The Métis Move West

1. The Métis Move West The Manitoba Act The Scrip The Northwest Mounted Police

2. The Manitoba Act Seemed to Protect Métis Rights • English and French would both be official languages • both Protestant and Catholic schools • 566, 580 hectares (1,400,050 acres)of farmland for the “children of the Métis” • the rights to their existing lands were protected.

3. Manitoba Under the Control of Ottawa • End of the Provisional Government and Métis representation • Macdonald sent troops to “Keep the Peace” • Troops were Militia from Ontario and members of the Orange Order • Militia want to avenge Thomas Scott • Métis assaulted and murdered • no Militia man was ever punished

4. Métis Still Optimistic about Manitoba • Métis assumed that the government would protect them and their rights • Confirm that they Métis owned the land they occupied • Able to select land for their children once Manitoba was surveyed

5. The Manitoba Scrip • To gain title to the land reserved for them, the Métis in Manitoba were required to have scrip • Each family granted a scrip • a piece of paper similar to money • 2 Kinds of Scrip • Money scrip could be converted to cash • Land scrip could be sold or exchanged fro a homesteader’s land grant or sold • $160 and $240 based on value of farmland

6. Problems with Scrip • Métis were cheated out of their scrip by land speculators • Most Métis: • did not understand that paper documents actually proved land ownership. • could not read or write. • had oral traditions…not written.

7. More Problems • Scrip not issued until late 1875 • slow land surveys • Adult Métis got $160, Children $240 • Children’s land hard to farm • Open Prairie land 6km away from the river • Land distributed by lottery • no control over where land grant was located

8. Government Wants Métis Land • The provincial government clearly supported the speculators and pressured the Métis to sell their scrip • Militia intimidate Métis • White land speculators con Métis to sell Scrip cheap • passed a law forcing Métis to sell scrip if white person wanted the land • prison terms to those who resisted

9. Métis Move West • Frustrated Métis sell their land titles (scrip) • Too many problems • Bison decreasing • Métis sold scrip cheap 30- 40$ • Far less than actual worth By mid 1970s many Métis left Manitoba, some settled in present day Saskatchewan

10. 1873 the Canadian government created the NWMP • To enforced the law and established a Canadian presence in the wild Northwest • paramilitary force • positive relations with Aboriginals • Specifically created to combat: • The American threat • The Whiskey trade

11. Cypress Hills Massacre 1873 • American wolfers attacked a group of Nakoda camping in Cypress Hills • Killed 20 because they thought the Nakoda stole horses Reaction • People feared the West • prompted the NWMP to step up their efforts to clear the prairies of American traders

12. The Great March • An effort to establish order in the lawless prairies - Winnipeg to Fort Whoop-Up • 300 NWMP • Their job was to suppress the whisky trade and bring law and order to the west • to protect the First Nations

13. Arrived at Fort Whoop-Up • First Nations groups were starving • American traders had fled • The First Nations, for a time, welcomed the protective presence of the NWMP • Continued to patrol the North-West Territories for the next 30 years