Joseph Boyden is an acclaimed novelist, and so it’s not surprising that his account of the roles Louis Riel and Gabriel Dumont played in the Northwest Rebellion should be suspenseful and elegantly written. He uses the present tense, so that the page becomes a stage upon which the events of this unfortunate imbroglio are dramatically played out.
Boyden leaves no doubt where his sympathies lie: The Métis are victims of a bigoted and heartless government. In 1884, a “balanced, reasonable, and conservative” petition was sent to the Dominion government asking that ownership to the land the Métis had so laboriously farmed for years be legally recognized.
Boyden writes: “But in the months of autumn turning to winter while the Métis wait for an answer — or even a simple telegram confirming that their petition has been delivered — they come to realize that once again, Sir John A. Macdonald likes to ignore them. His pleasure in insulting the Métis and the rest of the settlers seems to have no boundaries.”
Gabriel Dumont was the captain of the buffalo hunt on the Saskatchewan plains, and therefore the political and military leader of his people. Louis Riel was revered by the Métis as the brilliant political strategist who fought for their rights during the 1869–1870 Red River Resistance. In that process, Manitoba became a province.
The two men met for the first time in June 1884 when Dumont travelled to Montana, where Riel lived in exile with his wife and two children. The buffalo hunter convinced the educated strategist that the situation among the Métis people was desperate and that his leadership was crucial. The result of this meeting was the Northwest Rebellion, a truly shameful episode in Canadian history.
Boyden describes with verve the persona in this tragedy: the bigoted, uncaring politicians; the Judas priests who betrayed their flock; the vindictive magistrate who conducted a shamefully prejudicial trial designed to see Riel hanged. Regarding the actions of the cowardly and inept General Middleton, he writes: “While Middleton is willing to burn down homesteads, loot property for personal gain, and fire cannon and small arms onto homes where frightened women and children cower, he subscribes to the strange nineteenth century notion that gentlemen soldiers do not fight after dark.” Because they would, of course, be picked off by superior Métis sharpshooters.
Perhaps most intriguing of all was the relationship between the two Métis leaders — Riel, who had come to believe he was a prophet with godly authority to create an Aboriginal paradise on earth, but who abhorred violence, and Dumont, the skilled guerrilla fighter who at Riel’s bidding abandoned his plans to blow Middleton’s troops to smithereens.
Yet despite the engrossing drama, this is a most frustrating book. It’s one of a series called Extraordinary Canadians. We are, according to the editor, supposed to “look at ourselves through our society’s most remarkable figures.” Given this criterion, surely Louis Riel, easily the most colourful character in Canadian history, warrants a volume unto himself. (All but one of the seventeen other books in this series are individual biographies.)
Why choose the Northwest Rebellion, a sad but insignificant event in the overall history of Canada, rather than the far more important Red River Resistance? And why write about Riel at a point when he’s disgraced and a failure, emotionally unnerved by years in exile where he always feared assassination? Why not portray him as the handsome, well-read, charismatic, brilliant political strategist he was in 1869– 1870 — a true Father of Confederation?
— Maggie Siggins (Read bio)
Maggie Siggins is the author of Riel: A Life of Revolution.