Burying the Hatchet ceremony (Nova Scotia)

Governor Jonathan Belcher by John Singleton Copley

The Burying the Hatchet Ceremony happened in Nova Scotia on June 21, 1761 and successfully ended the warfare between the Mi’kmaq people and the British, which had lasted over a seventy-five year period, through six wars. The treaty created an enduring peace and a commitment to obey the rule of law.

Despite the intentions of the British dignitaries who attended the ceremony and helped draft the treaty, many British commitments were ignored by local British settlers who migrated onto Mi’kmaq and Maliseet territories. Twenty-five years after the ceremony, some warfare returned as Maliseet and Mikmaq communities joined Americans against the British in the American Revolution.

Historical Context

The Mi’kmaq, French and some Acadians fought against the British encroachment into Acadia/ Mi’kma’ki over a seventy-five year period, through six wars (See the four French and Indian Wars, Father Rale's War and Father Le Loutre’s War).

Frontier warfare against families was the Wabanaki Confederacy and New England approach to warfare with each other since King William's War began in 1688. Over this seventy-five years, there was a long history of the Wabanaki Confederacy (which included the Mi'kmaq) killing British civilians along the New England/ Acadia border in Maine (See the Northeast Coast Campaigns 1688, 1703, 1723, 1724, 1745).

To prevent the French and Wabanaki Confederacy massacres of British families, many Massachusetts Governors, issued a bounty for the scalps of men, women, and children of the Wabanaki Confederacy. During Father Le Loutre’s War, Edward Cornwallis followed New England's example when, after the Raid on Dartmouth (1749), he protected the first British settlers in Nova Scotia from being scalped by putting a bounty on the Mi'kmaq (1749).

During the final war, the French and Indian War, the French Officers, Mi’kmaq and Acadians warred against the British deportation of the Acadians and the bounty proclamation of 1756. Perhaps Northeastern Coast Campaign (1755) in Maine and the raids on Lunenburg in Nova Scotia are the most well known of these campaigns against civilians during the final war. Following the British capture of Louisbourg in 1758, Québec in 1759, and Montréal in 1760, the Mi’kmaq recognized the need for a new relationship with the British.

Former ally of Father Le Loutre, French priest Pierre Maillard accepted an invitation from Nova Scotia Governor Charles Lawrence to travel to Halifax and assist in negotiating with the Mi'kmaq peoples. He became a British official ("Government Agent to the Indians", with an annual salary of £150). He asked for (and received) permission to maintain an oratory at a Halifax battery, where he held Catholic services for Acadians and Mi'kmaqs in the area. In his official capacity Maillard was able to obtain agreement from most of the tribal chiefs to sign peace treaties with the British in Halifax.

The Ceremony

On June 25, 1761, a “Burying of the Hatchet Ceremony” was held at the Governor Jonathan Belcher’s garden on Spring Garden, Halifax in front of the Court House.

The Governor Jonathan Belcher, assisted by His Majesty’s Council, also Major General John Henry Bastide, the Right Honourable, the Admiral Lord Colville, and Colonel Forester, Commanding Officer of His Majesty’s Forces, and the other Officers and Principal Inhabitants of Halifax, proceed to the Governor’s Farm where proper tents were erected.

Chiefs from the Mi’kmaq Nations came to participate: Chief Joseph Argimault signed for the Micmacs of the Mesigash (Missaguash) River as well as chiefs from “Jediack,” “Pogmouch,” and Cape Breton.

Chief Argimault of the Monguash tribe was the last chief to sign. Occasion of “great pomp and ceremony, military officers, his majesty’s council, the assembly, the magistrates. Maillard was interpreter. Chief Joseph Argimault drew his own totem with the quill. When this was done the whole gathering marched in solemn proesseion to the governore’s garden beside Srpign Garden Raod and there, un a hot July sun, in a multitude of officials and staring soldiering, sailors, and townsfold, the savage chieve declared that “he now buried the hatchet in behalf o himself and his whole tribe, a token of their submission and of their having made pcace. Saying he laid the tomahawk in a sll grave dug amongst the flowers, where it was buried forever. The stone County Courthouse now stands beside the spot, a symbol of peace and the rule of law.

Chief of the Cape Breton Mi'kmaq’s declared: “As long as the Sun and the Moon shall endure, as long as the Earth on which I dwell shall exist in the same State you this day Laws of your Government, faithful and obedient to the Crown”.

The chief laid then laid the hatchet on the earth, and the same being buried, the Chiefs went through the ceremony of washing the paint from their bodies in token of hostilities being ended, and then partook of a repast et out for them on the ground, and the whole ceremony was concluded by all present drinking the king’s health and their haggas. The ceremony is said to have been performed where the courthouse now stands.

Aftermath

The British were relieved that a peace was reached. Thomas Wood praised Father Mallied for his efforts in negogiating it when he wrote, “Thanks to Malliard many Englishmen were saved from being massacred.”

The Mi’kmaq retained a strong sense of themselves as a sepaarate people. They still had their own language, a distinct material cuture, trial institutions, and a spiritual life informed by Mi’kmaq tradition and an ongoing attachment to the Catholic Church. The disresepct they often received from British colonists olnly served to emphaisze their status as separate nation. The British had not converted them to Protestantism in the 1750s.

The documents summarizing the peace agreements failed to establish specific territorial limits on the exansion of British settlements, but they assured the Mi’kmaq access to the natuarl fresources that had long sustained them along the regions’ coasts and in the woods.

During the American Revolution, Col. Allan's untiring efforts to gain the friendship and support of the Indians, during the four weeks he had been at Aukpaque was somewhat successful. There was a significant exodus of Maliseet from the region to join the American forces at Machias. On Sunday, July 13, 1777, a party of between 400 and 500 men, women, and children, embarked in 128 canoes from the Old Fort Meduetic (8 miles below Woodstock) for Machias. The party arrived at a very opportune moment for the Americans, and afforded material assistance in the defence of that post during the attack made by Sir George Collier on the 13th to 15 August. The British did only minimal damage to the place, and the services of the Indians on the occasion earned for them the thanks of the council of Massachusetts.

At the beginning of the American Revolution the Mi’kmaq and Maliseet were supportive of the Americans against the British. They participated in the Maugerville Rebellion and the Battle of Fort Cumberland in 1776. Three years later, in June 1779, Mi’kmaq in the Miramichi attacked and plundered some of the British in the area. The following month, British Captain Augustus Harvey, in command of the HMS Viper, arrived in the area and battled with the Mi’kmaq. One Mi’kmaq was killed and 16 were taken prisoner to Quebec. The prisoners were eventually brought to Halifax, where they were later released upon signing an oath of allegiance to the British Crown on 28 July 1779.