“We are wards of the Crown and cannot be regarded as full citizens of Canada”: Native Peoples, the Indian Act and Canada’s War Effort by Katharine Albertine McGowan A thesis presented to the University of Waterloo in fulfillment of the thesis requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, 2011 © Katharine Albertine McGowan 2011 Author’s Declaration: I hereby declare that I am the sole author of this thesis. This is a true copy of the thesis, including any required final revisions, as accepted by my examiners. I understand that my thesis may be made electronically available to the public. ii Abstract: The First World War left few untouched on Canada’s Native reserves: many councils donated money to war funds, thousands of men enlisted and their families sought support from the Military and war-specific charities, and most became involved in the debate over whether Native men could be conscripted and the implications that decision could have for broader Native-government relations. Much of the extant literature on Native participation in the war has paired enthusiastic Native engagement with the Canadian government’s shabby treatment. However, in many different ways and with many different goals, Native peoples achieved significant success in determining the parameters of their participation in the war. Yet, the resolution of these debates between Native peoples and the Canadian government, specifically the Department of Indian Affairs, inadvertently (from the Native perspective) cemented the Indian Act’s key role in Native peoples’ lives, displacing other foundational agreements and traditional organizational principles of reserve life. Native peoples’ varied participation in the First World War paradoxically saw Natives temporarily take control of their relationship with the Canadian government, but in the end brought them more completely under the authority of the Department of Indian Affairs. iii Acknowledgements: This project would have been impossible without the ongoing, honest and always challenging advice and guidance of Dr. Ken Coates. Importantly, he had faith in my abilities even when I did not, and has pushed me beyond my comfort zone. This has helped me become a better scholar, and hopefully set me on the path of continual development and questioning. I was lucky to have a committee of passionate, critical scholars, Drs. Susan Neylan, Whitney Lackenbauer, who have never been afraid to demand the best of me. The challenges they offered proved to me I can stand by my scholarship. Dr. Lackenbauer began me on this journey, and Dr. Neylan’s continued and detailed comments have helped me through this process. I am truly grateful. Additionally, Dr. John Herd Thompson’s excellent editorial comments have helped shape this work in its present form and will help guide me through future stages. The Tri-University History Program has been my home for the past four years, and the staff and faculty have always been wonderful help in various stages of this degree, particularly Donna Lang. This project was funded in part through a Social Science and Humanities Research Council Armand Bombardier Graduate Scholarship (Doctoral Fellowship), and a President’s Graduate Scholarship from the University Of Waterloo. I am also thankful for the constant attention and consideration I have received at the National Archives of Canada. Without their help, this project would have been impossible. I would also like to thank Dr. Greta Kroeker for her constant guidance, both inside and outside the classroom. She has provided an excellent example of an academic iv driven by the quest for knowledge as well as the desire to introduce new historians to the love of learning. My parents, Dr. Rosemary McGowan and Keith McGowan taught me a similar lesson early in life, and I believe they set me on this path (for better or worse). To Simon, this project, and many other things, would have been impossible without you. v Table of Contents Introduction: 1 Chapter 1: Native Councils and Individuals’ Donations to Canada’s War Funds 24 Chapter 2: Soldiering 61 Chapter 3: Support for Soldiers’ Dependants 96 Chapter 4: The Native Fight against Conscription 131 Chapter 5: Applying the Conscription Exemption on Reserves 160 Chapter 6: Protests Against Registration 194 Conclusion: 232 Bibliography: 241 vi Introduction: The First World War announced itself with violence in the Mohawk community of St. Regis on a spring night in 1915. St. Regis straddled the border between Canada and the United States, and its members had passed freely between the two countries. However, at dusk on 5 April 1915 (witnesses disagreed about the specific time) Nancy Oak and three of her daughters, aged 12 and 10 and an infant, crossed the North Bridge of the Ottawa & New York Railway over the St. Lawrence River and Cornwall Canal, on their way to Cornwall Island.1 Suddenly, and Nancy claimed without warning, Pte. Joseph Tyo appeared from the bridge’s south side, sixty yards from the family, and fired twice. The first shot flew “wild,” but the second passed through ten year-old Sarah Oak’s upper-left thigh. Major Hugh Cameron, who claimed to have heard his soldier call “halt” thrice before shooting, ran to the scene and used his handkerchief to tourniquet Sarah’s leg. His soldiers improvised a stretcher and carried the injured and hysterical girl to the nearest hospital.2 Indian Agent Francis E. Taillon and Nancy Oak both swore Pte. Tyo did not order the family to halt, and the Agent asserted the Militia had not made known their intention to patrol the railway bridge in question with armed soldiers. Yet, four days after the incident, a Military Board of Enquiry declared that the soldiers guarding the bridge 1 Indian Agent F.E. Taillon to Secretary J.D. McLean 7 April 1915 LAC RG 10 Volume 3188 File 466, 239; Proceedings of the Board of Enquiry, 3rd Division, Kingston, Ontario “Enquiring into and reporting thereon as to the accidental wounding of an Indian Maiden by a Sentry protecting the Ottawa and New York Railway Bridge at Cornwall, on Monday evening 5th day of April 1915,” 9 April 1915, LAC RG 10 Volume 3188 File 466, 239. 2 Proceedings of the Board of Enquiry, 3rd Division, Kingston, Ontario “Enquiring into and reporting thereon as to the accidental wounding of an Indian Maiden by a Sentry protecting the Ottawa and New York Railway Bridge at Cornwall, on Monday evening 5th day of April 1915,” 9 April 1915, LAC RG 10 Volume 3188 File 466, 239. 1 “performed their duty, as instructed, and under the circumstances were justified in firing upon the supposed intruders.”3 Unaware of this decision or dissatisfied with it, Sarah’s father Mitchell Oak haunted Agent Taillon’s office for a month seeking some resolution to his daughter’s ordeal. Taillon asked Department of Indian Affairs Secretary and Assistant Deputy Superintendent General John McLean (hereafter Secretary McLean) to send Mitchell an official letter detailing the Militia’s conclusion about Sarah’s shooting.4 Indian Affairs’ head bureaucrat and decision-maker Deputy Superintendent General Duncan Campbell Scott (hereafter D.C. Scott) reminded Agent Taillon, “I instructed you not to allow the child to want for anything.”5 Bureaucrats D.C. Scott and John McLean were key players in the implementation of policy during the war, but also frequently in its creation. Scott in particular was recognized as an expert in a largely isolated policy realm. McLean and Scott were career Indian Affairs bureaucrats who had risen primarily on their work rather than political connections, and by the beginning of the war both were located at the centre of Indian Affairs’ decision-making structure.6 Both men were committed to the Department of Indian Affairs, and they were involved in all important decisions, both crises and opportunities, regarding Native participation in the war. 3 Proceedings of the Board of Enquiry, 3rd Division, Kingston, Ontario “Enquiring into and reporting thereon as to the accidental wounding of an Indian Maiden by a Sentry protecting the Ottawa and New York Railway Bridge at Cornwall, on Monday evening 5th day of April 1915,” 9 April 1915, LAC RG 10 Volume 3188 File 466, 239. 4 Indian Agent F.E. Taillon to Secretary J.D. McLean 11 May 1915 LAC RG 10 Volume 3188 File 466, 239. 5 D.C. Scott to Indian Agent F.E. Taillon 19 May 1915 LAC RG 10 Volume 3188 File 466, 239. 6 Scott’s connections with the then Prime Minister John A Macdonald may have helped him get his job as a clerk, and although he was a Tory, Scott worked with both parties when in government. He was the first Deputy Superintendent General of Indian Affairs whose appointment was not based on patronage. E. Brian Titley, A Narrow Vision: Duncan Campbell Scott and the Administration of Indian Affairs (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1986), 17, 23-25; Dominion of Canada Annual Reports of the Department of Indian Affairs for the Year Ended March 1909 (Ottawa: King’s Printer, 1909), 601. 2 The Militia granted Sarah Oak $100 “in respect of her suffering,” which the Department of Indian Affairs decided to hold in trust until she reached the age of majority, married, or was in desperate need; Agent Taillon believed Sarah would receive little or no benefit if her parents received the money.7 Sarah Oak’s shooting was an extremely rare event, yet her ordeal encompasses many of the central themes in the debates between Native peoples and the Canadian government over Native participation in the First World War. Sarah Oak’s shooting represented an invasion of the Native world by non-Native actors and interests.