In June 1870, Canadian negotiators reached agreement with Riel's government to establish a new province to be called Manitoba. Impressive teams of lawyers were assembled for both sides. Yet, the type of books that he published and the language that he used did. Whatever small hope there might have been to achieve compromise and concessions was gone. were not reached by the new Canadian Pacific Railway. Ritchot returns from Ottawa, Riel is pleased with the outcome. Louis Riel is hanged at the North West Mounted Police Headquarters in Regina. October 20, 2019. Riel drafts a third version List of Rights. Three days later, understanding his cause to be hopeless and believing that a public trial might draw attention to the struggle of the Metis people for justice, Riel surrendered to Canadian troops. In October 1873, even with an outstanding warrant for his arrest, Riel won election to the Canadian Parliament. in A final appeal to the Judicial Committee in London was even less successful: the Committee found the grounds for appeal too weak to justify full argument. the province’s traditional support of the Conservative Party to the Liberal Party led by Riel's rag-tag army seized Fort Garry, a fort on the Red River owned by the Hudson's Bay Company. In the eight weeks before his trial, Riel occupied himself writing religious poetry, letters to relatives and friends, and notes about his religious and political movement. While attempting to convince U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant to threaten to invade Canada if it did not respect the terms of the Manitoba Act, Riel underwent a religious experience in St. Patrick’s Church in Washington, D.C., on Dec. 8, 1875, in which he said God revealed to him that he was the prophet of the New World and the Métis were God’s last chosen people. Support the troops! Riel still remains the most famous Métis leader and an important figurehead for Métis people in Western Canada. And it must not be forgotten, hidden or denied. Davidson, Louis Riel (1955); T.E. In Riel’s view, the particular moral quality of Indigenous Peoples might be termed their “voluntary simplicity,” or their willingness to live a simple lifestyle. See also related online learning resources. Among the delegates was Father Joseph-Noël Ritchot, a local Roman Catholic priest who received instructions from President Riel to negotiate a Métis land claim, Section 31, of the Manitoba Act. After having been hanged for treason by the Canadian state, he has been transformed … W. O. MITCHELL February 1 1952. Several times orderlies placed Riel in a strait-jacket. A week later, Riel left Montreal for Rupert’s Land, but before returning to St. Boniface in the Red River Settlement, he lived in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minn. In 1865, hoping to support his family in Red River, he became a law-office clerk in Montréal. Riel’s geographical segregation didn’t end there — all nations east of the Rockies and isolated on Vancouver Island were Catholic, while the three Protestant and Jewish nations were grouped together west of the Rockies on British Columbia’s mainland. Smith announces that Ottawa will welcome a delegation sent by the provisional government. For example, he referred to the descendants of French Canadians and Indigenous women as “métis” or “mixed bloods” although he still referred to the descendants of English and Indigenous women has “half-breeds.”[14] Furthermore, Stanley continued to denote Indigenous people as “Indians” and has a couple problematic ideas regarding treaties. [18] Therefore, each volume included only a foreword, an introduction, and then Riel’s work. The climactic battle between the badly-outnumbered rebels and Middleton's troops began on May 9 near Batoche. Between 1873-74 Riel was elected to federal Parliament three times, and three times the majority of sitting MPs voted to oust him for his role in the Resistance and the execution of Scott. Many rebels, including Riel, fled into the woods north of town in the face of the advancing troops. However, in the racially 3, Edmonton, The University of Alberta Press pp. Louis RielBiography of Louis Riel, Métis spokesman, regarded as the founder of Manitoba, teacher, and leader of the North-West rebellion. For Macdonald, that latter concession was quite enough and a date for the execution was set, November 16, 1885. MacDonald must avoid any confrontation between the English and the French – it is an election year. With a $5,000 bounty on his head, Riel decided life might be better for a while in the United States. A few minutes later, he was. It is naïve to think that Indigenous people blindly trusted Canadian authorities and that there were no other factors that caused them to have to sign the treaties. (The crisis helped build support to finish the railroad line. Riel himself was a former student (then St. Boniface College), and his mortal remains were buried in the St. Boniface Cathedral cemetary next to the university, after the Canadian State hanged him for treason on Nov. 16, 1885. head of a massive procession made up of the leaders of French Manitoba. Louis Riel is hanged at the North West Mounted Police Headquarters in Regina. Louis RielChronologie de la vie de Louis Riel (1844 à 1885) par le site Web du gouvernement du Manitoba. Riel’s political legacy likely influenced his son, who left Red River at a young age to study in Quebec. He began inscribing his name as “Louis David Riel” for the reason that he believed he was the David of the new world. As an Anishinaabe, Nanabush was human, noble and strong, or ignoble and weak.”1 The same is true for Riel ― if we are to embrace him, we must embrace him in his entirety, not simply laud those aspects of him that are comfortable or convenient. Given their client's central role in the rebellion, defense lawyers had little choice but to adopt an insanity strategy. Eventually, Riel's health improved enough to allow his discharge from the asylum in Montreal. On his way back in 1868, Riel stayed for several months in St. Paul, where he heard stories from Metis traders of growing unrest in the settlements north of the border along the Red River. Stanley (b. Despite his strong feelings about Riel's guilt, MacDonald nonetheless felt compelled to make an independent inquiry into Riel's mental condition. Signing up enhances your TCE experience with the ability to save items to your personal reading list, and access the interactive map. It was almost as if we were welcoming Riel’s jiibay back home to where his mortal remains are buried, perhaps to finally rest in peace. John Willoughby testified concerning Riel's vision of a new government of god-fearing citizens. immigrants from Ontario would follow, the Métis organized the Métis National Committee in order to protect the By the 1960s or so, the views of English Canadians drew closer to those of French Canadians. In March 1869, the HBC agreed to sell Rupert’s Land and the North-Western Territory to the The problem for the defense in an insanity case is proving to jurors that the defendant's mental condition was such that he could not appreciate the wrongfulness of his illegal conduct. Change ), You are commenting using your Facebook account. Riel led two popular Métis governments, was central in bringing Manitoba into Confederation, and was executed for high treason for his role in the 1885 resistance to Canadian encroachment on Métis lands. For it is also we as a people who have been stripped of our dignity — stripped of our lands, of our homes, of our history, of our culture and languages and sometimes our mental health. Although re-elected in a constituency by-election in Provencher in September 1874, Riel delayed in taking his seat and was later expelled from the House. At the asylum, Riel's mental condition continued to deteriorate. John Bruce is the President with Riel as secretary. Despite opposition from the Orange Lodge of Ontario, of which Thomas Scott had been a member, the provisional government’s delegates obtained an agreement with the Canadian He was clear that French-Canadians would have to renounce their nationality, intermarry with Métis and First Nations and assimilate into the Métis nation. Louis Riel’s Land ClaimsAn article about Louis Riel’s difficulties with various real estate transactions in western Canada. After doing some preliminary research, however, I came to the conclusion that the trial did merit coverage on the site--and not just because Louis Riel, at the time he is hanged in Regina, was an American citizen. Louis Riel, Métis leader, founder of Manitoba, central figure in the Red River and North-West resistances (born 22 October 1844 in Saint-Boniface, Red River Settlement; died 16 November 1885 in Regina, SK). The Métis population and others in the territories resist when a team of Canadian surveyors, led by McDougall’s former schoolmate John Stoughton Dennis and Mair as the paymaster, attempt to superimpose a grid system upon traditional landholding patterns. If the 1.4 million acres of land granted to the Métis in the 1870 Manitoba Act were roughly one-seventh of the surface area of the original postage-stamp province, Riel claimed compensation for two-sevenths (which included British Columbia) — one-seventh each for the Métis and First Nations. He proved himself to be a serious and gifted student, striking his masters as deeply faithful and scholarly, but some and a bit odd and reclusive. Although of seven-eighths white ancestry, Riel considered himself a Metis. He found "no excuse whatever" for his treason and sentenced Riel to "be hanged by the neck 'til you are dead.". Riel, however, could not afford his own defence, and so his counsel was paid for by friends in Riel's lawyers took an appeal to the Manitoba Court of Queen's Bench. I have a picture of my father from about 1939. meeting, a 10-point "Revolutionary Bill of Rights" was drafted. Both works follow the story of the frontier settlement period in Western Canada and how that affected particularly Métis and Indigenous people. By May 12, when it became apparent that the rebels ammunition was all but gone, the troops charged. who came to power in Quebec in 1886 on a platform that played to the feelings aroused by Riel's hanging. Fourth and final version of the List of Rights is sent to Ottawa with Ritchot as the representative for the Métis, Judge Black, the English, and Alfred Henry Scott, the Americans. However, when it became obvious that the expedition was out to lynch Riel, he fled to the United States. These and other unusual claims and practices landed Riel in an asylum near Montreal in March 1876. In consequence Canadian Indians were prepared to accept assurances of the Canadian Indian commissioners in good faith.”[16]. Riel returns to Saskatchewan when he is asked to help a group of Métis obtain their legal rights in the Saskatchewan Valley. [17]George F. G. Stanley, The Collected Writings of Louis Riel: Les Écrits Complet De Louis Riel, (Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 1985), Volume One, xxxi. For this is what Canada did to Riel; this is what Canada has done to us as a people. Riel surrenders. Louis is born on his grandparents Jean-Baptiste Lagimodière  and Marie-Anne Gaboury’s farm in the parish of St. Boniface. As God’s last chosen people, the Métis, who were as yet a young, small and fragile people, had to prepare for their future role. One of the most influential writers of Western Canadian history is George F.G. Stanley. Once again the name of one of North American's signature freedom fighters - an enigmatic leader variously described as a pioneer and a madman, a man regarded either as the founding father of Manitoba or a reckless revolutionary, a figure all but unknown below the Canadian border but a flashpoint, still, above it - echoes across this city and this country. The first is that Stanley was invited to be part of this project as the general editor. candidate for the priesthood, and he was given a scholarship to study at a Sulpician school in Montreal. Riel's response made it clear that the insanity defense was not one of his choosing: "If you will allow me, Your Honor, this case comes to be extraordinary, and while the Crown, with the great talents they have at its service, are trying to show that I am guilty--of course it is their duty--my counselors are trying--my good friends and lawyers who have been sent here by friends I respect, are trying to show that I am insane." Louis Riel was a leader of the Métis, a people of mixed Indian and European descent. Riel then performed a ritual in which he breathed the "Holy Spirit" into each person declaring support for his cause. Riel left the seminary and moved back to Red River. Louis Riel sat beside Monsieur and Monsieur told him that they wanted "to be treated as free men." Subscribe to Can Geo Today >Digital Edition >Our FREE Newsletters >. I came into this project unsure of where the task of decolonizing the Royal Society of Canada (RSC) would take me. Prime Minister Macdonald determined to proceed with the execution despite widespread opposition in Quebec. Testimony ended with the calling of rebuttal witnesses by the prosecution, each of whom recounted conversations with Riel that convinced them that he was not insane. ( Log Out /  They filed back into the courtroom. He is visiting his grandmother, Christine (Justine) Richard and great-grandmother, Marie-Rose Larocque, in St. Eustache, Man., a well-known Métis community. the Canadian national project, seeing it as assimilatory as much as unifying. Riel persuaded the surveyors to abandon their mission. After being admitted to a psychiatric hospital in 1878, Riel produced religious writings and continued to harbour an assumption of self-apotheosis. For many decades, French Canadians largely saw Riel as a hero; English Canadians saw him more as a villain. By March 1885, after having found little success in petitioning Ottawa for a redress of grievances, Riel took the radical step of calling a meeting in a local church where he called for a vote on setting up a provisional government, which Riel called "the Exovedate" (from Latin, meaning "out of the flock"), and taking up arms against the Canadian government. Riel was an atypical Métis. When they reached "deliver us from evil," the trap fell. Par archive.org. Just as controversial is the question of who were, and are, the Métis for whose rights Riel fought. Newspaper article The Métis politician, poet, and mystic Louis Riel (1844-1885) is one of the most compelling figures in Canadian history. The killing of the two rebels led to a fire fight that left twelve mounties and five rebels dead, with others on both sides seriously wounded. English Canada refuses to validate the claims of the Métis and the First Nations – they call upon the Macdonald government to act. Lacombe used his trace of native blood to gain entry to the hearts of the Métis and native peoples in 1852 when he … This speech proved Riel’s sanity — it also all but assured that he would hang. While he did invite American Jews to create a “New Judea” in British Columbia, it was conditional on them converting to Christianity. From archive.org. It was only in this way that the Métis canadien, as a new, regenerated people could prepare themselves for their role as a chosen people and receive the Holy See. Second, these works have a different intent than Stanley’s other published works. Over time, Louis Riel has been seen as "a demagogic madman," as an innocent victim of Prime Minister John Macdonald's fanaticism, or as a martyred national-liberation leader. Riel, however, understood that by casting him as insane, his lawyers would discredit his people’s legitimate grievances against Unlike the statues and busts of his Victorian contemporaries, which exude the cherished values of stability and respectability, that of the Metis … [2] In the process of discussing the troubles of frontier settlement, Stanley argued that many of the issues and conflicts arose from the “invasion and exploitation of new areas by European peoples.”[3] Yet, the basis of his argument also revolves around the problematic notion of a clash between “primitive” and “civilized peoples.”[4] So while Stanley attempted to sympathize with Indigenous populations, his own writing perpetuated western notions of what society should look like. Riel must hang "though every dog in Quebec bark in his favor," the Prime Minister was quoted as saying. Ge gave $1000 to a blind beggar. Change ), George F.G. Stanley, Louis Riel, and the Canadian West, Canadian History Roundup – Week of March 17, 2019 | Unwritten Histories, Conservation, Art, and Land – Fighting Poetry with Poetry to Dismantle the Colonial State. Father Alexis Andre and Father Fourmond testified about Riel's peculiar visions and religious beliefs. This book’s aim was different than The Birth of Western Canada and “Western Canada and the Frontier Thesis” as Stanley sought to write the “authoritative” story of Louis Riel. His remains were interred in the churchyard of the St. Boniface Cathedral. For example, he discussed the two major disruptions during this period: the Red River Rebellion and the Northwest Rebellion. That same day, the Committee seized Upper Fort Garry from the HBC and, with little resistance from While the majority of my work has been on compiling a reliable biography of this man, I also wanted to look at the progression of his written works on Indigenous topics. Change ), You are commenting using your Twitter account. A month earlier, he had received a letter from Metis friends that said, "The whole race is calling on you." On 20 July, his trial began in Regina. Format: Book Louis RielBiographie de Louis Riel, porte-parole des Métis, considéré comme le fondateur du Manitoba, instituteur et chef de la rébellion du Nord-Ouest. (We Americans tend to be remarkably ignorant about the history of our friendly neighbor to the north.) Louis Riel’s reply and defense of the Métis people is published in Le nouveau monde magazine of Montréal. None of these characterizations is entirely accurate; each contains some measure of truth. Surrounding the figure are walls designed by architect Étienne Gaboury engraved with Riel’s famous words, “I know that through the grace of God I am the founder of Manitoba.” The statue and its walls originally stood on the grounds of the Legislature of Manitoba, but after the Métis protested Lemay’s depiction as insulting both to Riel and to his people, it was replaced with artist Serge Joyal’s depiction of Riel, in which he appears more statesman-like, assertively brandishing the List of Rights that was to form the basis of the Manitoba Act in 1870. Smith persuaded Riel to summon a general meeting, at which Riel and other local leaders proposed a convention of 40 representatives of the settlement, equally divided between English and French speakers, to discuss the possibility of union with Canada (see Manitoba and Confederation). In February 1874, Riel won the seat again, even though he was hiding in Montreal, far from his Red River home, at the time. The surveyors employed the English system of square lots, plotted without regard to river access. Without contest, Riel is elected to Parliament in a bi-election on October 13, 1873. Being masters of their own destiny is the ancient desire of the Métis, and the struggle for that mastery is an apt description of Riel's movement, both doomed (the Métis have fought for recognition and rights for decades) and redeemed (Manitoba stands as Canada's fifth province, with the rights and prerogatives possessed by all the country's provinces).

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