(The Amnesty
Louis Riel, canadian politician (1844-1885)
...)
The Amnesty
Louis Riel, canadian politician (1844-1885)
This ebook presents «The Amnesty», from Louis Riel. A dynamic table of contents enables to jump directly to the chapter selected.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
-01- ABOUT THIS BOOK
-02- THE AMNESTY
The Collected Writings of Louis Riel / Les écrits complets de Louis Riel
(This critical, definitive edition is composed of five ann...)
This critical, definitive edition is composed of five annotated volumes: three of letters, diaries, declarations, and other prose writings, ordered chronologically; one of poetry; and a reference volume. Essential reading for anyone wanting to understand Riel and his influence on the history of Western Canada.
Louis David Riel was a Canadian politician, a founder of the province of Manitoba, and a political leader of the Métis people of the Canadian Prairies.
Background
Louis Riel was born at Saint-Boniface, Manitoba, on October 23, 1844, of Métis parents.
The Red River Settlement was a community in Rupert's Land nominally administered by the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), and largely inhabited by First Nations tribes and the Métis, an ethnic group of mixed Cree, Ojibwa, Saulteaux, French Canadian, Scottish, and English descent.
Louis Riel was born there in 1844, near modern Winnipeg, Manitoba, to Louis Riel, Sr. and Julie Lagimodière.
Riel was the eldest of eleven children in a locally well-respected family.
His father, who was of Franco-Ojibwa Métis descent, had gained prominence in this community by organizing a group that supported Guillaume Sayer, a Métis imprisoned for challenging the HBC's historical trade monopoly.
Sayer's eventual release due to agitations by Louis Sr. 's group effectively ended the monopoly, and the name Riel was therefore well known in the Red River area. His mother was the daughter of Jean-Baptiste Lagimodière and Marie-Anne Gaboury, one of the earliest white families to settle in the Red River Settlement in 1812.
Education
His quickness of mind was early recognized by the priests at Saint-Boniface, and Riel was sent east to study at the Seminaire de St-Sulpice in Montreal.
In 1858 Taché arranged for Riel to attend the Petit Séminaire of the Collège de Montréal, under the direction of the Sulpician order. Descriptions of him at the time indicate that he was a fine scholar of languages, science, and philosophy, but exhibited a frequent and unpredictable moodiness.
He began but did not finish studies for the priesthood in Montreal and returned home in 1868.
Career
In 1869 he became the secretary of the Comité National des Métis, an organization created by the population of Assiniboia, who were of mixed Native American and European heritage.
Unfortunately for his rebellion, the Canadian Pacific Railway was on the side of the government, and troops moved west with surprising speed.
He attempted to preserve their rights when the Canadian west was transferred from the Hudson's Bay Company to the Dominion.
Unfortunately Riel was somewhat overzealous in maintaining order in his domain, and he ordered the execution of Thomas Scott, a troublemaker from Ontario.
In 1875 he was granted an amnesty on the condition that he remain outside Canada for five years.
During 1876-1878 he was confined in asylums in Quebec.
He accepted readily, believing that this was the opportunity to fulfill his mission.
For the next 14 years Riel was in limbo.
Although he was three times elected to Parliament by Manitoba constituencies, he was never able to take his seat.
For part of the time he was in an insane asylum, and he was teaching school in the American West in 1884, when events again brought him to the fore.
He leaped at the chance and was soon leading yet another rebellion against Ottawa.
By this time he was clearly mad, believing himself the Messiah and certain that God was on his side.
After a few skirmishes the second Riel rebellion was crushed, and Riel found himself a prisoner.
Soon the rebel was brought to trial by a completely English-speaking court and jury, and predictably Riel was found guilty of high treason.
An insanity commission reported that he was sane, the Cabinet refused to commute the sentence, and Riel mounted the gibbet at Regina on November 16, 1885.
(The Amnesty
Louis Riel, canadian politician (1844-1885)
...)
Politics
Riel soon became involved in the politics of Montana, and in 1882, actively campaigned on behalf of the Republican Party. He brought a suit against a Democrat for rigging a vote, but was then himself accused of fraudulently inducing British subjects to take part in the election. In response, Riel applied for United States citizenship and was naturalized on 16 March 1883.
Connections
He married in 1881 while in exile in Montana in the United States; he fathered three children.