IllustrationWHO’S Ben Clarkson THAT The first cottager or a marauding invader? Samuel de Champlain’s influence in 1615 is still being debated 400 years later. Charlotte Gray, Joseph Boyden, and Douglas Hunter present three different perspectives of the first European in Ontario cottage country on this momentous anniversary 78 cottagelife.com Summer 2015 MAN? By Charlotte Gray 1615: A SPACE ODYSSEY The rocky pink islands of Georgian Bay, aglow in vivid sunsets. The sparkling, shallow waters of the French River and the tree-fringed lakes in the Kawarthas. Stands of majestic pines, their needle- was the toughest leg of the trip: the forty- heavy boughs rippling in the wind. ish explorer, his interpreter, a servant, That’s what we love about Ontario’s and 10 Algonquin guides must have had cottage country, right? This is our “wil- a wretched time paddling and portaging derness.” We overlook the buzz of Jet two large canoes through, in his words, Skis and the invasive species everywhere “an ill-favoured region…barren and unin- so that we can wallow in the idea that habited,” full of “rocks and mountains.” we are communing with nature. We Only the abundance of blueberries raised assume that our summer sojourns on his spirits. At first glance, it seems much this landscape are surface scratches the same today. But a closer look at the on its immutable ecology. map reveals that, thanks to a mining Not so. Southern Ontario was once frenzy 300 years after Champlain strug- covered in first-growth oak, birch, maple, gled across the land, tailings piles and and pine forests. And people have been abandoned rail lines now lurk beneath resculpting this landscape for centuries. the tangled undergrowth. In 1615, when the French cartographer When our explorer reached Georgian and soldier Samuel de Champlain made Bay, his heart sank: the water was not his epic trip through this region—the salty, so he knew he had not discovered first European to circle from the Ottawa the long-sought route to China. But after River to Lake Ontario via Lake Huron— the blackflies and the brambles of sweaty he did not kid himself that he was look- portages on the Shield, it was a relief ing at virgin wilderness. He saw signs of for his small party to reach open water. human habitation almost everywhere. And the fishing! I’m afraid that, because Space is space whether on the ground of pollution and overfishing, these days or in the sky, and Samuel de Champlain anglers would be hard-pressed to come reminds me a little of our astronaut Chris across a lake trout or pike of a size that Hadfield—a space traveller who delights the Frenchman caught. Champlain in learning about people and making also enjoyed meeting the local residents friends. Champlain’s space comprised and, being a jovial, friendly fellow, telling the vast areas from North America’s them how much he admired their care- eastern seaboard to the Great Lakes. In fully styled dark hair—“raised very high, his lifetime (circa 1574–1635), he made and arranged and combed better than at least 27 voyages from France to the our courtiers.” New World. He was both a dreamer and Where are those Wendat people—the a doer, determined to establish a French “Cheveux-Relevés” (“High Hairs”), he colony in North America in which both called them—today? Disappeared from First Nations and European settlers this region, along with the lake sturgeon would prosper. A stocky, muscular, dark- that were nine feet long: “a very large bearded man (if the only known portrait fish and marvelously good eating.” of him is correct), the “Father of New For a contemporary Canadian, the most France” faced danger fearlessly and took surprising part of Champlain’s travel careful notes. journal deals with the region now called The first part of his 1615 journey took Huronia, which stretches from the him up the Ottawa River, then across the southern tip of Georgian Bay, north of Canadian Shield into Georgian Bay. This Orillia, to Lake { Continued on page 122 } 80 cottagelife.com Summer 2015 Summer 2015 cottagelife.com 81 DON-DE-DIEU By Joseph Boyden the height of their powers in the 1600s range from 20,000 to 40,000 souls. Within a couple of decades of Cham- plain sending French missionaries to the Huron city states of Southern Ontario, their population was whittled down, mostly due to European-borne disease, In July of 1609, Samuel de Champlain, to maybe 10,000. Three in four Huron along with a small group of French sol- met a painful and horrible death from diers and a band of Wendat, fought a illnesses such as smallpox and scarlet much larger group of Haudenosaunee in fever. This, combined with Champlain’s what he pictured as the endgame of his what is presently upstate New York. refusal to properly arm the Huron attempt to Christianize the sauvages he Using his harquebus, a weapon new to against their enemy, is the reason his- became friends with. Yes, he must have the Native world, Champlain killed two torians offer for the devastating over- known that he was tearing apart the Haudenosaunee chiefs with one shot. throw of the once mighty Huron empire. cultural fabric of a people when he sent The Haudenosaunee fled, and in the But I don’t mean for this to be sim- his soldiers of Christ in to wage their blood of their dead a new alliance of the ply a history lecture. For many years holy war. After all, his firm belief that Wendat and the French was made. I worked on a novel called The Orenda, his culture was far superior to those In the next decades, what I call one which captures the rise and fall of the with which he came into contact in “the of the world’s first arms races erupted Wendat. As much as I’m fascinated by new world” sadly still exists in so many as these two great Native nations vied history, I’m loath to speak about such quarters of this nation today. But com- for control of the very lucrative trade brilliant beings as the Wendat and plex and complicated and advanced civi- with the strange and alien empires from the Haudenosaunee from a distant per- lizations already existed here before the across the great water. The Haudeno- spective, from a vantage point that sug- arrival of the first Europeans. Both the saunee made an alliance with the Dutch, gests that either is simply a relic of Wendat and the Haudenosaunee were who were more than willing to supply the past. The Wendat today survive in humans with human wants and human them with as many of these deadly Quebec and as the Wyandotte people desires, and yes, human faults too. new weapons as they could afford. But of Oklahoma. And of course the Haude- On one of Champlain’s first voyages Champlain and the French feared the nosaunee, the Iroquois, are not just to the New World, he arrived on a ship Wendat obtaining too much firepower some of the world’s greatest warriors named Don-de-Dieu, the Gift of God. and were very careful in controlling the but also the creators of the Great Law And it seems clear to me that this is trickle of weapons. Instead, they sup- of Peace, a doctrine used in large part exactly what he felt he was bringing to plied the Wendat with Récollet, then as a model for the U.S. Constitution. that foreign and frightening and massive Jesuit missionaries come from France And of course Samuel de Champlain place. I believe that there’s great irony and put in charge of saving the souls will live on in monuments and in history in that name, especially considering the of these sauvages. books, in street and college names. Just eventual near-annihilation of a people I often wonder if the Wendat would as I wonder if the Wendat would have who were his allies. But I’ll let you, dear have made this alliance with Champlain questioned their alliance, I also wonder cottager, decide for yourself. if they had known what was to happen to if Champlain would have questioned his them 40 years later. The European name side of the bargain had he known what Joseph Boyden’s books include Three Day for Wendat is Huron, and in March of was in store. He died on Christmas Day Road and Through Black Spruce. 1649, the Huron were finally overrun and of 1635 and would not have known the scattered to the winds by the Haudeno- coming destruction of a people he helped saunee, who Europeans call Iroquois. set into motion two and a half decades Estimates of the Huron population at before. There’s plenty of debate as to 82 cottagelife.com Summer 2015 Summer 2015 cottagelife.com 83 By Douglas Hunter THE MACCALLUM CHAMPLAIN It’s funny how your memory can play tricks where art is concerned. When I’m in Ottawa, I usually visit the National Gallery of Canada, and I always see the panels from the MacCallum cottage that feature Samuel de Champlain. Toronto It is hard to say, but Champlain doesn’t ophthalmologist James MacCallum was seem happy about what’s going on. a benefactor to a group of Toronto-based Champlain was a key figure in the landscape painters who would visit his MacCallum panels because he would cottage on Go Home Bay on eastern have paddled by on his journey to Wen- Georgian Bay.