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125 Years Ago in North America

The American Civil War breaks out in 1861. A group of ten southern states, called the Confederate States of America, the "Confederacy", wanted stronger state governments and a weak central government. That would make each state almost like a small independent country. The remaining northern states, the "Union", preferred the system as it was. A key issue was slavery. This was banned in the northern states, and there were abolitionist movements who wanted slavery banned throughout the country. But the southerners wanted each state to have the right to determine whether or not slavery would be legal. On the other hand, the southern states successfully pushed for and got a law that made it illegal to hide or help run away slaves anywhere in the United States. This made the "underground railroad" to Canada, a network of people helping slaves run away, especially important for escaped slaves.

Famous battles of the Civil War included the two battles of Bull Run in 1861 and 1862, and Chancellorsville and Gettysburg in 1863. The fighting was closer to that which would be seen in the First World War, than in the wars of Napoleon, with the use of trenches and primitive machine guns called Gatling guns. The Confederacy (maybe) had the better generals, like Robert E. Lee, but the Union had more men and more industry to produce weapons. By the time the war ended in 1865, some 623,000 people had died, including many civilians, with widespread economic destruction in the southern United States. More Americans died in the Civil War than in the two World Wars combined.

Although slavery was ended by the Union victory (President Lincoln made the "emancipation proclamation" freeing the slaves in 1863), people of African descent remained politically and economically disadvantaged. In 1868, black Americans were finally granted citizenship, and in 1870, black men received the right to vote, although laws in some states in reality kept blacks from voting.

In the decades following the invention of the steam-powered locomotive shortly after 1810, railroad building mushroomed across the United States. This both encouraged and resulted from the settlement of the west. In 1883, the North Pacific Railway was finished between Duluth and Portland, while the Southern Pacific Railway was completed the same year between New Orleans and Los Angeles. In 1889, a third trans-continental line was completed between Omaha and San Francisco.

The Sioux Wars

"What white man has ever seen me drunk? Who has ever come to me hungry and left me unfed? Who has seen me beat my wives or abuse my children?

What law have I broken?"

"Is it wrong for me to love my own? Is it wicked for me because my skin is red? Because I am Sioux? Because I was born where my father lived? Because I would die for my people and my country? God made me an Indian."

"Now that we are poor, we are free. No white man controls our footsteps. If we must die, we die defending our rights."

These three quotes are from Sitting Bull, or Tatanka Iyotake (1831-1890), a great spiritual leader of the Hunkpapa Lakota people, of the Sioux nation, who helped defeat George Custer at the Little Bighorn. From childhood, he excelled in the virtues most admired by the Sioux: bravery, fortitude, generosity, and wisdom. He killed his first buffalo at 10 years old, "counting coup" (touching the enemy without their knowing) at 14. With the leaders Crazy Horse and Gall, he stood fast against surrendering land or mining rights in the Black Hills, sacred to the Sioux, of what is now South Dakota after gold was discovered there in the mid-1870s.

Although peace had been made with the Americans in 1868, an army under George Custer invaded Sioux territory in 1876. Led by Crazy Horse, the Sioux defeated Custer was defeated at the battle of Little Bighorn, where every American soldier including Custer was killed. Even with this victory, the Americans still had too many troops, and Sitting Bull and his followers headed for Canada to escape the Americans. Returning in 1881, he was imprisoned for two years. In 1890, shortly before the massacre of the Sioux at Wounded Knee, Sitting Bull permitted his followers to join the anti-white Ghost Dance cult and was therefore arrested. In the fracas that followed he was killed by Indian police.

By the mid-1870s, the bison of North America are hunted to virtual extinction. In large part, the bison were hunted to eliminate the main food source for the plains

Indians and destroy their traditional way of life. This way they would have no choice but to give up their lands in exchange for small plots on reservations.

125 Years Ago in Canada

After a number of failed rebellions in Ireland, Irish nationalists attempted an invasion of Canada in 1866. Called Fenians (from the Irish name of their movement "Sinn Fein"), they did not really expect to capture all of Canada, but hoped to win enough military victories to force Britain to go to the bargaining table to give Ireland its independence. Many of the Fenians had fought in the American Civil War which had just ended in 1865. Although close to 5000 Fenians gathered in the United States, just 800 could cross the border before the American government stopped any more from going to Canada. This small force met a contingent of Canadian militia of about the same size at the hamlet of Ridgeway near Fort Erie on the Niagara River (now in southern Ontario). The Fenians won the battle, but then retreated back to the United States when they realized no more help would be coming.

While the military threat of the Fenians had proved to be weaker than it could have been, the colonial government of Canada (what is now the provinces of Ontario and Quebec) had been shocked. There was also concern about the slow reaction of the Americans to stop the Fenians. It was known that some Americans would have welcomed a Fenian success. So the combined fear of the Fenians and the Americans was an important cause (although not the only one) in the creation of the

Confederation of Canada in 1867. After much debate and argument, only four provinces joined-- Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. The people of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick were not given the chance to vote, Quebec voted in favour of union with just over 50 percent, while only in Ontario did confederation win a solid majority of the vote. Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland kept their colonial status. The new state was called the Dominion of Canada, with its first prime minister, Sir John A. Macdonald (1815-1891). The term "dominion" showed Canada was no longer a colony, but it was not a fully independent country either, as Britain still controlled foreign affairs.

The expansion of Canada to the west led to conflict with the Metis led by Louis Riel. The Metis had been given no say in their future. When the Hudson Bay Company sold its land rights to the Canadian government in 1870--including what are now the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, and most of British Columbia and the Northwest Territories--the Metis land had been sold along with them. Under Louis Riel, the Metis formed what amounted to an independent republic on the Red River. But when a British-Canadian army under General Garnet Wolseley arrived, Riel fled to the United States while large numbers of Metis moved farther west.

In 1873, an open battle was fought between a group of American whiskey traders and wolf hunters and the Assiniboine band of Little Soldier, near the Cypress Hills in what was now Canadian territory. This fight led to the creation of the Northwest Mounted Police Force (later renamed the Royal Canadian Mounted Police or RCMP) to watch over these newly acquired western territories.

In 1885, the Northwest Rebellion broke out. Riel was back among the Metis living in Alberta and Saskatchewan. He was joined by bands of Plains Cree. The plains Indians had suffered small pox epidemics and starvation with the disappearance of the bison, but many bands still refused to go onto reservations. One of the most important Cree leaders was Big Bear. The Metis leader Gabriel Dumont won a number of fights, but was finally defeated at Batoche by a Canadian force under the British General Middleton.

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