LAKELAND – The Acimowin Opaspiw Society (AOS) says it has found evidence that the members of Saddle Lake who attended the Blue Quills Residential School were specifically targeted by the government as a form of retaliation to the Frog Lake Massacre and the North-West Rebellion of 1885.
On March 29 at the St. Paul Recreation Centre, the AOS hosted an event commemorating the 140th year since the resistance, where they also presented their evidence to members of the public to support their claim.
Other speakers present during the day include Eric Tootoosis, a knowledge keeper from Poundmaker Cree Nation who spoke about the Cree perspective of the 1885 rebellion, as well as Canadian historian Bill Waiser who talked about the historical significance of 1885.
Retaliation
AOS is a non-profit organization based in Saddle Lake, representing the survivors of Blue Quills Residential School. Its mandate includes investigating unmarked burial sites and uncovering historical facts about residential schools.
AOS Executive Director Leah Redcrow said part of the group’s research involves studying the events of 1885, specifically the Frog Lake Massacre and the North-West Rebellion.
Redcrow explained that studying the two events are crucial, because what happened after 1885 led to “lasting impacts” to First Nation peoples, including the creation of residential schools.
Through the research, Redcrow said the organization retrieved a copy of a rebel pay sheet, specifying names of eight warriors from the Saddle Lake Snake Hills Band. The warriors’ names were Paskweyak, Centre Tail Feather, Wandering Spirit, Memnook, Bright Eyes, Redcrow (Leah Redcrow’s great-great-grandfather), Moosewah, and Wapowes.
The AOS compared the names to the records of those who attended Blue Quills, which include baptismal records retrieved from the Diocese of St. Paul, as well as sacramental records at Frog Lake and Fort Battleford.
After the comparison, AOS found the children who attended the residential school were descendants of the eight warriors.
This led to the AOS concluding the children were specifically targeted and detained as a form of retaliation, due to their ancestors’ alleged role in the Frog Lake Massacre and the North-West Rebellion. “They targeted the same families over multiple generations,” she said.
Descendants of the warriors were also present during the presentation, which includes delegates from the Rocky Boy Indian Reservation who say they are the descendants of Wandering Spirit, such as Elder Jenny Lasalle, Lasalle’s niece Suzanne Billy, and Montana state senator Jonathan Windy Boy.
Wandering Spirit’s descendants
Their ancestor, Wandering Spirit, was said to have been hanged alongside seven others for his role during the rebellion at the largest mass hanging in Canadian history in November 1885 at Battleford.
Six of those who were hanged were specifically hanged because of their roles in the Frog Lake Massacre, including Wandering Spirit, according to information from the University of Regina website.
But Elder Jenny Lasalle spoke during the March 29 event in St. Paul and said Wandering Spirit was not actually hanged but escaped to Montana.
Lasalle, who says she is one of Wandering Spirit’s grandchildren, said she may not know how long it took for Wandering Spirit to reach Montana, but “My mother was born after he [Wandering Spirit] got there.”
“When she [my mother] grew old enough, my grandmother told her the story . . . about my grandpa,” said Lasalle, such as how Wandering Spirit escaped from his shackle, when he was captured by the North-West Mounted Police.
Lasalle said she and her brother are the “only ones left of his [Wandering Spirit’s] grandchildren.”
What AOS says happened
According to several official government accounts, Wandering Spirit is said to be the war chief of a powerful Cree chief named Big Bear.
Chief Big Bear and his band wintered near Farm Agency No. 15 in Frog Lake. The agency was meant to serve the neighbouring Wood Cree reserves of Unipouheos and Puskiakiwenin around Frog Lake, according to information from the Government of Canada.
Big Bear’s band apparently grew frustrated from the lack of food, and Big Bear lost control of Wandering Spirit, who then led an attack against the agency, leading to the massacre, where nine settlers and Frog Lake’s Indian Agent died.
Redcrow said this is not what happened, because Wandering Spirit and the warriors from the Snake Hills Band were never part of Big Bear’s band.
She did confirm that Wandering Spirit and the other warriors were present when the massacre happened, because they were there to retrieve their children who were detained by priests from Frog Lake. But they were not aware of what was happening.
Wandering Spirit and the others then killed the priests away from the settlers at a nearby hill as retaliation for taking their children.
While this was happening, Big Bear and his men killed the settlers and the Indian Agent.
According to Redcrow, Snake Hills Band members had no reason to kill Quinn. She said Quinn was married to Jane Pritchard, who was the biological daughter of Simon Paskwayâhk – the Frog Lake chief at the time. Paskwayâhk was Wandering Spirit’s brother.
“So, they didn’t like [Big Bear],” because Big Bear’s band killed Quinn, said Redcrow.
While the rebellion was going on, the Snake Hills Band still needed to evade the authorities. To do that, they had to cover their tracks, which included ensuring any form of communication would not be traced to Snake Hills.
And because the Snake Hills Band did not like Big Bear for killing Quinn, Wandering Spirit and one of his brothers decided to sign their letters as Big Bear to throw off the authorities, hoping to implicate Big Bear at the same time, said Redcrow.
Other evidence
Historical narrative also suggests Wandering Spirit and his brothers were starving. That may be true for Big Bear’s band, suggested Redcrow. But it was not true for Wandering Spirit and the Snake Hills Band because Snake Hills was prospering at the time by trading with the Hudson Bay Company, she said.
This fact, according to Redcrow, is also more solid evidence that Wandering Spirit and the other warriors were not involved with the massacre.
According to an excerpt of a document Redcrow showed Lakeland This Week, titled “1884 Indian Affairs, Departmental Report,” the Hudson Bay Company claimed to have traded $56,000 in goods and supplies with the Snake Hills Band.
“That's the equivalent to $1.4 million today,” she said. “They were not getting help from the government. They had gardens . . . cattle. They weren’t starving, desperate Indians.”
It was only after the rebellion that Snake Hills Band stopped trading, “because nobody was allowed to do any trading after that,” she said.
The halt in trading, as well as the government attempting to arrest rebels, led to a mass exodus. Five hundred families from Saddle Lake fled to the United States and occupied Rocky Boy’s Indian Reservation in Montana, including Wandering Spirit and his brothers who escaped the government.
Mass hanging
Wandering Spirit took the name of his brother, Big Wind, because Big Wind was not listed in the rebel pay sheets.
Redcrow and the AOS are unsure of who was actually hung.
According to Redcrow, the false narrative was due to non-Indigenous individuals writing the history with a lack of consultation with First Nation peoples.
“This country needs to correct their narrative . . . because they’re affecting lives.”
