A Canadian Tragedy of Injustice: The Acadian Expulsion (Deportation/Diaspora)

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A Canadian Tragedy of InjusticeThe Acadian
Expulsion (Deportation/Diaspora)

• Far asunder, on separate coasts, the Acadians
  landed Friendless, homeless, hopeless, they
  wandered from city to city.
• -Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Evangeline A Tale
  of Acadie

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Also known as

• The Great Upheaval, the Great Expulsion, The
  Deportation, the Acadian Expulsion, or to the
  deportees, Le Grand Dérangement

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EARLY ACADIA

• Acadia began at Port Royal in 1605.
• During the 17th century, about 60 French families
  (with names such as Gallant, Boutilier, Thibault,
  Surette, Legere, Fougere, Samson, DEntremont,
  Babineau, Gaudet, LeBlanc, Boudreau, Saulnier,
  Dumaresq, Gagnon, Aucoin, Doucet, Doucette,
  Labatt, Touesnard, Cyr, Deveau, Deveaux, etc)
  were established in Acadia.
• They developed friendly relations with the
  Mikmaq, with whom they intermarried, learning
  their hunting and fishing techniques.
• The Acadians lived mainly in the coastal regions
  of the Bay of Fundy farming with dyke systems.

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Farming Dykes

• Aboiteau farming on reclaimed marshland.
• Labour-intensive method using dykes.
• Dykes stop high tides from inundating marshland.
  A wooden aboiteau built into the dyke, with a
  hinged door that swings open at low tide to allow
  fresh water to drain from the farmland but swings
  shut at high tide to prevent salt water from
  flooding the fields.
• Aboiteau farming of salt marshes tied to
  modernization of agriculture in the 19th and
  early 20th centuries.

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Acadian Culture

• The Acadians were and remain very family
  oriented devout Catholics. Like their French
  ancestors, they were known for their excellent
  culinary skills.

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• Caught in the middle between French (Cape Breton)
  and British (NS Mainland).
• Over 74 years, there were 6 wars in Acadia and
  Nova Scotia in which the Wabanaki Confederacy and
  some Acadians resisted British takeover of the
  region.
• France lost political control of Acadia in 1710,
  but the Mi'kmaq did not concede land to the
  British. Along with some Acadians, the Mi'kmaq
  used military force to resist the founding of
  British (Protestant) settlements by making raids
  on British towns.
• The Mi'kmaq assisted the Acadians in resisting
  the British during the Expulsion.

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• 1710 The British Conquest of Acadia.
• Acadians refused to sign an unconditional oath of
  allegiance to Britain.
• Various Acadian militia operations against the
  British.
• Supply lines to the French at Louisbourg and Fort
  Beausejour.
• This is often ignored. Acadians are usually shown
  to be neutral victims of imperial wars.

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Reasons Against Unconditional Oaths to Britain

• Some anti-British sentiment.
• Religion British monarch was the head of the
  Protestant Church of England.
• Male Acadians might have to fight against France
  during wartime.
• Mi'kmaq might perceive this as acknowledging the
  British claim to Acadia rather than the Mi'kmaq.
  Dangers of attack from the Mi'kmaq.

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Claude Picard, Ships Take Acadians into Exile
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What was it?

• The Deportation was the forced population
  transfer (or ethnic cleansing!) of the Acadian
  population from Nova Scotia, P.E.I., and Cape
  Breton between 1755 and 1763.

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Where is it?

• Acadia/Acadie the name given to lands in a
  portion of the French colonial empire.
• Parts of eastern Quebec, the Maritimes, and New
  England as far south as Philadelphia.
• People living in Acadia, and sometimes former
  residents and their descendants, are called
  Acadians.

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Who ordered the deportation?

• The British governor Charles Lawrence and the
  Nova Scotia Council.

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Events Leading to the Deportation

• The idea of solving the Acadian problem through
  full scale deportation, was not new.
• The Acadian Problem had existed since the late
  1600s.

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Relevant History

• Acadia was captured by the British from the
  French in Queen Annes War(17021713).
• The British conquest was confirmed in the Treaty
  of Utrecht (1713).
• The French kept Ile Royale (Cape Breton), Ile
  Saint-Jean (P.E.I) and parts of New Brunswick.

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Relevant History continued

• 1720-1740 Building of Louisbourg at Ile Royale
  (Cape Breton)
• 1749 Creation of Halifax as British stronghold
  to counter Louisbourg and protect Boston/New
  England.
• 1750-51 French strengthen position at Fort
  Beausejour in New Brunswick near Sackville
  Acadians were in the middle.

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But, why in 1755?

• War starts up again in 1756 The Seven Years
  War. It started in North America in 1754 as the
  French and Indian War but not declared by Britain
  till 1756.
• While the relationship between the French and the
  English had always been filled with animosity,
  tensions heightened.
• British worry that the Acadians will be disloyal,
  they tried to make them swear an oath or be
  deported.

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In 1755

• That year, the British attacked the French Fort
  Beausejour during the beginnings of a major
  military offensive to gain greater control of the
  continent.
• Within the walls of the fort, 300 Acadians were
  found. Despite claims that they had been forced
  to take up arms against their will, the discovery
  completely eroded British trust of the Acadians.

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Attack on Fort Beausejour

• Thomas Pinchon, the forts supply clerk had been
  sowing doubt among the Acadians for days before
  the Fort fell.
• The French later discovered, that Pinchon was a
  spy who had funneled information, including the
  plans to the fort, to the British.
• Lawrence was raging mad over the amount of
  Acadians who had rallied to Fort Beausejours
  defense.
• Lawrence said, Their pretending to have been
  forced to take up arms is an insult upon Common
  Sense. and The Acadians will prove for ever a
  Thorn in our Side.
• He made sure that the colonial office in London
  found out about the 300 Acadians present at the
  Fort.

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Fort Beausejour
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Oath of Allegiance

• Early in July 1755 - Lawrence orders Acadian
  leaders to appear before the Halifax Council to
  sign an oath of allegiance.
• The Acadians will not sign, but will hand over
  their firearms.

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One last chance

• On July 28 of 1755, Lawrence gave the Acadians
  one last opportunity to swear allegiance to the
  British Crown. The Acadians again refused,
  believing that this demand was no different than
  ones made over the past few decades.

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In the weeks that followed

• Lawrence, Destroy all the villages.and use
  every other method of distress.
• Carried out by 2000 New England militiamen who
  herded the Acadians together at their settlements
  and sent them on ships bound for the 13 American
  colonies, the Caribbean, back to France and
  England. The largest group went to Louisiana, a
  French colony.

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• The order to deport the Acadians read by Winslow
  in a church in Grand-Pré.

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Parks Canada - Grand Pré National Historic Site -
Grand-Pré's Legacy
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The Expulsion

• The New Englanders burned the Acadians barns and
  houses to deprive them of shelter if they tried
  to stay behind.
• Women and children took to the woods in hiding
  (MiKmaq help).
• Families were broken up as the British sent ships
  from the same villages to different destinations
  (intentional to kill their culture/cultural
  genocide).

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The Acadian Reaction

• The church erupted in shouts and cries. Every
  well-tanned face was frozen in shock or twisted
  in rage. What had they done to deserve such
  punishment? Where were they being sent? What
  would become of their wives and children? At
  first, few could grasp the enormity of what was
  happening. Weeks later, Winslow would note, many
  still found it hard to believe they were being
  stripped of their property and banished from
  their homeland -(Jobb 119).

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Their Fate

• The British response was swift and unforgiving.
• Before 1755 was over, an estimated 6,000
  Acadians were rounded up as prisoners and forced
  onto ships bound for the 13 colonies, The
  Caribbean, Britain, and France.
• Nearly half would die en route.

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Their Fate continued

• The deportations lasted for seven years.
• In the end, Acadians were sent to Massachusetts,
  New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North
  and South Carolina, Georgia and England, most of
  which were unprepared for their arrival.
• In total, the British are estimated as deporting
  75 of the Acadian population of 13,000. Seven
  thousand were deported in the first years alone.
  Another 3000 had been deported by 1762.

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British Ulterior Motives?

• British desired Acadian lands for the settlement
  of Protestants from Britain, New England, and
  Germany (around Lunenburg).
• These settlers came to be known as the New
  England Planters, the ancestors of most modern
  Annapolis Valley citizens.
• YouTube - The Acadians Deportation

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The Acadians in Louisiana

• 1756 a group of Acadians was sent to England
  and put into internment camps until France took
  them back in 1763.
• They had difficulty adjusting to French society
  and could not find comfortable homes.
• 1600 of them sailed for New Orleans, Louisiana, a
  Spanish colony, in 1785 to join others who had
  settled there earlier from 1766-1770.
• This is where we get the word Cajun.

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Effects on the Mikmaq

• The deportation destroyed the friendly social and
  economic relationships on which Aboriginal people
  had depended for nearly 150 years and led to poor
  relations with the British that culminated in
  wars and the now infamous treaties of the 1750s.

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The Return of The Acadians!

• By 1764, the Acadians were permitted to return to
  NS, NB and PEI.
• An estimated 3000 returned.
• By 1800, there were 4000 Acadians living in NS,
  3800 in NB, and 700 in PEI.
• Most settled in Cheticamp in CB and the SW of NS,
  in Malpeque in PEI, and to vacant land throughout
  NB.

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A New Identity

• The new Acadian identity was centered around the
  church since very few other aspects of their
  culture remained intact.
• The Expulsion unexpectedly acted as a unifying
  force and helped to create a uniquely Acadian
  identity that continues to this day.
• 2012 Grand Pré named UNESCO World Heritage Site.