Current ads
Jobs
Tenders
Notices
General

Click below

July 28, 2006

Taissumani: A Day in Arctic History
July 30, 1820 — Akaitcho and John Franklin, A Meeting of Two Chiefs

KENN HARPER

Akaitcho, the great chief of the Yellowknives, with one of his children.

---

Having sailed to York Factory on Hudson Bay, they continued on to Cumberland House, a Hudson’s Bay Company post, where they spent part of the winter. Franklin and Back left on snowshoes in January for Fort Chipewyan. The other two followed later in the spring with supplies. In July, once the parties were reunited, they proceeded down the Slave River and across Great Slave Lake to Fort Providence, a North West Co. post. The manager there recruited Indians to guide Franklin and his party to the Coppermine River, as well as to hunt for them.

The Indians in question were the Yellowknives, a north-western band of Chipewyan. Franklin called them the Copper Indians. They ranged from the east arm of Great Slave Lake to the Coppermine River, along the shores of which copper was said to exist. Both names by which the tribe was known derived from the alleged presence of this metal.

On July 30, 1820, the leader of the largest band of Yellowknives arrived at Fort Providence to meet John Franklin, whom he had agreed to assist. This was Akaitcho — the name means “Big Foot” in the Athapaskan language — and he led a group comprising about forty men and boys. (Curiously the number of females is not mentioned.)

His arrival was designed to impress. Franklin recorded it this way: “On landing at the fort, the chief assumed a very grave aspect, and walked... with a measured and dignified step, looking neither to the right nor to the left... but preserved the same immoveability of countenance until he reached the hall, and was introduced to the officers. When he had smoked his pipe, drank a small portion of spirits and water himself, and issued a glass to each of his companions, who had seated themselves on the floor, he commenced his harangue, by mentioning the circumstances that led to his agreeing to accompany the Expedition... He was rejoiced... to see such great chiefs on his lands, his tribe were poor, but they loved the white men who had been their benefactors; and he hoped that our visit would be productive of much good to them.”

The neighbouring Dogrib and Hare Indians feared Akaitcho. He was a “fierce and aggressive leader” who had driven them from parts of their traditional hunting range, stolen furs and women, and on occasion murdered them.

Franklin was to learn that Akaitcho was stubborn and unyielding where the interests of his tribe were concerned. Once the journey was underway, Akaitcho resisted suggestions that they should reach the Arctic coast that season, and as a result the party wintered at Fort Enterprise.

But the following year, when Franklin’s depleted and starving party straggled back from the Arctic coast, Akaitcho showed them the “utmost tenderness.” Franklin said that he “shewd us the most friendly hospitality and all sorts of personal attention, even to cooking for us with his own hands, an office he never performs for himself.”

In 1821, the North West Co. and the Hudson’s Bay Company merged and two years later the trading post at Fort Providence closed. The influence of Akaitcho diminished rapidly, for he had now to trade into Fort Resolution, where trade was dominated by other Chipewyans. At about this time, the Dogribs massacred a group of 34 Yellowknives, 30 of them women and children.

As a result, Akaitcho refused to join Franklin’s second expedition, to Great Bear Lake, sending word that he would not go into the land where his relatives had died “lest we should attempt to renew the war.” But he rendered essential assistance to a later expedition under George Back at Fort Reliance. Back wrote that “during this appalling period of suffering and calamity, Akaitcho proved himself the firm friend of the expedition.”

Back even reported a speech given by Akaitcho.

“It is true that both the Yellowknives and Chipewyans, whom I look upon as one nation, have felt the fatal severities of this unusual winter,” he said. “But the Great Chief trusts to us; and it is better that ten Indians should perish than that one white man should suffer through our negligence and breach of faith.” But even Back remarked that the man’s authority was much reduced and that he was in poor health.

Akaitcho died in 1838 and is buried on an island in Yellowknife Bay.

Taissumani: A Day in Arctic History recounts a specific event of historic interest, whose anniversary is in the coming week. Kenn Harper is a historian, writer and linguist who lives in Iqaluit. Feedback? Send your comments and questions to kennharper@hotmail.com.

July 21, 2006

Taissumani: A Day in Arctic History
July 22, 1755 - Massacre at Knapp's Bay

KENN HARPER

The west coast of Hudson Bay north of Churchill, what we know today as the Kivalliq or Keewatin, was largely Chipewyan Indian territory 300 years ago.

The Chipewyans spent their winters in the boreal forest but followed the caribou herds north of the tree line in the summer, possibly right to the Arctic coast. A group of Inuit — probably numbering between 100 and 200 — migrated from Coronation Gulf far to the west — the Kugluktuk area — to the vicinity of Chesterfield Inlet between 1650 and 1715. Some scientists surmise that, en route, they spent several generations on an upper arm of the Thelon River, a wooded area. If so, their new coastal home on Hudson Bay would have been a marked change from what they were used to.

The move brought the Inuit onto a coast that was seasonally Chipewyan territory. (Inuit had lived as far south as Churchill between 1200 and about 1450, but had withdrawn far to the north by 1500 as a result of a deteriorating climate.)

By the early years of the eighteenth century, there was a third group involved in the southern part of this area. In 1717, the Hudson’s Bay Company had established a post at Churchill and quickly established trade relations with the “Northern Indians” and the “Southern Indians,” their names for the Chipewyan and the Cree.

The very next year the HBC began sending trading vessels north along the coast during the summer, to trade with the Inuit at Whale Cove and a little to the south at Knapp’s Bay. They wanted to learn more about the potential for trade with the Inuit, and to entice them south to trade at Churchill.

But the Inuit resisted the suggestion, probably in fear of the Chipewyans. Company officials, too, questioned the policy, writing to London, “...we think there may be danger in drawing them to Ascomay Point [Churchill River]... while so mortal an enmity is subsisting between them and the Northern Indians.” So in 1739 the Bay changed its tactic — it would trade each summer by ship as far north as the ice would permit.

The Chipewyans resented the actions of these two groups of newcomers — the British and the Inuit — in what they viewed as their territory. They saw the British policy as favouritism. The Chipewyan had to travel over great distances to trade at Churchill, while the Inuit had only to remain in their camps and the floating trading posts would come to them.

In 1755, John Bean, captain of the sloop, Churchill, traded with Inuit at Knapp’s Bay and reported them “very kind and courteous.” He provided them with awls, needles, files, hatchets, tin pots and ice chisels and in return they gave him blubber and baleen as well as five wolf pelts and two fox skins.

While John Bean had been guiding his ship northward, a group of Chipewyan had been travelling south on foot, bound for Churchill to trade. When they saw the vessel, they sent up a smoke signal, but Bean realized that it was a Chipewyan signal and ignored it. His instructions were to trade only with Inuit on the coast.

The Chipewyans were incensed. They reversed their course and followed the vessel along the coast to Knapp’s Bay. Unseen by the Inuit and the British, they watched the trading until the vessel left. Then they waited until everyone was asleep in their tents, and attacked. They killed between 16 and 18 people. They kept one young woman alive, but when she escaped, they tracked her to a shallow pool where she was hiding, and “shot her instantly in the water.”

Hudson’s Bay Company records distinguish between “Home Indians” and “Away Indians.” The Home Indians lived at or near the trading posts and the company employed them as interpreters, hunters and labourers. They learned English and the dialects of any aboriginal neighbours, and became familiar with company trading methods and policies. “Away Indians” lived far from the posts, were more traditional hunters and less familiar with the ways of the white men. The massacre at Knapp’s Bay was undoubtedly the work of “Away Indians.”

Despite this incident, there was no subsequent increase in hostilities between Chipewyan and Inuit. On the contrary, the “Home Indians” wanted peace, as did the British and the Inuit. A few years after the incident, a few Chipewyan families began to spend their summers alongside the Inuit at Knapp’s Bay. They told the captain of a trading vessel in 1762 that there was a truce between the groups. Two years later, a company official reported that the Inuit and Chipewyan were “now tolerably well reconciled with each other.”

For the next quarter century, Chipewyan and Inuit lived in peace at Knapp’s Bay, an early and successful experiment in biculturalism. The Chipewyan were even the larger of the two groups, often outnumbering the Inuit three to one.

But this co-operation came to a sudden end. And violence had nothing to do with it. A smallpox epidemic in 1781-2 almost wiped out the Chipewyan. The French seized and occupied Churchill between 1782 and 1784, which prevented all trade north. On top of this, the climate was noticeably deteriorating. The Little Ice Age resulted in ocean cooling and terrible ice conditions off the Kivalliq coast. The caribou herds declined, making the area even less hospitable for the few remaining Chipewyan, who left the coast and withdrew to the more southerly forest.

Today, an opposite climate change, global warming, is noticeably affecting Inuit communities throughout the Arctic. Who can predict what changes it will cause to settlement patterns and land use practices that we take for granted today?

Taissumani: A Day in Arctic History recounts a specific event of historic interest, whose anniversary is in the coming week. Kenn Harper is a historian, writer and linguist who lives in Iqaluit. Feedback? Send your comments and questions to kennharper@hotmail.com.

Taissumani: A Day in Arctic History
July 16, 1948 - The Passing of Ataguttaaluk, Queen of Igloolik (Part 2)

KENN HARPER

Last week, this column recounted the first part of a story told by Tagurnaaq in 1922. Tagurnaaq recounted the tragic events that befell Ataguttaaluk, who, to save her own live, ate the already-dead bodies of her husband and children. Tagurnaaq's narrative continues:

(Continued from last week.)

Monica Ataguttaaluk of Igloolik in 1947, one year before her death.

---

"And when she was once more able to speak, she told us how it had come about. They had gone up country hunting caribou, but had not been able to find any; they then tried fishing in the lakes but there was no fish. Her husband wandered all about in search of food, but always without success, and they grew weaker and weaker. Then they decided to turn back towards Iglulik, but were overtaken by heavy snowfalls. The snow kept on. It grew deeper and deeper, and they themselves were growing weaker and weaker every day. They lay in their snow hut and could get nothing to eat. Then, after the snow had fallen steadily for some time, there came fierce blizzards, and at last her husband was so exhausted that he could not stand.

"They kept themselves alive for some time by eating the dogs, but these also were wasted away and there was little strength in them as food. It simply kept them alive, so that they could not even die. At last the husband and all the children were frozen to death; having no food, they could not endure the cold. Ataguttaaluk had been the strongest of them all, though she had no more to eat than the others. As long as the children were alive they had most. She had tried at first to start off by herself and get through to Iglulik, for she knew the way, but the snow came up to her waist, and she had no strength, she could not go on. She was too weak even to build a snow hut for herself, and the end of it was she turned back in her tracks and lay down beside her dead husband and the dead children. Here at least there was shelter from the wind in the snow hut and there were still a few skins she could use for covering.

"She ate these skins to begin with. But at last there was no more left, and she was only waiting for the death to come and release her. She seemed to grow more and more dull and careless of what happened. But one morning, waking up to sunshine and a fine clear sky, she realized that the worst of the winter was over now, and it could not be long till the spring. Her snow hut was right on the road to Tununeq, the very road that all would take when going from Igloolik to trade there. The sun was so warm that for the first time she felt thawed a little, but the snow all about her was as deep and impassable as ever.

"Then suddenly it seemed as if the warm spring air about her had given her a great desire to go on living, and thus it was that she fell to eating of the dead bodies that lay beside her. It was painful, it was much worse than dying, and at first she threw up all she ate, but she kept on, once she had begun. It could not hurt the dead, she knew, for their souls were long since in the land of the dead. Thus she thought, and thus it came about that she became an inuktumajuq, an eater of human kind.

"All this she told us, weeping; and Palluq and I, realizing that after all these sufferings she deserved to live, drove her into Iglulik, where she had a brother living. Here she soon recovered her strength, but it was long before she could bear to be among her fellows. It is many years now since all this happened, and she is married now, to one of the most skilful walrus hunters at Iglulik, named Ittuksaarjuat, who had one wife already; she is his favourite wife and has had several more children."

The terrible events that Tagurnaaq described took place in the spring of 1905. Although it is rare that an event that forms part of Inuit traditional lore can be accurately dated, this tragic story is an exception.

Atuat, the adoptive daughter of Tagurnaaq and Palluq, had accompanied her parents on the trip they had taken to the Pond Inlet area to trade. Captain James Mutch had wintered at Erik Harbour, just to the east of Pond Inlet, in the winter of 1903-04 and the news of his arrival had spread quickly among the Inuit, for Mutch had trade goods and was the first whaler to winter in the area. In her old age, Atuat retold the story of Ataguttaaluk's ordeal. The tragic events, she said, took place during the winter and spring following Mutch's first wintering.

After her rescue Ataguttaaluk spent several months recovering. In the fall, a famous hunter, Ittuksaarjuat, took her as his wife. With her marriage, Attaguttaaluk acquired status and influence. The explorer, Knud Rasmussen, referred to her as the "first lady" of Fury and Hecla Straits. White people in the region would later call Attaguttaaluk and her husband the "king and queen of Iglulik."

Attaguttaaluk was one of the first to be baptized in 1931 when Father Bazin established the first mission in the area, on the island of Avvajja. Her husband was finally baptized nine years later.

In June of 1948, Ataguttaaluk fell ill when an influenza epidemic hit Iglulik. Father Rousselière visited her and she began to complain about her illness. Then her tone suddenly changed. "Come, come," she said, "it's your turn to say beautiful things to me." The priest spoke to her about her impending death, but she, who had lived with death, cut him off. "I am not afraid," she told him.

In early July she was moved to a camp, Kangiq, on Melville Peninsula. Refusing to stay inside her son's tent, she awaited death outside. On the 16th of July, having outlived her husband by almost four years, Ataguttaaluk passed away peacefully. She was buried on a hilltop overlooking the shore. In memory of her, a school in Iglulik bears her name.

Taissumani: A Day in Arctic History recounts a specific event of historic interest, whose anniversary is in the coming week. Kenn Harper is a historian, writer and linguist who lives in Iqaluit. Feedback? Send your comments and questions to kennharper@hotmail.com.

Taissumani: A Day in Arctic History
July 16, 1948 - The Passing of Ataguttaaluk, Queen of Igloolik

This is the story told by Tagurnaaq, wife of Palluq, in 1922.

(First of two parts)

CLICK PHOTO TO ENLARGE
Monica Ataguttaaluk of Igloolik in 1947, one year before her death.

---

"Then we heard a noise. We could not make out what it was; sometimes it sounded like a dying animal in pain, and then again like human voices in the distance. As we came nearer, we could hear human words, but could not at first make out the meaning, for the voice seemed to come from a great way off. Words that did not sound like real words, and a voice that was powerless and cracked. We listened and kept on listening, trying to make out one word from another, and at last we understood what it was that was being said. The voice broke down between the words, but what it was trying to say was this: 'I am not one who can live any longer among my fellows; for I have eaten my nearest of kin.'

"Now we knew that there should properly be no one else in this part of the country but ourselves, but all the same we could distinctly hear that this was a woman speaking, and we looked at each other, and it was as if we hardly dared speak out loud, and we whispered: 'An eater of men! What is this we have come upon here!'

"We looked about us, and at last caught sight of a little shelter, built of snow with a piece of skin rug. It lay half hidden in a drift and was hardly to be noticed in the snow all round, which was why we had not made it out before. And now that we could see where it was the voice came from, it sounded more distinctly, but still went on in the same broken fashion.

"We went slowly up to the spot, and when we looked in, there lay a human skull with the flesh gnawed from the bones. Yes, we came to that shelter, and looking in, we saw a human being squatting down inside, a poor woman, her face turned piteously towards us. Her eyes were all bloodshot, from weeping, so greatly had she suffered.

"'Kikkaq,' she said - this was her pet name for Palluq - 'Kikkaq, I have eaten my elder brother and my children." ["My elder brother" was her pet name for her husband.] Palluq and I looked at each other, and could not understand that she was still alive and breathing. There was nothing of her but bones and dry skin, there seemed indeed hardly to be a drop of blood in all her body, and she had not even much clothing left, having eaten a great deal of that, both the sleeves and all the lower part of her outer furs. Palluq bent down quite close to hear better, and Ataguttaaluk - for we knew her now, and could see who it was - said once more:

"'Kikkaq, I have eaten your fellow-singer from the feasting, him with whom you used to sing when we were gathered in the great house at a feast.'"

"My husband was so moved at the sight of this living skeleton, which had once been a young woman, that it was long before he knew what to answer. At last he said: 'You had the will to live, therefore you live.'"

"We now put up our tent close by, and cut away a piece of the fore curtain to make a little tent for her. She could not come into the tent with us, for she was unclean, having eaten dead bodies. When we went to move her, she tried to get up, but fell back in the snow. Then we tried to feed her with a little meat, but after she had swallowed a couple of mouthfuls, she fell to trembling all over, and could eat no more. Then we gave her a little hot soup, and when she was a little quieter, we looked round the shelter and found the skull of her husband and those of her children; but the brains were gone. We found the gnawed bone, too. The only part she had not been able to eat was the entrails. We gave up our journey then, and decided to drive back to Iglulik as soon as she felt a little stronger."

To be continued next week.

Taissumani: A Day in Arctic History recounts a specific event of historic interest, whose anniversary is in the coming week. Kenn Harper is a historian, writer and linguist who lives in Iqaluit. Feedback? Send your comments and questions to kennharper@hotmail.com.

TOP

Advertising
Specs, rates,
& maps
Multi-paper
buying services
About the market
E-mail ad dept

More Information