deschatelets. LesAnnales de la. Propagation de la Foi (and its English version, The Annals of the Propagation of the Faith) are available at the National Library of Canada (microfilm) and at Archives Deschatelets, both in Ottawa. La Banniereis an Oblate journal, available at Archives Deschatelets. Les Missions des Missionnaires oblats de Marie Immaculee (hereafter Missions) is at Archives Deschatelets and at the Provincial Archives of Alberta. Petites Annales deMarie-Immaculeeis an Oblate journal, available at Deschatelets. Rapport sur les Missions du diocese de Quebec (1839-1874). This is the journal for the Propagation of the Faith in that diocese. Available at Deschatelets, St. Boniface, and many other locations. Rapport de I'Association de la Propagation de la Foi pour le diocese de Montreal (1839-1873). Available on microfilm at University of Manitoba.

'BOOKS AND ARTICLES

A Sister of Charity of Montreal. Notes and Sketches Collected from a Voyage in the North-West. Montreal: P. Callahan Book and Job Printer, 1875. Abel, Kerry M. Drum Songs, Glimpses of Dene History. Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1993. . "The Drum and the Cross An Ethnohistorical Study of Mission Work Among the Dene, 1858-1902." Ph.D. thesis, Queen's University, 1984. . "Prophets, Priests and Preachers: Dene Shamans and Christian Missions in

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the Nineteenth Century." HistoricalPapers/Canadian Historical Association, 1986, 211-24. Aberle, David F. "A Note on Relative Deprivation Theory as Applied to Millenarian and Other Cult Movements." In Millennial Dreams in Action, edited by Sylvia Thrupp, pp. 209-17. The Hague: Mouton & Co., 1962. Andre, Hyacinth. Interview with Martha McCarthy, Arctic Red River, September 1990. Andurand, R.P., OMI. "Fort Norman, Mission Sainte-Therese." Petites Annales des Missionnaires Oblats de Marie Immaculee 15 (1905), 57-61; 93—96. Arbuckle, Gerald A., SM. Earthing the Gospel. Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books, 1990. Asch, Michael. "The Impact of Changing Fur Trade Practices on the Economy of the Slavey Indians." In Proceedings of Second Congress Canadian Ethnology Society, Vol. 2, 646—57. Mercury Series, Canadian Ethnology Service Paper no. 28. Ottawa: National Museum of Man, 1975. . Kinship and the Drum Dance in a Northern Dene Community. Edmonton: Boreal Institute for Northern Studies, 1988. Assembly of First Nations. "Bulletin." [1987]. Aubert, Roger. Lepontificat de Pie IX(1846-1878). Paris: Bloud & Gay, 1952. . The Church in a Secularised Society. New York: Paulist Press, 1978. Axtell, James. "Some Thoughts on the Ethnohistory of Missions." Ethnohistoryif), no. i (1982): 35-41. Barkun, Michael. Disaster and the Millennium. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1974. Barnett. H.G. and L. Broom et al. "Acculturation: an Exploratory Formulation." In The Emergent Native Americans, edited by Deward E. Walker. Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1972. Basso, Ellen B. "The Enemy of Every Tribe: 'Bushman' Images in Northern Athapaskan Narratives." American Ethnologist^, no. 4 (1978), 690-709. Benoit, Dom. Vie deMgr. Tache. i vols. Montreal: Librairie Beauchemin, 1904. Berger, Thomas. Northern Frontier Northern Homeland. Rev. ed. Vancouver/Toronto: Douglas & Mclntyre, 1988. Berkhofer, Robert F., Jr. "Cultural Pluralism Versus Ethnocentrism in the New Indian History." In The American Indian and the Problem of History, edited by Calvin Martin, pp. 35-45. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987. Bieder, Robert E. Science Encounters the Indian, 1820—1880: The Early Years of American Ethnology. Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press, 1986. Blondin, George. When the World Was New, Stories of the Sahtu Dene. Yellowknife, NWT: Outcrop, 1990. Blondin, John. Interview with Martha McCarthy, Fort Norman, 31 August 1990. Bompas, William Carpenter. Diocese of Mackenzie. London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1888.

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Breton, P.E., OMI. Au Pays des Peaux-de-Lievres. Edmonton: Editions de 1'Ermitage, 1962. Breynat, Mgr. Gabriel, OMI. CinquanteAns au Pays des Neiges. 3 vols. Montreal: Fides, 1945,1947,1948. . "Canada's Blackest Blot." Toronto Star Weekly, 28 May 1938. Reprinted as Appendix XV in As Long as This Land Shall Last, edited by R. Fumoleau, pp. 379-89. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1967. Brown, Jennifer S.H. "Ethnohistorians: Strange Bedfellows, Kindred Spirits." Ethnohistory^, no. 2 (Spring 1991), 113-23. Cameron, Agnes Deans. The New North, edited by David Richeson. Saskatoon, Saskatchewan: Western Producer Prairie Books, 1986. Campbell, Joseph, with Bill Moyers. The Power of Myth. New York: Doubleday, 1988. Camsell, Charles. Son of the North. Toronto: Ryerson Press, 1954. Canada, Parliament of, Senate Select Committee on natural food products of Northwest Territories. The Great Mackenzie Basin. Ottawa: C.H. Parmelee, 1910. Canada, Sessional Papers, XVIII, No. 7 (1885). Annual Report, Department of Interior, 1884, by William Ogilvie. . XXXIV, No. ii (1900). Report of Commissioners for Treaty No. 8. Carney, Robert "Residential Schooling at Fort Chipewyan and Fort Resolution 1874-1974." Western Oblate Studies, Vol. 2, pp. 115-38. Lewiston, N.Y./Queenston, Ontario: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1992. . "The Hawthorn Survey (1966-1967), Indians and Oblates and Integrated Schooling." Study Sessions, Canadian Catholic Historical Association 50 (1983): 609-30. . "The Native-Wilderness Equation: Catholic and Other School Orientations in the Western Arctic." Study Sessions, Canadian Catholic Historical Association 48 (1981): 61-78. Carriere, Gaston, OMI. "Contribution des missionnaires a la sauvegarde de la culture indienne." Etudes Oblates 31 (1972): 165-204. . Dictionnaire biographique des Oblats de Marie-Immaculee au Canada . 3 vols. Ottawa: Editions de 1'Universite d'Ottawa, 1976-79. . "Fondation et developpement des missions catholiques dans la Terre de Rupert et les Territoires du Nord-Ouest (1845-1861)." Revue de 1'Universite d'Ottawa 41 (1971): 253-81; 397-427. . Le Pere du Keewatin. Mgr. Ovide Charlebois, o.m.L, 1862—1933. Montreal: Rayonnement, 1962. Coates, K.S. & W.R. Morrison. "More Than a Matter of Blood: The Federal Government, the Churches and the Mixed Blood Populations of the Yukon and the Mackenzie River Valley, 1890—1950." In 1885 and After: Native Society in Transition, edited by F. Laurie Barron & James B.

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Waldram, pp. 253-77. Regina: Canadian Plains Research Centre, University of Regina, 1986. Cockburn, R.H. "To Great Slave and Great Bear: P.G. Downes's Journal of Travels North from lie a la Crosse in 1938." [Part III]. Arctic38, no. 4 (December 1985): 324-35. Colson, Elizabeth. "Power at Large: Meditation on 'The Symposium of Power'." In The Anthropology of Power, edited by R.D. Fogelson & R. Adams, pp. 375-86. New York: Academic Press, 1977. Comfort, D.J. Meeting Place of Many Waters. Fort McMurray Library, Alberta: 1974. Crosby, Rev. Doug, OMI, "Text of the Oblate apology to native people." Western Catholic Reporter, 26 August 1991. Croteau, Bishop Denis, OMI. "The Northern Church of Tomorrow." In Western Oblate Studies, Vol. i, edited by Raymond Huel, pp. 193-97. Edmonton: Western Canadian Publishers, 1990. Cruikshank, Julie. Athapaskan Women: Lives and Legends. Ottawa: National Museum of Canada, 1979. . Life Lived Like a Story: Life Stories of Three Yukon Native Elders. In collaboration with Angela Sidney, Kitty Smith, and Annie Ned. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1990. . Reading Voices: Oral and Written Interpretations of the Yukon s Past. Vancouver: Douglas & Mclntyre, 1991. Daniel, Richard. "The Spirit and Terms of Treaty Eight." In The Spirit of the Alberta Indian Treaties, edited by Richard Price, pp. 47-100. Edmonton: Pica Pica Press, 1987. Dene Cultural Institute. Deh'cho; "Mom, we've been discovered!". Yellowknife, NWT: Dene Cultural Institute, 1989. Dorris, Michael. "Indians on the Shelf." In The American Indian and the Problem of History, edited by Calvin Martin, pp. 98—105. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987. Douglas, George M. Lands Forlorn. New York: The Knickerbocker Press, 1914. Duchaussois, R.P., OMI. Apotres Inconnus. Paris: Editions Spes, 1928. . Aux Glaces Polaires. Ville La Salle, P.Q.: Noviciat des Oblats de Marie Immaculee, 1921. -. The Grey Nuns in the Far North. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1919. Edmonson, Munro S. "Nativism, Syncretism and Anthropological Science." Nativism and Syncretism. Publication 19, Middle American Research Institute. New Orleans: Tulane University, 1960. Fernand-Michel, ed. Dix-huit ans chez les sauvages. Paris: Nouvelle Maison Perisse freres de Paris, 1870. Fogelson, Raymond D. & Richard N. Adams. The Anthropology of Power Ethnographic Studies from Asia, Oceania, and the New World. New York: Academic Press, 1977.

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. "The Ethnohistory of Events and Nonevents." Ethnohistory 36, no. 2 (Spring 1989): 133-47. Franklin, John. Narrative of a Journey to the shores of the Polar Sea, in the Years i8ip, 20,21, and,22. London: John Murray, 1823. Fumoleau, Rene, OMI. As Long as This Land Shall Last. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart Limited, 1967. . "Missionary Among the Dene." Kerygma^j (1982): 139-66. Gill, Sam D. Native American Religions, An Introduction. Belmont, California: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1982. . Native American Religious Action: A Performance Approach to Religion. Columbia, South Carolina: University of South Carolina Press, 1987. Gillespie, Beryl C. "An Ethnohistory of the Yellowknives: A Northern Athapaskan Tribe." In Contributions to Canadian Ethnology, edited by David B. Carlisle, pp. 192-245. Mercury Series, Canadian Ethnology Service Paper no. 31. Ottawa: National Museum of Man, 1975. Giraud, Marcel. The Metis in the Canadian West. Translated by George Woodcock. 2 vols. Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 1986. Gittins, Anthony J. Gifts and Strangers: Meeting the Challenge oflnculturation. New York and Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1989. Goldring, Philip. Papers on the Labour System of the Hudson's Bay Company, 1821— 1000. Vol. i. Ottawa: Parks Canada Manuscript Report Series no. 362,1979. . "Religion, Missions, and Native Culture." Journal of the Canadian Church Historical Society XXVII, no. 2 (October 1984): 43-49. Gottesman, Dan. "Native Hunting and the Migratory Birds Convention Act: Historical, Political and Ideological Perspectives." Journal of Canadian Studies 18, no. 3 (Fall 1983): 67-89. Goulet, Jean-Guy. "Religious Dualism among Athapaskan Catholics." Canadian Journal of Anthropology i, no. i (Fall 1982): 1-18. Graham, Angus. The Golden Grindstone: The Adventures of George M. Mitchell, recorded by Angus Graham. Toronto: Canadian branch, Oxford University Press, 1935. Grant, John Webster. Moon ofWintertime. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1984. . "Missionaries and messiahs in the northwest." Studies in Religion 9, no. 2 (1980): 125-36. Grim, John Allen. "The Shaman: An Interpretation of This Religious Personality Based on Ethnographic Data from the Siberian Tribes and the Woodland Ojibway of North America." Ph.D. thesis, Fordham University, 1980. Grouard, Mgr. fimile, OMI. "Excursions au Mackenzie et au Klondyke." Les Missions des missionnaires oblats deMarie Immaculee 39 (1901): 117-41. . Souvenirs de mes Soixante ans d'Apostolat dans I'Athabaska-Mackenzie. Winnipeg: La Liberte, n.d.

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Gualtieri, Antonio R. Christianity and Native Traditions. Notre Dame, Indiana: Cross Cultural Publications, Cross Roads Books, 1984. Guichen, Vicomte de. La France morale et religieuse a la fin de la Restauration, Paris: Emile-Paul Editeurs, 1912. Hanbuiy, David T. Sport and Travel in the Northland of Canada. London: Edward Arnold, 1904. Hara, Hiroko Sue. "The Hare Indians and their World." Mercury Series, Canadian Ethnology Service Paper no. 63. Ottawa: National Museum of Man, 1980. Helm, June. "Dogrib Folk History and the Photographs of John Alden Mason: Indian Occupation and Status in the Fur Trade, 1900-1925." Arctic Anthropology~yNl\l, no. 2 (1981): 43-58. . "Female Infanticide, European Diseases, and Population Levels Among the Mackenzie Dene." American Ethnologist j, no. 2 (May 1980): 259-85. . Prophecy and Power Among the Dogrib Indians. Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 1994. Helm, June & Eleanor Leacock. "The Hunting Tribes of Subarctic Canada." In North American Indians in Historical Perspective, edited by Eleanor B. Leacock and Nancy O. Lurie, 343-74. New York: Random House, 1971. Hillman, Eugene. "Inculturation & the leaven of the gospel." Commonwealn (January 1991): 21-23. Hoffman, R. "Missionary." New Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. 9. Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America, 1967. Honigmann, John J. Ethnography and Acculturation of the Fort Nelson Slave. Yale University Publications in Anthropology. London: Humphry Milford, Oxford University Press, 1946. Huel, Raymond. "La Mission Notre-Dame-des-Victoires du lac la Biche et 1'approvisionnement des missions du Nord: le conflit entre Mgr V. Grandin et Mgr H. Faraud." In Western Oblate Studies, Vol. i, pp. 17—36. Edmonton: Western Canadian Publishers, 1990. Hultkrantz, Ake. Native Religions of North America. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987. . "Tribal and Christian Elements in the Religious Syncretism among the Shoshoni Indians of Wyoming." In Belief and Worship in Native North America, edited by Christopher Vecsey, pp. 212-34. Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press, 1981. Isbister, A.K. "On the Chipewyan Indian." Report of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, 1847, pp. 119-21. . "On the Loucheux Indians." Report of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, 1847, pp. 121-22. Janes, Robert. Archaeological Ethnography Among Mackenzie Basin Dene, Canada. Calgary: Arctic Institute of North America, 1983.

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Jennings, Francis. "A Growing Partnership: Historians, Anthropologists and American Indian History." Ethnohistory^^, no. i (1982): 21-34. Jones, Strachan. "The Kutchin Tribes." Smithsonian Institution Annual Report, 1866, pp. 320-27. Kennicott, Robert. "Journal of Robert Kennicott May 19, i859-February n, 1862." In The First Scientific Exploration of Russian America and the Purchase of Alaska, edited by James Alton James, pp. 46—136. Evanston and Chicago: Northwestern University, 1942. Kiev, Ari, MD, ed. Magic, Faith, and Healing, London: The Free Press of Glencoe, Collier-Macmillan, 1964. Kirkby, W.W. "A Journey to the Youcon, Russian America." Smithsonian Institution Annual Report, 1866, pp. 416—20. Kraus, Gus. Interview with Martha McCarthy, Fort Simpson, September 1990. Krech, Shepard, III. A Victorian Earl in the Arctic. London: British Museum Publications, 1989. . "Disease, Starvation, and Northern Athapaskan Social Organization." American Ethnologists 5 (1978): 710-32. . "The Influence of Disease and the Fur Trade on Arctic Drainage Lowlands Dene, 1800-1850." Journal of Anthropological Research 39, no. i (Summer 1983): 123-46. . "Interethnic Relations in the Lower Mackenzie River Region." Arctic Anthropology'i6, no. 2 (1979): 102-22. . "The State of Ethnohistory." Annual Review of Anthropology ^o (1991): 345-75. . "'Throwing Bad Medicine': Sorcery, Disease and the Fur Trade Among the Kutchin and other Northern Athapaskans." In Indians, Animals and the Fur Trade: A Critique of Keepers of the Game, edited by Shepard Krech III, pp. 73-108. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1981. —. "The Trade of the Slavey and Dogrib at Fort Simpson in the Early Nineteenth Century." In The Subarctic Fur Trade: Native Social and Economic Adaptations, edited by Shepard Krech III, pp. 99-146. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1984. La Barre, Weston. "Confession as Cathartic Therapy in American Indian Tribes." In Magic, Faith, and Healing, edited by Ari Kiev, pp. 36-49. London: The Free Press of Glencoe, Collier-Macmillan, 1964. Lanternari, Vittorio. The Religions of the Oppressed. Translated by Lisa Sergio. London: Macgibbon & Kee, 1963. Leacock, Eleanor Burke, and Nancy O. Lurie, eds. North American Indians in Historical Perspective. New York: Random House, 1971. Leflon, Jean. Eugene de Mazenod. Translated by Francis D. Flanagan, OMI. 4 vols. New York: Fordham University Press, 1961. Lefroy, John H. In Search of the Magnetic North, edited by George F.G. Stanley. Toronto: The Macmillan Company of Canada, 1955.

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Lesage, S., OMI. "Sacred Heart Mission 1858-1958." Fort Simpson: 1958. Levasseur, Donat, OMI. Les Oblats de Marie Immaculee dans I'Ouest etleNorddu Canada, 1845-1967. Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 1995. Lewis, James R. "Shamans and Prophets: Continuities and Discontinuities in Native American New Religions." American Indian Quarterly (Summer 1988): 221-28. Linton, Ralph. "Nativistic Movements." American Anthropologist 45 (1943): 230-40. Loewen, Jacob A. "Confession in the Indigenous Church." Practical Anthropology 16 (1969): 114-27. . "Confession, Catharsis and Healing." Practical Anthropology 16 (1969): 63-74. Long, John S. "The Cree Prophets: Oral and Documentary Accounts." Journal of the Canadian Church Historical Society, XXXI, no. i (April 1989): 3-13. McCarthy, Martha. "Glut, Isidore." In Dictionary of Canadian Biography, Vol. XIII (1901 to 1910), pp. 205-6. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994. . "The Founding of Providence Mission." Western Oblate Studies, Vol. i, pp. 37—49. Edmonton: Western Canadian Publishers, 1990. . "The Missions of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate to the Athapaskans 1846-1870: Theory, Structure and Method." Ph.D. thesis, University of Manitoba, 1981. . To Evangelize the Nations: Roman Catholic Missions in Manitoba 1818-18/0. Winnipeg: Manitoba Culture, Heritage and Recreation, Historic Resources Branch, 1990. McCormack, Patricia A. "Becoming Trappers: The Transformation to a Fur Trade Mode of Production at Fort Chipewyan." In Rendezvous: Selected Papers of the Fourth North American Fur Trade Conference, 1081, edited by Thomas C. Buckley, pp. 155—73. St. Paul, Minnesota: North American Fur Trade Conference, 1984. . "Chipewyans Turn Cree: Governmental and Structural Factors in Ethnic Processes." In For Purposes of Dominion: Essays in Honour of Morris Zaslow, edited by Kenneth S. Coates and William R. Morrison, pp. 125-38. Toronto: Captus Press, 1989. Mackenzie, Alexander. Voyages to the Arctic. 2 vols. Toronto: George N. Morang & Company, 1902. McNeill, William H. Plagues and Peoples. Garden City, New York: Anchor Press/Doubleday, 1976. Madill, Dennis F.K. "Treaty Research Report: Treaty Eight." Treaties and Historical Research Centre, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, 1986. Martin, Calvin. Keepers of the Game. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1978. . "The Metaphysics of Writing Indian-White History." In The American

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Rich, E.E. The Hudson s Bay Company, 1670—1870. 3 vols. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1960. Ridington, Robin. "Beaver Dreaming and Singing." Anthropological.S. 13, nos. i &: 2 (1971): 115-28. . "Fox and Chickadee." In The American Indian and the Problem of History, edited by Calvin Martin, 128-35. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987. . "From Hunt Chief to Prophet: Beaver Indian Dreamers and Christianity." Arctic Anthropology ^^, no. i (1987): 8-18. -. "Knowledge, Power, and the Individual in Subarctic Hunting Societies." American Anthropologist, Vol. 90 (1988): 98-110. Roberts, Leslie. The Mackenzie. New York: Rinehart & Company,i949. Ross, Bernard R. "The Eastern Tinneh." Annual Report, Smithsonian Institution, 1866, pp. 304-11. Russell, Frank. Explorations in the Far North. Des Moines, Iowa: University of Iowa, 1898. . HuntingMusk-Ox with the Dog-Ribs. Toronto: Canadiana House, 1970. Sainville, Edouard de. "Voyage a 1'embouchure de la Riviere Mackenzie (1889-1894)." Bulletin de la Societe de Geographie [Paris] 19 (1898): 291-307. Savoie, Donat. Les Amerindiens du Nord-Ouest Canada auXDf Siecle selon Emile Petitot. Vol.11. The Loucheux Indians. Ottawa: Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, 1970. . "Emile Petitot, missionnaire, explorateur, artiste et anthropologue." North/nord(December 1975): 6-13. Schreiter, Robert]. Constructing Local Theologies. Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books, 1985. Serrurot, J., OMI. "Au pays des 'Plats-C6tes-de-Chiens'." Petites Annales des Missionnaires Oblats de Marie-Immaculee (1931): 240-44. Sharp, Henry S. "Shared Experience and Magical Death: Chipewyan Explanations of a Prophet's Decline." Ethnology 25, no. 4 (1986): 257-70. Shorter, Aylward. Toward a Theology oflnculturation. Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books, 1988. Sioui, Georges E. Pour une autohistoire Amerindienne. Laval, Quebec: Les Presses de 1'Universite Laval, 1989. Slobodin, Richard. "'The Dawson Boys'—Peel River Indians and the Klondike Gold Rush." Polar NotesV (June 1963): 24-35. . Metis of the Mackenzie District. Ottawa: Canadian Research Centre for Anthropology, St. Paul University, 1966. Smith, David M. "Cultural and Ecological Change: The Chipewyan of Fort Resolution." ArcticAnthropologyy^M, no. i (1976): 35—42. . Inkonze: Magico-Religious Beliefs of Contact-Traditional Chipewyan Trading at Fort Resolution, NWT, Canada. Mercury Series, Ethnology Division Paper no. 6. Ottawa: National Museum of Man, 1973.

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INDEX

Abel, Kerry, xxi, 153 Aborigines Protection Society, and influence on HBC, 33 Akaitcho, 15 Alexis, Brother, 185 Anderson, Bishop David, 34, 46—47 Anderson, Fort, 126 Anderson, James, 37-38, 40-42, 46, 48, 84, 92,157 angels, 102,134-35,146,149

Anglican Church, missions of, 31-32, 34—35, 41, 43; and English sovereignty, 53; and imperialism, xviii; opposition to HBC policy, 43. See also Church Missionary Society. animal guardian, 23 Arctic Red River, xxiii, 52 Athabasca Dene, xv, 12, 39, 87 Athabasca District, xvii, 13, 27-29, 32, 42-43, 64, 69,107-8, no, 113,

263

116-17,120,123-24,134,156,160, 168,172-73 Athabasca-Mackenzie region, 8, 60,122, 171,184 Athabasca-Mackenzie, vicariate of, 60, 63-65, 71 Attiche, 23 Ayah, 104-5

Back expedition, and Akaitcho, 15; and Mandeville, 116 baptism, 86-7, 95, 99,129,145 Bear Lake people, 15-16, 24,146-47 Beaulieu, Francis, 90,109—14,123 Beaulieu, King, 116 Beaver Indians, 37, no Belcourt, Georges, 33 Bermond, Father Fran£ois-Xavier, OMI, 34 Big Island, 47-49,114 bishop-king, 47, 63 Blanchet, Father Norbert, 30 Blondain (Blondin), 108 Blondin family, 167 Blondin, John, 99 boatmen, 16-17, 4*> 47~4&> 129,143 boats and boat brigades, 68—69, 72, 120-21,129 Bocquene, Father Desire, OMI, 62 Bompas, Bishop William C., 54-56, 62, 125 Boucher, Jean-Baptiste, i&Lamalice, 92 Bourget, Bishop Ignace, 9 Bouvier, Catherine, 112,114—15 Bouvier, Joseph, 48,114 Breynat, Bishop Gabriel, OMI, xxi, 24, 55, 65, 71-72,116,167,175-78 brokers, 172,178 brothers, Oblate, 62, 65-68, 72 Brough, Nancy, 92 Bury, H.B., 163 bushman, 76

264

Campbell, Robert, 93,112 Camsell, Julian, 165 Caribou-Eaters, 14, 37-38, 99,136-38 catechism, 81,156,163,181,183 Catholic ladder, 85,142 Catholicism, and culture, 74,168 Cayen (Louison Cadien), 115 celibacy, 93 Chesne, Zoe de, 7 Chipewyan, 14, 86,132 Christianity, European, xviii, 180; and civilization, xx, 148,156 Christmas, 85 church decorations, 84 citizenship, 61—62 Church Missionary Society, and indigenous vocations, 93; and homeopathic medicine, 125; and Mackenzie missions, HBC support of, 46-49, 63,117; and schools, 155, 157,159,166,168; and Native prophecy, 102-3. See also Anglican Church. Churchill, 14, 99,138 civilisation chretienne, xviii, 5,159,181 civilization, xviii, 5 Clarke, John, no clergy, 60 Glut, Bishop Isidore, OMI, 62, 64, 71, 129,135-36 Colvile, Governor Eden, 34, 38, 40, 43 communion, 86, 88—89, 95,129. See also Eucharist. confession, 86-88, 95,128-29,135,140. See also Penance. confirmation, 70, 86, 89-90 Conroy, H.A., 176 Coppermine, 15 Counter-Reformation, 3 Creator, 75 Cree, 30, 86 Croteau, Bishop Denis, OMI, 94,190 Cruikshank, Julie, 19

T R O M THE Q R E A T ' R I V E R TO THE "ENDS OF THE 'EARTH

Dallas, Governor, 54 De Smets, Father Pierre, S.J., 33 Decutla, 104 Deh'cho, xxix, 1-2,17-18 Demers, Father Modeste, 30 Dene, 11-26, 32, 74 Dene Catholicism, xxii, 188 Dene elders, 18, 20,122 Dene lay leaders, 97,105 diocesan structure, 57 Dogribs, 15, 87,100, no, 139-40,147 dogs, 137,143 dreams, 21—23, 98,101,127,134 dualism, 187 Duchaussois, Father Pierre, OMI, xx, 68, 133 Ducot, Father Xavier, OMI, 164

education, Dene, 98,168 Emmanuel, 99 English language, 61 epidemic, 15,17, 87,120-30,153,189 Ermatinger, Francis, 36 Eucharist, 183. See Communion. Evans, Rev. James, 32, 80 excommunication, 21, 94—95,101,130, 147-48,187 extreme unction, 77, 86, 94,115 Eynard, Father Germain, OMI, 79

famine, 123,172-73,176 Faraud, Bishop Henri, OMI, 2, 37, 40, 42, 60, 62-63, 66, 69, 72, 92,123, 125-26,129-30 farms, 71—72 feast, 99 female seclusion, 91 female infanticide, 91,123-24 Filion, Mme, 126 Fisher, Marie, 48. 5^ Gaudet, Charles P. Flett, Andrew, 52,102

Flett, James, 52 Fond du Lac (Athabasca), 14, 37-39, 99, 136-38,144 Fond du Lac (Great Slave). See St. Vincent de Paul. Forbin-Janson, Bishop, 7 foreign missions, 3, 5-7,125; and Oblates, 9, 61 Fort Chipewyan, xvii, 14, 32, 36-38, 86, 93, no, 116,121,128 Fort Franklin, 104,122 Fort Good Hope, 16, 43, 48,126 Fort Halkett, 14,100 Fort Liard, 14—15, 86,101,109,141 Fort McPherson, 43,52,100,102,108, 121,144. See Peel's River. Fort Nelson, 15,100,103-4,141-42. Fort Norman, 15-16, 43, 50,101,122, 146,176 Fort Rae, 15, 42,101,3:13,139,144,147 Fort Reliance, 116 Fort Resolution, 14, 37, 40, 42,188 Fort Simpson, 14, 46—48,114,126,176 Fort Smith, 71,114,121,126,176 Fort Wrigley, 50 Franklin expedition, and Akaitcho, 15; and Beaulieu, no; and Mandeville, 116 freemen, 174 freetraders, 31, 71,112-14 fur trade and Dene, 13-17, 24-15

Gascon, Father Zephirin, OMI, 53, 99-100, in, 139 Gaudet, Charles P., 48 Gaudet, Dora and Bella, 85 Gaudet, Mme, 100. See Marie Fisher, gens du large, 16,126,139,143 Gens de la Montagne, 14 Giroux, Father Constantin-Alarie, OMI, 53 Good Hope Mission, 46, 65, 87, 92,121, 128—30,138—39,142-44,146

INDEX 265

Grandin, Bishop Vital, OMI, 46-47, 60-64, 7J> 88-89, 92~93> In > XI3> J32 Grant, John Webster, 153 Great Bear Lake, 43 Grey Nuns (Sisters of Charity of Montreal), 126,157-70,181-82 Grollier, Father Henri, OMI, 38, 47-49, 60, 87,102,108,114,129,139,157 Grouard, Bishop fimile, OMI, xxi, 64, 100,112,141,173-75

hand-game, 86, 95,146 handshake, 78-79, 95 Hardisty, William, 114,116,122 Hares, 15-16,126,128-29,143,146 Harris, Thomas, 176 Hassall, Thomas, 32 Hay River, 50,104 health, Oblates in north, 60 Helm, June, 123,147 Hering, Constantine, 124 Hislop & Nagle, 72 holy orders, 86, 93-94. See also ordination, holy pictures, 82,183 Holy Eucharist, 86. See Communion. Holy Name of Mary, 52. See also Peel's River and Arctic Red River, home missions, 3-5 homeopathy, 124-27,130 Honigmann, 103 Hoole, Colin, 92 Hoole, Elize Taupier, 109. See also Fisher, Marie, hospital, 126 Hudson's Bay Company, and Oblates, 27-30, 33; and marriage, 92—93; and education, 159,164 Hultkrantz, Ake, 187 Hunt, Rev. Robert, 125,132 Hunter, Archdeacon James, 46, 48, 63,

lie a la Crosse, 14, 32-33, 87,113,132-33, 142 immortality, 77 imperialism, xviii inculturation, xviii, 61,147,183 influenza, 15 inkonze, 22, 25, 81,101,105,127,129, 138-39,147-48,188 interdependence, 189 Inuit, xx, 126 Irish brothers, 53 Isbister, Alexander Kennedy, 14,17, 33, 79

Jaricot, Pauline, 7 Jesuits, 6, 64, 87,131 jonglerie, 128-29,146 jongleur, 22,128,141,147,187 judgment, 81

Kearney, Brother Patrick, OMI, 62 Kennicott, Robert, 79 Kirkby, Rev. William West, 46, 48-50, 93> 125 Klondike, 64 Krangue, Noue'l de, 142 Krech, Shepard III, 124

La Loche, 37, 41, 68,103,109, in, 120, 122,126,134,143 Lac du Brochet, 14. See also Reindeer Lake or Lac Caribou. Lac la Biche, 64, 69,113 Lac Ste. Anne, 31 Lacombe, Father Albert, OMI, 65, 173-74

87

266

Hurons, 87,132 hymns, 81-82, 98-99,101,105,167

TROM

THE

C J R E A T 1UVER TO THE

•£ N D S O F T H E

TARTH

Lafleche, Bishop Louis-Richer, 9, 33 Laird, David, 173 Lamalice. See Boucher, Jean-Baptiste. Langevin, Archbishop, 65 language, 79 Lanternari, Vittorio, 149 Lapierre's House, 52 Laurier, Prime Minister "Wilfrid, 165 Le Pas, 31 Lecore, 87 Lecorre, Father Auguste, OMI, 64,164 Lefroy, John H., 32 Lenoir, 86 Lepine family, 117 Levasseur, Father Donat, OMI, xxi Liard River, 112 License to Trade, 27, 41, 43 Long, John S., 137 Loucheux, 17, 48,126,144-45 Lucas, Rev. Mr., 55 L'Oeuvre Apostolique, 7

Macdonald, John A., 172 Mackenzie, Alexander, and immortality, 77; and Loucheux, 17; and Mackenzie River, 2, no; and Mackenzie District, xvii, 14, 27, 31, 40, 42-43, 69,108, no, 112,123,156 Mackenzie River, 16,18, 63, no, 112 Mactavish, Governor William, 113 Mandeville, 112,115-16 marriage, 86, 90-91,130,134,152,181 Marten Lake, no, 147 Martin, Calvin, 25 martyrdom, 8-9 Mass, 98,140,143 Matoit, 103-4 matrimony, sacrament of, 86. See also marriage. mauvais monde, 15

Mazenod, Bishop Eugene de, OMI, 3—5, 60, 63; and communion, 89; and schools, 156 McDonald, Archdeacon Robert, 52,54, 145 McDougall, Inspecting Chief Factor James, 69 McKenzie, Roderick, 32, 37 medals, 84, 87 medicine, Dene, 76, 86,119-28 medicine, Oblate, xvii, 119-20,124-26 medicine-maker, 78, 98,100-2,146, 187. See also jongleur. Mercredi, Joseph, 38—39,116 messiah, 92 messianic, 150 Metis, Red River, 33-34, 41, 68; Athabasca, 37, 39,174-75; Mackenzie, 46,116,160,183; and schools, 157; and auxiliaries to Oblates, 107-17 Metz, Johann-Baptist, 183 Migratory Birds Convention Act, 175 millenarian, 150,152 Moose-Deer Island, 42 Mountain Indians, 16 myths, 19-20

Nahannies, 15 Naohmby, 24 Nativity Mission, 38, 46, 64, 99, in, 122,129,134 Norway House, 31—32, 68

Oblate Congregation, xviii; ideology of missions, xix-xxi; mission methods,

5,78 Oliver, Frank, 71,165 oral history, xxiii Oregon, 30 Overholt, Thomas W., 151

INDEX 267

papacy, 6—8,182 patriarchalism, 91 Peel's River, 48, 52,102—3 Penance, 186. See Confession. Pepin, Jean-Baptiste, 114 Pessar, Patricia, 152 Petitot, Father Emile, 12, 60, 79, in, 115,120,122,126-28,139,145 Pope John Paul II, 191 Propaganda, 62,182 Propagation de la Foi, L'Oeuvre de la, 7-9, 62,164 prophet, 100,101-4,133-54 Protestantism, 40, 84 Provence, 4, 95, 98,105 Provencher, Bishop Norbert, 7, 9, 63, 68 Providence Mission, 50, 64-65,112-14 provisioners, 14—15,17

Quebec Archdiocese, 9; and support of mission schools, 160

raven, 128,133,142 Reid, John, 114 reincarnation, 77 Reindeer Lake, 37,137,144,146 Restoration, 78, 81, 98,105 Ridington, Robin, 104 Roman Catholic Church, and faith, xvii; and tradition, 20 romanticism, 8—9 rosary, 84, 86, 98,101,105,140 Ross, Bernard, 46, 48, 90-91,114 Ross, Donald, 31, 91,112 Rupert's Land, bishopric of, 46 Rupert's Land, territory of, 27 Russell, Frank, 24

268

sacraments, 86,182 Sacred Heart Mission, 43, 49. See also Fort Simpson. Sacred Heart, devotion to, 85 Sainte-Enfance, L'Oeuvre de la, 7, 62, 164 Salt River, 109-13 savage, 5, 9,181 sawmills, 70,162 schools, 123,155-70 Scott, Duncan C., 166 scrofula, 123,132 Seguin, Father Jean, OMI, 103,130,139, 142,145 serpents, 82,128 Seven Sorrows Mission, 39. See also Fond du Lac Athabasca. Simpson, Governor George, 30, 40, 68, 72, 92,112 Sisters of Charity of Montreal. See Grey Nuns. Slaveys, 14, 146-47 Slobodin, Richard, 112,164 Smith, David M., 174 social policy, xix Son of God, as applied to priests, 97, 127; Chipewyan prophet, 132-33,142 song, 22, 81 sovereignty, xviii, 6, 30, 61 Spendlove, Rev. William, 141—42 spirit-guide, 22 spirits, evil, 75 spiritual leaders, 97 St. Albert, 64 St. Boniface, 7,10, 63—64,109,112 St. Bruno, 114 St. Cyr, Baptiste, 81 St. Germain, Catherine, in St. Germain, Pierre, in St. Isidore, 114. See also Salt River and Fort Smith. St. Joseph Mission, 40, 42, 46, 48, 65. See also Fort Resolution.

T R O M THE CJREAT H I V E R TO THE "ENDS OF THE -EARTH

St. Michael's Mission, 42. See also Fort Rae. St. Paul Mission. See Fort Nelson. St. Raphael Mission, 43. See also Fort Liard. St. Vincent de Paul Mission, 42,116 Ste. Therese Mission, 50, 65. See also Fort Norman, steamboats, HBC, 69,121 steamboats, mission, 70-71 subsistence, xix, 12—13,147 Sunrise, Chief, 104 syllables, 80, 95,105,156,184 syncretism, 101,148,153,188

taboos, 24, 88 Tache, Archbishop A., OMI, xvii, 33, 36, 38, 41-43, 50, 62-63, 68, 86, 89, 92-93, IH-I2,117 Taylor, Nicol, 50 Ten Lost Tribes of Israel, 20 Thanizeneaze, Clemence, 99 Thibault, Father Jean-Baptiste, 30, 35, 109, in, 132 Tissier, Father, OMI, 109 Todd, James, 112 Tourangeau, Cecilia, 105,167 Tourangeau family, 117 transport, 68-72

treaty, 123 Treaty n, 123; and schools, 176-78 Treaty 8,123; and schools, 165,173—76 tuberculosis, 123,127

ultramontanism, xviii, 6, 40,180 Uzpichi"e, Cecile, 100

Vegreville, Father Valentin, OMI, 134 Villebrun family, 117 virgin birth, 91-92 Virgin Mary, 82, 91-92

Wentzel, Alex, 112 Wesleyans, 30 Willow Lake, no Wilson, Bryan, 149 Wright, Paul, 18, 20 Wrigley, Commissioner, 69—70

Yakeleya, Elizabeth, 167 Yellowknives, 15, 42,100, no, 112,116 Yukon, 52, 64, 65

Zaslow, Morris, 72

INDEX

269