Chapter II: The Annuity Payments at Fort Pitt

It was October, 1884, and the Plain Crees of Big Bear’s band were camped above the North Saskatchewan River near Fort Pitt. The Indians were assembled to receive their annuities, which would be paid at Pitt on the 20th of that month. Under the treaty the chiefs received each twenty-five dollars, councillors fifteen, all others—men, women, children—five dollars each every year “while grass grew and water ran.”

Fort Pitt was an old and important trading-post of the Hudson’s Bay Company, thirty-five miles from Frog Lake. George Dill and I had made the round of the payments at the various reservations with a trading outfit in competition with other traders for a share of the Indians’ crisp new notes. Now our tents were pitched near the Indian lodges in readiness for the business that would follow the last and largest payment, that to Big Bear and his band. The Indian’s day of affluence is soon past; his money is gone almost as soon as he receives it.

A new prophet and champion had arrived among the band. I had met Little Poplar at Frog Lake a few days before. He had come from Fort Pitt with an order on John Delaney, the farming instructor, for provisions. I learned later how he had secured it. On the trail he had encountered the government inspector of Indian agencies. The following dialogue ensued:

_Little Poplar_: “Who are you?”

_Inspector_: “Me? I visit the reservations every year to see that the Indians are properly treated, that they have what is necessary. I’m an inspector.”

_Little Poplar_: “Huh! That’s what I am, too—an inspector. I come from the country of the Kitchemokomanuk (Americans—Long-Knives); I wanted to know whether or not my people were well treated. They are hungry, I find. Give me a _musinagen_—I want thirty sacks of flour, ten sacks of bacon, tea, sugar; that will be good medicine. Quick!”

He got the order. I was standing with Delaney in front of the agency when Little Poplar drove up with his Crow brother-in-law. He was a handsome Indian. Above medium height, straight as a rush, muscular, with clean square-cut features, full jaw, long plaited black hair, a quick tongue and cool aggressive manner, it was apparent at once that he was a savage bound to be a leader among his people and that a white man to deal with him successfully would have to possess exceptional tact and courage. He wore a fancy green blanket, leggings profusely beaded, moccasins, a wide leather belt with a heavy knife and Colt’s revolver stuck in it, a broad Stetson hat encircled by a brass band and eagle plumes, brass earrings and brass bands on his wrists. Without mention of the order he stepped up to Delaney and said curtly:

“I want thirty sacks of flour, ten of bacon, ten pounds of tea and fifty pounds of sugar.”

Delaney looked at the impudent savage with some curiosity.

“I don’t know you,” he said. “You may be in treaty and again you mayn’t. We don’t give stuff even to treaty Indians whenever they take a notion to ask for it. To strange Indians and non-treaty Indians we don’t give anything at all.”

Little Poplar’s lower lip stuck out. “Why doesn’t the Big Chief Woman send agents who can do something? It is men like you”—he looked insolently at Delaney—“that cause trouble between the Indians and the police like they had at Poundmaker’s last summer!”

He drew from under his blanket the inspector’s order and handed it to Delaney. “Now, am I going to get the provisions?” he sneered.

Of course he got them. Delaney could not refuse, though he was plainly nettled. The supplies were loaded on the carts that had trailed Little Poplar and he returned to Pitt. T. T. Quinn, the Indian agent, followed a day or two later with the cash for the payment to Big Bear’s band—which brings me back where I began.

Little Poplar has been introduced thus early in order to show the class of men who led what had long been recognized as the most turbulent and warlike band of savages in the Canadian North-west, and because his influence and that of other chiefs served to foment the discontent and restlessness in their followers which was so soon to culminate in one of the most sanguinary events in the history of the Canadian government’s relations with its Indian wards.

On October 19th Agent Quinn sent word to Big Bear that he would pay the band at the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post in the morning. The Indians arrived promptly. They filled the office in the big fort building where Quinn was seated; they packed the hall, the stairs, the doors and the open windows and trailed away into the square between the building outside. All were painted and carried guns under their blankets.

Little Poplar was first to speak. He had come, he said, from across the line; come to see his people, do something for them. He had heard that they were hungry. That was so. The Americans treated their Indians better—gave them more to eat, more clothes. He would not speak much now. He would hear the others. After that he would speak.

Wandering Spirit, war chief, spoke next. He lamented the disappearance of the buffalo, the red man’s one friend, and the Indians’ destitution, contrasting it with the abundance of the past. Other leaders followed, speaking in the same strain.

Then Little Poplar rose again and walking out in front of Quinn, said:

“Are you Kapwatamut?”

Quinn raised his eyes. “That’s what they call me,” he replied.

“May I look at you?” the Indian went on.

Six and a half feet tall, spare, athletic, broadshouldered, exceedingly active, Thomas Trueman Quinn was a splendid figure of a man. A native of Minnesota, notwithstanding his mixed Sioux and Irish-French blood he was well educated, exceptionally intelligent and had served with distinction in a Wisconsin regiment through the American Civil War. Afterward he had seen many exciting adventures while employed as a scout with the regular army in frontier Indian campaigns. It was from his knowledge of the Sioux language that he received from the Crees his name of Kapwatamut or The Sioux Speaker.

He rose leisurely, turned completely round before Little Poplar, sat down again. He looked at Little Poplar. “Seen all you want?” he asked.

The Indian scowled. “I have heard of you!” he retorted. “I heard of you away over the other side of the Missouri River. I started to come this way and the farther I came the more I heard. _You’re_ the man the government sent up here to say ‘_No!_’ to everything the Indians asked you!”

Little Poplar bent over and shot the last sentence at Quinn like a slug from a catapult. There was intense silence in the room. The agent signed to him to proceed.

“Now, I am going to ask you something. I will ask it three times before I sit down. It is long since the buffalo went away, my people are hungry and would like to eat fresh meat again. Will you kill an ox before the treaty money is paid?”

Quinn shook his head. “The government gives cattle to the Indians for work and milk, not to kill. There’s no beef for you.”

Little Poplar went on: “I crossed the line and travelled north. By and by I came to where the grass had been torn up. Two iron lines had been laid down and stretched away east and west as far as I could see. (The Canadian Pacific Railway.) I said to myself, ‘What is this?’ I thought for a moment and then I said: ‘_Hai_, yes; I know! This is the _pewabisko meskano_, the iron road that the government has built to carry food and clothing in their big wagons to the poor starving Indians.’ And I want them to bring money out the same way, in the big wagons, and to throw it out on both sides of the iron road so that everybody can have plenty of it!”

He turned to Quinn. “For the second time, I ask: Will you give us beef?”

“I’ve answered that question. You heard what I said,” replied the agent.

“Very well!” Little Poplar raised his voice. “We will have the government build a telegraph line from here to Battleford, and”—he lifted the whip in his hand—“I will lash the wires as they do and we will have him removed! I will have a new man sent in his place within a moon. I know the government has given orders that you are to have beef, but he won’t follow them. I look around me,” he went on, “and of all the leaders who stayed when we went south, how many are left? I see one old man!” He placed his hand on the white head of Chief Keehewin; then faced the agent: “For the third and last time I ask—and when you answer, _speak loud_ so that every Indian in this house can hear—Will you give us beef?”

“_No!_” came the reply in the deep voice of the agent. Little Poplar wheeled about.

“Go!” he shouted, raising his arms. “Let him keep his _peecoonta_ money! _Neeuk!_”

And with yells of defiance the whole band swept out of the house, across the square and up the hill, firing their guns in the air as they went.

That afternoon the Indians danced the war dance and Big Bear made a speech. He attacked the government and the Hudson’s Bay Company and ignoring the other whites present, walked up to Captain Francis J. Dickens, son of the novelist, commanding the North-West Mounted Police at Fort Pitt, and held out his hand.

“You are a man,” cried Big Bear, “whom Manito made to be a chief! We like you; your heart is good. As for that man”—he pointed at Quinn—“his heart is made of stone! He may go back to Frog Lake. When the governor made the treaty with us we were told we should have beef to eat at every payment.” He placed his hands, fingers extended, on either side of his head and turned fiercely on the agent. “You want my head—_take it_!” he cried, flinging his open hands in the agent’s face as though delivering it to him.

“When I am hungry this winter and ask for food,” said Miserable Man to Quinn, “if you don’t give it to me I will kill you.”

Quinn smiled good-humouredly. He had heard Indians talk before. He did not mind such trifles as their threats.

Big Bear apologized later to everyone for his harsh words, but for two days the band danced the war dance and refused to be paid. The police detachment was kept constantly under arms in anticipation of trouble and Quinn sent his half-breed interpreter to notify the chiefs that unless they came to terms he would return the following afternoon to Frog Lake.

Meanwhile the Hudson’s Bay Company officer, having made large advances to the band, grew anxious about his debts. He ordered a steer to be slaughtered and sent as a gift to the Indian camp.

This mollified the Indians; still, they objected, the beef had not come from the government. They would compromise matters, they said, by accepting the money at their camp instead of at the fort. Quinn decided to humour them and sent word that he would pay them there next morning.

During these days of “strained diplomacy” Dill and I had nothing to do but mind our tent-store, fry our bacon, watch the Indian youngsters’ deft archery and try otherwise to kill the time while awaiting developments. The Indians did not molest us. They came, talked, examined blankets, knives, print, shawls, handkerchiefs, rings—all our stock, but without money they could not buy. We were glad to hear a truce declared.

At eight-thirty next morning two troopers came with the pay-tent and pitched it about a hundred yards from our quarters. They were followed in twenty minutes by Quinn, who notified Big Bear by messenger that he was ready to begin the payment. The band was in council. After waiting for some time, Quinn walked over to our tent.

“In twenty minutes it will be ten o’clock,” he said, looking at his watch. “If they don’t show up before then they get no money.”

He returned to the pay-tent. A little later he passed our place carrying under his arm a box sealed with red wax. It contained the annuity money—seven thousand dollars.

He had scarcely disappeared in the direction of the fort when Big Bear, Wandering Spirit, Little Poplar and other chiefs came rapidly toward our tent. They were talking excitedly and stopped a moment to ask what had become of the agent. We told them he had got tired waiting and had probably gone to dinner. Gesticulating angrily and with exaggerated expressions of amazement, they went on. They overtook him before he reached the fort and persuaded him to return and make the payment.

(THE GROUP INCLUDES FOUR SKY THUNDER, OKEMOW PEEAYSIS (BIG BEAR’S THIRD SON), STANLEY SIMPSON, LOUIS GOULET, CORPL. SLEIGH AND BILLY ANDERSON).

_Facing p. 22._
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For the next two days I was busy at the store. The Indians danced and feasted and I went once or twice at night with Stanley Simpson to the dancing lodge and heard Little Poplar count his _coups_ and tell how, using me occasionally, and not altogether to my liking, as he swung his heavy Colt’s pistol in my direction, as representing the enemy, he had taken Blackfoot scalps. Then Dill went to Battleford, ninety miles away, to deposit our funds and bring back a fresh stock of goods, while I returned to Frog Lake and put up a log building for our winter trading quarters. Soon after Dill’s return, by mutual agreement we dissolved partnership. He continued what had been our business and I accepted a position with the Hudson’s Bay Company at Frog Lake.