Dwindling Animals and Diminished Lands: Early Twentieth Century Developments in Eastern James Bay

TOBY MORANTZ McGill University

For those who have collected personal histories from James Bay Cree elders or had the opportunity to read and study them, one is struck by the numerous accounts of hardship they endured due to the scarcity of food resources in this century. I can do no better in relaying a sense of the tragedies that befell them than by quoting directly from one of the accounts. It is by Samuel Mayappo, a hunter at Wemindji, born in 1902 and interviewed in 1977 by Colin Scott:

Most of the time the only thing that the people depended on was fish. I didn't like what I saw while I was out in the bush [starvation]. All of my late brothers died from starvation. Two of them were older than I was. One of them who died in the bush lay there for three days and the other one who also died in the bush lay there for one day. . . All my late brothers were nothing but bones when they died from starvation.. . (Scott collection 1977)

The son of Samuel Mayappo, Angus Mayappo, who was born in 1929, also relates what he recalls of this period when he was a young boy, not yet old enough to hunt. This was during the 1930s. He focuses on the very little food they had to eat during one period when they were travelling with another family in search of a decent fishing lake. The head of the other family was so weakened with hunger that he was unable to help them set up the tipi. That night Samuel Mayappo killed two ptarmigan and a squirrel. The ptarmigan were shared by the two families and eaten right away. The squirrel was saved for the journey the following day. Angus Mayappo recounts this particular incident:

209 210 TOBY MORANTZ

When we got up the following morning the squirrel was cooked. We journeyed on without any breakfast. As we moved on, afire was set up where the squirrel was to be eaten by the two families. As the squirrel was divided, I was given the head of the squirrel which had to last me for a whole day. I saved part of it for my next meal. The part that I saved was the brain inside the squirrel's head. I guess you all know the size of a squirrel's head. That's all I ate for a whole day. That's how scarce food was and how hard it was to get it.

For our understanding of the Cree adjustments to these dire living conditions the oral histories remain the most valuable source, but not sur­ prisingly, they do not tell the whole story — just as the history culled from the archival records is highly incomplete. The combination of the two sources of historic data is what is needed to depict this era. It is evident from the documents that there is not one single explanation for this star­ vation period, such as a depletion of animal resources. Rather, it was a culmination of processes begun in the century before. It is these historic processes which I shall try to unravel, as well as analyzing Cree strategies in coping with changed situations. This paper profits from a similar analysis presented by Adrian Tanner at the Algonquian Conference in 1977 (Tanner 1978). Tanner collected per­ sonal testimonies of the game shortage period from people living at Fort George (now Chisasibi). In his paper he outlines some of the factors that contributed to the starvation in the 1930s, such as declining caribou herds. He also noted that fishan d small game became critical food resources caus­ ing a shift in winter hunting arrangements. Another feature resulting from this was a slight realignment of the coaster-inland adaptations. Tanner's study was based primarily on the oral history accounts with some doc­ umentary evidence coming from published records. This present study, using primarily archival records, corroborates Tanner's analysis and at the same time draws in other historic considerations.

Ecological Details and Historical Background, 1860-1870 The written documents pertinent to two posts form the source mate­ rial for this study, although ideally all the posts in the James Bay territory should be studied. The Fort George and Rupert House Posts were selected since the Cree at each exploited somewhat different eco-systems. In bio­ logical parlance all of James Bay would be termed "a physically stressed ecosystem" (after Ochman and Dodson 1982:803), but Fort George, located a few hundred kilometers north of Rupert House, is characterized by a lower productivity of vegetation (Dunbar 1968:92). As a result, mammal popu­ lations such as beaver are proportionately greater in the southern regions of James Bay than in Fort George and, in both cases, inland rather than on the coastal plain (Traversy 1976). Thus, the Cree of the more southern DWINDLING ANIMALS 211 parts of the territory potentially enjoyed a greater number and variety of animals than those in the north. However, the Cree who traded at Fort George but who hunted to the north of this region had access to the vast herds of caribou which summered on the treeless tundra and moved south to winter in much smaller herds in the forest-tundra transition zone. A wood­ land variety of caribou was also found in pockets throughout the James Bay region, inland moreso than coastal. Unfortunately for the Cree these herds are considerably smaller (perhaps eight to ten individuals) and their movements tend to be unpredictable, making them, even under the best of conditions, a less reliable food source. Wildfowl, geese and ptarmigan could often be caught in large numbers but just as often were scarce or difficult to hunt due to the climatic conditions. A number of small mammals, such as hare, undergo high and low population cycles making them an unreliable resource. Fish, seemingly, were always there but ice conditions on the lakes, water levels and climatic conditions often reduced the numbers harvested. Thus, the Cree with different resource bases in different regions developed various hunting strategies and social systems that best helped them obtain their food. These ecological factors plus the different historic events in each sub-region resulted in different situations. The documentary sources consulted, besides the ever useful Hudson's Bay Company Archives, were the records of the Canadian Department of Indian and Northern Affairs, records of the R.C.M.P. and some missionary accounts. Published accounts such as the one by the surveyor A.P. Low (1896) were also used. This study begins with the 1860s for a variety of reasons. One is that it is just prior to the period when influences other than the Hudson's Bay Company and the Anglican church began to have an influence on life in James Bay. The other reason is that my earlier historic accounts have all ended about this time and I am now taking up the story at this point. Rupert House, in the 1860s, was a trading post that catered to two somewhat different Cree populations. There were the coasters, some 31 hunters (B. 186/d/7, 1871-1874), who hunted relatively close to the post, going inland only in February. The journal entries show the coasters coming in to the post frequently, bringing in either their furs or supplies of country food for the post employees. The furs were traded for cloth, ammunition and tools while the provisions were often exchanged for imported foods. Thus, on November 23, 1864, a Cree named Marten brought in 40 rabbits and in exchange took out 2 lbs. of barley, 1/2 lb. of biscuit, 6 lbs. of flour, 2 lbs. of sugar and 5 lbs. of oatmeal (B. 186/d/6a, 1864-1865). In the spring and again in the fall the coasters were provided ammunition to hunt the geese along the coast. Fish, waterfowl and berries sustained them in the summer, while after the goose hunt large numbers of coasters gathered at 212 TOBY MORANTZ

Smokey Hill for the traditional fall fisherywhere , if they were successful, they could lay up a store of dried fish. In the summer men were employed by the Company to cut the long marsh grasses for hay, or to work on the supply brigades to the inland posts. During the year other occasional labour was performed by the coasters. The inlanders, numbering 67 men, arrived at the post in June, in groups of ten or twelve canoes. They traded their furs, remained a month or so, took their advances for the following year and returned inland. Generally, this was their only visit to the post. As for their trade, they took mainly cloth, tools and ammunition but extremely little food. For instance, in 1865 Waupatchew took out 4 lbs. of sugar, 1/4 lb. of tea, 6 lbs. of flour and 4 lbs. of pork. In the Rupert House fur returns, beaver had been decreasing up to the 1820s, but then doubled by the 1850s to levels of 5,000 per year (Francis and Morantz 1983:130). This level of beaver returns might be a reflection of the Hudson's Bay Company's manipulation to some degree of what furs were traded. In 1862 the post manager wrote that beaver were still fetching a low price on the London market and thus "martens must be considered as our staple article of trade" (B. 186/b/70:10d). No doubt, that year the hunters were encouraged to bring in martens instead of beaver. In the 1860s, as in every previous decade, there were some years that either the Rupert House coasters or the inlanders or both suffered hardships. One such year was 1862 when it is said the coasters were assisted with oatmeal (B. 186/b/70:12). Inland at Nichikun it was said that "starvation during the winters has become an annual recurrence" (B. 186/b/70:6d, 1860). (I am using "starvation" in the literal sense; see Black-Rogers 1987.) The Fort George records yield similar figures for 1870 when there were about 85 hunters at the post without a breakdown into the coaster and inlander groups. There is, however, a corresponding breakdown of imported foods taken out in exchange for country foods which reads much like the Rupert House one above (B. 77/d/17:ld, 1870). The country foods brought in included fish, ptarmigan and venison. The daily journals indicate that in the 1860s venison was still a food source for some coasters once they moved inland to hunt in the middle of winter (B. 77/a/35). Other coasters complained of being hard up and received some oatmeal and a couple of old geese (B. 77/a/35, May 19, 1865). There were also reports of inlanders suffering and weak from lack of food. Coaster employment at Fort George seems to have followed a similar pattern to that at Rupert House with most of the Indian labour so engaged in the summer months. The major difference between the two posts was that Fort George was home, at various times, to the caribou hunters who up until the 1820s remained very much on the periphery of the fur trade, trad- DWINDLING ANIMALS 213 ing only some caribou hides for the most essential items. A combination of ecological factors, Hudson's Bay Companyjaanipulation and perhaps the gradual acceptability of European items of manufacture drew these caribou hunters more and more into the fur trade (see Morantz 1983a). To accom­ modate their increasing appetite for clothing, tobacco, and other items of European manufacture, many of these Cree alternated winters on the tun­ dra with winters in the more southerly forested regions where they could trap fox, marten and the occasional beaver. Others moved south after the caribou's fall migration and began trapping (Low 1896:51). While hunting the caribou herds on the tundra the Cree formed themselves into large hunt­ ing parties, perhaps as many as eleven hunters and their families. However, a winter hunting group of this size could not be supported in the forest re­ gions where small furbearers were being sought. Consequently, these Cree separated into several small family units for their southern economic activ­ ities, more closely resembling the composition of the Rupert House inland winter hunting groups. An indication of the availability of beaver in the Fort George region comes from the fur returns of 1854-1868 (Francis and Morantz 1983:148- 49). In 1858, the number of beaver pelts traded was 1,686 but declined to 937 the following year. This may not indicate a decrease in overall numbers (since in 1861 they were up to 1,155), but rather a preference by the Cree to ignore beaver hunting when caribou hunting was possible. In 1868, only 409 beaver pelts were taken in trade. What these numbers show is that beaver were available and trapped in the Fort George region but in fewer numbers than at Rupert House. Sickness was also a condition with which the Cree had to contend. In 1866 there were a number of deaths from some unnamed sickness. However, there is no mention of widespread, identifiable epidemics either because there were none or they occurred inland and were unknown to the trader and they simply were not recorded.

External Pressures After 1870 As we turn to the next period, 1870 to 1940, it will be seen that al­ though much remained the same some new elements were introduced. In the 1870s the Hudson's Bay Company shared James Bay and the Cree with only a few itinerant Anglican missionaries. Later, towards the end of the 19th century the Anglicans gained considerable influence, particularly at Fort George with the strict but respected Reverend William G. Wal­ ton who served there for 32 years. Although the Anglicans along with the Catholics, who arrived in the early 1920s, all played significant economic roles, these cannot be discussed here. One must keep in mind, though, 214 TOBY MORANTZ that the missionaries were also influencing the Cree in predictable ways (see Long 1986). The next intruders into James Bay were government surveyors. The first to arrive was Dr. Robert Bell in 1877 for the Geological Survey of Canada. A.P. Low arrived ten years later and made many return visits. They were followed in quick succession by geological survey teams from the United States and Canada. With the completion of the CPR rail line in 1886 to a location at a mere ten days travel from Moose Factory, access to James Bay was made easier. With completion of each of the later regional railways making James Bay more attractive, the Hudson's Bay Company was quick to see it as a threat to their economic monopoly (A. 74/40, 1925- 26). Although the improved accessibility brought benefits to the Crees in the form of competition and thus better fur and store prices, it also brought in destructive influences, particularly diseases. Their point of entry was Moose Factory. This post was the supply depot for the region and so the diseases spread rapidly and widely. European diseases were not new to the Crees but once outsiders started coming in regularly from the south rather than after a long ocean voyage during which the pathogens ran their course, the frequency of disease seems to have escalated. Rarely were posts along the coast immune, though sometimes inlanders escaped the effects by having already left for their hunting grounds inland. In 1884 a whooping cough epidemic struck and the next year a skin disease. In 1891 there was an influenza outbreak and in 1896 another epidemic of whooping cough, followed in 1898 by chicken pox from which 27 Crees died at Rupert House. Another 29 died at Fort George from a particularly severe outbreak of influenza in 1900. By 1902, the measles epidemic that came to Moose Factory from Temagami in late 1900 began to take its toll at Fort George and Rupert House — over 100 recorded deaths at the former and about 30 at the latter post. Influenza struck again in 1904 at Fort George killing three people and yet again in 1908 killing 20 at Rupert House. No figures are cited for the victims of tuberculosis though occasional references to deaths by this cause are found, as in 1921 (B. 77/a/57:95, Mar. 24). German measles, measles and chicken pox hit in 1918, 1919 and 1920. It seems as though the later measles outbreaks had less serious consequences for the Crees, but nevertheless each attack interfered with the hunting cycle. Usually the sicknesses befell the Cree in late summer when they were all encamped at the post and on through the fall, just in time to prevent them from laying up a store of dried geese or fish. More importantly, such an unrelenting series of devastating illnesses left them in a weakened physical and mental state. There was yet another assault on their physical well-being. In 1891, William Broughton, the Rupert House post manager, wrote of the great DWINDLING ANIMALS 215

scarcity of provisions in the district, a situation which had caused a number of deaths for distant hunting families. He goes on, though, to alert us to another compounding factor which has to do with the supplying of inland posts. Voyaging, as it was called, involved about 40 men each summer performing arduous labour for a round trip of about 50 days. Besides paddling upriver from dawn to dusk the men had to lug hundred-pound packs and canoes over the portages. Between Rupert House and Nichikun there were 71 portages (B. 186/b/28:43d, 1835). No wonder that Broughton reported the following:

The inland Indians are getting run down physically and are so injured by the voy­ aging that it becomes yearly more difficult to get them to go in the canoes, so much so, that practically a great portion of the transport is performed by coast Indians who even now have to some extent be brought from Eastmain and Fort George (B. 186/e/31, 1891)

In addition to disease the railroad, this time the CNR, brought in Euro- Canadians who set into motion other destructive forces. These were the white trappers. Although already active in the more southern colonized parts of Quebec and Ontario they began encroaching on the lands to the north in the 1920s. Harry Cartlidge, a missionary at Waswanipi, wrote a letter in 1927 on behalf of the chief to Indian Affairs. In it he complained that:

In recent years the Quebec Fisheries Ltd. of Senneterre have had large gangs of men working along the Nottoway River and Lake Mattagami and these men engage in trapping, more or less and have practically killed most of the fur bearing animals along these waterways. (RG 10 Vol. 6750,file 420-1 0 A, Oct. 29, 1927)

By 1929, two white trappers were reported by the Revillon Freres Com­ pany manager to be trapping in the Fort George district (RG 10 Vol. 6750, file 410-10 A. to Ind. Aff., Oct. 8, 1929) and in 1931 the Oblate mission­ ary at Moose Factory, Emile Saindon, complained to Indian Affairs that 14 white men with enough provisions for a year were in the Eastmain vicinity (Oct. 29, 1931). By then airplanes were used to fly in the men and to transport their provisions. In the Eastmain case the trappers were outfit­ ted by a merchant in Kapuskasing and expected to produce about $2,000 worth of furs each. This was during a period when the territory was al­ ready suffering from serious declines in all animals. With the completion of the rail line to Moose Factory in 1932, even more white trappers invaded the country. A cheerier addendum to this story is that in 1932 the Moose Factory Indians refused to assist in the transport of these white trappers' supplies (Ibid. Report by J.J. Wall, Ind. Agent, Moose Factory). 216 TOBY MORANTZ

Not only did the whites take the furs from Indians' hunting territories but they did so in ways highly foreign to the Cree and no doubt morally repugnant. As Chesterfield and others reported, these whites used poison to kill the animals. Some even dynamited the beaver houses and dams or used traps with cloth wrapped jaws that kept beavers captured in the summer and fall alive until the arrival of cold weather. Furthermore the whites systematically slaughtered all the animals, thereby cleaning out an area in one season. (Ibid. Memo to Ind. Aff. from Supervisor Indian Timber Lands, July 7, 1926). Cases of violence between whites and Indians were reported. The Province of Ontario responded to this situation by passing laws forbidding whites to trap beaver and otter in the province. The effect this had, according to Cartlidge, was that scores of these trappers moved over into Quebec. Beginning in the late 1920s, Quebec set aside hunting reserves starting with Abitibi, Grand Lac Victoria, St. Maurice, etc. but it took some time before game wardens fully enforced these restrictions on white trappers. Earlier provincial government restrictions on the hunting of large game, going back in the case of Quebec to the 1890s, did interfere with the Indians' traditional hunting stratgiess though these regulations were more easily enforced in the south of the province and therefore were less troublesome for the Crees (Ibid. Chipman, HBC Commissioner, June 12; Dec. 12, 1896). According to both government and Hudson's Bay Company officials, the Indians reacted to the uncontrolled slaughter of their animals by do­ ing the same. Thus, in 1927, J.J. Wall, Indian agent at Moose Factory commented with regard to white trappers and Ontario Indians encroaching on the lands of Quebec Indians that the latter have begun slaughtering the animals if they hear of strangers in the area (Ibid. June-Oct., 1927). J.S.C. Watt, the Hudson's Bay Company manager at Rupert House, made a similar observation in a letter to his district manager, dated Aug. 17, 1929:

I happened to ask the Indians, why, with so many old beaver houses on Ministok- watin there were no beaver at present. The answer was that nowadays the Indians do not respect each others hunting lands as formerly, and consequently kill every­ thing in sight, knowing that if they do not do so, some other Indians will come along and do so. (Watt Papers, Letter #40)

Watt then goes on to comment that up to about 20 years ago each Indian considered his hunting lands as his private property and handed them down to his family. Watt was then discovering the basis of the Cree traditional conservation system and later used this model as the foundation of the hunting preserves he was instrumental in establishing at Rupert House. The anthropologist, Father John Cooper, provided a similar analysis DWINDLING ANIMALS 217 in a 1933 report commissioned by Indian Affairs (RG 10 Vol. 8620 File 1/1- 15-15, Pt. 1) to explain the breakdown of the old system of conservation practiced within the family hunting ground system. However, he went further and writing of James Bay in particular, he suggested that this breakdown in the more remote areas resulted from a demoralization due to their extreme poverty for this was a time when, as he says, "the beaver are just not there". Frank J. Speck, also commented on the situation of the "Caucasian invasion" in a 1936 article (cited in Elton 1942) in which he urged that the government close the Quebec Peninsula to white trappers on the grounds that the quantity of game in the interior was too uncertain to support more than "a limited number of souls."

Failure of Animals

Ideally a discussion of the decline in animals should be accompanied by some form of quantification, but the figures are not there. Instead we must rely on the impressions of the traders and commentators like Low. The food and fur situation at each post will be summarized separately, as ecological conditions were not uniform throughout James Bay. Even for the regions contiguous to each post it is difficult to generalize about animal numbers because very often inlanders might be well off versus coasters or vice-versa. Among even the inlanders there was often disparity in the availability of resources since the territories involved were vast. At Fort George the resource that was historically most vital to the ma­ jority of the Crees was the caribou. It is known that this resource failed the Crees and the Inuit on the eastern James and Hudson Bay coasts about the turn of the century. Low, in his 1896 report, noted that caribou were formerly abundant on the coast as far south as Cape Jones (part of the Richmond Gulf-Clearwater Lake herd) but of late years were found only in small numbers north of Great Whale River (Low 1896:318). On the other hand, he found that inland at Nichikun the caribou were generally abun­ dant, but some years were scarce when periodically they failed to return to the wooded areas from the barrens. The explanation for the loss of the coastal herd was given by Flaherty. He proposed that the herd changed its migration to the eastern slope of the Ungava Peninsula (Flaherty 1918:454). Today this shift is more properly accounted for by a contracting of the herd. Low (1896:319) had earlier commented that many of the Hudson Bay Indi­ ans who lived on this herd migrated to Fort Chimo. According to entries in the Fort George journals, beginning in the early 1800s, the coasters were not always assured of finding caribou, and so some years caribou are reported as being scarce. Little is ever said of the avail­ ability of caribou for the inlanders since they came to the post only in the 218 TOBY MORANTZ summer. Therefore it is difficult to determine exactly when this general loss of caribou begins. In 1887 it was said that caribou were scarcely seen for several years and this was repeated in 1889. In 1891 and 1892 people in all directions were said to be starving because partridges and rabbits were scarce. In 1893 many caribou were found inland but the coasters required help from the post to get through the winter. As one continues through the journals we find that inlanders were sometimes getting caribou to the extent that they were neglecting their beaver trapping, as reported in 1903 (B. 77/a/50:57, June 29). Coasters did find them but less often, as at Paint Hills in 1907 (B. 77/a/52: Apr. 2). Although 29 caribou were reported taken at Great Whale River in 1930 (B. 135/a/196:46, Mar. 23), the comment made by the post manager circa 1900 seemed to hold. He said that "the deer have quite forsaken their haunts" (B. 77/b/8:8). A typical entry regarding the state of food resources once the caribou were gone is from Donald Gillies's undated report of either 1901 or 1902. He writes that: the past winter has again been a very hard one in this section. Rabbits continue very scarce. This much cripples the coast Indian. Partridges were very numerous on the coast to the North but inland and south of this they were very scarce. The fall goose hunts were fairly successful but the spring hunts turned out very poorly. The Indians report good signs of marten inland and I am also informed that there were more young birds partridges &c seen last spring than in the previous year. This augurs well for the coming winter and I expect that the inlanders at any rate may do well. We have again had sickness among our Indians influenza brought along by Mining Prospectors but though many have been very ill happily so far no hunters have died ... (B. 77/b/8:8).

There are oral history accounts regarding the loss of caribou by people from Fort George and Great Whale River who were born about the turn of the century. The Fort George people tell, as did George Pepabano, that by the time they were old enough to hunt, the caribou had disappeared (Tan­ ner collection 1977). The Great Whale River people, on the other hand, reported getting some caribou even when they were old enough to hunt, as John Kowapit did in about 1918 (Turner collection 1974). They had to travel far to get the caribou — Upper Seal Lake for example — and they often went without food. In these oral history accounts, such as by Emma Wesapo (Tanner collection 1977), it is clear that these inlanders, once the caribou disappeared, focused on ice fishing, shifting their camps often to travel from lake to lake. The other major food source was ptarmigan but these were not always obtainable. In really desperate times, in the hopes of keeping alive until food was found, people boiled lichens. It is difficult to assess the number of beavers for the Fort George region during the period since there are no fur return statistics for this period nor are there complete runs of the post records. Journals for the most DWINDLING ANIMALS 219 crucial years, in the 1920s, are either missing or very poor in data. It seems, though, that some level of beaver harvest was maintained up to 1941, although in that year the post manager commented that only 115 beaver were traded when there used to be from 500 to 600. We know from statistics for the period from 1854 to 1868 that numbers fluctuated from highs of 1,600 to lows of 400. This suggests that the inlanders probably never were heavily reliant on beaver, unlike caribou, and when the number of beaver dropped they were not so drastically affected as they would have been at Rupert House. Food resources, although on the whole poor inland, were never so consistently poor as for the coasters. However, people did starve to death. In 1932 it was reported that 17 people from Great Whale River died as a result of sickness and starvation (D. FTR/24). The Crees at Fort George relied on furs other than beaver to enable them to buy Hudson's Bay Company goods. Marten and fox were the two most common, but were also the most subject to high and low cycles. Other fur animals trapped were muskrats and, starting in the 1920s, minks. The most sought after fur in the early 1900s was the rare silver fox. Spurred on by competition the prices for them were high. In 1916 Revillon Freres was paying $200 for a prime pelt vs. the Hudson's Bay Company's $175. Relatively high prices continued into the 1920s with $132 being given for a silver fox compared to $9.00 for a cross fox, $10.00 for a beaver skin, $6.00 for a mink and $.75 for a muskrat (D. FTR/21:4, 1924). Accordingly, advances to the hunters were high. At Rupert House in 1915 it was said that Revillon Freres was advancing $300 to each hunter, while the Hudson's Bay Company was advancing $150. Compare these figurest o the $50.00 total that coasters were said to receive for their hunts in 1929 when foxes of all types were not plentiful (Watt Papers, Letter #40, Aug. 17, 1929). By 1938 when the Fort George records resumed after a 10-year hiatus, reports of muskrats, foxes and minks were good in most regions. Only beaver and marten continued to be down in number. Caribou was never a relatively stable food resource in the Rupert House region except for some hunters such as the Diamin family who hunted along the Nottoway River and had access to a small woodland herd based at Soscumica Lake (RG 10, Vol. 6754, file 420-10-4-NO-l 1, Oct. 4, 1948). In 1877 the number of beaver pelts traded at Rupert House was 2,300 (B. 186/a/99: June 25). In 1932, the number traded was 8 (Watt Papers, July 5). It was not a sudden decline but a gradual one. About 1907 one finds in the journals increasingly repeated references to poor fur hunts among the inlanders. Unfortunately there is little direct comment on beaver, but one can assume beaver is very much in the mind of Watt, the post manager, when he commented in 1929 that the inlanders made the poorest fur hunt on record (July 26). In 1934 beaver were said to be at an all time low 220 TOBY MORANTZ

(D. FTR/27). Beaver was a major food source for the inlanders and they suffered. For instance, three starved to death at Neoskeweskau in 1933 (D. FTR/25:11). The years 1929-1932 were considered by the Hudson's Bay Company to have seen a drastic decline in country food. The year 1938 was considered another particularly bad year (B.186/a/112:29, Dec. 31). However, by 1940, the Crees at Rupert House were beginning to harvest beaver from the reserves and living conditions began to improve for them. By contrast, it was a surprise to find in the Waswanipi records for the early 1900s (B. 227/a/55-68, 1907-1940) that the Crees there were periodically living off moose and bear. Yet, in the previous century when other Crees were subsisting on caribou or beaver the Waswanipi people were said to have a diet offish and hare only, as in 1835 (B. 227/e/12:l). The scarcity of furs had devastating effects since it meant the hunter could obtain fewer manufactured goods. But often these scarce conditions were further aggravated by other factors. For instance, World War I caused a slump in the fur market and fur prices dropped in 1915, thereby re­ ducing the purchasing abilities of the Crees. As a result the Hudson's Bay Company complained that Indians were not bothering to look for furs (D. FTR/3, 1915). In 1932 when there was a serious shortage of all ani­ mals, fur values coincidentally also decreased and the Company lowered its advances (D. FTR/24, 1932), thereby further exacerbating an already poor situation.

Other Factors

It is generally true that only inlanders, or those Crees far removed from the post, starved to death. Those nearby managed to survive for several reasons. One reason is employment at the post. The coasters had always worked for the post. They performed outside labour, but in the 1700s and 1800s it was generally confined to summer work. Provisioning of the post in the winter was in earlier times carried out by widows or old men whose families had left them at the post for the winter months. It is doubtful if there was a sudden change, but in the 1870s in the Rupert House journals there seems to be an increased number of references to Indian labour reported as having been utilized throughout the year. At Fort George, Inuit labour began to be drawn in, and there was also increased Indian involvement in work around the post. At Rupert House, in the winter months, hunters, not women, brought in food. Starting in March they also worked at sawing lumber and cutting firewood, in April cutting pickets, in May hauling firewood and making a road and so on. On one day in April of 1880 (B. 186/a/100:4d, Apr. 16) there were 14 hunters working at the post. It was a year in which it was recorded there were no DWINDLING ANIMALS 221 rabbits, ptarmigan or fish. They were paid in flouran d other foodstuffs. Prior to about 1838 flouro r oatmeal had never been a sale item at the Company's stores (B. 186/b/36:10d). If the coasters were unable to find game in the spring period leading up to the goose hunt, the Company provided them with rations. They recognized that the Indians were on the coast to undertake the goose hunt for them. Otherwise they would be inland where they could secure more food. Thus there was a changeover from the Company giving out limited handouts to the Company demanding something immediate in return. It also seems as though the Company was reducing its permanent European labour force by using casual Indian labour as it needed it. Before this period the Company servants cut the firewood and sawed the lumber, netted their own ptarmigan and fished for themselves, as in 1790 (B. 59/a/66:26-28). It also may be that coaster interest in performing a kind of wage labour coincided with reduced food supplies on the coast. Another employer of Cree labour was the missions, with their schools and hospitals as at Fort George, plus the other traders, the Revillon Freres Company and independent traders. Thus, this was one way the coasters survived on the coast — by exploit­ ing the Hudson's Bay Company food resources in what ways they could. Another way was through relief issued by the Company (or companies) but paid for by the Department of Indian Affairs. It is first mentioned in the 1892-93 journal when it is said that Indian Affairs heard of the great desti­ tution and decided to give assistance. In May, 1906, Rupert House received $362 in relief and Fort George, $330 (RG 10, Vol. 3708, File 19,502, June 7, 1906). In 1911 Rupert House received $948 and Fort George $679. By 1913 these amounts had risen to $2,478 and $2,093 (RG 10, Vol. 3174, File 432, 659, List of Relief Payments, Nov. 27, 1913). In 1933, it was reported that the government "only now was beginning to recognize the intensity of the Indian's plight and now was increasing the amount of relief though they have suffered for the past three years" (D. FTR/25, 1933). For the first time the government also dispensed clothing and tenting. Another form of outlay to the hunters was, of course, the advances made by the fur traders. In 1924 the district manager, George Ray, strongly supported the advances even though there would not be immediate returns. He saw the debt system as a means of keeping the Indians alive during the lean years and for which the Company would be reimbursed in the fat years. He felt it was an easier system to manage than one based on gratuities (D. FTR/19:341, Oct 24.) These advances were already high compared to the fur returns. The Hudson's Bay Company was in competition with the Revillon Freres Company who had established themselves in James Bay in 1903. However, in 1926, the two companies came to a kind of less competitive working arrangement, and in 1932 the Hudson's Bay Company 222 TOBY MORANTZ was said to have curtailed advances (D. FTR/24). Although in subsequent years hunters did receive credit, we must assume these were drastically reduced amounts owing to the end of a lively competition and the depressed fur market.

Discussion The changed conditions for the coasters seem to have affected their subsistence practices. With the possibility of some form of wage labour and of relief it seems that many coasters incorporated these alternative food sources into their hunting strategies. Having experienced hunger and death and having alternatives, it is not surprising that many chose the safer path — near the post. In 1902, the post manager of Fort George lamented that the coasters "seem to have utterly lost the energy and self- reliance so characteristic of the upland hunters" (B. 77/b/8: 158, 1902). Similarly at Rupert House Watt found in 1929 that "the fear of starvation prevents the coast Indians from going far inland" (Watt Papers, Letter #40, Aug. 17, 1929). Moreover, many coasters were said to be poor fur hunters (B. 77/b/8:138, 1903). On several occasions the Company traders mentioned that they tried to get the most promising and industrious coasters to go inland in the hope that in time they might make steady hunts This does not seem to have happened — certainly not on any significant scale. In one case when a Fort George hunter wintered with a group of inlanders they all starved and were forced to boil and eat some 200 made beaver of furs they collected (B. 77/b/8:138, 1903). Gillies, the manager, does not say but one could imagine this coaster did not return inland the next winter. The Company was anxious to reduce the number of coasters since they were responsible for about 70% of the outstanding debt. Ray, the district manager in 1921, commented how it would make sense to encourage these coasters to shift their locale. However, experience had taught Ray that "the coasters are quite useless in the bush" because the hunting grounds would be "strange" to him. Ray saw some benefits to the Company since the "coaster's precarious life makes him less independent and more amenable to discipline. Consequently it is they who do nine-tenths of the inland voyaging" (D. FTR/13:182, 1921). Three years later Ray seems to have taken a harder line for he sounds critical of those Cree trading at Great Whale River. He writes in his report of 1924:

Because they once went to a certain point in search of country food and found none they assume they never willfind any . This is the Native character. They live almost entirely on imported food instead of learning to live on the country. They must be taught differently. (D. FTR/19:339,1924) DWINDLING ANIMALS 223

A return to a more intensive hunting lifestyle by many coasters at both posts did occur, following the successful operations of the beaver preserves. This is a long story in itself. In brief, in an attempt to respond to the poverty of the Crees at Rupert House, Watt, the post manager there, de­ vised a scheme for a beaver sanctuary north of the Rupert River for which he gained the support of the Cree hunters. This sanctuary was granted by the Quebec government in 1932 to regulate hunting over the territory. Beaver hunting was to be closed until such time as the numbers increased. Cree guardians were hired at $100 per annum to enforce the regulations. A further beaver preserve, called the Nottoway, was set up south of the river in 1937, also with guardians. By 1942 the system had been refined. Hunt­ ing territories were assigned based, as they said, on traditional territories. The head of the hunting group for each territory was made a "tallyman" and required to enforce the regulations and survey the houses. By 1945 the system had turned into a registered trapline in which each territory was registered (RG 10 Vol. 6752, file420-10-1-3 , Nottoway Preserve, 1947 Report). In 1942 the Old Factory reserve was established encompassing some of the lands of Fort George hunters. The increase of beaver on these preserves was dramatic. In 1933, there were 162 beaver reported on the Rupert's House Beaver Sanctuary which increased to 1,545 by 1937. (RG 10 Vol. 6754, file420-10-4-1 , Pt. 1, Chart). In 1940 the Rupert House people were allowed to begin hunting small numbers of beaver (Pt. 2, to Tyrer, Moose Factory from Watt, Rupert House, Dec. 8, 1939) and each year this quota was increased until it reached the maximum carrying capacity. Not until 1946 did trapping begin over the Nottoway Preserve (RG 10 Vol. 6755, file 420-10-4-1, Pt. 4, to Allan from Denmark, Aug. 15, 1946) and the Old Factory Preserve. Although living conditions in the 20th century did not change as dra­ matically for the inlanders as the coasters, nevertheless they did change. Rupert George, a Great Whale River Cree, commented that in his father's day the hunters came to the post only once a year (Turner collection 1974). Since he was born in 1895 it is evident that this had changed by the time he was hunting (circa 1913). The Revillon Freres Company arrived in James Bay in 1903, and by 1904 "tripping" had begun. Tripping was the mid­ winter supply to the Indians' camps provided by the companies using dog teams often manned by Inuit. It also referred to the Company's sending out of dog teams in the spring or canoes in the summer to transport the furs. If news travelled to Fort George of a silver fox in someone's camp then often the companies' teams raced each other to get there first. By 1909 the Fort George manager was complaining of the difficulty of get­ ting the inlanders off to their hunting grounds as now he was expected to take their supplies upriver by canoe. Although the Revillon Freres and 224 TOBY MORANTZ

Hudson's Bay Companies came to a business arrangement in 1926 and the Revillon Freres Company ceased operations in 1936, this mid-winter supply was continued. Presumably it had become vital to the inlanders' hunting strategies. The dependence on or expectation of a mid-winter supply is the likely explanation for the opening of inland posts, such as Kanaaupscow in 1921. Tripping never got started at Rupert House because competition was not keen there. The Revillon Freres were said to have used their store at Rupert House more as a supply depot for their inland post at Nemaska (D. FTR/5, 1916). However, the inlanders of Rupert House developed the practice of coming to the post at Christmas to resupply themselves and at the same time participate in the religious and social activities associated with the season.

Conclusions

This study of the game shortage period, based on archival records, corroborates much of Tanner's analysis that he drew from oral history ac­ counts, with some help from published sources. Both our studies agree as to the time period for the disappearance of the caribou in the Fort George region and the changed food resources. Tanner (1978:151) also shows that some inlanders moved even further inland during this difficult period. Such information could not be corroborated in the records of Fort George and would require a study of inland post records such as Fort McKenzie and Nichikun to see if during the starvation period, moreso than before, people moved further inland. What is in the Fort George records is a clear indica­ tion of a movement closer to the post and a reliance on it by the coasters. It seems also from increased references to hunters at the post that the coaster population must have grown in relation to the inlander population. Tan­ ner (1978:158) points this out using Desy's figureso f coasters making up two-thirds of the band in the 1960s vs. Morantz's figures of two-fifths in the mid-1800s, but the actual numbers, broken down into coasters and in­ landers, are not given. Even the inlander population at both posts moved closer to the post in the sense that they became much more reliant on it and visited it or were visited by it several times a year. This mid-winter supply likely also put limits on the distances from the post that Crees hunted. The one detail in Tanner's paper that needs correcting is that the mid­ winter supply arose out of necessity during the starvation period. It was maintained because of these conditions but it had been introduced for an­ other reason — competition with the Revillon Freres Company. As for the findingso f this study there are several that are worth high­ lighting. One important one is that during this period a part of the Cree DWINDLING ANIMALS 225 coaster population seem to have become truly trappers in Leacock's (1954) sense of producing for exchange purposes. Their subsistence pursuits seem to have been of minor consequence and subordinate to trapping for ex­ change. Another finding is that although the late 1920s and early 1930s were extremely depressed times for food and furs, they probably hit the Crees of this century harder than they would have their ancestors of 100 or 200 years ago. This is because many coastal Crees had almost abandoned hunting and lacked the skills to move further inland where they were more likely to find game than on the coast. Wage labour and relief payments had undermined their independence and were the causes of this reduced abil­ ity to hunt. Probable other causes that affected the inlanders, too, were their weakened physical state after an almost unrelenting series of diseases and perhaps a "demoralization", as Father Cooper called it, caused by the sickness and starvation they endured. The effects of the white trappers' assault on their animals and the government regulations undermining their control of their own territories should also be considered. One cannot help but wonder how the Fort George Crees coped psychologically and perhaps even spiritually with having had to switch from the chase of the caribou to the more mundane activity of fishing. The same might be asked of the Rupert House Crees who lost the hunting of beaver and all its attendant social and religious rituals. This study has also demonstrated that although the James Bay region is home to nine bands of Crees, one must be cautious not to generalize. Two coastal bands, Rupert House and Fort George, were shown historically to have exploited varying subsistence bases and to have experienced somewhat different historic processes. In trying to sort out what kind of social and economic accommodations or adjustments the Crees made to their changed subsistence bases, the oral history accounts were found to be far more informative than the fur trade and government reports. Thus this paper has also demonstrated that oral history and documented history are not competing or contradictory reserves of historic data but complementary and essential to telling the full story.1

JI am grateful to the Governor and Committee of the Hudson's Bay Company for their permission to consult and quote from their archives on deposit at the Provincial Archives of Manitoba. I also appreciate the help from the staff of the Hudson's Bay Company Archives in locating some of these records. 226 TOBY MORANTZ

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Long, John S. 1986 "Shaganash": Early Protestant Missionaries and the Adoption of Chris­ tianity by the Western James Bay Cree, 1840-1893. Ph.D. thesis, Univer­ sity of Toronto.

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Morantz, Toby 1983a "Not Annuall Visitors" — The Drawing in to Trade of Northern Algo­ nquian Caribou Hunters. Pp. 57-74 in Actes du Quatorzieme congres des Algonquinistes. William Cowan, ed. Ottawa: Carleton University.

1983b An Ethnohistoric Study of Eastern James Bay Cree Social Organization, 1700-1850. Ottawa: Canadian Museum of Civilization. Canadian Eth­ nology Service Paper 88. Ottawa.

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Scott Collection 1977 Oral history accounts recorded by Colin Scott at Wemindji, James Bay. On deposit at the National Museum of Man, Ottawa and the Cree Re­ gional Authority, Val d'Or.

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Tanner Collection 1977 Oral history accounts recorded by Adrian Tanner at Fort George, James Bay. On deposit at the Ministere des Affaires culturelles, Quebec and the Cree Regional Authority, Val d'Or.

Traversy, Normand 1977 Etude du castor a la baie James. Pp. 569-94 in Environnement-Baie James-Symposium. Montreal: Societe de developpement de la baie James.

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Watt Papers Correspondence and Reports of James S. C. Watt. Ontario Public Archives 228

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