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Perfect Kneeling:

The Mackenzie Inuits First Contact with Missions

Walter Vanast McGill University

Introduction

Conversion of the Mackenzie Inuit, now known as the Inuvialuit, is said to have been remarkably

quick,1 giving rise to competing explanations. Ethnologist and religious cynic Vilhjalmur Stefansson

ascribed it to fashion, like a new style of hats, spreading east along the coast from Alaska; missionaries, to

the flowering of carefully tended seeds. Whichever concept is right (and any others put forward) must

explain that the road to baptism was in fact very slow: its sudden acceptance in 1909 followed fifty

years of contact with Christian clerics. This article describes their first meeting.

Missionaries on the Mackenzie:

Hunter and Grollier

When in 1857 Anglican Rev. James Hunter decided to leave his church in the Red River

Settlementa

to visit the Mackenzie, he had several reasons, some of which he could not state. It was a time

of turmoil, for the Hudsons Bay Companyb, which ruled much of British North America, was under

siege. Parliament in Britain was just then reviewing its licence to the Northwest Territories, its charter to

Ruperts Land would soon end, and in the Settlement rebellion against it was stoked by one of Hunters

colleagues. So he needed escapea period of rejuvenation.

Concern for career also spurred the quest. Hunter had been among the first clerics sent from

England to the Northwest (his early workc

was on the Saskatchewan River), and had already been

promoted to archdeacon. That made him a likely candidate to replace the aging bishop. One way to raise

his chance was to blaze a new path for missions.

The reason Hunter gave his sponsor, the Church Missionary Society in London, was to battle

Rome, whose priests had bypassed Anglican sites and gone as far as Great Slave Lake.d

To counter them,

aNow Winnipeg and St. Boniface in Manitoba.

bHBC or Company hereafter

cAt Cumberland House

dRobert Choquette s recent history of the Catholic priests work, The Oblates Assault on Canadas Northwest, describes them as the shock-

troops of their faith and uses military terms throughout.(Choquette)


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he would push right through their ranks to the Mackenzie. The journey meant absence from home (a

fourth child had just arrived), but he looked forward with pleasure to planting the cross on the coast.2

That prospects were good was shown by Peter, an Inuk who with his master, an Anglican

minister, had just reached the Settlement from Ungava, east of Hudsons Bay. Remarkable in honesty

and truthfulness he affirmed what famed HBC explorer John Rae had said of the Inuit in that part of the

country:e that they were its fairest tribe and the easiest to bring under Christian instruction.3 But

nothing came of plans to take Peter along, for he passed away, supposedly because of the climate.4

The death did not lessen Hunters drive, for in addition to Inuit he hoped to convert the Far

Norths Indians, the Dene people. As he told the CMS, they were well disposed toward the gospel and

must be brought to the fold before priests reached them. Hence his rush to get possession of Fort

Simpson, headquarters of the HBCs Mackenzie District. Success was likely as the trader in charge,

Bernard Ross, had asked Hunter in.5

They knew each other well from years both had spent at posts far to

the south. More than that, they were brothers-in-law. f [ ]

Hunter left for the blessed work on an HBC brigade (a flotilla of fur-trade boats, each driven by

a dozen paddlers) in June 1858.6

Months later at Great Slave Lake he met Father Henri Grollier, a man of

sharp words who was making his mark. In winter he had united in marriage Charles Gaudet, a junior

Company clerk raised in a Catholic Montreal, and his mixed-blood wife. (Payment 1-14) As it pained him

to see the enemy advance, he dropped his local work and travelled at Hunters side to Fort Simpson.g

But when Indians there flocked to the priest, Bernard Ross sent him back at once.h

That winter Hunters work among the Dene was blocked by a mixed-blood woman (baptized in

the South into the Roman faith), who told everyone the difference between priest and minister. Indians

now understood the latter was lhomme dune femme, a man linked to a wife, while Oblates belonged to

God. Her tone was especially sharp because her daughter was the wife of Gaudet, who had just renounced

his Catholic faith and adopted that of Hunter. i

eThe comments by famed HBC surgeon and explorer John Rae referred to the Inuit of Hudsons Bay and adjacent coasts. He had not yet

published his highly negative views of those he had encountered in the Mackenzie Delta during his expedition with John Richardson in 1848.

fNorway House, on the inland water route west of Hudsons Bay. A fur trade post was called a fort, a house, or a factory. Only the last gave a

sense of size or importance. The former could be large (e.g. Norway House) or small (LaPierres House in the Yukon).

gHunter journal, Aug. 11, 1858, CMS Reel A91, NAC. [Grollier citation?]

h

iMr. Gaudet was last year admitted into the Church of England by Archdn Hunter. W. W. Kirkby to CMS Aug. 20, 1859. I am not sure of the

exact date of Gaudets conversion, or when his mother-in-law knew of it, so linking it to her behaviour may be unjust.


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Peer pressure likely caused the move, for Gaudet may have feared that being seen as a Papist

would stall his career, and for that had good reason: he was the only trader in the district of the Catholic

faith and Chief Trader Ross, born in Northern Ireland, despised Rome. His switch that winter was

Hunters only success, for natives, except a few who did so briefly, would not come his way. Grollier

gleefully wrote that in July the minister left in shame to rejoin his dear other half. [ref.?]

The ministers view of Inuit had by now greatly changed. Rather than peaceful and eager to learn,

they were a very treacherous and blood thirsting race.7 A Gwichin (i.e. a member of the Dene tribe that

live adjacent to the Delta) had murdered his Inuit wife, for which her people vowed revenge. So Hunter

had not visit the the nearby HBC site then referred to as Peels River and later as Fort McPherson.

Gwichin had long bought goods from whites to sell to Inuit, and to keep that trade ensured that

no one from the Delta got south to a fort. When murder occurred, revenge triggered cycles of killing. And

since HBC men had contact only with Gwichin, they believed the latters story of being a peaceful

people. That view, however, foundered after the 1840 building among them of the Peels River post.

Short of food and miffed by changes in intra-tribal the post induced, they threatened assault.[ref.]

Late that decade the HBC built Fort Yukon across the mountains. But since much of the trade it

drew had formerly gone to Peels River, the latters profit dropped.[ref.] The only means to raise it back

up was to draw Inuit from the coast, barter with them directly, and cut out the Gwichin. That, however,

proved difficult, for the former thought whites gave the Gwichin guns to kill them [ref.] It took repeated

tries, through emissaries with gifts, to show otherwise, and a massacre of Inuit by Gwichin brought a set-

back. [ref.] But in 1854 a chief and two men ascended the Peel and entered Company buildings.[ref.]

Traders on the Coast

The threat that kept Hunter from the Delta was overblown, for an HBC clerkjearly that year

visited the Inuit. Well received, he found them anxious for a settled intercourse with whites. Still, given

the hatred between them and Gwichin, Chief Trader Bernard Ross felt they must not come to Peels

River. And he dared found no post in the Delta without a translator good at his work. 8

If some Gwichin were capable of speaking the Inuits language, they lost that skill at strategic

times. Having failed to keep space between whites and people from the coast, it seems they used language

as a barrier. True or not, Ross was angry his plans were poorly explained.

jJames Lockhart. His report is not included with the transcript of the B. R. Ross letter to Simpson in the HBC correspondence book. I have not

yet searched for it elsewhere.


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The need for translation was strong because he had sent another clerk, Roderick MacFarlane, to

the mouth of the Anderson, east of the Mackenzie. If a post were put there, it would serve both nearby

Inuit bands and the people of the Delta, whom he still somewhat feared.kThe foray, however, did not go

as well as hopedthe presence of Indians in MacFarlanes group caused problems. [reference?]

To avoid such issues in future, MacFarlane asked the Inuit for a boy to take south to train as an

interpreter. Though that got no response, Ross hoped a similar request by Gaudet, now in charge at Peels

River, would bring success. His stay with the Delta Inuit boosted HBC fortunes, as he enjoyed their

hospitality and got many pelts.9 But his request to let a youth go needed time for discussion.

Inuit Youths for the HBC

On average, Inuit families consisted of a mother, father, and two childrena formula that

changed in tandem with the number of wives a man possessed. Other offspring were left to die or given

up for adoption. By age ten a boy helped with hunts, and girls with chores; giving one up meant loss of

labour in the present, and less security in the future. Besides, bonds of love were tight.

On the other hand, some children were miserably unhappy. For those who were orphaned or

given away past the infant stage, the relation with adoptive parents was often that of slaves. Though

worked the hardest, they were last to be fed, and wore decrepit clothes. [Nuligak]

In winter the following may have happened. Given the travel that occurred along the coast

between tribes, it may have been aware of the HBCs foray to the Anderson, and that a post might go up

thereperhaps Gaudet himself told them of it. But that location was not suitable to themselves: getting

there meant travel overland, and the site did not fit their migrations south through the Delta. Besides, they

would have to share whites attention with another tribe. So they decided to let two youngsters go, but in

return, wanted a post in their midst. On hearing their wish, Gaudet advised it would carry more weight if

posed directly to Chief Trader Ross at Fort Simpson. Then he arranged for Tiktik (one of the chiefs) and

the children to accompany him there later.

Gaudet did not know it, but the scheme fit perfectly with pressure from HBC governor Sir George

Simpson, who wanted a fort near the coast built at once. You will apply yourself with energy he

ordered Ross, to the early accomplishment of that object. The Company could send no interpreter from

Hudsons Bay, so the only remedy was to offer sufficient inducement to the Esquimaux to allow one or

two or more children to be raised among staff. For this and the fort there was no limit to cost.10

kThe letter also advised that people from Cape Bathurst (very friendly) would shield the new post from damage by those from the Delta. Ross

to Simpson, 1858, 11, 29. HBCA B200/b/33.


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Ross got the letter in July 1859 when, as each year, he took the Mackenzies furs on a month-long

journey to Portage La Loche, where he exchanged them for new trade goods brought by a brigade from

the South. Debarking at that point was Hunter who was returning home (where his daughter Mary would

die before he arrived) and coming aboard was his replacement, the Rev. William Kirkby, whose task it

was to found permanent missions.

The governors missive told that the HBCs exclusive licence to the Northwest Territories had not

been renewed. So its role in helping missions was no longer as governing body, but as private

individuals. The new approach included Father Grollier, who (so the letter advised) would join the

brigade as it made its way back to Fort Simpson, and stay there until boats left for the Lower Mackenzie.

He planned to start a mission at Good Hope.

Implicit in all this was HBC concern for its hold on Ruperts Land, whose 1670 charter would be

up for review in a decade. After the nasty things said about the Mackenzie District at parliamentary

hearings in London two years before, in recent books about the Far North, in reports by naval visitors, and

in attacks by former fur-trade employeesl, it was here the Company had to act.

What gave Christians a special sense about missions to Inuit was the final phrase, the end of the

worldin Jesus s Great Commission, which was seen as an order to take the gospel to the globes most

distant sites.m An Old Testament text, He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river

until the ends of the earth, was thought to presage it.n

To recover the Companys reputation it had to be seen not only trading with Inuit but assisting

clerics to bring God to them and other far-off peoples. And since public relations required these measures,

they had to be put in place even though the Mackenzie was not part of Ruperts Land. Sir George, as a

result, ordered Ross to help missions to the full extent conditions permitted.

Perfect Kneeling

At each Mackenzie District post, the clerks summer departure was timed to reach Fort Simpson

just as the chief trader returned with new goods from the South. In 1858 Ross arrived from the portage on

lAlexander Isbister and John McLean.

mThe Great Commission, KJV Matthew 28:18-20, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations,

baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have

commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. The New Century Version translates the last words as the end

of this age." For British fascination with the Arctic see the turgid, overly academic volume by David (David).

nPsalms 72:8, King James Version. The idea for this line comes from Martha McCarthys From the Great River to the Ends of the Earth,

(McCarthy), a superbly researched, fluent account of Mackenzie missions south of the treeline.


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August 14, and Gaudet from Peels River less than twenty four hours later. What made for excitement

was the presence on board of Tiktik and four other Inuit: a man, a woman, their boy, and a nine-year-old

girl, Attingarek, who had come without her parents.11

The crowd was thrilled by their height, intelligence, good nature, exotic dress, and remarkably

fine looks. The children would pass among a number of Europeans without notice. Kirkby was beside

himself with joy. Here, he wrote in his journal, is a new tribe to the Redeemer. May his glorious

Kingdom be speedily established among them.12

The promise seemed strong because these people spent large parts of the year in permanent

dwellings. Given where they lived, they could not be made to farm, the sine qua non of conversion tactics

in the South. But there was no need to collect them in communal settings since they already did so

themselves. Their large villages of driftwood homes were all so many facilities to the progress of the

Gospel. Already Ross had invited Kirkby to the fort to be built near them. Grollier, too, had asked to go,

but was not allowed.13

Ross met the Inuit in the mess room, where numerous HBC men watched the proceedings. Saying

nothing of his plans for a post on the Anderson, he told them he would place one wherever they wanted.

But he needed an interpreter and asked that the boy and girl be left with the minister for training. When

the men agreed, Kirkby lept with joy. The youngsters after some training would bring the message of

salvation to all on the coast.

As the session ended, the chief trader was about to make gifts when he asked Kirkby to hand

them out instead, so as to establish attraction between cleric and future converts. 14 Next morning, a

Sunday, they came to worship in the same packed space and behaved with the greatest decorum. They

stood, sat, and kneeled as if they had been used to it for years. Never before had Kirkby so strongly felt

the gracious assistance of God.o

On Monday in Kirkbys room (in the officers quarters upstairs) the visitors left nothing

untouched. A clock and umbrella intrigued them most, but they were not content just to look. Wanting

goods to take home, they made signs for knives, scissors, and needles, and Kirkby took them to the store

and purchased it all. Then Gaudet brought a translator, a Gwichin who had come on the journey from

Peels River, so that Kirkby could speak at length of Jesus and salvation.15

By Tuesday the men and the boy wore European suits, the girl a dress and bonnet, all made by the

tailor. But Kirkby was aghast, for the priest had hung a crucifix from their necks. The figure, he had told

them, was the child of the sun and if worn without fail (like the amulets on their native clothing) would

oWhile closing the service, Kirkby thanked HBC personnel on behalf of the CMS for their noble efforts to erect a church.


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save them from harm. Gaudet threw the crosses to the ground while raising a hand as if in horror and

disgust.16

It was not until a week after the Inuits arrival, as they boarded Gaudets boat for home, that the

boy realized he was to stay at Fort Simpson. He wailed so loud and clung to his mother so tight that, to

Kirkbys distress, she took him along. Only Attingarek, without parents to appeal to, was left behind.

At Peels River, where many Inuit met the boat, the delegates told of their excellent treatment. So

good was the news, many offered to go the next year. But when matters related to Attingarek came up,

conflict arose. Ross had sent a present to the girls father, and as he stepped forward to claim it another

man wanted it also. It turned out she had belonged to two families in sequence. At some point one had

given her up to the other, and there she was raised. It was the second father who argued the gift should go

to him, for he was taking the greater loss. As a fight was about to erupt, Gaudet proposed the gift be

shared, to which the men agreed.17

Attingarek becomes Maria

For the next few weeks Attingarek, the poor little Eskimo girl, remained dull and withdrawn.18

Only a Gwichin boy, an orphan Gaudet had brought south along with the Inuit and who knew her tongue,

brought some comfort.

Also at Fort Simpson was an HBC manpwhose Gwichin wife spoke some of the Delta Inuit

language, and it was with her that Attingarek stayed. Each day with the boy and four others she went to

Kirkbys school, and as they gained skill in saying letters and body parts, she cheered up. Smart as the

rest, she was perfectly happy and anxious to learn.19

In 1861 one of Attingareks fathers, also a chief, came to Peels River and told Gaudet he wanted

to see her the next year. 20 But to go to Fort Simpson by Company boat he needed consent from Ross, who

in spring refused it, preferring he come the next year.21 And by then something had happened to the

chiefs relationship with Gaudet, who ruled against his going.22

So reunion of the two never took place.

Attingarek further lost connection to home when her name was changed. It probably happened in

an informal way at first, but was documented when in early 1863 McFarlane arrived from Good Hope for

a visit, and received orders to build a fort near the coast. The site, however, was not in the Delta as Tiktik

had hoped, but on the Anderson River. Kirkby, who failed to grasp how far from their homes that would

pJames Flett. He had the prior years been stationed at La Pierres House, a subsidiary to Peels River west of the mountains. He had no

relationship to the orphan boy, who was pure Indian and had been given the name William Flett.


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be, quickly baptized Attingarek and the Gwichin boy so MacFarlane could report the news to their

friends. [xxxx]

Baptism in that era involved assigning a new first name, often one from the bible. Rarely,

however, did ministers choose one of liking to the Roman Church. Yet the minister probably had no

choice, as many women related to HBC men were called Mary, including the sister of Chief Trader

Bernard Ross, his deceased mother-in-law Mary Ross, who held the same relationship to Archdeacon

Hunter, and the latters recently deceased daughter. Attingarek was now Maria Ross.

Despite the hope raised by Tiktiks visit to Fort Simpson, Kirkby made no effort to contact Inuit

and instruct them further. Three years later, on his way to the Yukon, he came across a group that

forcefully took some goods from his boat but caused no harm. In an account published by the

Smithsonian Institution he featured their good looks, which he thought reflected high intellect, a claim he

bolstered by reference to Attingarek, who by then spoke and read English well. (Kirkby 416-20) Despite

that fine result, however, she brought no help in evangelization.

Girls on the coast became sexually active when still children by todays standards, often

experiencing trial marriage before starting a permanent home. And in the fur-trade men took very young

brides. So it is no surprise that Attingarek at age thirteen became partner to William Brass, a postmaster

who spent time at Fort Simpson.

In describing the marriage, which seems to have occurred la faon du pays during his absence,

Kirkby failed to hide dismay: As far as earthly things go she has a comfortable home for her future life.

Brass had been assigned to a post well south of the treeline, 23 but if plans came through to place him at

Peels River (where he had been before), Attingarek might still tell her poor countrymen something of

Jesus.24 None of that came about. How long Attingarek stayed Brasss wife, whether she bore him

children, or what age she attained, no one seems to know.

LEnvoi

Governor Simpson died in 1860 after a series of convulsions (he had had them as far as two

decades back).25 The life of the Little Emperor had come to an end, and so before long would that of his

empire.

Next to leave this world was Father Grollier. Shortly after meeting Tiktik and his fellow

emissaries, he founded a mission at Fort Good Hope, and from there visited Peels River, where he laid

dubious claim to effecting permanent peace (under a cross held aloft) between Inuit and Gwichin.

Shortness of breath felled him in 1863, at age 35.


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Though he never entered the Delta, Catholic histories tell how Grollier realized his ideal, which

was to take the cross all the way to the Pole.(Champagne 121)26

That claim parallels the inscription on

his grave: Je meurs content, O Jsus, votre tendard estlev jusquaaux extrmits de la terre. (I die

content, Oh Jesus, for your standard has been raised even unto the ends of the earth.)(Choquette

photograph, 58)

Similar words marked Canadas founding four years later. When delegates sought to name it a

kingdom and the United States objected, the solution (a dominion) was found in one of the bible texts

that, as we saw above, served as basis for missions: He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and

from the river until the ends of the earth.q

Given that heady mix of national pride with Christian

triumphalism, as well as colonists pressure for soil, the HBC recognized its charter would not be

renewed, and after negotiating gave up its rights in 1870.

Charles Gaudet in 1863 moved to Good Hope, where he stayed many years. His only white

companions there were two Oblate priests and a brother at the Catholic mission. Soon he secretly reverted

to the Catholic faith,27 but in public did not show it till a decade later. (Payment 5)

Hunters Mackenzie journey did not lead to his becoming the next bishop.28

In 1862 at the Red

River Settlement he had to deal with scandal involving xxxx Corbett, the medical missionary who had

whipped up rebellion against the HBC. After making a servant girl pregnant, he had tried to abort the

foetus. The nastiness that followed contributed to Hunter being brushed aside for the episcopal post.

Returning to England, he became a renowned London preacher.

For decades nothing came of missions to the Mackenzie Inuit. Each spring clerics might have

spent weeks with them during their stay at Peels River, or followed them to their homes in the outer

Deltaand sometimes they didbut scandal or some other issue nearly always negated those efforts.

That is not to say that this was a cause of the failure to obtain convertsit may be that no matter how

steady the contact, people were not ready to adopt Christian tenets.

The same might be said of extraction, i.e. bringin individuals to a well-established mission,

teaching them bible concepts and the evangelizers language, and then sending them home to spread the

new faith. After Attingarek other youths from the coast stayed at length at HBC posts from time to time,

but close exposure to clerics and contact with their own people never helped (as far as one can tell) the

Christian cause. To the contrary, it often caused problems.29

Tiktiks people found little use for the fort on the Anderson River. Bernard Ross confidently

wrote that it would bring an important and lucrative trade, 30 but when instead for two years it only

qLeonard Tilley, government leader in New Brunswick, suggested the text. (Morton 97-98)


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brought cost, the HBC chose to move it to the Delta. 31 Lumber was readied for shipment, and then the

plan was dropped. Fort Anderson made further loss and by 1865 stood empty. Inuit later burnt it down for

nails. Promise of a new one for the Delta was made from time to time, but that, too, came to

naught.(Vanast)

When in 1889 Americans began to whale the Beaufort Sea and traded with the Delta Inuit, the

HBC again planned in their midst. But it was whalers themselves who installed one at their nearby supply

base at Herschel Island. And after their departure for points further east, Anglican missionary Isaac

Stringer from 1897 to 1901 ran it for them. Living with wife and children in their plant, he established his

mission there. As during the Inuits visit to Fort Simpson, trade and evangelization were closely bound.

It would not surprise it Tiktik felt bitter about his stay far south on the Mackenzie, but it would

not surprise if he felt bitter. Attingarek had stayed with whites, yet the HBC had not built a fort for his

people. Yet he continued to visit Peels River in spring,32

though some years he may have stayed on the

coast, where he played a central role in a murderous feud between his family and another.33

Also causing decline in Inuit numbers was illness, which from time to time felled many natives.

After Tiktiks wife died in November 1885, she was brought to Peels River and lay frozen in the

warehouse beside three Gwichin.34 That she taken there for burial, rather than left above ground where

she died, may be a first sign of willingness to adopt Christian rites. It did not, however, point to a

receptive attitude to Isaac Stringer, who came to the post in 1892 (he was then still a bachelor), and whose

specific task was to convert them.

Stringer saw the Inuit oftenat the fort, in the Delta, and at Herschel Islandbut had not one

convert when nine years later he left the North. It was only after another eight years of mission, and that

by an far less popular cleric, that the first baptisms came about.

Around the time Tiktik lost his wife he had a new daughter, Sukayak (the fast one), perhaps the

offspring of a more junior woman in his household. In 1901 she worked briefly at Herschel Island for the

Stringers, sewing beautiful coats trimmed with fur from unborn caribou fawns. It was in these that in the

fall on their way home the clerical family was photographed, and in which they were later received by the

King and Queen of Britain. 35

Sukayak and her husband survived a 1902 epidemic that killed eighty of the two hundred in their

tribe, and on a summer tour in 1909 Stringer (now a bishop based in a Yukon city) held a hearty

service, with many present, in their tent.rDuring that trip a few Inuit were baptized, and soon thereafter

nearly all the Inuit of the region, including the two hundred who had moved there from Alaska in prior

rAt Nalugogiak


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years, joined the Anglican Church. Details about the Christian path of eachconfirmation, marriage,

etc.can easily be had, including that of a second man named Tiktik, who in 1914 along with other Delta

natives volunteered to take the gospel east along the coast to other Inuit. 36

But how one wishes we knew more of Attingarek.

(Vanast 2007)

1Vanast, etc. (Vanast 2007) The process and its speed was first described by Ernest S. Burch (Burch

1994) in relation to the Inuit of Alaska.

2Hunter to CMS, Nov. 4, 1857, Feb. 11 and May 11, [see also two refs below; check] 1858, CMS reel A91,

NAC.

3Hunter to CMS, Nov. 4, 1857, CMS reel A91, NAC.

4Hunter to CMS, Feb. 11, 1858, 02, CMS reel A91, NAC.

5Hunter to CMS, April 9, 1858, CMS reel A91, NAC.

6Hunter journal to CMS, June 8, 1858, CMS reel A91, NAC.

7Hunter journal for CMS, Nov. 30, 1858, CMS reel A91, NAC.

8B. R. Ross to Simpson, Nov. 29, 1858. HBCA B200/b/33

9B. R. Ross to Simpson, Mar. 26, 1859. [file number?]

10Simpson to Ross, June 15, 1859. B200/b/34.

11Kirkby journal, CMS reel A93, NAC. The girls age: Sept. 8, 1859; the rest of the paragraph, Aug. 15,

1859. Tiktiks name, March 19, 1860.

12Kirkby journal, Aug. 15, 1859.

13Kirkby to CMS, Nov. 10, 1859, CMS microfilm A80, p. 469-70, NAC.




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17Gaudet to Kirkby, letter that reached Ft. Simpson Mar. 19, 1860.


19Kirkby journal, Sept. 8 and 9, 1859.

20Gaudet to B. R. Ross, Feb. 2, 1861, HBCA B200/b/34.

21Ross to Gaudet, Mar. 26, 1861, HBCA B200/b/33.

22Gaudet to Ross, Feb. 9, 1862, B200/b/34.

23Fort Halkett, on the Liard.

24Kirkby to CMS, Nov. 29, 1862, CMS reel A93, NAC.

25

26(Champagne 121),

27Petitot to Fabre, Mar. 21, 1865, Oblate Artchives, Rome

28Anonymous, July 14, 2007.

29 The main examples are George Greenland (Arveuna), David Copperfield, and Kalukotok.

30 Bernard Rogan Ross to HBC Governor, Mar. 20, 1861, HBCA B200/b/33.

31A. G. Dallas to W. L. Hardisty, May 22, 1863, HBCA 200/b/34.

32 Peel River HBCJ 1873, 06, 05.

33 IOS 1899, 07, 01. VS typed diary transcript, DCL, Stef. MSS 98 (5):V-9.

34Peel River HBCJ Nov. 4, 1885.

35For Sukayak and her husband see Isaac Stringer diary and Sadie Stringer diary, Apr. 4-18, 1901. the V.

Stefansson diary, Dec. 17, 1906, Feb. 5, 1907, and April 18, 1912; Anderson photo album, National


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Archives of Canada (162, C23955, Apr. 5, 1910; 176, C23955,June 18, 1910; 180, C23950, June 18, 1910;

Anglican church ecclesiastic records; Rasmussen Notes, 1924.

36 For this second Tiktik, or Tyiktik, as whites also spelled it, see the Isaac Stringer diary (Nov. 20, 1898,

Jan. 31, Feb. 1-2, 1899, July 20, 1900, July 30, 1909, July 12, 1912, when the offer to go east to the

Copper Inuit occurred, and July 25-16, 1927; the V. Stefansson diary, Jan. 28, 1907, AMNH version, p.

179; Stefansson typed diary transcript, Dartmouth College Library, Stef. MSS 98 (5):V-9; Anglican church

register of baptisms, marriages, births, June 8, 1910, July 10, and 12, 1912, Nov. 1, 1913, Jan. 21, 1921.

Documents

Perfect Kneeling 7