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Acess Denied: Twenty years later,
in 1894, the amity and cooperation that
led to the signing of Treaty No. 4 has largely
evaporated. In that year, the federal government's
Department of Indian Affairs officially
transferred the ownership of the Treaty
Grounds to the Department of the Interior,
but unofficially, the First Nations signatories
to Treaty 4 had lost access to the land
not long after the agreement was struck.
Tensions between local tribes - facing ever-worsening
living conditions - and local settlers had
led government officials to ban large aboriginal
gatherings. First Nations freedom of movement
had been further limited following the Cree
uprising and North West Rebellion of 1885,
when the imposition of a pass system prevented
reserve residents from leaving their reserves
without permission.
Restitution: In 1985, when an aboriginal
burial ground was discovered on the site
of the original Treaty Grounds in Fort Qu'appelle,
the Treaty Four First Nations filed a claim
for land. In 1995, a Settlement Agreement
provided compensation to purchase the land
and re-establish the Treaty Grounds, and
in 2001, the land was officially converted
to Indian Reserve status.
Today, there are 34 signatories to the
Treaty Four agreement, including 27 bands
from Saskatchewan and 7 from Manitoba.
| Portable
Pemmican
Modern-day out-trippers who
rely on specialty freeze-dried
camp meals may be surprised
to learn that 18th and 19th
century voyageurs carried their
own lightweight, calorie-packed
convenience food. Thousands
of years before the invention
of commercial food preservation
methods, aboriginal Americans
were skillfully preparing a
highly-nourishing, long-lasting
and easily portable food known
as pemmican.
Vacuum-Packed: Derived
from a Cree word that originally
described the preparation of
bone marrow grease, the dietary
staple of the fur trader was
an ingenious combination of
dried lean meat (primarily bison,
but also moose, elk or deer),
wild berries (such as Saskatoon
berries) and suet or bone marrow
grease. Originally preserved
in animal bladders or intestines,
pemmican prepared for European
traders was stored in bison-skin
bags called "parfleches"
that were sealed with melted
tallow. As the skin bags dried
and shrank, they compressed
the pemmican mixture and created
a vacuum seal, rendering the
contents virtually un-spoilable.
A Well-Balanced Meal:
Highly-concentrated pemmican
lightened the load of voyageur
canoes, with only 1 kilogram
providing the nutritional equivalent
of up to 5 kilograms of fresh
meat. In addition to the protein
and fat contained in the mixture,
vitamins supplied by the berry
component helped to prevent
scurvy. Greens, roots and flavourings
such as wild onions could be
added to enhance the pemmican,
when it was made into a soup
or stew.
Pemmican Gourmet: At
the height of the western fur
trade, pemmican production was
an important First Nations industry.
The Hudson's Bay Company paid
a premium price for the highest
quality "sweet pemmican,"
made exclusively from the leanest
red meat of bison cows and young
bulls.
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Fort Espérance:
Pemmican Post of the Lower Qu'appelle
Travellers who venture off the TransCanada
highway, northeast of Rocanville near the
Saskatchewan-Manitoba border, will encounter
the historic site of Fort Espérance
on the lower Qu'appelle River.
Today, amidst farmers' fields, only the
ruins of an old fireplace and the depressions
of some former cellars hint at the area's
former role as a major pemmican provisioning
post for the Assiniboine-Red River fur trading
district.
Originally constructed by the North West
Company on the south side of the Qu'appelle
in 1787, Fort Espérance was strategically
located in the sheltered wintering grounds
of the great prairie buffalo herds. Hide
sacks known as "tareaux", packed
with pemmican made from buffalo meat, were
sent down the Assiniboine and Red Rivers
and across Lake Winnipeg to the Nor'Westers'
supply depot at the mouth of the Winnipeg
River.
Fort in Flux: The fort was re-located
several times during its 32 years of operation,
moving in 1810 to a site on the Qu'appelle
Lakes (probably the southern end of Round
Lake). Unpopular with the local First Nations
tribes, the fort was again shifted downstream
to the north bank of the river in 1815.
Battle Base: From its new location
(known as Fort John), just west of Big Cutarm
Creek, the legendary Métis leader
Cuthbert Grant launched his attack on Lord
Selkirk's Red River settlers, in a bloody
confrontation that became known as the Battle
of Seven Oaks. Fighting for control of the
lucrative western fur trade, North West
Company men also burned a nearby Hudson's
Bay Company post, seizing furs, pemmican
and prisoners.
Fort Espérance came full circle
in 1816, when it was moved to higher ground
above its original 1787 location. Ongoing
hostilities between North West Company employees
and local aboriginal people resulted in
the closure of the fort in 1819, and the
transfer of its provisioning function to
a post on the Assiniboine River.
Furs at Fort
Qu'appelle
Thirty years after the North West Company
abandoned the Qu'appelle Valley, the Hudson's
Bay Company established a fur-trading post
further west on the Qu'appelle River, between
the second and third Fishing Lakes (now
known as Echo and Mission). After a brief
move south, to present-day Qu'appelle, the
post was transferred back to its original
location, at the present site of the town
of Fort Qu'appelle.
| Fort
Qu'appelle Museum: In
the museum adjacent to the shuttered
log building of the original
1865 Fort Qu'appelle trading
post, visitors can view a collection
of First Nations artifacts,
Hudson's Bay Company items and
displays related to the area's
historic North West Mounted
Police Post. The museum's collection
also includes medical gear (such
as early x-ray machines) from
the nearby "Fort San"
tuberculosis sanatorium, which
treated hundreds of patients
after its construction during
World War I.
Last
Mountain House: Built
at the south end of Last Mountain
Lake (near present-day Craven),
in the waning days of the fur
trade in 1869, Last Mountain
House served briefly as a winter
fur trade outpost of Fort Qu'appelle.
Three reconstructed log buildings,
a privy and an ice house have
been reconstructed as a provincial
heritage site. |
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By 1870, the fort was both a relay point
for furs collected further west at Last
Mountain House and sent on to York Factory
to the east, and a pemmican supply post
functioning much like its predecessor on
the river, Fort Espérance. Near the
fort's log stockade, the Hudson's Bay Company
raised livestock and cultivated several
acres of agricultural land, growing wheat,
barley, potatoes and other vegetables. Food
supplies from the fort were sent east to
Fort Ellice, west to Chesterfield House
on the South Saskatchewan River and north
to Fort Carlton.
Cold and Dark: Life in the mid-19th
century fort could be harsh, especially
in winter, when fear of fire caused by exploding
gunpowder-a chief article of trade-prevented
the heating of storage or trading buildings
on even the coldest days. Candlelight was
limited by the need to use tallow in pemmican-making,
and large open fireplaces were often the
only source of light when darkness fell.
Rise of Retail: With the waning
of the fur trade and the arrival of large
numbers of settlers, the Hudson's Bay Company
shifted its operation from trading to retailing.
In 1897, a new brick and stone Hudson's
Bay Company general store was built on what
is now the corner of Company Avenue and
Broadway Street in Fort Qu'appelle. The
building, designated as a provincial heritage
property, now houses private retail businesses.
A Millennium
of Mourning at Moose Bay
Forming a grassy dome on a steep hill high
above the lower Qu'appelle, a conical mound,
15 metres in diameter and 1.5 metres high,
marks an ancient aboriginal burial ground.
| The
Treaty Four Governance Centre
Rising above the long architectural
curve of a modern administration
building in Fort Qu'appelle,
the world's largest occupied
tipi houses the Chief's Legislative
Assembly of the Treaty Four
First Nations. The Treaty Four
Governance Centre, officially
opened in 2000, includes administrative
and educational offices, includes
meeting, museum and cultural
space, and is the home of the
Treaty Four Keeping House and
Archives. |
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Almost 1,000 years old, the Moose Bay Mound
at Crooked Lake Provincial Park is one of
many burial mounds built throughout North
America between 1000 B.C. and 1600 A.D.
The site is notable for its relative isolation,
and is among the northernmost examples of
this widespread early aboriginal burial
practice.
A 1968 excavation of the Moose Bay site
by archaeologists from the Saskatchewan
Museum of Natural History revealed a total
of 8 burial units, consisting of bundled
remains surrounded by mortuary offerings
of decorated pottery vessels, birch bark
containers, tubular stone pipes and bone
tools.
Monumental Effort: Burial mounds such
as Moose Bay were constructed by first stripping
the sod from a circular area, then erecting
a wooden post in the centre of the depression.
About one year following death, the remains
of the deceased, which had been tightly
wrapped in buffalo hides, were rubbed with
ochre, re-bundled, placed on the ground
around the central post and surrounded by
grave goods required for the next life.
After a tipi-like structure was built to
cover the bundles, many tonnes of earth
were hauled to cover the burial chamber.
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