Big Bear: not just another pretty face

Glenbow File number: NA-1010-24
Title: Big Bear, Cree.
Date: 1885

Big Bear was not known as a handsome fellow.  His biographer Hugh Dempsey notes that, "even when he was young, Big Bear was not a good-looking person, and the smallpox scars made him even homelier." (Dempsey, Big Bear, 1984, p. 18)  Our best known images of Big Bear are those surrounding the 1885 North-West Rebellion in a stage when the Cree chief, while still able to keep up with the best of them, was sixty years old.  Having seen his fair share of violence, starvation, and just plain hardy living, he admittedly looks like someone who has spent his days on the windswept and sunbeaten prairie.

The Cree chief was apparently no narcissist, and would often make fun of his appearance. An incident in the early 1880s shows that Big Bear had a good sense of humour about it all.  Walpole Roland, a photographer that wanted to take the chief's picture, was taken aback by the exorbitant demands for provisions from his prospective model.

Roland noted, "After giving him some presents, I said I could not afford so much; that he was reversing the order of things seriously, and further that I would try and find, if possible, a more repulsive-looking Indian between here and the Rockies and call him Big Bear.  At this he laughed very heartily and, wishing me good day, gave me a parting shot by adding that I would probably go beyond the Rockies to find his rival in ugliness." (Dempsey, p. 117)  Roland concluded that he had met the most stubborn chief on the prairies.  The judgement is in keeping with a leader who refused to take treaty, demanded better terms, and stalled on the selection of his reserve for many years. 

"Crow" D.F. Barry

Pictures or portraits of Big Bear in his youth are rare, if not non-existent.  One picture that is identified as the chief, appears to be a case of shoddy journalism, mistaken identity, and a pinch of colonial racism.  The original of the offending picture has been recently sold by auction, and identified as photographer D. F. Barry's "Crow". On the back of the photograph was pencilled, "Crow" - also called Pispisa Ho Waste (Good Voice Prairie Dog)". Barry travelled the American West in the 1870s and 1880s and is famous for capturing iconic pictures of the American frontier. A host of his photographs have been digitized in the Denver Public Library.  In a 1921 interview,a Lakota elder Elk was shown the photograph and described it thus:  

the man, Crow, whose picture you show me, wears those things in his hair. They are stripped feathers. He was shot by two arrows once. He pulled them both through. He did not break them off. So he can wear the quill of the eagle's feathers for each one.

Users of the internet forum American-Tribes have identified an earlier misconstruction of the Barry photo as Big Bear in The Graphic illustrated magazine.  This may be the original case of swapped identity, but could be that the Canadian Illustrated News ran these graphics first, as the McCord-Museum has them listed as the work of John Henry Walker (1831-1899), who sold his etchings to that journal.

One gets the feeling the north-west rebellion was good news in 1885, and editors were fine with running the picture of any aboriginal man who looked suitably exotic enough to impress their readers.  The portrait of "Poundmaker" on the far left has been suggested to be "Bad Soup", perhaps of the Blackfoot tribe.

Big Bear from Gowanlock's "Two Months..."

Curiously, the publication of Frog Lake "Massacre" survivor Theresa Gowanlock's memoir of her, "Two Months in the Camp of Big Bear", has a portrait of Big Bear, which appears to have been altered from the D.F. Barry cabinet portrait.  All of this misrepresentation boggles the mind. While further investigation is needed to confirm these identities, the phenomenon points to a shared American-Canadian construction of the "Indian" which hinges on the sensationalism of military reportage and a demand for images in a time when photography was in its infancy.  Historians should have picked up on the mistaken identity long ago.  "The Crow" is clearly a handsome chap!

Louis Riel and the Miracle that never Was

Louis Riel will not go down in history as a brilliant military commander.  Instead of tactical control, Riel sought divine intervention on the field of battle.  This did not turn the tide of the 1885 Northwest Rebellion.  Despite the hesitations and questionable military acumen of his opponent General Middleton, the Métis would go down in defeat.

Historian Jennifer Reid notes that, at the Battle of Batoche, Riel was unarmed on the battlefield.  Instead of shouting tactical directions, he recited the rosary.  This did not seem to increase the military effectiveness of the surrounded Métis.

Battle of Batoche

The Capture of Batoche, lithograph by Sergeant Grundy (courtesy Library and Archives Canada/C-2424).Canadian Encyclopedia

While Dumont's troops had held their own defending their rifle pits until 12 April, Middleton lured them from their cover, leading to their undoing.  One of his fellow insurgents called to Riel, "Work your miracle now, it's time".  (Reid, Louis Riel and the Creation of Modern Canada, 248).  Riel lifted his arms into a cross.  Intervention was not forthcoming.  When fatigued, two Métis soldiers held up his arms and he called to the heavens, "My God, stop those people, crush them."

Riel's prayers were left unanswered, and finally, with Riel's men resorting to firing rocks and nails for ammunition, the forces under General Middleton swarmed the remaining insurgents and took Riel into custody a few days later.

Prisoner Louis Riel in the camp of Major-General Frederick Middleton

1885, by James Peters LAC Ref. No.: C-003450

After Batoche, Riel gave up hoping for his miracle.  He wrote to his diary while awaiting execution, "Oh my God, it is you who are waiting for me."  Thomas Flanagan's history, Louis 'David' Riel: Prophet of the New World suggests that Riel's religious world view was irrevocably tied to his actions in the 1885 Métis troubles.  To Flanagan, Riel's millennial belief in the coming of a French-Canadian and Métis kingdom, explain his suicidal attempts to offer himself as the Martyr of Batoche.

Louis Riel speaking at his trial Date     1885Author     O.B. Buell

Riel's lawyers were unable to convince the jury that his political and religious delusions or mental imbalance had caused him to act irrationally.  Sentenced to death in September, his trial was postponed for an inspection of his mental health, but Riel was deemed both capable and culpable.  Riel was hung on 16 November 1885 for high treason.