Priests and Passes: Father Lacombe, Chief Crowfoot, and their CPR lifetime passes

Father Albert Lacombe looms large in the early history of Western Canada. Born in St. Sulpiche, Lower Canada, he left for the West in 1850, when he took a posting in Pembina, joining the Metis on the buffalo hunt the following year.  In 1853, Lacombe was sent further into Rupert's Land, to assume a position at Lac St. Anne, and several years later he set up an mission at St. Albert for indigenous people in the Fort Edmonton area. While the evangelical efforts of religious orders have received their fair share of condemnation for their role in the colonial project of nation building, there are also a few connections between Lacombe and the actual construction of the iron road.

Lacombe's direct involvement with the railway may have begun in 1880, as the transcontinental line was just beginning to be extended across the prairies.  As Raymond Huel notes in the Dictionary of Canadian Biography, "he assumed responsibility for ministering to railway workers along a section of the transcontinental line being built east of Winnipeg, and in the camps he found that blasphemy, drunkenness, and immorality were rife. 'My God, send me back to my old Indian mission,' he wrote in his diary."

File number: NA-4209-2
Title: Father Albert Lacombe en route to Calgary from Blackfoot reserve, Alberta.
Date: Autumn 1884

Lacombe's role as "railway worker" continued into 1883.  As surveyors plotted the location of the line near Blackfoot Crossing, Lacombe negotiated with the Niitsitapi (Blackfoot) chiefs, giving them gifts of sugar, tobacco, tea, and flour, relaying that Lt. Gov. Edward Dewdney would hear their protests personally.

Pierre Berton's popular history The Last Spike recalls that the directors of the CPR were so pleased with Lacombe's ability to clear the grade of indigenous resistance that they made the priest president of the CPR for an hour.  Lacombe decided to immediately grant himself two lifetime passes on the railroad, and free transport of goods for Oblate missions.  Not stopping there, he also guaranteed himself free use of the telegraph for life.  The directors were reportedly more than happy to afford him the privileges.

Lacombe was said to loan his passes out rather frequently, and one humorous incident, recorded by Berton, is worth repeating:

"On one occasion the two passes, which became familiar along the line, were presented by two nuns, newly arrived in the west.  'May I ask,' the conductor politely inquired, 'which one of you is Father Lacombe?' He let the blushing sisters go on their way."

"Blackfeet at Earnscliffe." 1886  Father Lacombe at centre, standing.
"Front row", left to right: North Axe, Peigan Chief, One Spot, Blood sub-chief. "Middle row", left to right: Three Bulls, half brother of Crowfoot, Crowfoot, Blackfoot Chief, Red Cloud, Blood Chief. "Back row", left to right: Father Lacombe, John L'Heureux, interpreter. Credit: Canada. Dept. of the Interior / Library and Archives Canada / PA-045666

Interestingly enough, there was already a precedent for the gifting of a lifetime pass for negotiations surrounding this very territory. Chief Crowfoot's pass is among the interesting articles exhibited in the recently updated Canadian History Hall at Ottawa's Canadian Museum of History. Isapo-Muxika (Crowfoot) was granted this permanent ticket in 1877 for his help in the successful negotiation for the route of the main line through Blackfoot territory. These gifts suggest great trepidation on the part of the railway directors when it came to crossing the lands occupied by the Siksika (Blackfoot). That same year, the Siksika were granted their reserve at Blackfoot Crossing, which the CPR's main line crosses to this day.

These two lifetime passes seem to be the only ones recorded, but perhaps there were more? Crowfoot is said to have worn his around the neck for the rest of his life, suggesting it served as a symbol of his role as intermediary between the two cultures. It would be interesting to know if there are any other lifetime passes which still exist, or if Lacombe's pass has survived the years.

Chief Crowfoot's Military Youth

Title: Earliest known
 illustration of Crowfoot.
Date: 1875
Photographer/Illustrator:
Nevitt, Richard Barrington 
Glenbow Image No: NA-51-1

Chief Crowfoot of the Blackfoot, is generally not known as a generalissimo.  After his abstention from the 1885 North-west Rebellion, he rose to notoriety as an emblem of loyalty, or in the parlance of the late nineteenth-century, a "good Indian."  Yet like any resident of the West in the nineteenth-century, Crowfoot did not live a life devoid of violence.  Hugh Dempsey's biography, Crowfoot: Chief of the Blackfoot (1972, 1982) recorded the problems discerning the details of the future chief's youth as an occasional warrior.  Dempsey wrote in the early 1970s, "Blackfoot tales of war often were embellished with supernatural acts, while the date and place were not considered worthy of recall. For this reason, the telling of [Crowfoot's] first and subsequent war exploits can only attempt to follow a logical path through the maze of fact and legend." (Dempsey, p. 13)

Crowfoot's youth shows numerous examples of his skill at warfare.  In several raids on enemy camps during the 1840s, he was shot by the enemy.  In one instance, Crowfoot daringly ran into an enemy camp and touched a lodge of the enemy Crow tribe.  Subject to Crow gunfire, a ball hit Crowfoot in the arm, but passed through without shattering any bone.  In another raid on the Shoshoni tribe, Crowfoot was more seriously injured by gun fire, necessitating help to return to his own camp.  The lead ball had lodged in Crowfoot's back, and as it was never removed, caused him problems in later life.

Title: Combat between Blackfoot, Assiniboine and Cree people, Fort McKenzie, Montana.
Date: August 28, 1833
Photographer/Illustrator: Bodmer, KarlGlenbow Archives Image No: NA-2347-1

Crowfoot was by all accounts a brave warrior, and several episodes narrated by Dempsey enforce the claim.  On one occasion, Crowfoot was out with a party which hoped to steal horses from the Crees, but encountered an enemy band wandering the windswept prairie on their own horse-stealing foray. As Dempsey wrote,

Crowfoot was among the first to rush into the fight, where he singled out a Cree warrior who was running toward the trees.  To travel more quickly, Crowfoot hurled aside his rifle as he ran after his enemy.  The Cree reached the dense bushes, but Crowfoot followed him.  Risking ambush, he plunged along the trail until he came close enough to grab the Cree by the hair.  Wrenching him backward, Crowfoot plunged the knife into his chest and killed him on the spot.  He then hacked the scalp from the Cree's head and returned to his comrades, who had also been victorious.  (Dempsey, p.18)

Glenbow Image No: NA-1241-10
Title: Chief Crowfoot, Blackfoot.
Date: 1885
Photographer/Illustrator:
Gully, F., Calgary, Alberta

Another violent encounter with the Crees later developed into a shooting match between rifle pits. When stalemate seemed to threaten, Crowfoot left his defences and crawled forward towards the enemy.  Dempsey writes that "[a]rrows and balls whistled past him, but he kept moving forward until he found a shallow depression midway between the two lines.  Then reaching into his firebag, he withdrew his pipe and turned to his comrades, shouting, 'Oki, come and smoke with me!" (Dempsey, p. 18)  Crowfoot's calm in the face of danger inspired his followers to start crawling forward towards his position, and when the Cree saw this movement, they assumed the worst, turned and fled.  Leading by example had won the day.

A bloody confrontation in 1873, shows that revenge could be the causus bellus of First Nations warfare.  Crowfoot's eldest son had left the camp at Three Hills and headed to war.  The son was Crowfoot's only healthy son.  One son suffered from developmental issues and the other had poor vision.  The eldest would never return to his father's camp, having been shot by the Cree north of the Red Deer River.

As Crowfoot mourned, his anger grew.  Dempsey notes, that Crowfoot's one true flaw was his fiery temper, and in this case his wrath was directed towards the Cree tribe. (p. 67)  As Dempsey wrote, "Revenge did not have to be upon the actual killer of Crowfoot's son; it was knowledge enough that the Crees were responsible.  The blood of a Cree, any Cree, would avenge the loss."  (p. 71)  After searching the prairies, a small group of Cree were discovered.  One man was killed, his body "scalped and mutilated, satisfied Crowfoot's desire for revenge."  (p. 71)  Later on, when a peace treaty was in effect between the two tribes, Crowfoot adopted the future Cree chief, Poundmaker, as his son.  Given the previous revenge killing of a Cree man, the choice of Poundmaker as a "replacement" for his eldest son is particularly ironic.

Title: "Crowfoot", Chief of the

 Blackfeet Indians. 

Credit: O.B. Buell/Library
 and Archives Canada/C-001871
Date 1886

Crowfoot's power in the 1870s and beyond were not due to his military prowess.  When chiefs such as Big Swan and Old Sun rode out against their enemies, Crowfoot remained in his lodge.  This being said, Crowfoot's reputation of bravery in his earlier years could not have hurt him in later life.  The 1870s were the last gasp of Crowfoot's power amongst his tribe.  During this period he had a large herd of around 400 horses, and still enjoyed the esteem of his people.  Even at the signing of Treaty No. 7, however, Crowfoot was not considered the greater leader of the Blackfoot confederacy.  Both Red Crow and Rainy Chief of the Bloods had larger followers, and Red Crow was closer to what one might call the leader of the combined Blackfoot, Blood and Piegan tribes. By 1881, whisky had crushed the organization of Crowfoot's people.  Dempsey notes that it was only "with the old order changing [that] he emerged as Crowfoot the peacemaker."  (p. 81)