Treaty Story
Lake Babine Barricade Negotiation History
The Lake Babine Nation along with other aboriginal people share the universal belief that natural food is a gift from the animals The most important concept is that all things in the universe are dependent on each other. This is taught to the Babine people through stories and songs of the histories since time immemorial. The stories tell of the origin of all game animals, and the origin of hunting skills. They outline the human being’s relationship is to animal and plant life and how hunting, killing, or taking of life affects us and others in the balance of the natural world. The Lake Babine people maintained a seasonal round of activities such as fishing, trapping, hunting and gathering plants from the land that provided food, medicine and materials. This activity maintained the people of Lake Babine economically, politically, spiritually and socially which provided a strong tie to their land and in their spiritual lives.
Prior to contact with the Europeans, the capture and use of salmon played a central role in the lives of the Native people living along rivers and near the coast of the region that is now called British Columbia. With the development of processing corporations, the government of Canada introduced regulations that restricted certain fishing and processing activities in the name of protecting the salmon from over fishing and habitat degradation. In October 15th 1904, Helgesen, a fishery officer, made his visit of inspection to the Babine Lake. About seven miles down the river, he found two huge barricades, a half a mile apart, in full swing for fishing where crowds of Indians could be seen on the banks. Mr. Helgesen informed Chief Atio that he was sent by the Government to destroy and remove all barricades, and any other obstructions that prevented the Salmon from getting up to their natural spawning ground. Officer Helgesen explained the Fishery Laws and Regulation to Chief Atio. The people were distressed and showed it. In response, Helgesen set back anyone who showed a spirit of resistance. Helgesen told them, they had committed a gross breach of the law. Mr. Helgesen told Chief Atio that if they resisted and did not destroy the barricades nothing would save them from punishment or imprisonment. After that statement, a goodly number went and worked away in the cold icy water, chopping and breaking down their barricade. Helgesen said that after two hours, the workers could not stand the icy water, any longer and came to him and demanded that the Government should pay for taking it down. No amount of threats and persuasion could get them to go back into the water. . To end all the talk and to get the remainder of it out, Mr. Helgesen had to hire six Indians who took out the last stick.
In the winter of 1905, the head chiefs of the Babine tribe corresponded with Father Morice in three consecutive letters. His letter stated they declared that some party claiming to act in the name of some Government wanted to prevent the natives from taking their usual supply of salmon for the year and would allow them to fish only with nets instead of traps as they had done from time immemorial. The Babine chiefs earnestly begged Father Morice to take the matter up with the superintendent of Indian Affairs so that they would not have to fight for their bread, which is the dried salmon in the north. Father Morice said that the ignorant person who forced them to take down the barricade might have committed the terrible blunder, since he knew very little about matters in the northern interior, of starving two whole tribes of Indians. Father Morice said, “On the contrary the Babine people should be helped out of the public funds as a compensation for the loss of furs they have suffered at the hands of white parties during these few years”. Father Morice believed that if the Babine people could only fish with nets, they would only obtain enough for their daily consumption during the fishing season. They would literally starve from the beginning of September to the middle of July.
The next year the Babine people attempted to build the barricade to do their gathering for the winter, the fish Guardians came to remove the weir on August 23, 1906. Helgesen report states, “when our men prepared to leave the village and go 7 miles below to the barricades. Chief George shook hands with the men and in his loud voice said, Good Bye, Good Bye, and the women sang their most musical strain. This was interpreted to signify the last farewell and the song of death”. When the guardians started to dismantle the barricade the community defended it. The guardians reported women armed themselves with clubs that was used on Norrie and Wells. When two fish guardians went into the river the women pushed them under the water. The Lake Babine oral stories states that one of the women sat on the fish warden in the water playing with him. The fish wardens sent back a report that Babine people were uprising and asked for a militia of a hundred to be sent to the community. Warrants were issued for the men from Babine.
Father Coccola talked the Babine Indian and upon his pleading, nine Indian surrendered and were jailed on September 26, 1906. The men were taken to Hazelton and tried in court before Magistrate Hick Beach and six were sentenced to New Westminster jail for six months. The men were convicted for obstructing peace officers, disobeying warrants and assaulting Constables. Father Coccola sent a telegram to Mr. Venning, Assistant Commissioner of Fisheries requested a suspended sentence for the six Indians and immediate release upon condition set out by him. Stipendiary Magistrate Hicks Beach sent a telegram on October 2, 1906, stating he could not release the Babine Indians as they pleaded guilty to the charges. Father Coccola continued to negotiate with the government to release the Indian and started to negotiate for the chiefs to make a trip to Ottawa to negotiate with DMF and DIA senior officials. A letter was sent from Mr. Brodeur, Minister Marine and Fisheries to Mr. Sloan, Esq. M.P. Nanaimo on September 27th, 1906 suggesting that Chief Big George of the Babine Indians with Father Coccola be invited to Ottawa to discuss the question of further good behavior to avoid any further difficulty occurring.
Chief big George walked twenty five mile from Old Fort to Fort Babine. He picked up Jack Williams and Father Coccola and took horses and traveled to Hazelton through the mountains. Father Coccola wired Mr. Loring on October 13, 1906 from Hazelton that the chief and sub-chief and he hope to reach Ottawa in two weeks. They took a boat from Hazelton down the river to New Westminister. They then took a train and traveled to Ottawa with Father Coccola as an interpreter. On October 25, 1906, the Babine Chiefs arrived in Ottawa. The two Babine men did not understand a word of English and only communicated with the priest during the whole trip. In Father Coccola’s memoirs reveals more about Chief Big George’s participation than do the DMF minutes. Although they were shaken about the journey, when they met with the government officials they responded to the questions directed to them regarding the incident with the Barricade and the attack of the women. Chief George significantly challenged Euro-Canadian power in his response to being questioned about whether the Babine Indians had guns.
In the meeting in Ottawa, Chief Big George was questioned about the incident in Fort Babine. He was asked if the Babine Indians threatened the DMF officers. Chief George said, No. Our men were all sitting, on the lake shore, women were driving stakes in the river to catch salmon, as we had always done except last year because we were promised abundance of nets by these officers. The nets were sent too late when the best run of fish had gone through. When we made use of the nets to get the last fishes passing by we found the nets being too old and rotten, salmon passed through them. The consequence was that we nearly starved in winter and had no bait for our traps. So this fall our women had resolved to fish as they always did by using barricades, even at the cost of life. When driving the stakes, the officers advanced in the creek to pull them out and one of the strong women weighing 200 lbs threw one of them down in the water and sat on him but after that, she took him to shore and left him along.
The chiefs negotiated the treaty regarding the removal of the weirs. In exchange for agreeing to use nets and not to rebuild the barricade the government made a promise to supply the people with farm equipments nets and a school among other items. The Babine Indians backed up their claim with a physical presence on the ground where community members resisted the removable of their weirs with compensation. They used these same techniques to force DMF officials to honour the compensation agreement which they made. This arrangement was never officially ratified by Ottawa but nets were still being distributed fifty years later. The loss of weirs required enormous changes for the Babine Indians including a virtual cessation of trade and the end of the use of the Babine Lake surplus fish production to offset fluctuation on other fishing areas. The economy for the Babine Indian shifted from reliance on salmon to trapping, the fur trade and the wage labour. Although nets were a poor substitute for weirs, the Babine Indians remained active fishers and came to rely on other tools such as boats. The Babine Indians continue to have a need for the fisheries, the trapping and wage labour could not provide them with a sufficient income.
On November 8, 1906, a letter was sent to Mr. Brodeur, Minister of Marine and Fisheries from Frank Oliver, Minister of the Interior stating the view taken by the Indian Department and the rights of the Babine Indians. He said, “It has always been a leading feature of the British and Canadian Government to recognize the Indians as having a first right to their ordinary means of livelihood in the part of the country in which they live, and to recognize an obligation on the part of the Government that if, in the progress of civilization they are deprived of that means of livelihood, provision shall be made for them at the cost of the Government. He goes on to say, “The Babine Indians have been located in their present village from time immemorial. The reason for their location at the point was the facilities existing there for their securing in a short period of each year, a supply of fish sufficient for the whole year. He goes on to say that the claim by the fishery officer and the canneries, that the barricades prevents the fish from passing and spawning in the lakes and streams above, that condition existed from time immemorial as at present then the canneries are not infringed upon. He said the barricade have not prevented the passage of fish to their spawning ground in the past, as demonstrated by the statement of Chief George, that in former years, when the Indians were more numerous and required more fish than the present, they had three barricades to the one now. If the salmon passed through the first and then the second to the third, then the third had to be built then some fish must have went through the third. Mr. Oliver talked more about the regulation of the fish by the Marine and Fisheries department and that he felt that it is not desirable to place the Indians in a position of dependence upon the Government.
