Red River Rebellion
The majority population of the Red River had historically been Métis and First Nation people. Upon his return, Riel found that religious, nationalistic, and racial tensions were exacerbated by an influx of Anglophone Protestant settlers from Ontario. The political situation was also uncertain, as ongoing negotiations for the transfer of Rupert's Land from the Hudson's Bay Company to Canada had not addressed the political terms of transfer. Finally, despite warnings to the Macdonald government from Bishop Taché and the HBC governor William Mactavish that any such activity would precipitate unrest, the Canadian minister of public works, William McDougall, ordered a survey of the area. The arrival on 20 August 1869 of a survey party headed by Colonel John Stoughton Dennis increased anxiety among the Métis. The Métis did not possess title to their land, which was in any case laid out according to the seigneurial system rather than in English-style square lots.
Read more about this topic: Louis Riel
Famous quotes containing the words red, river and/or rebellion:
“The A B C of being,
The ruddy temper, the hammer
Of red and blue, the hard sound
Steel against intimation the sharp flash,
The vital, arrogant, fatal, dominant X.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)
“A river seems a magic thing. A magic, moving, living part of the very earth itself—for it is from the soil, both from its depth and from its surface, that a river has its beginning.”
—Laura Gilpin (1891–1979)
“The questioning spirit is the rebellious spirit. A rebellion is always either a cloak to hide a prince, or the swaddling wrapper of a new rule.”
—Honoré De Balzac (1799–1850)