Cuthbert Grant
| Cuthbert Grant | |
|---|---|
| Captain-General of all the Half-Breeds; Chief of the half-breeds and warden of the Plains | |
| Born | c. 1793 Fort de la Rivière Tremblante (near Kamsack, Saskatchewan) |
| Died | 1854-07-15 White Horse Plain (St François Xavier, Manitoba) |
| Occupation | Fur trader; Métis leader; farmer; justice of the peace; sheriff; councillor; warden of the plains |
| Father | |
| Partner | |
Cuthbert Grant (c. 1793 – 15 July 1854) was a Métis fur trader, military leader, and statesman, widely regarded as the most influential leader of the Métis people during the early nineteenth century. He is best known for leading Métis forces at the Battle of Seven Oaks in 1816 and for founding Grantown (present-day St. François Xavier) on the Assiniboine River.
Early life
Grant was born around 1793 at Fort de la Rivière Tremblante, near present-day Kamsack, Saskatchewan, the son of Cuthbert Grant, a long-time employee and wintering partner of the North West Company from 1795, and a Métis woman believed to be of Cree and French descent.[1] His uncle Robert Grant was among the original Montreal fur traders who helped establish the NWC in 1779.[1]
Following his father's death in 1799, William McGillivray, the NWC's Montreal agent, became his guardian. McGillivray brought the young Grant to Montreal in 1801, where he was baptized on 12 October in the Scotch Presbyterian Church (later known as St Gabriel Street Church). Grant received his education in Montreal under McGillivray's supervision, becoming effectively bilingual in English and French. He has been described as the first educated Métis to exert a profound influence over the fate of his people.[1]
Career
Entry into the fur trade
Grant entered NWC service around 1810, working initially in the Montreal offices. In 1812, he traveled with the annual brigade to Fort William and was assigned as a clerk in the Upper Red River department, posting to Fort Espérance on the Qu'Appelle River under John Pritchard.[1]
Rise to Métis leadership
By 1812, conflict was intensifying between the NWC and the Scottish settlers arriving under Miles Macdonell to establish a colony on the Red River, threatening NWC transportation routes. In fall 1814, NWC partners Alexander Greenfield Macdonell and Duncan Cameron appointed Grant and others — William Fraser, Angus Shaw, and Nicolas Montour — as captains of the Métis, cultivating the idea of a Métis nation with aboriginal rights to the land. By March 1816, Grant held the title "Captain-General of all the Half-Breeds."[1]
Grant arrived at Fort Gibraltar on 30 August 1814 as one of Cameron's officers, working to persuade settlers to accept NWC transportation to Canada. In March 1815, after the arrest of Peter Pangman (Bostonais) by HBC men, Grant led a party of 27 Métis to seize four colonists as hostages. His men harassed the settlement through June 1815, ultimately forcing Governor Macdonell's surrender on 17 June and the full colonial evacuation by 25 June. As the DCB notes, Grant and the Métis were made to appear responsible for actions ultimately intended to serve the NWC's interests.[1]
Battle of Seven Oaks
In May 1816, Grant led approximately 60 Métis horsemen in an expedition aimed at preventing the colony from recovering. His party ambushed HBC boats, captured Brandon House (commanded by Peter Fidler), and advanced toward Fort Douglas. On 19 June 1816, near the junction of the Assiniboine and Red rivers, his party encountered Governor Robert Semple and a group of settlers. In the engagement that followed — the Battle of Seven Oaks — approximately 20 of Semple's party were killed along with one of Grant's men. Grant himself shot Semple, mortally wounding him. The wounded on Semple's side were killed and most of the dead mutilated; Grant was unable or unwilling to stop the violence.[1][2]
Legal troubles and exile
Following the violence, Grant was implicated in the murder of Owen Keveny and subsequently surrendered to Commissioner William Bacheler Coltman in August 1817, being transported to Montreal on charges of murder, theft, and arson. He was released on the Keveny charge, but in spring 1818 true bills were found against him for theft, pillage, and the murders of Semple and the Seven Oaks colonists. Rather than face trial, Grant jumped bail and fled northwest by canoe. After the acquittal of François-Firmin Boucher for Semple's murder, the charges against Grant were quietly dropped.[1]
HBC employment and settlement
After the 1821 merger of the NWC and Hudson's Bay Company, Grant was initially excluded from employment. George Simpson recognized Grant's influence among the Métis and in July 1823 appointed him clerk at Fort Garry and special constable. Grant's presence stirred antagonism among settlers who remembered 1815–16, and following an assault by a group led by Alexander MacDonell, he retired in 1824.[1]
Grant then settled at White Horse Plain on the Assiniboine River and founded the village of Grantown (later St François Xavier) in spring 1824, gathering approximately 100 Métis families around him. He transported goods for the HBC under contract and traded independently under licence. By 1827 he had 34 acres under cultivation. In July 1828 the HBC Council of the Northern Department appointed him "warden of the plains of Red River" at an annual salary of £200, tasked with suppressing the illicit fur trade in the district. He remained respected enough among the Métis to be regularly elected captain of the annual buffalo hunts.[1]
Later offices
In 1835, the Council of Assiniboia commissioned Grant as a justice of the peace. In March 1839 he was appointed councillor and, with Alexander Ross, sheriff of Assiniboia. From 1840 he held the combined title "Chief of the half-breeds and warden of the Plains." He negotiated a Métis–Sioux peace settlement in 1844, though renewed conflict broke out by 1851.[1]
Declining influence
During the 1840s, Grant's standing diminished as a French Métis faction led by Louis Riel (the elder) displaced the Scottish half-breed leadership he represented. The central conflict became the question of free trade versus the HBC monopoly. In 1849, when Pierre-Guillaume Sayer was tried for illicit fur trading, Grant presided as magistrate. Despite armed Métis pressure outside the courthouse, Sayer was found guilty but left unpunished, effectively ending the HBC's exclusive hold on the trade. Grant was subsequently relieved of his warden position.[1]
His followers, including his son-in-law Pascal Breland, became moderate Métis political figures. They remained apart from Louis Riel (the younger) during the events of 1870 and from Gabriel Dumont in the 1880s.[1]
Death
In late spring 1854 Grant fell from his horse. He died on 15 July 1854 at White Horse Plain and was buried the following day inside the church of St François Xavier, which he himself had built at Grantown following his conversion to Roman Catholicism.[1]
References
[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10]
- ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 George Woodcock."George Woodcock, "Grant, Cuthbert," Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 8."[website].Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 8 (University of Toronto/Université Laval).1985.University of Toronto/Université Laval.Link.(Rights: copyrighted | Access: open)
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 M. A. MacLeod and W. L. Morton."Cuthbert Grant of Grantown: warden of the plains of Red River."[book].1974.Toronto.(Rights: unknown | Access: open)
- ↑ Marcel Giraud."Le Métis canadien; son rôle dans l'histoire des provinces de l'Ouest."[book].1945.Paris.(Rights: unknown | Access: open)
- ↑ Alexander Ross."The Red River settlement: its rise, progress and present state; with some account of the native races and its general history to the present day."[book].1856.London.(Rights: unknown | Access: open)
- ↑ J. M. Gray."Lord Selkirk of Red River."[book].1963.Toronto.(Rights: unknown | Access: open)
- ↑ J. P. Pritchett."The Red River valley, 1811–1849: a regional study."[book].1942.New Haven, Connecticut.(Rights: unknown | Access: open)
- ↑ C. B. Martin."Lord Selkirk's work in Canada."[book].1916.Oxford.(Rights: unknown | Access: open)
- ↑ Margaret Complin."The warden of the plains."[book].Canadian Geographical Journal, vol. 9 (August 1934), pp. 73–82.1934.Montreal.(Rights: unknown | Access: open)
- ↑ M. A. MacLeod."Cuthbert Grant of Grantown."[book].Canadian Historical Review, vol. 21 (1940), pp. 25–39.1940.(Rights: unknown | Access: open)
- ↑ "PAC, MG 25, 62."[record].Library and Archives Canada.(Rights: unknown | Access: open)