The Sipekne'katik First Nation is composed of four Mi'kmaq First Nation reserves located in central Nova Scotia. As of 2012, the Mi'kmaq population is 1,195 on-Reserve, and approximately 1,190 off-Reserve. [1] The First Nation includes Indian Brook 14, Nova Scotia, near Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia. The band was known as the Shubenacadie First Nation until 2014 when the traditional spelling and pronunciation of its name was officially adopted. [2]
In Canada, the First Nations are the predominant indigenous peoples in Canada south of the Arctic Circle. Those in the Arctic area are distinct and known as Inuit. The Métis, another distinct ethnicity, developed after European contact and relations primarily between First Nations people and Europeans. There are 634 recognized First Nations governments or bands spread across Canada, roughly half of which are in the provinces of Ontario and British Columbia.
In Canada, an Indian reserve is specified by the Indian Act as a "tract of land, the legal title to which is vested in Her Majesty, that has been set apart by Her Majesty for the use and benefit of a band."
Father Louis-Pierre Thury sought to gather the Mi'kmaq of the Nova Scotia peninsula into a single settlement around Shubenacadie as early as 1699. [3] Not until Dummer's War, however, did Antoine Gaulin, a Quebec-born missionary, erect a permanent mission at Shubenacadie (adjacent to Snides Lake and close to the former Residential school). He also make seasonal trips to Cape Sable, LaHave, and Mirlegueche. [4]
Louis-Pierre Thury was a French missionary who was sent to North America during the time of King William's War. He was a liaison between the French and their Native American allies during the course of the conflict, and died soon after it ended.
The Nova Scotia peninsula is a peninsula on the Atlantic coast of North America.
The Dummer's War was a series of battles between New England and the Wabanaki Confederacy who were allied with New France. The eastern theater of the war was fought primarily along the border between New England and Acadia in Maine, as well as in Nova Scotia; the western theater was fought in northern Massachusetts and Vermont at the border between Canada and New England.
The Shubenacadie mission's dedication to Saint Anne speaks to a spirit of accommodation on the part of both the French and the Mi'kmaq. Anne, traditionally identified as the mother of Mary, was the grandmother of Jesus himself. The esteemed position of grandmothers in Mi'kmaw society was a point of agreement between Roman Catholicism and the Mi'kmaw worldview, and highlights the complexity and contingency of the 'conversion' process. [4]
In 1738, Father Jean-Louis Le Loutre arrived in October of that year at Mission Sainte-Anne, having spent the previous winter in Cape Breton learning the Mi'kmaw language with Abbé Pierre Maillard. During Father Rale's War and King George's War, Mission Sainte-Anne was a sort of military base along with being a place of worship. Coulon de Villiers' hardy troop passed this way on their brutal mid-winter march toward the Battle of Grand Pré in 1747, and Mi'kmaw warriors used the site as a staging point for their attacks on Halifax and Dartmouth during Father Le Loutre's War. [4] During Father Le Loutre's War, Captain Matthew Floyer arrived at the Mission on August 18, 1754 and recorded:
Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre was a Catholic priest and missionary for the Paris Foreign Missions Society. Le Loutre became the leader of the French forces and the Acadian and Mi'kmaq militias during King George's War and Father Le Loutre’s War in the eighteenth-century struggle for power between the French, Acadians, and Mi'kmaq against the British over Acadia.
King George's War (1744–1748) is the name given to the military operations in North America that formed part of the War of the Austrian Succession (1740–1748). It was the third of the four French and Indian Wars. It took place primarily in the British provinces of New York, Massachusetts Bay, New Hampshire, and Nova Scotia. Its most significant action was an expedition organized by Massachusetts Governor William Shirley that besieged and ultimately captured the French fortress of Louisbourg, on Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia, in 1745. In French, it is known as the Troisième Guerre Intercoloniale or Third Intercolonial War.
The Battle of Grand Pré, also known as the Battle of Minas and the Grand Pré Massacre, was a battle in King George's War that took place between New England forces and Canadian, Mi'kmaq and Acadian forces at present-day Grand-Pré, Nova Scotia in the winter of 1747 during the War of the Austrian Succession. The New England forces were contained to Annapolis Royal and wanted to secure the head of the Bay of Fundy. Led by Nicolas Antoine II Coulon de Villiers and Louis de la Corne, Chevalier de la Corne under orders from Jean-Baptiste Nicolas Roch de Ramezay, the French forces surprised and defeated a force of British troops, Massachusetts militia and rangers that were quartered in the village.
Floyer's map, which accompanied his written report, suggests the presence of three structures at the mission site.
Twelve months later, the Expulsion of the Acadians began during the French and Indian War and by October 1755, Mission Sainte-Anne appears to have been destroyed. Oral tradition says the Mi'kmaq destroyed the mission to prevent it from falling into the New Englanders possession and dumped it into Snides Lake, which was adjacent to the mission. [5]
The Expulsion of the Acadians, also known as the Great Upheaval, the Great Expulsion, the Great Deportation and Le Grand Dérangement, was the forced removal by the British of the Acadian people from the present day Canadian Maritime provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island — parts of an area also known as Acadia. The Expulsion (1755–1764) occurred during the French and Indian War and was part of the British military campaign against New France. The British first deported Acadians to the Thirteen Colonies, and after 1758, transported additional Acadians to Britain and France. In all, of the 14,100 Acadians in the region, approximately 11,500 Acadians were deported. A census of 1764 indicates that 2,600 Acadians remained in the colony, presumably having eluded capture.
The French and Indian War (1754–1763) pitted the colonies of British America against those of New France, each side supported by military units from the parent country and by American Indian allies. At the start of the war, the French colonies had a population of roughly 60,000 settlers, compared with 2 million in the British colonies. The outnumbered French particularly depended on the Indians.
The reserve was established by Governor Michael Francklin in 1779. [6]
Michael Francklin or Franklin served as Nova Scotia's Lieutenant Governor from 1766-1772. He is buried in the crypt of St. Paul's Church (Halifax).
Sipekne'katik is composed of five parts as shown:
Community | Area | Location | Population [7] | Date established |
---|---|---|---|---|
Indian Brook 14 | 1,234.2 hectares (3,050 acres) | 28.8 km. southwest of Truro | 1,084 | July 8, 1820 |
New Ross 20 | 408.3 hectares (1,009 acres) | 64 km. northwest of Halifax | 0 | March 3, 1820 |
Pennal 19 | 43.5 hectares (107 acres) | 67.2 km. northwest of Halifax | 22 | March 3, 1754 |
Shubenacadie 13 | 412 hectares (1,020 acres) | 32 km. north of Halifax | 0 | March 3, 1999 |
Wallace Hills 14A | 54.8 hectares (135 acres) | 19 km. northwest of Halifax | 10 | March 10, 2011 |
Shubenacadie is a community located in Hants County, in central Nova Scotia, Canada. As of 2006, the population was 2074.
The Acadians are the descendants of the French settlers, and sometimes the Indigenous peoples, of parts of Acadia in the northeastern region of North America comprising what is now the Canadian Maritime Provinces of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island, a Gaspé, in Quebec, and to the Kennebec River in southern Maine.
Indian Brook 14 is a Mi'kmaq reserve located in Hants County, Nova Scotia. In the 2016 Census, the reserve has 1,089 residents.
Abbé Pierre Antoine Simon Maillard was a French-born Roman Catholic priest. He is noted for his contributions to the creation of a writing system for the Mi'kmaq indigenous people of Île Royale, Cape Breton Island, Canada. He is also credited with helping negotiate a peace treaty between the British and Mi'kmaq people, which resulted in the Burying the Hatchet Ceremony. He was the first Catholic priest in Halifax and is buried in the St. Peter's Cemetery in downtown Halifax.
The Siege of Annapolis Royal in 1744 involved two of four attempts by the French, along with their Acadian and native allies, to regain the capital of Nova Scotia/Acadia, Annapolis Royal, during King George's War. The Siege is noted for Governor of Nova Scotia Paul Mascarene successfully defending the last British outpost in the colony and for the first arrival of New England Ranger John Gorham to Nova Scotia. The French and Mi'kmaq land forces were thwarted on both attempts on the capital because of the failure of French naval support to arrive.
The Raid on Lunenburg occurred during the French and Indian War when Mi'kmaw fighters attacked a British settlement at Lunenburg, Nova Scotia on May 8, 1756. The native militia raided two islands on the northern outskirts of the fortified Township of Lunenburg, [John] Rous Island and Payzant Island. According to French reports, the Mi'kmaq killed twenty settlers and took five prisoners. This raid was the first of nine the Natives and Acadians would conduct against the peninsula over a three-year period during the war. The Wabanaki Confederacy took John Payzant and Lewis Payzant prisoner, both of whom left a written account of their experience.
The Siege of Grand-Pré happened during Father Le Loutre’s War and was fought between the British and the Wabanaki Confederacy and Acadian militia. The siege happened at Fort Vieux Logis, Grand-Pré. The native and Acadia militia laid siege to Fort Vieux Logis for a week in November 1749. One historian states that the intent of the siege was to help facilitate the Acadian Exodus from the region.
The Battle at Chignecto happened during Father Le Loutre's War and was fought by 700 troops made up of British regulars led by Charles Lawrence, Horatio Gates, Rangers led by John Gorham and Captain John Rous led the navy. This battle was the first attempt by the New Englanders to occupy the head of the Bay of Fundy since the disastrous Battle of Grand Pré three years earlier. They fought against a militia made up of Mi'kmaq and Acadians led by Jean-Louis Le Loutre and Joseph Broussard (Beausoliel). The battle happened at Isthmus of Chignecto, Nova Scotia on 3 September 1750.
Jean Baptiste Cope was also known as Major Cope, a title he was probably given from the French military, the highest rank given to Mi’kmaq. Cope was the sakamaw (chief) of the Mi'kmaq people of Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia. He maintained close ties with the Acadians along the Bay of Fundy, speaking French and being Catholic. During Father Le Loutre’s War, Cope participated in both military efforts to resist the British and also efforts to create peace with the British. During the French and Indian War he was at Miramichi, New Brunswick, where he is presumed to have died during the war. Cope is perhaps best known for signing the Treaty of 1752 with the British, which was upheld in the Supreme Court of Canada in 1985 and is celebrated every year along with other treaties on Treaty Day.
The Attack at Mocodome occurred during Father Le Loutre's War on February 21, 1753, when two English died and six Mi'kmaq. The battle ended any hope for the survival of the Treaty of 1752 signed by Governor Hobson and chief Jean-Baptiste Cope.
Nova Scotia is a Canadian province located in Canada's Maritimes. The region was initially occupied by Mi'kmaq. During the first 150 years of European settlement, the colony was primarily made up of Catholic Acadians, Maliseet and Mi'kmaq. During the latter seventy-five years of this time period, there were six colonial wars that took place in Nova Scotia. After agreeing to several peace treaties, this long period of warfare ended with the Burial of the Hatchet Ceremony between the British and the Mi'kmaq (1761) and two years later when the British defeated the French in North America (1763). During these wars, Acadians, Mi'kmaq and Maliseet from the region fought to protect the border of Acadia from New England. They fought the war on two fronts: the southern border of Acadia, which New France defined as the Kennebec River in southern Maine. The other front was in Nova Scotia and involved preventing New Englanders from taking the capital of Acadia, Port Royal, establishing themselves at Canso.
The Attack at Jeddore (Isidore) happened on April 21, 1753 off Jeddore, Nova Scotia during Father Le Loutre's War. The Mi'kmaq killed nine of the British delegates and spared the life of the French-speaking translator Anthony Casteel, who wrote one of the few Captivity narratives that exist from Acadia and Nova Scotia.
Treaty Day is celebrated by Nova Scotians annually on October 1 in recognition of the Treaties signed between the British Empire and the Mi'kmaq people. The first treaty was signed in 1725 after Father Rale's War. The final Halifax Treaties of 1760-61, marked the end of 75 years of regular warfare between the Mi'kmaq and the British. The treaty making process of 1760-61, ended with the Halifax Treaties (1760-1761).
The Treaty of 1752 was a treaty signed between the Mi'kmaq people of Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia and the governor of Nova Scotia on October 1, 1752 during Father Le Loutre's War. The treaty was created by Edward Cornwallis and later signed by Jean-Baptiste Cope and Governor Peregrine Hopson. Cornwallis was at the signing at Cope's request.
St. Aspinquid’s Chapel was established by Priest Louis-Pierre Thury at Chebucto in the late 17th century. The chapel is a natural stone amphitheatre located by Chain Rock Battery on the Northwest Arm at Point Pleasant Park. There are numerous notable people interred in the burial grounds around the chapel and it is also the location of the Mi’kmaq celebration of the Feast of St. Aspinquid, which was conducted through much of the 18th century. During the French and Indian War two Mi'kmaw chiefs fought each other in a battle near the Chapel (1760).
John Hamilton was a British army officer of the 40th Regiment of Foot who fought in both King George's War and Father Le Loutre's War. He was eventually captured by a Mi'kmaq militia. He was an important prize for the Mi'kmaq because of his connections with the Nova Scotia establishment, his father and father-in-law being members of the Nova Scotia Council. He was also an artist and attempted to negogiate peace between the Mi'kmaq and British.
The Miꞌkmaq–Nova Scotia–Canada Tripartite Forum was established in 1997 to provide the Miꞌkmaq, Nova Scotia and Canada a place to resolve issues of mutual concern. The Forum's vision is to develop Mi'kmaw communities and foster positive relationships with other Nova Scotians.