In late Saturday afternoon 15 July 1916 Rev. John McDougall awaited the Royal visitors at the "Indian Village" just below Cascade Mountain north of Banff. (1) The retired Methodist missionary had been asked to attend and to interpret at the adoption of the Duke of Connaught as a Stoney Nakoda chief.

The Stoneys had known "John" (2) for half-a-century, since the 1860s. They respected him as a spiritual leader who emphasized similarities between their own religious beliefs and Christianity. To quote Stoney historian Chief John Snow: "There was simply not that much difference between what we already believed and what the missionaries preached to us. What differences there were did not seem very important." (3) John McDougall had strong personal ties dating back decades with the Stoney Nakoda and individuals from other First Nations. "We hunted and trapped and fished," John wrote "and engaged in all manner of athletics, foot races, horse races, anything for real fun and common brotherhood." (4) In 1950, John Laurie, a close friend of the Stoneys, noted that the Stoney Nakoda still had a "reverence and awe of John McDougall, who, until his death, was so closely linked with his Stoney friends." (5)

In 1873, Rev. George McDougall, John's father, had chosen a traditional winter camping ground near the meeting of the Bow and Ghost rivers for the mission to the Stoney Nakoda. The previous year Rev. Morley Punshon, president of the Wesleyan Methodist Church Conference in Canada, (6) had formally ordained John into the Methodist clergy. In Punshon's honour the Methodist mission obtained the title of Morleyville, later shortened to Morley. The Stoneys, in their language, called the Bow valley and Bow River, Mini Thni Wapta, or in English "cold water," an apt description of the waters of the Upper Bow River. (7) After his father's death in 1876, John became the Stoneys' main non-Aboriginal contact. The Blackfoot referred to the Morley mission as "where John lives," or in Blackfoot, tsawnokoway, the word tsawn, being a Blackfoot adaptation of "John." (8) For over thirty years Morley served as John McDougall's headquarters until he moved to Calgary around 1900, several years before his retirement from Methodist missionary work in 1906. (9)

"John" used Cree as his language of communication with the Stoney Nakoda. He learned some Stoney, a Siouan language, totally different from Ojibwe and Cree, but did not become fluent." (10) No problem as the Rocky Mountain or Woodland Crees (11) and the Stoney were close allies and many Stoney could converse in, or at least functionally understand, spoken Cree, (12) Many could read the Methodist books printed in Cree syllabics. John himself had co-operated with the Rev. E.B. Glass to compile a Cree Hymn Book, in syllabic characters, published in Toronto in 1888. (13)

The Stoneys regarded Treaty Seven, signed in 1877, forty-nine years earlier, as a peace treaty. (14) Rev. McDougall had acted as their interpreter in Cree and English with the representatives of the "Great Mother Queen." (15) They followed his suggestions at the Treaty Seven signing at Blackfoot Crossing. Their missionary assured them it was in their best interests to sign before tens of thousands of settlers arrived. To the Prairie First Nations, he explained what he had seen "among the Indians of Eastern Canada." "There they held their reserves among the white people and were living in peace. I predicted the same conditions would come to pass in this country." (16)

In hindsight John's recommendation in 1877 to set aside only one Stoney reserve around the Morley mission greatly hurt the Stoney Nakoda. (17) Apparently he did not stress that there were three Stoney bands, each of which wished their own reserve in their traditional hunting and gathering areas. John, a perpetual optimist, believed that the Stoney Nakoda would adjust quickly to farming, the best location for which was around the existing Methodist mission at Morley. The schools would provide the training in Christianity and agriculture. His promotion of the Bow River valley for agriculture was premature, as no real experiments had been made of its fanning potential. (18)

At the time of Treaty Seven the Mountain Stoney territory extended from the Athabasca River south to the Montana border. The Stoney Nakoda had three main divisions--the middle or Chiniquy band who hunted principally along the Bow River and its tributaries; the Bearspaw band who extended their hunting grounds down to Chief Mountain on the Montana border; and the Goodstoney (later Wesley) band whose territory reached north to the Athabasca River. (19)

John's dream of the Stoney Nakoda becoming self-supporting Christian farmers around the Morley mission was not achieved. It was discovered the soil at Morley was poor, the climate too dry, and the growing season too short. Farming could not even support the Chiniquy band who principally resided in the Morley area. A number of the Bearspaw band continued to live south of Morley in the foothills, and a significant number of Goodstoney (later Wesley) band members in the mid-1890s established a settlement in the Kootenay Plains to the north. In addition to these challenges, perhaps the most formidable of all remained. As John wrote in 1895, "The migratory habit of the Mountain Stoney is still a serious drawback to our schools, and, indeed, a very great drawback to steady growth on all lines." (20)

Any Stoney negativity concerning John's failure to gain recognition of all three Stoney Nakoda First Nations in 1877 was not voiced in 1916, publicly at least. McDougall himself now realized his error. In the spring of 1909 he supported the petition of the northern Wesley band, for a reserve near the North Saskatchewan River. (21) The following year he wrote that the Kootenay Plains were "the original home country of these people and they have always clung to it." He added that it "was by force of circumstances over which these men had not control that They were given [a] Reserve near Morley." (22) John argued for reserve status for the Kootenay Plains, but the interests of the settlers and developers came first and he was not successful.

The Duke of Connaught and his wife, the Duchess of Connaught, and their daughter, Princess Patricia, arrived by car at the Banff racetrack from the Banff Springs Hotel on July 15 at 4:15 p.m. Several others arrived by horseback, including Dorothy Lougheed, the seventeen-year old daughter of the recently knighted Sir James Lougheed. Lady Lougheed drove out in her car. The Lieutenant Governor and Mrs. Brett rode in an old-fashioned Victoria, behind horses, others came in "tally-hos, smart traps, buggies, even wagons." (23) The Mounties escorted the Connaughts to the Indian village just to the north. The Banff Crag and Canyon described the cleared space, prepared between two tepees; "With the vivid green grass for a carpet and the blue sky for a canopy, the towering heights of Cascade mountain forming a background, no more fitting stage could have been prepared."

Several hundred non-Aboriginal spectators, men, women, and children, joined the Stoney Nakoda to witness the adoption of Queen Victoria's only surviving son. (24) Rev. John McDougall that afternoon would interpret the Stoneys' address to the Duke of Connaught in English, and the Governor General's reply back to them in Cree.

John McDougall had defended Indigenous religious practices when zealous officials in his own church tried to suppress them. Publicly he stated in 1908; "The Indians of the old faith have as much right to join in the sun dance, or the thirst dance, as a Methodist has to join a camp meeting. We fought hard for the privilege of civil and religious liberty, and the Indian is just as much entitled to religious freedom as the white man." (25) In spite of the complaints of some Indian agents and religious groups he helped to convince the Superintendent-General of Indian Affairs to allow the First Nations to participate the first Calgary Stampede in 1912. (26) He also supported their participation in the Banff Indian Days held each year in July.

John McDougall saw no problem with maintaining the symbols of the Stoney Nakoda's old culture. Banff Indian Days should continue and thrive. It met a cultural need. It allowed a people proud of their identity to celebrate their history and traditions. The Calgary News Telegram noted in 1917: "Every summer at Banff when they have the Indian Pageant Dr. McDougall rode in at their head." (27) With the leading Methodist's approval, the Stoney Nakoda's endorsement, and the important support of Banff itself, a consensus existed. To help the worthy cause of increasing the tourist traffic flow, the Banff Springs Hotel and local Banff merchants stepped up eagerly to help the Indian Days Committee.

The Canadian Pacific Railway in July 1916 offered special rates for the two days, and announced a special train to be sponsored by the returned veterans from the Western Front, from Calgary to Banff on Saturday the 15th. As in previous years, Banff merchants raised funds to pay for the prizes and for the Stoneys' travel expenses, food rations, and a small payment to them from the Indian Day's admission charge. The Crag and Canyon commented on 8 July: "The committee in charge are leaving no effort unspared to make this the premier Indian day in the annuals of Banff." (28)

In mid-July 1916 several hundred Stoney Nakoda men, women, and children travelled by horse and wagon and on horseback to attend the Banff Indian Days. They set up tepees on the spacious meadow at the base of the "mountain where the water falls" Cascade Mountain. (29) At their traditional camping area they held their ceremonies, games, and socialized. For more than 10,000 years North American Indians had lived and travelled thorough this region. (30) The Stoney Nakoda oral tradition holds that their ancestors resided along the Rocky Mountain foothills from time immemorial. (31)

The Stoney came to the mountain hot springs for healing. They gathered mountain plants and herbs in the area for medicine. They went to the mountains to obtain natural earth-paints and pipe stone for ceremonial use. (32) The Stoney Nakoda name for the location of the Banff Indian Days was Mini Hrpa, or "waterfall," after Cascade Mountain's distinguishing physical feature. (33)

The Stoneys' journey of sixty-five kilometres took two days from Morley, with a stopover in the mountains at Indian Flats, just east of Canmore. (34) They called the Flats, too-wup-chinchin-koodibee, that meant in Stoney, "shooting at a young spruce tree." When the Stoneys camped here boys practiced their archery on a young tree. (35) Now they returned to Mini Hrpa, Banff, to share their culture proudly with the Newcomers. In the words of Walking Buffalo, or George McLean; "When we go to Banff every summer [for the Indian Days], it is like a medicine for us. Our chests bulge out to the air of the mountains. And when we get back to the reserve, we feel better than before." (36)

Non-Aboriginal North Americans loved to see the First Nations parade in traditional regalia, to watch their games, to view their tepees. They were curious to hear traditional drumming and see Aboriginal dancing. Prizes were offered for the best decorated traditional outfits. Dating back to the 1890s, and held annually since 1911, Banff Indian Days had become the town's leading summer event. The recent completion of the Calgary-Banff coach road contributed to a growing increase in the number of visitors. (37)

A week before the opening of the regular two-day event, the organizing committee announced an extraordinary addition--the adoption of the Duke of Connaught, governor-general of Canada, as a chief of the Stoney Nakoda. (38) The Indian Days Committee had first consulted the Stoney Nakoda who stated they wished "to make the Duke a chief of the tribe." (39) The Committee then wrote to Colonel Edward Stanton, the governor general's military secretary. (40) He replied with welcome news on July 4th: "His Royal Highness will be very pleased indeed to be present at the annual meeting of the Indians on July 14th and 15th and further, His Royal Highness wishes me to ask you to convey to the Chiefs his appreciation of the great honor they propose to give him by making him a Chief of the Stony tribe--an honour which he will always remember, and the esteem in which he holds the Indians of Western Canada." (41)

The Duke of Connaught, a professional soldier, stood at the highest echelon of the British Empire's military elite, a field marshal. One of his godfathers was the Duke of Wellington, the victor at the Battle of Waterloo, the final defeat of Napoleon in 1815. (42) The dignified, white-haired Duke had served all around the Empire. He was a former commander-in-chief of the Bombay army in India. More recently His Royal Highness served as the Commander in Chief in Ireland, and Commander-in-chief in the Mediterranean, with headquarters at Malta. (43) Without question he was the most distinguished of the modem British princes. (44) Familiar with other cultures, he spoke French, German, and had learned Hindustani (45) during his years in India.

The Duke's empathy toward the First Nations dated back to his first visit to Canada. In 1869 the Mohawks, members of the Six Nations or Iroquois Confederacy, along the Grand River in Ontario, adopted the eighteen-year old prince as Kavakoudge, which means "the sun flying from East to West under the guidance of the Great Spirit." (46) He enjoyed henceforth, as one of their chiefs, the right to sit with the hereditary chiefs in their Council, and to participate in their governance. (47) Only five years earlier the Iroquois writer Pauline Johnson reviewed his 1869 adoption in her essay, "A Royal Mohawk Chief," in her 1911 collection, Legends of Vancouver. In 1912 when on a visit to Vancouver, he visited the poetess who was in hospital suffering from cancer. (48)

On Friday morning 14 July 1916 the grand parade began while tourists lined Banff Avenue, the main street. Leaving downtown Banff, the Stoneys crossed the Bow River bridge onto Spray Avenue, then up to the magnificent hotel set above the junction of the Bow and the Spray. The parade concluded at the Banff Springs Hotel. Mounted on horseback, dressed in their best buckskin costumes and finest beaded regalia, the First Nations assembled in the hotel courtyard to pay their respects to the Duke and his family. His Royal Highness, erect and distinguished-looking, walked amidst the mounted warriors and their families.

That afternoon the Connaughts informally attended the Stoneys' sports and games at what the townspeople knew as the old Banff race track. (49) On the spacious meadow on the northern outskirts of town the Stoney Nakoda set up their painted canvas tepees on their traditional camping area at the base of Cascade Mountain. (50) The rodeo included exhibition bareback and saddle bucking, horse races, roping competitions, and archery events. Stoney language hymns and prayers and their own sacred songs began the contests. (51) Of all the events, the Duke liked best the bow and arrow competitions. He described the archery in a letter to his nephew, King George V, as "extraordinarily good & interesting." (52)

Two years earlier, in August, 1914, the Connaughts had planned to spend two weeks of complete vacation at the Banff Springs Hotel. But tranquillity and rest were not to be as world events intervened. On 28 July 1914, Austria declared war on tiny Serbia. Three days later, Serbia's ally, Russia, mobilized its army, placing it on a war footing. That day the Duke had gone on a day long fishing expedition with guides and some staff, arriving back for dinner. (53) Later that evening came the news that the Governor General's family and staff had to leave Banff the following morning. (54)

The next day, August 1, while the royal party was en route to Ottawa, Germany declared war on Russia. In Ottawa, the Duke had just begun to write his report to the king, when he learned that Great Britain had declared war on the German Empire. (55) The previous day Germany had declared war on France. With the British entry into the struggle Canada automatically was at war as well. Canada controlled domestic issues, but not its own foreign policy.

For the Connaughts the war meant conflict with close relatives. The German Kaiser was the Duke's nephew, the son of his eldest sister Victoria. The Duchess of Connaught herself was born a princess of Prussia and was a cousin of Wilhelm II.

By the summer of 1916, at the time of the Duke's second visit to Banff, World War One had entered its third year on the battlefields of France and Belgium. In late 1914 the Duke felt the loss of his nephew, Prince Maurice of Battenberg, killed in the first Battle of Ypres in Flanders. (56) The year 1915 had been brutal. The Canadian regiment, the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry (PPCLI)--named after the Duke's daughter --took heavy casualties in early 1915. On 21 March the PPCLI commander, Colonel Francis Farquhar, a former Coldstream Guard officer, decorated officer in the South African War, veteran of the Boxer Rebellion in China, and the Duke of Connaught's military secretary to the outbreak of the War, died in action. (57) Several months earlier Captain D.O.C. Newton, a former member of the British Army's Brigade of Guards, and an aide to the Governor General, was the first PPCLI officer fatality. (58) He lost his way at night in no-man's land and was shot by one of his own sentries. (59) During the Second Battle of Ypres in April 1915, 6,000 Canadians were killed, wounded or taken prisoner. (60)

Both sides had built a series of trenches from the Swiss border to the North Sea. In 1915 the war expanded beyond the simply horrific

when poison gas was introduced as a new weapon in the killing grounds of France and Belgium. Those gassed become among the most vulnerable for contracting tuberculosis. The casualties in combat soared in 1916. At Mt. Sorrel in Flanders, in just ten days of fighting in early June, the Canadians lost 8,000 men, killed or wounded. One of the fatal casualties was Colonel Herbert C. Buller, another member of the Duke of Connaught's small military advisory staff. As did Colonel Farquhar, at the outbreak of war, he had joined the newly formed Princess Pats to serve overseas. While leading the PCLI at Mount Sorrel Buller died in action. (61)

On the first day of July 1916, the deadly Battle of the Somme began. At Beaumont-Hamel nearly 700 men from Newfoundland and Labrador were killed or injured. On July 2, of the 801 men in the Newfoundland Regiment who had gone over the top the previous day, only 68 remained to shout out their names. (62) Along the entire British front that first day, casualties numbered roughly 57,500, with nearly 20,000 deaths. After the guns on the Somme fell silent four and a half months later, the French and British had suffered more than 600,000 casualties. The Germans admitted to losses of 465,000. (63) This figure of one million casualties was ten times greater than the total number of registered North American Indians in Canada. The 1911 federal census reported "native Indian and Eskimo" as roughly 105,000 or only a little more than one per cent of the total population of Canada of about 8 million. (64)

As it had across Canada, the war made a deep impact on Banff. In the first year of the war, a hundred men from Banff enlisted, a huge number when one considers the winter population of Banff was just over 1,000. (65) Malloch Luxton, Norman's youngest brother, was Banff's first casualty overseas. The popular Banff resident enlisted in late summer of 1915, only to be killed in Belgium on 18 December 1915. (66) His older brother, Norman Luxton, was the key organizer of the Banff Indian Days committee. Like many other Canadians at the end of the second year of the war, John McDougall knew the anxiety caused by the conflict; three of his sons had enlisted in the Canadian Army. (67)

The climax of the 1916 Banff Indian Days, the adoption ceremony, was scheduled for Saturday afternoon. It was preceded by a military inspection about 10 o'clock. That morning about eighty veterans and returned soldiers from the Banff area assembled in front of the Banff Springs Hotel, accompanied by a military band. The Duke met the returned soldiers some with lost limbs, eyes, and other injuries. The Duchess recorded in her diary, "Some had been gassed--a sad & patriotic sight." (68)

Two important Stoney leaders, both members of the Bearspaw band, awaited His Royal Highness. They stood by the clearing for the ceremony. Calf Child was a spiritual leader, an individual of mythic stature amongst his people. Walking Buffalo, his son-in-law, stood with him. Marius Barbeau, Canadian anthropologist, visited the Stoneys at Morley in the early 1920s. He described Calf Child (whose name in English was Hector Crawler) in these terms: "Calf-Child, a Stony of Morley Reservation, is not only endowed with a remarkable personality, but he is the most noted medicine-man of the present generation in his tribe. He is also a great healer." (69) Although respectful of John McDougall's church Crawler did not convert to Christianity, although he often attended the Methodist mission church at Morley. Norman told how the Elder once explained his faith to him: "Hector did admit that some of the talk of the white Medicine Man was good and he had no hesitation in taking that part and putting it with his own teachings, for he claimed this made his Medicine that much stronger." (70) But despite John McDougall's best efforts he kept to his ancient customs, and did not convert to Christianity.

Hector Crawler's son-in-law, Walking Buffalo, had far greater exposure to non-Aboriginal ways than most Stoney Nakoda. He attended the McDougall Orphanage or residential school at Morley in the mid-1880s, (71) followed by a brief stay at the Methodist Indian residential school at Red Deer. He then worked for a short period in Calgary as a blacksmith and a police scout. Walking Buffalo spoke fluent English. (72) His English name, George McLean, had been given to him by Rev. John Maclean, Methodist missionary to the Bloods. On a visit to Morley (73) Maclean adopted the bright young lad and arranged for him to receive clothes for school from church parcels from central Canada. In English Walking Buffalo took his last name. (74) Walking Buffalo respected both traditional and Christian faiths. John Niddrie, a teacher, and later principal at the Morley Indian residential school from 1889 to 1910, later wrote; "We always held George in high regard and found him very willing to assist us when we held a service, and he proved to be an able interpreter." (75) When Walking Buffalo married Flora Crawler, he complied with both the Methodists' and the Stoney Nakoda's marriage customs. The young man negotiated with her father, and paid the agreed number of horses. He then escorted Flora to the Methodist church to have the minister pronounce them man and wife. (76) Walking Buffalo considered he had the equivalent of Grade Four in his formal schooling. (77) This early training in English made him a Stoney spokesperson for all of his adult life.

At the 1916 induction ceremony, Walking Buffalo and Hector Crawler presented the Stoney Nakodas' address to the Duke. The fact that they had retained their traditional faith, or much of it, may have been a matter of small importance to the Imperial representative. In India, for instance, the British government acted differently than the Canadians did with the First Nations. In Canada there was limited freedom of religion, with constant pressure direct and indirect to convert to Christianity. In British India, with a quarter of a billion Indians, they were secure in the practice of their own religion.

Written in Cree syllabics, Walking Buffalo read the Stoney Nakoda's welcoming address, signed by himself and Wesley band member Jonas Benjamin. Immediately John McDougall interpreted it into English His Royal Highness received a Stoney name, "Teenchaka Eeyake Oonka," which according to the Banff Crag and Canyon, meant in English, "Great Mountain Chief." An 1877 Treaty Seven medal was placed around his neck. As the Crag and Canyon reported, the medal on one side had "two raised figures, a policeman and an Indian, and on the obverse a raised portrait of Queen Victoria." John had been present at Treaty Six fifty years earlier, as well as at Treaty Seven the following year. The Duke in his khaki uniform, removed his cap, and was invested with a chief's headdress. (78)

One could cut the hypocrisy with a knife during the two-day event. Did anyone inform His Royal Highness that the Stoney Nakoda could only camp at the foot of Cascade Mountain during Banff Indian Days? That Natives were welcomed into the park only for the duration of Indian Days?" Or, that despite the promises of the treaty in the name of his mother forty-nine years earlier, they could not hunt in Rocky Mountain (Banff) National Park? Federal and provincial authorities welcomed Banff Indian Days to increase tourist revenue but at the same time they worked to end the Stoneys' subsistence hunting within and beyond the national park's boundaries.

In the early 1920s Walking Buffalo told Marius Barbeau that the authorities--federal and provincial--for over two decades had prevented them from visiting the western slopes of the Rockies and the Columbia Valley in British Columbia to hunt game with their friends the Kootenay. "After a while they decided that we had to stop from going over, owing to the white people enforcing the law." Why did they do this? "It was because the government thought we killed off the game when we visited them. It was the reason why they stopped us." (80) Walking Buffalo continued; "It is the same way in Alberta. We cannot visit others. Only the agent gives a pass or a permit." (81) The Stoneys were forbidden hunting in the national parks of Banff, Yoho, Jasper, and Kootenay. They faced restricted hunting outside of them. As Walking Buffalo told Marius Barbeau, at Treaty Seven the Stoneys had retained their treaty rights. "Today that is why we feel as if in confinement, with all the law and regulations." (82)

Did the Governor General know of the charges against the Stoney, that they would slaughter all wildlife they could find if given the opportunity? He did, if he had read an article delivered to him in Ottawa several months earlier. Just that March, the Duke received from Clifford Sifton, chair of the federal government's Commission of Conservation, a report on the "Conservation of Fish, Birds and Game," a compilation of addresses at a meeting of the Commission on 1-2 November 1915. The volume was sent directly to "Field-Marshal, His Royal Highness Prince Arthur William Patrick Albert, Duke of Connaught and of Stratheam, K.G., K.T., K.P., Etc., Etc., Governor General of Canada." (83) Did he read the report written by W.N. Millar of the Faculty of Forestry at the University of Toronto, "The Big Game of the Canadian Rockies. A Practical Method for its Preservation"? It emphatically attacked the very people who had just honoured him by adopting him a chief. Professor Millar accused the Stoneys of "the killing of game regardless of age or sex, the extermination of whole bands of sheep or elk whenever possible, the killing of moose when yarded up in the winter, the use of dogs and the making of drives in which the whole camp, men, women and children participate, the slaughter of game at all seasons of the year and its constant harrying and disturbance regardless of the season." (84)

In the face of sport hunting groups that argued against Native hunting outside of the national parks as well as inside them, John McDougall fully supported Aboriginal hunting rights as a treaty right. In the 1910s he defended the Plains First Nations against outrageous charges by non-Aboriginals. (85) The Stoney Nakoda believed they retained the right to hunt game where they wanted in their traditional hunting territory, and also the right to fish at any time of year in all lakes, rivers, and streams. (86) Earlier, John had greatly annoyed the Department of Indian Affairs when he advised the Stoneys to continue to hunt outside Banff National Park, in accordance with Section 15 of the Indian Act. (87) This was a treaty right.

The adoption of the Duke of Connaught on 15 July 1916 was properly recorded, to quote the Crag & Canyon; "A moving picture machine and scores of cameras and kodaks were busily operated, during the ceremony." (88) A surviving ten-minute newsreel (89) shows that John McDougall did a splendid job. Clearly the afternoon was a career highlight. Later a note arrived from His Royal Highness, with an autograph photo of himself in Indian costume, with his interpreter in the foreground. (90)

John died five months later, at the age of seventy-three. On 30 January 1917, the Calgary Herald ran on its front page a photo of him with the Duke, the Stoney Nakoda, and non-Aboriginal dignitaries. It was captioned, one of Rev. John MacDougall's "last public appearances." Truly, the adoption ceremony was a career moment for the distinguished Methodist minister who died exactly one hundred years ago in Calgary on 15 January 1917.

Donald Smith is a Professor Emeritus of History, University of Calgary. A chapter on John McDougall will appear in the new book on non-aboriginal Canadians' perspectives on the First Nations, 1867-2017.

A VISIT BY CROWFOOT

In 1886, a special train travelled across the prairie to view of the construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway. A passenger, identified only as E.S. accompanied the official party and wrote an account of it which was published in The Week, a Toronto magazine, on August 5, 1886. The following is an excerpt from this article.

Gleichen was reached at 8.30 p.m. There is a large Indian reserve in this neighbourhood, and Chief Crowfoot, accompanied by six or seven women, appeared upon the platform and entered the train: he passed through every car, nodding and shaking hands with all the passengers. He is a fine looking, intelligent man, and retains the national costume of his forefathers, which, on this occasion, was resplendent with beads and embroidery, and adorned with several medals.

Crowfoot was decorated by the Government, and his character established in the country by his proved loyalty during the late rebellion. He received quite an ovation from the gentlemen on the train, and was presented with the freedom of the Dining Car in an elaborate address, and a substantial souvenir was collected for him in a purse of seven dollars; in fact, he so much appreciated the attention bestowed upon him that he was very loath to part with his hosts, and in the end he and his companions had to be forcibly lifted from the last car by a stalwart porter and conductor to prevent them be ing carried off in the train, a proceeding which they evidently treated as a good joke, judging by their shouts of laughter, as one brown dame after another was encircled by a pair of strong arms. The end car of the long train was quite outside the platf orm, and the descent from its steps was some feet to the ground below.

The Week, August 5, 1886

NOTES

(1) John Maclean, McDougall of Alberta (Toronto: The Ryerson Press, 1927), 259.

(2) "Life in the Great Lone Land, Rev. Mr. McDougall and is Aborigine Assistants," London Daily Free Press, 7 September 1886. He was called John all over the North West.

(3) Chief John Snow, These Mountains are our Sacred Places. The Story of the Stoney People (Toronto: Samuel Stevens & Company, 1977), 17.

(4) John McDougall, In the Days of the Red River Rebellion (Edmonton: The University of Alberta Press, 1983), 25. Originally published in 1903.

(5) John Laurie, "Home on the Kootenay Plains," Canadian Cattlemen, August 1950, 22-23.

(6) William Westfall, "William Morley Punshon," Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 11: 1881-1890 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1982), 719-720.

(7) Roland Rollinmud and lan A.L. Getty, "Foreword," in Courtney W. Mason, Spirits of the Rockies, Reasserting an Indigenous Presence in Banff National Park. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2014, xi.

(8) Hugh A. Dempsey, Indian Names for Alberta Communities (Calgary: Glenbow-Alberta Institute 1969), 15.

(9) Trudy Soby, Be It Ever So Humble (Calgary: Century Calgary Publications, 1975), photos 85-87.

(10) Rev. Thomas Woolsey mentions that, "He speaks the Cree language remarkably well, [and] is gradually acquiring a knowledge of the Stone Indian." Thomas Woolsey to Enoch Wood, dated 1 January 1864, Edmonton House, in Heaven is Near the Rocky Mountains. The Journals and Letters of Thomas Woolsey 1855-1869, ed. Hugh A. Dempsey (Calgary: Glenbow Museum, 1989), 148.

(11) Hugh A. Dempsey, Maskepetoon. Leader, Warrior, Peacemaker (Victoria, B.C.: Heritage House Publishing Company, 2010), 116.

(12) Robert H. Lowie, "The Assiniboine," American Museum of Natural History, vol. 4 (1909): 7.

(13) That same year, again with Rev. Glass, John McDougall also brought out a Primer and Language Lessons in Cree and English. Maclean, McDougall, 261.

(14) Snow, Mountains, 29.

(15) McDougall, On Western Trails, 186.

(16) John McDougall, Opening the Great North West. Experiences of a Missionary in 1875-76, with an introduction by J. Ernest Nix (Calgary: Glenbow-Alberta Institute, 1970), 59.

(17) Nix, "McDougall," 696.

(18) R.B. Nevitt, A Winter at Fort Macleod, ed. Hugh A. Dempsey (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart West, 1974), 85.

(19) Ian A.L. Getty, "Chiniquay," Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 13: 1900-1910 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994), 195.

(20) John McDougall, "Morley Mission and McDougall Orphanage," The Missionary Outlook, July 1895, 102.

(21) Snow, Mountains, 69.

(22) John McDougall to the Deputy Superintendent General of Indian Affairs, 10 November 1910, RG 10, file 339151, Library and Archives Canada, cited in Snow, Mountains, 73.

(23) "The Duke of Connaught becomes an Indian Chief," unidentified 1916 clipping included in Robert George Brett fonds, M-131, vol. 3, scrapbook vol. 3, Glenbow Archives, Calgary.

(24) "The Duke of Connaught a Chief of the Stoney Tribe, His Indian Name is Teenchake Eeyake Oonka, meaning Great Mountain Chief," Crag & Canyon, 22 July 1916.

(25) Reverend John McDougall cited in the Manitoba Free Press, 19 October 1908, RG 10, vol. 3,825, file 60,511-2; cited in Katherine Pettipas, Severing the Ties that Bind, Government Repression of Indigenous Religious Ceremonies on the Prairies (Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press, 1994), 141.

(26) Hugh Dempsey, "Native Peoples and Calgary," in Centennial City, ed. Donald B. Smith (Calgary: The University of Calgary, 1994), 31.

(27) "Empire Builder and Missionary, Rev. Dr. John McDougall, Has Passed Away," Calgary News Telegram, 16 January 1917. The microfilm copy of the newspaper at the Glenbow Library has the first half of the article, the full version appeared in another edition of this same issue, a copy of the full article is in the John Maclean Collection, Obituary (duplicate), United Church Archives, and is misidentified by John Maclean, as from the Calgary Herald.

(28) "Indian Day at Banff, July 14 and 15," Crag & Canyon, 8 July 1916.

(29) E.J. Hart, The Place of Bows. Exploring the Heritage of the Banff-Bow Valley. Part I to 1930 (Banff: EJH Literary Enterprises Ltd., 1999), 61.

(30) Ibid., 9.

(31) Ian Getty, "Stoney-Nakoda," Canadian Encyclopedia on the Web http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/stoney-nakoda/

(32) Chief John Snow, "Treaty Seven Centennial: Celebration or Commemoration?" in One Century Later. Western Canadian Reserve Indians since Treaty 7, eds. Ian A.L. Getty and Donald B. Smith (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1978), 2.

(33) Hugh Dempsey, Indian Names, 6. Aphrodite Karamitsanis, Place Names of Alberta. Volume One. Mountains, Mountain Parks and Foothills (Calgary: University of Calgary Press, 1991), 13. Courtney Mason, Spirits of the Rockies. Reasserting an Indigenous Presence in Banff National Park (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2014).

(34) Patricia Parker, The Feather and the Drum. The History of Banff Indian Days 1889-1978 (Calgary: Consolidated Communications, 1990), 132.

(35) Hugh Dempsey, Indian Names, 1.

(36) George McLean, "Life on the Reserve," in section "Indian Narratives Recorded in 1926," in Marius Barbeau, Indian Days on the Western Prairies. Bulletin No. 163, Anthropological Series No. 46 (Ottawa: National Museum of Canada, 1960), 213.

(37) Mason, Spirits of the Rockies, xi.

(38) "Indian Day at Banff, July 14 and 15," Crag & Canyon, 8 July 1916.

(39) "26th Annual Indian Day," Crag and Canyon, 1 July 1916.

(40) "Edward Alexander Stanton," entry in Richard Leslie Hill, A Biographical Dictionary of the Sudan, 2nd ed. (London: Frank Cass, 1967), 343. He had considerable organizational experience himself, he had been the British governor of Khartoum in Sudan, from 1900 to 1908.

(41) Edward Alexander Stanton to W. [N.] K. Luxton, Esq., Banff, 4 July 1916, Archives of the Whyte Museum of the Canadian Rockies, LUX/I A-123.

(42) An additional point of interest, in 1926 the Duke of Connaught (who lived to 1942) became the godfather of the future Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.

(43) Noble Frankland, Witness of a Century, The Life and Times of Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught, 1850-1942. (London: Shepheard-Walwyn, 1993), 389.

(44) Ibid., 385.

(45) Ibid., 133.

(46) Pauline Johnson, "A Royal Mohawk Chief," Legends of Vancouver (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1961; originally published by the Vancouver Daily Province. (1911), 174.

(47) Pauline Johnson's earlier account of the adoption, published in the Weekly Detroit Free Press, 12 May 1892, appears, in Tekahionwake: E. Pauline Johnson's Writing on Native North America, eds. Margery Fee and Dory Nason (Peterborough, Ontario: Broadview Editions, 2016), 93-98. Johnson, "Mohawk Chief," 175.

(48) Frankland, Witness, 291.

(49) Jon Whyte, Indians in the Rockies (Banff: Altitude Publishing Ltd., 1985), 71-72.

(50) Hart, The Place of Bows, 61.

(51) Laurie Meijer Drees, "The Banff Ludian Days," Native Studies Review, 1, 2 (1991): 75-76. Laurie Meijer Drees, "Indians' Bygone Past:' The Banff Indian Days, 1902-1945," Past Imperfect, 2 (1993), 8-9.

(52) The Duke of Connaught to his nephew King George V, dated Banff, 15 July 1916, Royal Archives (hereafter RA) GV/PRIV/AA42//43. Material from the Royal Archives is used by permission of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II; and I am most indebted to Pamela Clark, Senior Archivist, Royal Archives, Windsor Castle, for sending me those excerpts.

(53) F.O. "Pat" Brewster, They Came West. Pat's Tales of the Early Days (Banff: Altitude Publishing, 1979), 21-22. Katharine Villiers, Memoirs of a Maid of Honour. (London: Ivor Nicholson & Watson, n.d.), 251.

(54) Villiers, Memoirs, 252.

(55) Frankland, Witness, 312-313.

(56) Ibid., 320.

(57) "Col. Farquhar Killed. Commander of Princess Patricia's Regiment a Famous Officer," New York Times, 22 March 1915. David J. Bercuson, The Patricias. The Proud History of a Fighting Regiment (Toronto: Stoddart, 2001), 22, 49. He was buried 20 March 1915.

(58) Bercuson, The Patricias, 39.

(59) Sandra Gwyn, Tapestry of War. A Private View of Canadians in the Great War (Toronto: Harper Collins Publishers, 1992), 87, 142.

(60) Desmond Morton and J.L. Granatstein, Marching to Armageddon, Canadians and the Great War 1914-1919 (Toronto: Lester & Orpen Dennys Limited, 1989), 62.

(61) Gwyn, Tapestry of War, 296.

(62) Ibid., 304.

(63) Morton and Granatstein, Marching to Armageddon, 112-114 (Mt. Sorrel), 94-95, (Battle of the Somme).

(64) "Series A-75-113, "Origins of the population, census dates, 1871-1951," in Historical Statistics of Canada, ed. M.C. Urquhart and K.A.H. Buckley (Toronto: Macmillan, 1965), 18.

(65) Susan Warrender, "Mr. Banff". The Story of Norman Luxton (Calgary: Alistair Bear Enterprises, 2003), 89.

(66) Warrender, "Mr. Banff", 92-93. "The War is Coming Home. Malloch Luxton died and D. Bannerman reported seriously wounded," Crag and Canyon, 8 January 1916.

(67) "Pioneer Missionary's Son Drops Dead," Calgary Herald, 23 January 1943 [John B. McDougall]. "Prominent Veteran Dies at 69," Calgary Herald, 1 September 1965. [Douglas McDougall]. First World War letters of son David L. McDougall, 1915 to 1917, are in the George and John McDougall Family fonds, Glenbow Archives, M-729-119, 120,121, 122,123. "Pioneer Missionary Closes His Long Pilgrimage", Calgary Albertan, 16 January 1917.

(68) Excerpts from the diary of the Duchess of Connaught, 15 July 1916, R A VIC/ADDA15/8445/1916: 15 July. Material from the Royal Archives is used by the permission of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II; and I am most indebted to Pamela Clark, Senior Archivist, Royal Archives, Windsor Castle, for sending me these excerpts.

(69) Barbeau, Indian Days, 10.

(70) Eleanor G. Luxton, "Stony Indian Medicine," in The Developing West. Essays on Canadian History in Honor of Lewis H. Thomas, ed. John Foster (Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 1983), 119-120.

(71) Two references to George McLean appear in the Christian Guardian 11 January 1888 (letter from Mr. Youmans, principal of McDougall Orphanage); and The Missionary Outlook, April 1888 (letter from Mrs. Youmans). Also there is a letter from George G. McLean, dated 31 October 1888, McDougall Orphanage, in Our Forest Children, 3,4 (July 1889), 31.

(72) Grant MacEwan provides a biographical portrait of Walking Buffalo in Tatanga Manl Walking Buffalo of the Stonies (Edmonton: Hurtig, 1969).

(73) Rev. John Maclean visited Morley in the spring of 1884. "Morley," Christian Guardian, 21 May 1884. This was the first time he met Walking Buffalo, to be known in English as George McLean. John McLean (Maclean), The Hero of the Saskatchewan. (Barrie, ON: Barrie Examiner, 1892), 48.

(74) MacEwan, Tatanga Mani, 84-85. John W. Niddrie, Niddrie of the North-West. Memoirs of a Pioneer Canadian Missionary, eds. John W. Chalmers and John J. Chalmers (Edmonton: The University of Alberta Press, 2001), 61.

(75) Niddrie, Memoirs, 61.

(76) MacEwan, Tatanga Mani, 140.

(77) Typescript of interview with Walking Buffalo, 3 February 1962, Grant MacEwan Fonds, Acc. 74/74.7, Box 23/02, University of Calgary Archives.

(78) "The Duke of Connaught a Chief of the Stony Tribe," Crag and Canyon, 22 July 1916.

(79) Jonathan Clapperton, "Naturalizing Race Relations: Conservation, Colonialism, and Spectacle at the Banff Indian Days," Canadian Historical Review, 94 (2013): 352.

(80) George McLean (Walking Buffalo), "Meetings of Kootenay and Stony Indians," in Barbeau, Indian Days, 137.

(81) Ibid.

(82) Ibid. 138.

(83) Commission of Conservation Canada. Committee on Fisheries, Game and Fur-Bearing Animals. Conservation of Fish, Birds and Game. Proceedings at a Meeting of the Committee, November 1 and 2, 1915 (Toronto: The Methodist Book and Publishing House, 1916), frontispiece.

(84) W.N. Miller, "The Big Game of the Canadian Rockies. A Practical Method for its Preservation," in Commission of Conservation Canada. Committee on Fisheries, Game and Fur-Bearing Animals. Conservation of Fish, Birds and Game. Proceedings at a Meeting of the Committee, November 1 and 2, 1915 (Toronto: The Methodist Book and Publishing House, 1916), 113.

(85) "Rev. Dr. McDougall Denies Indians are Slaughtering Deer in the Foothills," Calgary News Telegram, 15 January 1912. "John McDougall, "The Aborigine Not So Bad," Christian Guardian, 27 September 1916.

(86) Snow, Mountains, 38.

(87) J. D. McVicar, N.W. Mounted Police, to E.W. Jarvis, superintendent, NWMP, LAC RG 10, vol. 3796, file 47441-2; cited in Theodore (Ted) Binnema and Melanie Niemi, "'Let the line be drawn now': Wilderness, Conservation and the Exclusion of Aboriginal People from Banff National Park in Canada," Environmental History, 11 (October 2006): 734.

(88) "The Duke of Connaught a Chief of the Stoney Tribe, His Indian Name is Teenchake Eeyake Oonka, meaning Great Mountain Chief," Crag & Canyon, 22 July 1916.

(89) The Archives of the Whyte Museum of the Canadian Rockies has a video copy.

(90) Maclean, McDougall of Alberta, 259.