This Métis Thing - Red River Roots

First, a disclaimer: I am not writing this to educate anyone about Métis or Canadian history. I am no historian. If you find errors, exaggerations, or artistic licence here, please forgive me. It’s not my intent, but it is my shortcoming. 

So. Not a history book… This is a blog.

I am Métis, but feel like I don't know nearly enough about it. I've been looking at this over the past years, and I'm ready to start sharing. What I am trying to do here is figure out this Métis thing.

Let's start with family history. 

One of the biggies when you read history in Canada is the Red River Resistance. It’s generally on the Top Ten List. The story often begins with a yarn about how, way back in ye olden times, a farmer in the sleepy Red River Valley noticed uninvited surveyors on his land. I don’t think of it as all that long ago, really: one hundred and fifty years or so. It was October, in the fall of ’69. (That’s 1869, with apologies to any Bryan Adams fans out there.) 

In 1869, Canada was all fresh and zippy from the recent Confederation of 1867. The thing is… the Red River Settlement, where these surveyors were busy with what could only be called land speculation, was not a part of this new British Dominion. Canada, as far as residents of the Red River were concerned, was a neighbouring nation, kinda like the USA. Oh, things were in the works, for sure. The new Canadian Government was negotiating for huge tracts of land from the Hudson Bay Company, (which had been the primary Colonial presence up until then.) John A. MacDonald, Canada’s ambitious, racist, and genocidal founding father, was keen to grab this area for his proper immigrant nation. By proper he meant White Protestant farmers from the United Kingdom. The Métis who lived there were not consulted.

So… remember that farmer on his land, just farming? Back in the fall of ’69? He was more than just a farmer. He was also a superb buffalo hunter and Captain of the hunt. I imagine him on a horse with a rifle, frost in the air, his beard fluttering in the breeze… Anyways, he was my great-grandpa, four generations up. His name was André Nault. Nault is my family name… my Mom’s maiden name. He was very French, and very Catholic, as were most of his family and neighbours in the area. Grandpa André was raised there, the son of French Settlers. His wife lived with him on the Red River. She was French, too. They had lots of kids, lots of kin. 

This is badass buffalo hunter Grandpa André and his family, about a year before things went nuts.

They were part of the Métis community that was growing and thriving in the prairies. First Nations and Settlers had been intermarrying for a while by the time Grandpa André spotted those surveyors. Everyone was someone’s cousin. They had been hunting, trading (remember the Hudson’s Bay Company?) and farming for about a hundred years. My Grandpa André was White, but he was an accepted member of the Métis community, and he knew trouble when he saw it.

Concerned about these strangers with surveying tools, Grandpa André started talking to his neighbours. They hurried to get word to his cousin (that’s my first cousin, four times removed.) This guy was known to be smart. He was educated from a stint in the seminary in Montreal. That didn’t work out for him, so he had come home to his people in the Métis community at Red River. My cousin’s name is synonymous with the Red River Resistance. He was Louis Riel, a bit of a rock star… the bad boy of Canadian history. Controversial to this day. Cousin Louis knew trouble when he heard it, so he joined this bunch of relatives and neighbours to go have a chat with these strange trespassers. Good thing, because he was the only one who spoke any English.

Classic shot of Cousin Louis, bad boy of Canadian history.

What happens next is key to my story. I am trying to share what I have learned about myself as I figure out this Métis thing. My conclusion? I am, actually, Métis A F.

So… Grandpa André rounded up some men for support. They confronted the Canadian Government’s surveyors that day. They shut them down and sent them packing. In doing so, these men sparked the Red River Resistance, one of Canadian History’s Biggest Hits. They were my family, and they are my history. Of the 16 Métis men who showed up to represent on Grandpa André’s farm, eleven of them are in my family tree. Four of them are my direct ancestors.

Here are my four grandpas that were involved in that First Act of Resistance, back in 1869:  

One was André’s neighbour, Édouard Perreault dit Morin. Years later his granddaughter (Marie Perrault) would be married to my Great-Grandpa (Damase) Nault. That makes Edouard my four times grandpa. Some historical accounts have Grandpa Édouard noticing the surveyors first, but I’m going with Grandpa André. Whatever… Choose your own adventure. The Perraults lived on Red River Lot # 13. They were next to the Naults, who were on Lot # 12. These families were neighbours for generations, up to the days of my Mother’s youth in the 1950s. More on that another time, perhaps.

Grandpa Édouard.

Of course, Grandpa André Nault was a big part of the confrontation with the Canadian surveyors. After stopping them, the Red River Resistance kicked in, big time. André went on to be a Captain in Manitoba’s Provisional Government under Cousin Louis Riel. He led and participated in many important armed resistances. He was in charge of executing a Canadian anti-Métis agitator named Thomas Scott. (Guy was a total dick, BTW.) This caused a massive political uproar in English Canada, for which the Métis and Grandpa André paid a high price (not to mention Cousin Louis). Ultimately Grandpa André was assaulted, imprisoned for a year, then pardoned. 

Side note: Grandpa André had three brothers with him against those surveyors. My four times great-uncles. I had lots of kin there that day.

Other grandpas present were two generations of Carrières. The group of Métis that Louis Riel gathered included Elie Carrière and his son, Damase. Elie was a mature 48-years-old at the time. He’s my four times grandpa. Damase would have been a strapping fella of 18 years. I like to think of him as feisty. He was my three times grandpa. His story is sad and relevant. More about him later. 

Three times Grandpa Damase Carrière. Like I said. Feisty.

Cousin Louis’ Provisional Government negotiated with Canada and made a deal. The Red River Resistance ended with the creation of Manitoba (as Canada’s first western province). The execution of Thomas Scott led to John A. Macdonald undertaking what became known as the reign of terror. He sent a Canadian militia against the Métis in Red River to “establish order”. 

This militia (The Red River Expeditionary Force) would become the RCMP in later years. It had British and French Canadian soldiers, but it also included a special component for the Métis. John A. Macdonald was a member of the Orange Lodge (a staunchly Protestant fraternal order). He had canvassed this group for racist, anti-French, anti-Catholic immigrants to join up and go teach those Half Breeds a lesson. 

It was during this time that Grandpa André was bayonetted by Orangemen thugs. This militia was so effective in abusing the Métis that many fled the Red River, creating a Métis diaspora across the prairies, especially in Northern Saskatchewan, notably in a place called Batoche. 

It took fifteen years, but the Canadian government wanted to have another go at the Métis. They wanted Batoche. Cousin Louis Riel was drawn out of exile (in Montana) to lead the Métis. Those who went to fetch him were all my kin: there was Napoléon Nault (my three times great-uncle), Gabriel Dumont (legendary military leader and hunter, also my four times great-uncle), and…  my three times Grandpa Damase Carrière! He lived in Batoche by then. He had a family. 

In 1885 He defended his home against a military attack from the Canadian government that used all kinds of cool, new technology. Trains, a steam boat, and even a nifty gatling gun were brought in. The Métis ran out of bullets, but apparently, up until then, they had held out pretty well. Grandpa Damase broke his leg. When the Canadian troops caught him they thought he might look a bit like the famous Louis Riel, so they tied a rope around Grandpa Damase’s neck and dragged him around with a horse, killing and mutilating him. I have visited the group grave where he is buried. 

The group grave in Batoche. RIP Grandpa Damase.

After the Métis’ defeat at Batoche, Cousin Louis Riel surrendered himself to the Canadian Military in hopes of brokering some kind of peace and clemency for the survivors. You probably know he was hanged for treason. 

So, as I said, three time Grandpa Damase Carrière was an interesting person, for me at least. He was 18 years old for the Red River Resistance, representing Métis and stopping surveyors. He was driven away by the “reign of terror” in the new Manitoba. Finally, he instigated, fought for, and died in Batoche (sometimes called the North West Resistance). He and his wife had a daughter named Mathilde. She was 10-years-old when the Canadian troops were mangling her dad’s corpse in Batoche. 

She was also my great-great-grandma. She was married to a guy I actually met. He was my mom’s great- grandpa, a family favourite, Alexandre Nault. He was a son of four times Grandpa André. We called him Papère. He lived to be ninety. More on them another time, I hope.

Great-Great-Grandma Mathilde, survivor of Batoche, with my three times Grandpa Alexandre Nault. He was son of legendary political resister and buffalo hunter, Grandpa André Nault. I have no idea who the kid is.

Okay… if you’re still with me, thanks and congratulations. Because now, this is where the connection gets real for me. With the edge of my fingertips I can reach these people. We have gone from 150 years ago at the Red River Resistance, to my birth, in pretty much the same location, in 1964. 

Why did I lack a sense of culture and family pride in these events? The stories of my several Grandpas resisting John A. MacDonald’s surveyors, sparking a movement, creating a province, igniting the birth of Western Canada? That shit is certainly badass. Why was it not handed down and celebrated? Why did I need to do research in my middle age to begin to understand it?

Well… Racism. 

You see… I have plenty of First Nations family. They coyly show up as my research deepens. Hard to track, un-named, a “Cree Woman” or “Assiniboine” marrying a French trader back in the late-17 to mid-1800s, especially in the Perrault and Carrière families. Their children show up in records with an “HB” written next to their names. Half Breed was the term the Canadian government used to define us. It’s a pejorative today, but it used to be on the official documents. In the eye of the White Settlers and the British Colonizing State, the Métis were less than human. These children are my Métis family and I am of them.

But I am also White. My Dad was born in London, England. I have plenty of UK ancestry, too. As a Métis person I am an Indigenous Canadian, but I was raised in White culture and can’t jig to save my life. We never made bannock (although my tourtière is off the chain). I have never  suffered the systemic racism that is the default for the First Nations and Indigenous Peoples of Canada. My Whiteness protects me from that. I hope to examine this in a future post. It is a fat and tangled knot.

What about Mom, raised on Red River Lot # 12 amongst all the Naults, Carrières, and Perraults? It is certainly ancestral Métis land. It’s where Grandpa André spotted those surveyors in 1869. It's where I met his son, my Papère, ninety-five years later. In hushed ways, Mom and her siblings, as far as I can tell, were the first generation that kinda “passed” for White. Or did they? Family lore recalls someone calling Mom something worse than Half Breed, in my lifetime. I do know that circumstances moved our family west, all the way to Vancouver, and Mom left most of that behind, and was happier for it.

Assimilation, colonization, generational trauma, abuse, addiction, residential schools… these are part of the Indigenous story of Canada, and part of my own family story. These will be much more difficult to examine and discuss than just working on a family tree and reading some history. More fat knots to untangle.

The path forward is decolonization, anti-racism, reconciliation, and the dismantling of White supremacy. Tall order... That’s where I find myself today as I try to figure out this Métis thing. Wish me luck.

I bought my sash online.

*Note. This bit of writing was inspired by chats with family members and cousins, especially Derrick Nault, who got me going with a list of men who stopped the surveyors and nudged me, generally.  Another mentor (and fact-checker) is my pal, Erin Dolmage, who teaches at Seneca College. The history I shared is helped by my recent readings, mostly of The North-West is our Mother, by Jean Teillet, and Chester Brown’s graphic novel Louis Riel. There are conflicts in facts. Your milage may vary. Also… the free online course, Indigenous Canada, from UofA was extremely helpful.  Finally, a lot of this stuff just comes from working on the family tree on ancestry.ca and connecting the dots. Thanks. Merci. Miigwetch.

Click here to go to Part Two.