Of the two officers Steele was the senior in years and in length of service. He had been in the Red River Expedition, and was in the School of Gunnery at Kingston, when he enlisted in the Mounted Police at its organization and worked his way up from the ranks. Powerfully built, he had all the appearance and carriage of a frontier soldier, accustomed to unexpected situations and always ready for any action that might be necessary. Perry attracted me first by his stalwart appearance and fine horsemanship. Even in a country where riding was a fine art, Perry was a distinguished figure on a horse, and later on I discovered that he made a point of doing everything well. He was a graduate of the Royal Military College, and had served with the Royal Engineers before joining up with the Mounted Police, where his genius for thorough administration and his general popularity raised him to the highest position in the Force.
The news from the North coming to us at Calgary, indicated that the whole country north of the Red Deer River to Edmonton and beyond was full of rather surly and hostile Indians, who would rise at any moment if they thought there were any chances of success. Hence, General Strange, a thorough-going soldier greatly beloved by all of us, determined to push on to Edmonton with all speed accompanied by Steele.
We of the Winnipeg Light Infantry waited a few days till Perry could reach us from MacLeod, and then we also started north under his guidance. We forded the Bow River, but when we got to the Red Deer we found it flooded by the spring freshets into what our Adjutant Constantine, who later did such splendid service with the Mounted Police, called, in warning the men, "a wide, swift-flowing and treacherous stream." Strange had crossed before the river rose, but how we were to get over was a problem. Our chances of getting on to the north looked slim. It was well that Perry, whose service with the Royal Engineers meant something, was along in command of the column. He decided to throw a rope across with the little skiff, which was the only thing in sight and then construct and cross by a swinging raft. The raft was constructed under his direction, and his own detachment of Police, with the gun and ammunition and harness put on board. Of course, he went himself, as he never asked his men to go anywhere without him. Things went fairly till near the other side, when the rope made out of the picketing lines of the horses broke by binding round the tree, from which it was being paid out, and the raft began to go down the raging current. At the risk of their lives Perry and Constable Diamond, grasping another rope, plunged into the torrent and managed to reach the sh.o.r.e and fasten it to a tree. But the current was too strong and this rope gave way. The boat went down a mile or so and, being caught in an eddy, was beached, and the stuff on board dragged up a steep cut bank.
Then Perry commandeered lumber from a primitive saw-mill down the river, and built a ferry on which, in a day or two, we crossed. In the meanwhile, as we were in the hostile Indian country, Perry had accomplished the difficult task of crossing the 65th Regiment in the little skiff, taking a whole dark night to do it. He kept our regiment on the south side till the ferry was built. He thus had both sides guarded against any attack. Once over the river, we made a quick march 100 miles to Edmonton, where General Strange paid a high compliment publicly to Major Perry for the splendid way in which he had overcome obstacles and got our relief column through in such good time. The people of Edmonton gave us a hearty welcome, as their position in the midst of a big Indian country was very serious for a time.
Big Bear, with the prisoners, was now treking away to the north, and it was our business to overtake him. The Infantry went down the river, while the Mounted Men went by trail near the river bank, or our clumsy, open flatboats might have come under fire. Forced marching, from Fort Victoria by Frog Lake to Fort Pitt, brought us to the scene of the Big Bear"s atrocities, as we saw from the Sun-dance Lodge, the mutilated body of Constable Cowan and the charred remains of the nine white people who had been ma.s.sacred at Frog Lake reserve. Fort Pitt was burning, but we saved two buildings. Big Bear and his marauding band in large force had kept up their retreat and vanished, but whether it was on the north side of the river, or the south side where they would effect a junction with Poundmaker could only be ascertained by scouting parties.
Accordingly, General Strange at this point detailed Major Perry and seventeen men of his detachment (keeping the rest for the nine-pounder gun) to cross the river to the south side and move towards Battleford.
It was not an enviable duty, and as the men crossed the river in the darkness and started their ride through a region that was supposed to be infested with hundreds on the warpath, it looked rather like a last patrol. However, after a hard ride they made Battleford to find that Poundmaker had surrendered, Middleton having just then arrived. Perry reported to Middleton with the information that Big Bear must be on the north side, arranged for a steamer to go up with supplies, which we needed very badly, and got on the steamer to return with his men. When part of the way back he got word that we were engaged with Big Bear, and so he landed his men and sent the steamer back to Battleford for reinforcements. After one of the most severe and risky rides of the campaign, Perry and his men rejoined us to find that his gunners under Sergeant O"Connor, and the nine-pounder, had made fine gun practice, and had been mainly instrumental in demoralizing the forces of Big Bear, with whom we had been in contact for two hot days. General Strange was much pleased with the way in which Major Perry had carried out the difficult reconnaissance with a handful of men.
Meanwhile, after our fight with Big Bear and his flight from Frenchman"s b.u.t.te, where he had a strong and well-fortified position, Major Steele, with his mounted detachment, had made a rush to Loon Lake, where, in a rattling encounter during which Sergeant Fury was severely wounded, he completed the defeat of Big Bear. Two days or so afterwards our scouts crossed Gold Lake in birch canoes and secured the release of the remaining prisoners of Big Bear, the others having come in to our lines after the fight at Frenchman"s b.u.t.te, where Constable Donald McRae, still happily surviving, was wounded, but refused to leave the field till he had exhausted his ammunition.
On the disbanding of the Alberta Field Force General Strange, who had served ever since the Mutiny, warmly commended the Infantry, and expressed the opinion that he had never commanded better soldiers than were in the Mounted Police detachments, ready for all kinds of duty.
Preceding the surrender of Poundmaker, already mentioned, at Battleford, the fight at Cut Knife Hill had occurred. Colonel Otter had made a swift march from Swift Current to Battleford and relieved the beleaguered garrison and civilians there. With Otter came Superintendents W. M.
Herchmer and Neale with a few Mounted Police. And when Otter decided to go out and attack Poundmaker these, with the few who had been at Battleford, and those who had come from Fort Pitt under Inspector d.i.c.kens, made up seventy-five Police, who went on that errand with Otter, and some 200 of his infantry and artillery. Just why Otter went out has never been very clear, except that he possibly wished to punish the band of Indians and prevent a possible junction of Poundmaker and Big Bear. Anyway, the Police were under his command, and they went in obedience to orders, as was their fashion. And the Police, being the advance guard to Cutknife, and both the advance and rear guard on the return, as well as in the hottest part of the fight for seven hours, where they behaved with great gallantry, lost heavily in killed and wounded in proportion to their numbers. It is not any reflection on the gallantry of the other corps, who were totally unused to Indian warfare, to say that it was the masterly tactics of the Police which extricated the column from the ravine after Colonel Otter saw that it was not advisable to continue the conflict against the large force of Indians who had every advantage in position. A few days after this Poundmaker, who was a very splendid-looking Indian, and who had given the order to cease fire when Otter was retiring, came in and surrendered to General Middleton, and the rebellion was practically over, though it was still a few days before Big Bear was captured, as already related.
Perhaps there is no finer summing up of the services of the Mounted Police during the rebellion than that given by Dr. A. Jukes, Senior Surgeon of the Force, in his report at the end of that year. He says, "While I must leave to those whose duty as combatant officers it more especially becomes to record with sorrow, not unmingled with pride, the names and services of the gallant men who have fallen unflinchingly in the path of duty, I cannot withhold my humble tribute to the courage and fort.i.tude of the mere handful of Mounted Police who, fewer in numbers than any battalion engaged in active operations, and generally far over-matched by enemies wherever it was their privilege to meet them, have left beneath the bosom of the prairie of their dead, "killed in action," a number greater than that of any battalion in the field, save one whose record, at least, they have equalled."
And one cannot close this chapter without emphasizing what has often been overlooked by those who do not know Western affairs at first hand.
Looking back now over the years, one is not surprised to have to see that the collapse of the rebellion, instead of leaving the Mounted Police Force carefree, actually added to their burdens and ushered them into a period of p.r.o.nounced and continuous strain. The Militia, which was made up of several thousands of men--infantry, artillery, cavalry--all were withdrawn and scattered to their homes in various parts of Canada. The Mounted Police stayed at their posts or moved from place to place, as required in a readjustment period. The defeated rebels and many of the Indians were in a sullen mood, the year had been wasted from the standpoint of producing anything for food, the Indians were off their reservations in some cases, in others the reservations had been laid waste, and the buildings that had been erected for their comfort had been burned or wrecked by themselves when the spirit of destruction arose as they went on the warpath. Yet the officers and men of this remarkable corps, without any cessation or furlough, took up the ravelled skein of human life around them, and with great patience, skill and tact, soon had things running smoothly again. It was a wonderful piece of reconstructive statesman-like work and, as it proceeded, both the half-breeds and Indians who had been disaffected began to regret deeply the action they had been misled by agitators into taking contrary to the advice of the men in the scarlet tunic, who had always been their friends, and who always had stood for the square deal for every one. It was not only not the fault of the Mounted Police, but largely through ignoring their long-repeated warnings to the Government that the rebellion had taken place. While it lasted these Police did their duty like men at great cost without ever saying, "We told you so." And when it was over they so comported themselves in the midst of a distracted population that it could never occur again.
CHAPTER IX
RECONSTRUCTION
In writing these chapters it is necessary to throw in a story or incident here and there out of the regular sequence in time, so as to relate cognate subjects to each other. Hence, as their names have all been already mentioned, it may be well here to indicate the terms of office occupied by the several Commissioners who have directed the destinies of the famous corps. With all of these, except Colonel French, who was the first in order, I have had some personal contact. The office of Commissioner has been held by Colonel G. A. (later Sir George) French from 1873 to 1876, by Colonel James F. McLeod from 1876 to 1880, by Lieut.-Colonel A. G. Irvine from 1880 to 1886, by Colonel Lawrence W.
Herchmer from 1886 to 1900, and from 1900 up to date by the present Officer Commanding in the person of Colonel A. Bowen Perry, C.M.G. These all had their distinctive traits of character and each had his own speciality--foundation building, discipline, organization and so on--but they all meet on a common plane as soldiers and gentlemen without fear and without reproach. Of Colonel French we have already written--he was the layer of the corner-stone--and the after-history of the Police as a spirit level proves that it was well and truly laid. Colonel McLeod came into the command when the Indians, under changing conditions at home and amidst perplexing problems born of the Indian situation south of the boundary, had to be handled with unusual discreetness and care. And MacLeod was distinctly the man for such a period, of wide human sympathies, absolutely impartial and even-handed in his magisterial decisions and inflexibly courageous, he became to Indian and white man alike a sort of embodiment of the highest ideals of British administration.
Colonel Irvine had served with credit under Wolseley and was highly esteemed by his men. His commissionership fell within the stormy time of the second Riel rebellion, and despite the fact that he was not generously treated by the Commander of the Militia forces during that period, he emerged from it with an enhanced reputation and with the respect not only of his own men, but of all who knew how difficult and important his task had been.
Colonel Lawrence W. Herchmer, besides some service with Imperial forces, had been through some especially important work in connection with the Frontier Boundary Commission. This experience proved of much value to the Force and the country when he became Commissioner. Coming in the restless period succeeding the rebellion, Colonel Herchmer"s contribution to Police history was his extension of the patrol system all over the vast territory under his oversight. A man of fine appearance and courteous bearing he was well liked and popular with the men and the community during his term of office.
Colonel Perry, the present Commissioner, has had the longest term of service in the supreme command. As his name will come up frequently in the remaining chapters of this story, we need not make special note of his work here. But it is not too much to say that owing to his outstanding ability and his wide range of general knowledge, as well as his keen perception, he has during his long term of office practically recreated the Force in many particulars. He has unusual power for getting to the heart of a situation by a sort of intuitive insight. He has the reputation of being able to grasp and a.n.a.lyse the contents of doc.u.ments almost at a glance and seize their salient points for action.
His decisions are thus made after rapid a.s.similation of the facts, and he expects his orders to be carried out with exactness and dispatch. In this he is not disappointed, as the officers and men under his command have such confidence in his judgment that they work out his plans with enthusiasm. He is fair to all cla.s.ses, but will not tolerate movements that make for the subversion of the const.i.tution or the wanton disturbance of law and order. Intensely Canadian, he is not insular, for few men in his line have read more extensively in the fields of history.
Having made these notes on the men who have guided the Force, we can take up the story again where we ended the last chapter with the close of the second Riel rebellion.
As intimated at that point, the Militia Forces were withdrawn and the Mounted Police were left alone to deal with the problems of reconstruction and peace. Certain of the rebels who had been specially seditious and murderous had to be rounded up and dealt with by process of law in order that such unseemly doings should not again menace the safety of the settler and the march of civilization. It fell to the lot of the Police to gather the evidence, to secure the presence of witnesses, to furnish guards, and at headquarters in Regina the duties were very heavy. But these trained men worked with steady precision, for the lesson had to be taught that insurrection and murder were not to be tolerated under our flag. The men in the scarlet would see that whatever had been true of other frontiers, Canada was not to have a wild west or a wild north either. So the rebels suffered the due reward of their deeds. Louis Riel was tried and, despite the efforts of his lawyers, Lemieux and Fitzpatrick, brilliant men who came from Quebec to defend him and whose conflict with the Crown lawyers, B. B. Osler and Christopher Robinson, afforded a consummate spectacle of dialectic sword-play, this leader of two rebellions was executed at Regina.
Several Indians, notably Wandering Spirit, who was the evil genius of the Big Bear revolt, were also visited with capital punishment. Big Bear himself, who had become decrepit, and the lordly Poundmaker, who st.u.r.dily maintained that he had only defended himself when attacked at Cutknife, were confined to the Stony Mountain penitentiary for a time, but released when a medical board decided that the change from out of doors would soon end their lives. Poundmaker was a splendid-looking man, stately and grave in manner, and his chivalry at Cutknife, where he ordered the "cease firing" when Otter was withdrawing, ent.i.tled him to consideration. I recall his pride in the long pleats of glossy black hair that adorned his handsome head. It was a graceful recognition of his gallantry that the authorities at the penitentiary, at the instance of the Department, left the fine locks of their captive unshorn during his prison term. At the suggestion of the Mounted Police officers many of the chiefs who had remained loyal were taken on a tour of the east, where they received many tokens of the kindly att.i.tude of Canadians towards them.
[Ill.u.s.tration: INDIAN TEPEE.]
[Ill.u.s.tration: DOG-TRAIN.]
I recall a story in that connection--a missionary story. It is in place here because no one knew so well as the Police what a large part in preserving peace in the rebellion time was played by missionaries like John McKay, of the Mistawasis Reserve near Carlton, John McDougall, of Morley, George McKay, of Prince Albert, Pere Lacombe and others. In the partnership of the Police and the missionaries the law and the gospel wrought together for good ends. The story was told a group of us by John McKay, to whose influence over Chief Mistawasis was largely due the fact that that powerful Cree chief, whose reserve was almost within sound of the guns of Duck Lake, did not join in with Chief Beardy and Dumont.
After the rebellion, Mistawasis was one of the chiefs taken east as a reward for his loyalty. I recall seeing some of them being driven around eastern cities in cabs to see the sights. They preserved the usual stoical silence and evinced no surprise, but they missed nothing and when they got back home their tongues were loosed and for many a day they recited their experiences and told the story of the white man"s great cities and manifest power.
Mistawasis, on his way home, met John McKay on the plains, and they sat around the camp fire late that night as the chief poured out his recollections of what he had seen. One thing had puzzled the Indian, though he had thought much over it. "The strangest thing that happened,"
said Mistawasis, "was in Ottawa, where some good people had a missionary meeting at a house, and they were singing songs, and a lady played on the singing machine (piano). At last they asked me and Star Blanket to sing. We both were ashamed, because we could not sing much. But I told Star Blanket I would sing what the missionary taught us out on the plains and I began, and all of a sudden the lady ran to the singing machine and began to play and then they all joined in and I was leading the whole band." "Now," continued the Chief, "how did they know in Ottawa the same thing you taught us out at the reserve in Saskatchewan?"
And then John McKay told him the tune was "Old Hundred," which all good people knew, and that the company sang it in English words while he sang in Cree, but that they were singing the same thing. This delighted Mistawasis, who felt that he and the white people there were really one in the deep experiences of life. And that meant brotherhood to him.
But all the Indians were not like "Big Child," as this chief"s name meant, and so the Mounted Police had strenuous work for some years after the rebellion, when scarcely a thousand of them had to patrol and guard a territory twenty times as large as some European kingdoms.
From the ably written and graphic Police reports for the years following the rebellion, one can visualize the changing conditions of the country.
The outbreak had undesignedly advertised the wide West. The thousands of men who had come out on military duty, having spied out the wondrous fatness of the land, had gone back to the east to become unofficial immigration agents by telling what they had beheld. And so the tide of humanity began to flow over the plains towards the setting sun. This means that the buffalo were gone for all time and that game generally would become a precarious means of existence, that the ranch and the farm would supersede the open plain, that settlers would need much guidance as well as protection, that the Indians would have to be taught to stay on their reserves and make a living there, and that the half-breeds, who were no lovers of agriculture, would have to be weaned from their nomadic inclinations. In some parts of the vast country, as at Prince Albert, Superintendent A. B. Perry, who took charge there after the rebellion, states, "The general att.i.tude of the half-breeds and Indians was one of regret for what had happened." All was going well, but in some other quarters there was a sort of sullenly defiant spirit abroad which took all the tact and the courage of the Police to overcome. It was fortunate that the officers and men of the Police had from the beginning so commended themselves to the Indians and half-breeds as exponents of fair play that these natives of the country never seemed to hold the Police responsible for the errors, delays or mistakes of any government.
In speaking of Police reports I would like the reader to bear in mind that, in addition to the reports furnished by the combatant officers generally so cla.s.sified, commissioners, superintendents, inspectors and others, some of the most remarkable and important doc.u.ments sent forward to the proper authorities, through the usual channels, were written by the surgeons and their a.s.sistants, and also by the veterinary surgeons.
Men and their troop horses were companions on the long trails, and they both had to be cared for by sympathetic experts in each line. It was vastly important that both should be kept fit if the work was to be done, and of the two the men themselves were always more anxious about their horses than about their own comfort. Hence these health-preserving specialists were of peculiar value for the efficiency of the corps. And as they were men of education as well as keen observers, their reports bore the evidences of research, which made them treasuries of information.
As an indication of the way in which the Police showed that they were in the country not only to preserve law and order but to guide settlers in the interests of the country"s development as well as for their own welfare, I quote from one of Commissioner Lawrence Herchmer"s annual reports this valuable statement in 1886: "As a rule too little fall ploughing is done in the North-West, and there is consequently too much hurry amongst the farmers in the spring and large tracts of land are sown, but not sufficiently worked--nearly all the farmers work too much land for their strength. Very few of them made any use of the manure from their farmyards, and although at nearly all Police posts, farms are quite close, I am not aware that any manure is drawn from our stables by any farmers." This statement was amply justified and very much needed, as those of us who knew the country then can affirm. Many had rushed west with the idea of getting rich "quick." They spread themselves over too much land, they neglected fall ploughing and ran the risk of getting caught with frost next season, and they thought they could save themselves time and money by doing without a fertilizer and taking all they could get out of the land. No doubt Herchmer and his thousand men preached the gospel of good farming with effect, for not many years pa.s.sed before the flagrant mistakes he pointed out were remedied, to the great benefit of the country which has become in large measure the granary of the Empire.
In patrol work the following from Superintendent Neale throws a little side-light on some of the frequent experiences of the Force in that period. The reference is to the "Old Man"s River" in the foothill country in December. Neale says: "I had gone ahead to try the ice and found it unsafe. The saddle horses were then crossed, followed by the wagons, one of which, the hospital spring wagon, came to grief by the horses refusing to face the wind, trying to get on the ice and breaking the pole. Both men and horses were covered with ice, as the wind was very strong and bitterly cold. The stopping place at Kipp being only in course of erection, there was no place to go into, and the raising of a tent was an impossibility. However, the horses were placed in the shelter afforded by some haystacks, and after being dried and fed the men managed to get a cup of tea and then turned in with their horses."
There is not much detail here, but one who knows that country at that season reads between the lines and shivers. And that the conditions might crop up at other dates is evident by a line in the same report which says that "Inspector Sanders travelled the whole distance from Lethbridge to Bull"s Head _coulee_ in a driving snowstorm." That would be a dangerous outing.
That others of the Police were taking note of new conditions for the benefit of the country, as Lawrence Herchmer did in his remarks on farming above quoted, is evidenced by a recommendation by Superintendent Steele, who says in 1886: "I wish to call your attention to the quality of wood used last winter for fuel, causing large fatigues, much waste and consequently great expense. This could be avoided by entering into coal contracts with people residing near the coal beds on the North Saskatchewan, who would be able to supply at low rates." Thus were these guardians of the peace keeping their eyes open and urging forward the proper industrial development of the country.
There is a striking and characteristic pa.s.sage in a later report from Superintendent Perry, the general truth of which is just as vital to the well-being of the State to-day as it was when written not long after the rebellion. It appears that Perry and his men had traced and brought for trial a good many cattle-killers, mail-robbers and others, but found much difficulty in getting convictions in local court where jurymen and others seemed to have more sympathy with the accused than necessary.
Perry sees the far-reaching danger of this att.i.tude, and refers to it as follows: "I regret that convictions for the serious crimes were not secured against the guilty parties. Evidence was produced for the defence which could well be doubted. Not only has this case produced sympathy for crime, but in other cases, it has been plainly manifested.
Pet.i.tions have been forwarded to lessen the penalties where laws of the country have wilfully and knowingly been broken. So notorious has this become, that it has disheartened us in attempting to secure criminal convictions. There seems to be an absurd idea that the dismissal of a charge means a snub to the Mounted Police, whereas it strikes home at the root of society and threatens the lives and property of the very men who jeer and flaunt." The frontier was fortunate in having men who saw and pointed out this tendency in time. There is the ring of a statesman in that declaration.
But Perry and his men were by no means deterred, even if feeling disheartened by that state of apparent sympathy with law-breakers. This is attested by the fact that when the first stage robbery ever accomplished in the territories took place by the holding up of the Prince Albert mail near Humboldt, Perry and his detachments under Inspectors Begin and Guthbert so combed the whole country in search of the perpetrators that this attempt to introduce the Jesse-James programme into Canadian territory was effectually discouraged. It took some time to land the robber, a man named Garnett, in the north country, who was given a long term sentence in the penitentiary.
The Police were always on active service, but the service was very varied in character. It is interesting to find this note in one of the reports of that period written by Superintendent Deane, then in command of the Headquarters District at Regina. "On the 15th of August it was reported to me that a child about two and a half years old, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Pringle, of Regina, had strayed from her mother, who was on a visit to Pense. A Police party was dispatched to search the neighbourhood. The child was lost on the evening of the 15th, but the loss was not reported to me till the following afternoon. The child was found on the evening of the 17th in some bushes a mile or two away from the house from which it had strayed, and beyond being somewhat frightened, was little the worse for the exposure." One can quite imagine the concern of these red-coated knights of the saddle for the lost child. They would not say much, but thoughts of food and sleep would be put aside till the child was found. What plan they employed is not stated, but I have seen men under similar conditions, mounted or dismounted, holding hands and swinging in compa.s.s circles on the plain so as not to leave a foot of ground unsearched. Deane"s report is as above, but again those who know the country and the men will read between the lines and see these uniformed athletes quieting the fears of the little one and then going away to some other duty glad with the remembrance of the child and the rejoicing parents.
For a few years after the Riel outbreak there was a lot of unrest amongst the Blood Indians down to the south, where the proximity of the boundary line gave much opportunity to horse-thieves, cattle-killers and smugglers of whisky, but the watchfulness of Superintendents Neale and MacDonnell, Inspectors Howe, Sanders, Wattam, Sergt.-Major Lake and others checkmated every effort at lawlessness. Inspector Sanders made a clever capture of two Bloods, "The Dog" and "Big Rib," who were tried and sentenced, but who escaped to the other side of the line from the sheriff. This escape led some of the Bloods to think they could get ahead of the Police. In fact one of the chiefs, "Calf Shirt," brought in liquor from Montana and said he would defy the Police, while another Indian, "Good Rider," tried cattle-killing on the Cochrane Ranch. But the Police took a hand at this point. Superintendent Neale wired Superintendent MacDonnell for a detachment of officers and men, and MacDonnell sent Inspector Howe with twenty men to meet Neale with a like number at Stand Off. The result was that both "Calf Shirt" and "Good Rider" were arrested at two different camps, and each was duly tried and sentenced to a term with hard labour. This nipped the law-breaking in the bud. That was the Mounted Police way.
After this experience it is not surprising to read in Commissioner Herchmer"s report for 1888, "There has been a remarkable absence of crime during the past year and, outside arrests of criminals from the United States, we have made no important arrests in our territory." This was the gratifying result of the thoroughness of the Police patrol system, and the natural sequence to the fact that there was not much use or profit in trying to thwart the law when these red-coated guardians of the peace were around, and as the Indians found that law-breaking did not pay, they turned to more profitable pursuits, in which they were encouraged and helped by the Government and the Police. Hence this observant Commissioner is able to say that "in all quarters of the territories the Indians are making rapid strides towards self-support."
The day was coming when, under the same paternal encouragement, the Indians would be the prize-winners at the fairs on the plains where they had once hunted buffalo--a very remarkable transformation.
In the same year Herchmer calls attention to the highly pleasing fact that the introduction of the telephone would lead to an enormous saving of men and horses, and notes the able and diplomatic way in which Superintendent Steele, a.s.sisted by Inspectors Wood, Huot and Surgeon Powell, had quieted matters in the Kootenay country where Chief Isadore"s att.i.tude had discouraged settlement. With his usual social insight, Herchmer indicates that the Mormon settlement in southern Alberta, with its possible polygamy, will be the better of some oversight in the interests of British law. This latter was a wise decision, and led at least to the practical abandonment of a doctrine that had brought much odium upon that sect.
It is interesting to find in that period of the late eighties a letter to Superintendent Deane, at Lethbridge, from the Montana Stock Growers"
a.s.sociation conveying a resolution of "thanks to the officers and men of the North-West Mounted Police and also to the Canadian authorities generally for a.s.sistance given to many of the citizens of Montana in recovering horses stolen from our territory." And that the Police were just as ready and willing to see the Indians got their dues either way is evidenced by another entry in which Deane pithily says, "A Blood Indian named "Mike" laid an information against a Blackfoot for stealing his horse. "Mike" recovered his horse and the Blackfoot is now serving three months" imprisonment here." Touching on the question of smuggling near the boundary, Deane tells of a patrol consisting of Constables Campbell and Chapman who, between Pendant d"Oreille (evidently a place where people should step lively, for the Superintendent says it "bristles with rattlesnakes") and Writing-on-Stone. These constables came across a man named Berube with five horses and a wagon. His story did not sound well to them, and so they asked him to come to camp. He agreed with evident reluctance, and when he said he was hungry and his team tired, the Police told him to unhitch the team, mount one of them and come along to camp for breakfast. Then Berube wished to get his pocket-book out of the wagon, but instead he fished out a revolver and galloped away saying he would riddle them if they followed. Of course they followed. With the usual Police restraint they forbore to shoot.
Campbell overtook the smuggler, but just as he ranged alongside the policeman"s horse stumbled and fell, Campbell, leaping off as the horse fell and grabbing at the halter of Berube"s horse, but failing to hold him owing to the speed. Berube again threatened the riddling process, but the constables chased him to a slough, where the smuggler"s horse got mired, but Berube tried to lead him out. Campbell fired in the air, but Berube kept going, whereupon Campbell shot the smuggler"s horse, and the patrol took Berube and his four horses into camp. Deane says that as the horses appeared to be glandered, he wired for Veterinary Surgeon Wroughton (now the able a.s.sistant Commissioner), who declared the case virulent, and ordered everything destroyed. This was done, and Deane adds, "The slaughter and destruction were carried out by the Police, some of whose clothes suffered destruction in the process for which they, not unreasonably, look for some compensation." And we hope they got it. Handling glanders was almost as dangerous as either the bullets or the rattlesnakes.
Superintendent Perry, who with the good a.s.sistance of Inspector Cuthbert commanded in the Prince Albert district in 1888, made some specially valuable recommendations as to the future care of the Indians, and praised the work of the missionaries amongst them. He said, "The hope of improvement in the Indian lies in the training of the rising generation, and it is to be hoped that before long the children will be taken in hand." And Perry"s recommendation then made as to Industrial Schools bore fruit not many years later to the great advantage of the Indian and the country as well. Thus were the Police doing social service work as their duties proceeded.
An interesting side-light is thrown on the changing conditions of the West by our finding that in the late eighties a detachment of Police was sent by request from that Province into southern Manitoba. This detachment, under Inspector J. A. McGibbon (recently a.s.sistant Commissioner at Regina, now retired), who had done important work at Moose Mountain and other far western points, had headquarters at Morden.
The business of this detachment was to patrol the whole country near the boundary line, to grant special "Let Pa.s.ses" to people who were ent.i.tled to cross backwards and forwards, to prevent wood being taken from the Canadian side by Dakota settlers, and generally to stand for law and order. In connection with other work I was up and down that region a good deal in those days, and recall the sense of general security the scattered settlers had because of the presence of McGibbon and his men.
After five years in command of the Prince Albert district, which had been the critical storm centre around which the winds of the Riel rebellion had beaten fiercely, Inspector A. B. Perry, before changing to another command, makes another valuable contribution to the development of Western history when he writes some special paragraphs in regard to the future of the half-breeds. Game was disappearing and the occupation of freighting on the prairie was being rendered useless by the incoming of railways. Perry says, "The ma.s.s of the half-breed population must therefore turn their attention to other methods of making a living. They have no alternative: farming must become their occupation in earnest.
The English and Scotch half-breeds have already done this successfully; but very few of French descent have yet made any real attempt at it."
Perry was right. These people had the blood of the nomad and the volatile in their veins. Perry continues, "As farming is the inevitable pursuit of the French half-breeds, all who are friendly to them should agree in urging and encouraging them to remain on their present holdings, so that they may at once face their destiny and ultimately obtain the position of a self-supporting people. They should be treated with patience and aided generously, remembering that it is not easy for white men possessing all the advantages of education and civilization to change their occupation. Can the half-breed hunter or freighter be expected to be more apt in adapting himself to change? It would be an astonishing thing if they quietly and quickly adapted themselves to the work of a farm on which success is only obtained by hard, patient and continuous labour." And Perry goes on to advise special instruction for these people. And he concludes, "There is a tendency on the part of some to regard the problem of the future of these people as insolvable.
Knowing their many sterling qualities I cannot despair, but believe their descendants will be prosperous and desirable citizens of our North-West Territory." Words like these could not be written by a man who contented himself with the routine duty of a policeman, but by a wide-awake Canadian who was anxious for the future of his country and his fellow-citizens, and it is because there were so many in the Force who saw these questions in the light of Canada"s future that we have always placed the Mounted Police amongst the real nation-builders of this new Dominion.
And the decade which ended with 1890 finds one of the new pages in the story of the Police in the patrol by Inspector J. V. Begin across the stormy waters of Lake Winnipeg up to the bleak sh.o.r.es of Hudson Bay at the famous old post of York Factory. This patrol involved much hardship and danger, but it stabilized conditions in that remote Keewatin area.