Product Code Database
Edgar Dewdney, (November 5, 1835 – August 8, 1916) was a Canadian surveyor, road builder, Indian commissioner and politician born in , England. He emigrated to British Columbia in 1859 in order to act as surveyor for the Dewdney Trail that runs through the province. In 1870, Dewdney decided to take up a role in Canadian government. In this year, he was elected to the Legislative Council of British Columbia as a representative from the Kootenay region. In 1872, he was elected as a Member of the Parliament of Canada for the Yale region representing the Conservative party. He was reelected to this position in 1874 and again in 1878. Dewdney served as Lieutenant Governor of the North-West Territories from 1879 to 1888, and the fifth Lieutenant-Governor of British Columbia from 1892 to 1897. Additionally, he served as the Indian commissioner in the North-West Territories from 1879 until 1888. In 1897, Dewdney retired from politics and began working as a financial agent until his death in 1916.
Throughout his political career, Dewdney played a role in the settlement of western Canada and defining the relationship between the government of Canada and the Indigenous peoples of the North-West in the nineteenth century. Dewdney experienced several political and humanitarian issues throughout his political appointments. As Lieutenant-Governor of the North-West Territories, Dewdney had to manage with a starvation crisis faced by the Indigenous peoples after years of deliberate extermination of buffalo herds, promoted by the Government of Canada to force the Indigenous inhabitants off the land prior to its settlement. Additionally, as Indian Commissioner, Dewdney subsequently tackled issues pertaining to the North-West Rebellion of 1885, and selected Regina to be the capital of the North-West Territories.
(University of Toronto/Université Laval: 2003).
Dewdney originally wanted to pursue a career in civil engineering, studying the subject at Cardiff University. After his civil engineering training in 1859, he decided to start a life in the Pacific northwest in hopes of making a fortune with his newly acquired qualifications. Dewdney was also motivated to move to the North-West Territories after the discovery and further mining of gold in the Fraser Valley. He was active in the development of pack trails in the colony of British Columbia including the Dewdney Trail which became the main trail into the interior of the colony.Dewdney was active in political life in British Columbia throughout the 1860s. Dewdney had a limited understanding of the functions of Canadian politics when his interests first piqued.Titley, Brian. The Frontier World of Edgar Dewdney. Toronto, ON: UBC Press, 1999. 39. After a few years in Provincial politics, Prime Minister John A. Macdonald requested Dewdney to become the Indian Commissioner in the North-West, as he knew of the “Indians” in the area quite well. Dewdney had an advantage due to his general knowledge of Indigenous peoples and that he did not originate from Ottawa.Titley, Brian. The Frontier World of Edgar Dewdney. Toronto, ON: UBC Press, 1999. 40. Later in his life, Dewdney held dual titles of Indian Commissioner and Lieutenant-Governor of the North-West Territories.Dempsey, Hugh A. The Amazing Death of Calf Shirt and Other Blackfoot Stories. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1994. 180. He was also the Lieutenant-Governor of British Columbia and after three years retired and became a surveyor.Harvey, R.G. Carving the Western Path, By River, Rail, and Road Through B.C’s Southern Mountains. Toronto, ON: Heritage House, 1998. 117. Due to his prestigious career in politics, Dewdney was considered suitable to conduct the study and surveying of the Cascades. He discovered three routes, Allison, Coquihalla, and Railroad Passes in his 1902 exhibition. However, he disclosed that he never liked any of these routes due to their engineering difficulties. As a result, Dewdney suggested the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) should be built from Midway to Princeton, then north to Merritt and Spences Bridge, and have Fraser Canyon as the way through the Cascades.Harvey, R.G. Carving the Western Path, By River, Rail, and Road Through B.C’s Southern Mountains. Toronto, ON: Heritage House, 1998. 134. Dewdney is recognized as a legendary trail builder of colonial days in British Columbia, as this played a large role in the westward expansion of Canada.Harvey, R.G. Carving the Western Path, By River, Rail, and Road Through B.C’s Southern Mountains. Toronto, ON: Heritage House, 1998. 116. Despite this recognition, he faced issues regarding Canadian expansionism and the effect on Indigenous peoples.
1881, Macdonald arranged Dewdney's appointment as Lieutenant Governor of the North-West Territories, then an executive position. Dewdney resigned his seat in the Commons, but remained Indian Commissioner during his term as Lieutenant-Governor, which lasted until 1888. Macdonald, along with being Prime Minister, held the cabinet post Minister of the Interior. Dewdney took orders directly from Macdonald. Indian Claims Commission. Carry the Kettle First Nation Inquiry, Cypress Hills Claim. pp. 31,32 Responsible government had not been granted to the North-West Territories, so Dewdney was the Territories' head of government. Perhaps his most notable decision in office was changing the territorial capital from Battleford to Wascana Cree for "Pile of Bones" in 1883: a featureless location without water apart from a short spring run-off Wascana Creek, trees or topography. This is where Dewdney had secured a substantial real estate for himself adjacent to the near-future planned Canadian Pacific Railway line. Other townsites were also considered probable territorial capitals, including Fort Qu'Appelle and Qu'Appelle, the latter to the extent of having been designated the cathedral city of the new Diocese of Qu'Appelle by the Church of England in Canada. The matter was a national scandal at the time.Pierre Berton, The Last Spike: The Great Railway 1881-1885 (Toronto: McLelland and Stewart, 1973), 120) Still, the initial major street of Pile of Bones, later renamed Regina by Princess Louise, Marchioness of Lorne, was called Dewdney Avenue.
After his term as Lieutenant Governor of the North-West Territories, Dewdney was again elected to Parliament and served as the member for Assiniboia East (now southeastern Saskatchewan) from 1888 to 1891. During this period he also served as Minister of the Interior and Superintendent of Indian Affairs.
In 1892, he was appointed to the non-executive viceroy post of Lieutenant-Governor of British Columbia. He served in this post until 1897.
He retired from politics in 1900, after unsuccessfully running for Parliament in New Westminster, British Columbia.
In 1909, following the death his wife Jane, Dewdney remarried. His newlywed wife was Blanche Kemeys-Tynte, the daughter of Colonel Charles John Kemeys-Tynte of Halswell, Somerset, England.
Geographical Review 70, no. 4 (1980): 383.
Indigenous peoples had already starved to death at Qu'Appele, Fort Walsh, Fort Macleod, Battleford, Carlton, Fort Pitt, Fort Saskatchewan, Edmonton, Touchwood Hills, Fort Ellice, Moose Mountain, Fort Calgary, and elsewhere. Dewdney's solution was to locate the native tribes on reserves. Their agents would teach them how to farm.He reported conditions at the Blackfoot Crossing in July 1879 as follows:
By that autumn, seventeen instructors were established at different reserves along with supplies of tools and seed. They began to teach the natives how to farm.
Dewdney was later denounced for not responding to four official requests for food aid during the winter of 1882-83 for "over 2000 Indians here almost naked and on the verge of starvation". When finally pressed to send food supplies after the official requests, Dewdney stated it was government policy to use famine to force Indians onto reserves.
The Report of the Royal Commission to Inquire into Changes Affecting the Administration of Justice in the North-West Territories was conducted by Dewdney in 1880 regarding the administration of Indian Affairs. This communication was written to the Superintendent-General of Indian Affairs in Ottawa and provided insight into conditions in the North-West. This report was controversial because it only provided a colonial viewpoint into the lives of Indigenous peoples. The Indigenous voice was omitted from the report, making the report biased to colonial views. Dewdney outlined in the report that the “scarcity of buffalo in Fort Walsh had not been exaggerated, and numbers of Indians of the Cree, Assiniboine and Blackfeet were awaiting the arrival of Col. MacLeod and myself.”Canada. Royal Commission to Inquire Into Changes Affecting the Administration of Justice in the North-West Territories. Report of the Royal Commission to Inquire Into Changes Affecting the Administration of Justice in the North-West Territories. Ottawa: Indian Affairs, 1880. 76. The decline of the buffalo populations created a famine which “reduced the Indians to a state of dependence on government relief supplies and even forced the Indians to seek government on their reserves.”McQuillan, D. Aidan. “Creation of Indian Reserves on the Canadian Prairies 1870-1885.” 384. In order to resolve the starvation crisis, Dewdney proposed relocating all Indigenous peoples in the region onto reserves. Because of the scarcity in buffalo populations, the government had no other choice but to provide Indigenous peoples on reserves with food rations, distributed by the North-West Mounted Police.
Due to the high decline in the buffalo population, many Indigenous communities were facing starvation. Changes needed to be made in regards to the government’s actions in controlling and alleviating the threat of a starvation crisis. Dewdney traveled to parts of the north-west with Col. James Macleod, the Commissioner of the North-West Mounted Police, in response to the threat of a starvation crisis. Before traveling to Blackfoot Crossing, Macleod stated in Fort Walk that the resolution to the buffalo problem and the starvation of the Indigenous peoples was to promote an agricultural lifestyle rather than one based on the reliance on buffalo. After observing the crisis at Blackfoot Crossing, Dewdney stressed that the Indigenous peoples there should work to relieve themselves of starvation that resulted from the disappearance of buffalo.Canada. Royal Commission to Inquire Into Changes Affecting the Administration of Justice in the North-West Territories. Report of the Royal Commission to Inquire Into Changes Affecting the Administration of Justice in the North-West Territories. Ottawa: Indian Affairs, 1880. 79. He proposed stationing instructors on reserves in order to educate the Indigenous peoples on how to sustain an agricultural society, as well as to provide those on reserves with the necessary supplies. The Royal Commission shows that members of the Blackfoot nation were grateful for Dewdney’s efforts made to ending the crisis. Both members of government in Ottawa and Dewdney believed that the Blackfoot Crossing could be a prosperous agricultural settlement. Upon arriving to Blackfoot, Dewdney hoped to talk about this possible prosperity but before his arrival, he had received news that a number of buffalo had crossed through the settlement and destroyed the crops.Mulvany, Charles P. The History of the North-west rebellion of 1885. Toronto, ON: A. H. Hovey and CO., 1885. 59.
In the early 1880s, government officials such as Dewdney withheld rations from Indigenous people as a tool to bring them into submission.Carter, Sarah. Aboriginal People and Colonizers of Western Canada to 1900. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1999. 142. From 1881 to 1883, it was recorded that buffalo and buffalo herds were headed towards Fort Walsh. Upon hearing this, Dewdney ordered that the food rations for Fort Walsh be reduced. The North-West Mounted Police began preparation to abandon their post at the fort, which meant Indigenous peoples could only receive their treaty payments and other assistance if or when they signed the treaty and moved north. Dewdney's refusal to allow the supply of relief to Indigenous communities created a volatile environment.Hogue, Michel. Metis and the Medicine Line: Creating a Border and Dividing a People. North Carolina, USA: University of North Carolina Press. 2015. 155. In October 1882, reports from Augustus Jukes, senior surgeon for the North-West Mounted Police, regarding the limited food and lack of shelter did not have an effect on Dewdney. As a result, Fort Walsh closed in 1882 which left many Indigenous people starved, unless they signed Treaty One or Treaty Two. Dewdney said that he would recognize any male Cree as a chief if he could get the support of one hundred or more men to accept him as a leader. As a result, many Metis, Cree and Assiniboine separated from their bands in order to receive the promised rations from the government.
In 1882, it was reported that Cree and Assiniboine that settled in the Cypress Hills were supplied with minimal food rations. As a result, many Cree and Assiniboine began travelling to Indian Head. However, many died along the journey as a result of starvation. The reserve in Indian Head was called Win-cha-pa-ghen, or Skull Mountainettes, because the mountains were covered with the victims of the starvation crisis who received little aid from the government of Canada. In the spring, many made the journey back to the Cypress Hills, where Augustus Juke reported that many of the Cree and Assiniboine were in a state of starvation and did not have the basic necessities of life. This was the direct result of the Indian Commissioner’s insistence on letting them starve unless they complied with the government's request for them to sign treaties.Carter, Sarah. Aboriginal People and Colonizers of Western Canada to 1900. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1999. 149. Dewdney was quoted saying “the longer they continue to act against the wishes of the Government, the more wretched will they become.”Carter, Sarah. Aboriginal People and Colonizers of Western Canada to 1900. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1999. 148.
In 1884, tensions between Louis Riel and the government were rising. Charles Borromée, the Justice of the Supreme Court of the North-West Territories and legal advisor in the North-West Territories, sent a letter to Edgar Dewdney on September 5, 1884, regarding the conditions of Indigenous communities during the North-West Rebellion. Borromée wrote “Riel can harm the country, and that the government must come to the assistance of the Indians or misery and starvation will result.” Dewdney ultimately ignored this information, allowing the half breed (Metis) to starve.Rouleau Borromee, Charles. Charles Borromee to Edgar Dewdney, September 5, 1884. Held at Glenbow Museum.
In 1886, Dewdney described the state’s initiatives to provide rations to Indigenous communities as a “policy of reward and punishment,” implying that only bands deemed as “loyal” would receive rations, livestock, and other farming equipment.Daschuk, James. Clearing the Plains: Disease, Politics of Starvation, and the Loss of Aboriginal
Life. Regina, SK: University of Regina Press, 2013. 159
Geographical Review 70, no. 4 (1980): 389-390
Edgar Dewdney was the Lieutenant-Governor of the North-West Territories during the Riel-led rebellion of 1885. It is clear that there were many issues in the North-West region prior to the outbreak of the Metis rebellion. The North-West Mounted Police Superintendent L.N.F. Crozier acted as an informant for Dewdney in the events leading up to the outbreak of the rebellion. With the information that he had gathered, Dewdney believed that he could maintain peace within the region and that he had control of the situation.Titley, Brian. The Frontier World of Edgar Dewdney. Toronto, ON: UBC Press, 1999. 63. However, he did not have faith in the ability of Indian agents across the region to maintain and control the unrest that was beginning to arise within Indigenous communities. As a result, Dewdney called for the appointment of a second roving inspector in 1885, as he believed that it would be difficult for one man to do the job effectively over a vast amount of territory, as well as the fact that the current roving inspector T.P. Wadsworth was reporting his findings to other officials behind Dewdney’s back. Since his arrival in the North-West Territories, Dewdney supported the increase of rations for Indigenous communities and believed that it was crucial that the terms outlined in treaties were met in order to maintain peace between the Metis and colonial settlers.Titley, Brian. The Frontier World of Edgar Dewdney. Toronto, ON: UBC Press, 1999. 64.
The North-West Rebellion can be linked to the starvation crisis, which is represented in the Frog Lake Massacre. The Frog Lake Massacre on April 2, 1885, was due to the restlessness of the Native people in the area of Frog Lake due to the lack of food and resources.Mulvany, Charles P. The History of the North-west rebellion of 1885. Toronto, ON: A. H. Hovey and CO., 1885. 89. Theresa Delaney, a settler who was held captive whose husband was shot in Frog Lake believed that Edgar Dewdney should be blamed as a cause for the massacre in that while visiting Frog Lake, Dewdney made many promises in regards to food and aid, but none of the promises were fulfilled.Delany, Theresa, and Theresa Gowanlock. Two Months in the Camp of Big Bear. Regina, SK: Canadian Plains Research Centre, University of Regina, 1999. xxx. Although the massacre cannot be directly linked to Dewdney’s unfulfilled promises to the Indigenous peoples of Frog Lake, it is clear that the lack of government intervention at a time of crisis worsened the conditions. Due to the lack of resources, aid, and food provided to those in the region, it is clear that the residents of Frog Lake were living in unjust circumstances. Additionally, Dewdney acted as a mediator between the government and the Indigenous peoples of Frog Lake.
The early 1880s saw raids led by Indigenous bands to steal cattle and horses from ranchers. This is directly linked to the loss of buffalo in the area and the subsequent starvation crisis. These raids occurred across into the United States and created American tensions. As a Result, Dewdney created a permit system in 1882 so that groups such as the Blackfeet and Assiniboine could move across the border to hunt, visit relatives, and for leisure.Hogue, Michel. “Disputing the Medicine Line: The Plains Crees and the Canadian-American Border, 1876- 1885.” Montana: The Magazine of Western History 52, no. 4 (2002). 11-12. Dewdney supported and defended the allegations against Canadian Indigenous peoples as being held responsible for the depredations in Northern Montana.Hogue, Michel. “Disputing the Medicine Line: The Plains Crees and the Canadian-American Border, 1876- 1885.” Montana: The Magazine of Western History 52, no. 4 (2002). 11. Rancher anxieties and prompts from Americans due to raids by Indigenous peoples pushed Dewdney to move Indigenous bands “from the southern prairies of Assiniboia to reserves north of the Canadian Pacific Railroad.” This plan disrupted bands searching and following remaining buffalo across the international boundary. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police were instructed to use force when faced with bands attempting to move north.McQuillan, D. Aidan. “Creation of Indian Reserves on the Canadian Prairies 1870-1885.” 385. Dewdney triumphantly claimed that there were no more natives north of the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) line. As a result, the development of the CPR could continue further west by the instruction of Dewdney.
Concerning governance, Dewdney advocated for the enforcement of the Indian Act to dispose Indian chiefs. This would help the colonial government maintain power in local communities by removing Indigenous leadership and eradicating self-governance. As a result of this enforcement, arrests were made against those who were viewed as ‘bad Indians.’Monaghan, Jeffrey. “Settler Governmentality and Racializing Surveillance in Canada's North-West.” The Canadian Journal of Sociology 38, no. 4 (2013). 502. The use of language such as ‘bad Indians’ left for interpretation that any Metis or Indigenous person that rejected government policy was atrocious. Additionally, Dewdney mediated territorial disputes as Superintendent-General of Indian Affairs while traveling areas affected by colonial expansion as well as food and land disputes.
Dewdney was known for making many promises to the Indigenous peoples which raised their morale, but ultimately leaving these promises unfulfilled.Delany, Theresa, and Theresa Gowanlock. Two Months in the Camp of Big Bear. Regina, SK:
Canadian Plains Research Centre, University of Regina, 1999. 30.
Additionally, there was concern that the Department of Indian Affairs, its agents, and Dewdney had secretly been in contact with Montana grocery and mercantile firm I.G. Baker Company. The worry was that the Department had purchased subpar goods to distribute to the Metis who were affected by the starvation crisis. It was claimed by the Hudson's Bay Company That Dewdney and other key officials in the North-West and Ottawa were linked with the company and therefore profiting off of the starvation crisis.Daschuk, James. Clearing the Plains: Disease, Politics of Starvation, and the Loss of Aboriginal Life. Regina, SK: University of Regina Press, 2013. 137-138. Dewdney's relationship with the Baker Co. relates back to before his appointment as Indian Commissioner. Dewdney was known to involve himself in various business ventures and investments in the North-West that resulted in his personal financial gain.Daschuk, James. Clearing the Plains: Disease, Politics of Starvation, and the Loss of Aboriginal Life. Regina, SK: University of Regina Press, 2013. 138. Flour supplied to Indigenous communities by the Baker Company was unfit for consumption and caused deaths in several reserves. Additionally, there was the belief that the food had been tampered with which created a formal independent investigation into the Baker Company’s flour supply.Daschuk, James. Clearing the Plains: Disease, Politics of Starvation, and the Loss of Aboriginal Life. Regina, SK: University of Regina Press, 2013. 139. It was determined that the flour was indeed substandard, which reflected negatively on Dewdney given his relationship with the Company.
Furthermore, there are also reports that Dewdney and other agents from the Department of Indian Affairs used food as a tool for coercion. Many Indigenous people on reserves were at the mercy of these agents.
|
|
