Great peace of Montreal

Stakes and war

The control of the networks of the Traite furs becomes a stake of competition between the various Amerindian nations, each one wishing to appear as an interlocutor privileged near Europeans. The “war of the furs” opposes soon the Huron S and the algonquin S allied of the French to the nations iroquoises of powerful the Ligue of the five nations supported by the Dutch then the English colonists.

Military forwardings in answer to the incursions iroquoises do not make it possible to foresee a durable peace and advantageous for the crown. In order to restore the calm one and the royal authority, the Régiment of Carignan-Salt boxes is dispatched in News-France in 1665 with for mission of subduing the nations iroquoises. At the price of a campaign devastator, those are forced to seek peace overtures. One boom opens for the colony.

This climate of stability does not last and the hostilities begin again quickly, encouraged by the colonists of New England, who urge their allies iroquois to undertake new incursions armed into the Vallée with the St. Lawrence. The year 1690 sees the governor Frontenac pushing back an English attack on Quebec. In reprisals, the Iroquoisie is pacified by the weapons.

In spite of the made efforts and talks started in Montreal and Quebec, the realization of a general peace with the five nations iroquoises fails.

Be a prelude to with peace

As from 1697, Iroquois are separated gradually of their intransigent attitude. Their demographic decline was accentuated with the wire of the conflicts and the epidemic S, putting in danger until their existence even. In parallel the trade in Iroquoisie quasi-is ruined at the end of the 17th century and only the merchants of New England adulterate with the Five nations.

The bolt iroquois finally raised, nothing is opposed from now on to the development of an advantageous total peace to the whole of the parts. Hitherto and throughout the century, several separate peaces had been concluded so much between the French and the Amerindians who enters Amerindian nations. All appeared without a future. In the light of the preceding attempts, this decisive negotiation will be the several preliminary stage object.

In March 1700, a first conference is organized in territory iroquois, with Onontagué. In September of the same year, a preparatory peace is signed in Montreal with the Five nations iroquoises. Thirteen Amerindian marks are reproduced on the treaty. Following this first agreement, it is agreed that an invitation will be carried to all the nations of the Big lakes so that they go to Montreal at the summer 1701 in order to ratify the general agreement there. French, religious emissary and soldiers introduced particularly well among the Amerindians, are charged with this diplomatic approach, in particular Jean-Baptiste Nicolas Perrot, the “most known French in the East of the Mississippi”, which had before visited many Amerindian tribes during its voyages and was pioneer of Wisconsin. In waiting of the large gathering, the negotiations continue: in Montreal, in May 1701, it is the question of the neutrality of the Five nations which is approached.

Agreement

The first delegations arrive to Montreal at the beginning of the summer 1701, at the conclusion of sometimes long and painful tours. The ratification of the treaty does not intervene immediately, the negociations lasting for ever between the representatives and the Callières governor, anxious to negotiate until the end.

The signature is carried out in a large plain apart from the city, arranged for the occasion. The representatives of each nation affix the mark of their tribe to the bottom of the treaty, generally an animal.

A large banquet follows the solemn act then the peace pipe is exchanged by the various chiefs, each one of them pronouncing a harangue peace.

This treaty, result of negotiations carried out according to the diplomatic protocol of the Amerindian nations, must put a term at the ethnic conflicts. From now on, the negotiation will have to take precedence over direct confrontation, French beginning to arbitrate the disagreements being able to occur between the nations signatories. On their side, the iroquois promise to remain neutral in the event of conflict between the French colonies and English.

The after-treaty

As from the signature of the treaty, the trade and forwardings of discovered can begin again in all quietude. The sior of Cadillac leaves Montreal to go to found in the area of the Big lakes the station of draft of the Detroit, promised with a bright future, while the missionaries Jesuits take again their spiritual missions in the “Pays of in top”.

At the diplomatic level , the peace of Montreal seems a single fact in all the Histoire of America. Astonishing detail, this one always valid and is recognized like such by the Amerindian communities.

Contrary to the Spanish political marked by the control of the natives and denounced by the authors of the time as Las Put, the French chose in Canada the way of the reason. Admittedly, the conflicts were numerous and bloody with the Amerindian nations and they did not cease after 1701, but never they were not inscrirent in the drifts of the Spanish policy.

On the contrary, the Amerindian Culture impressed much the colonists, as attests some the tradition of the “runners of wood”, intermediaries in the trade of the furs.

In fact, of all the colonizers of America, only the French did not exterminate the autochtones nor did not try to reduce them in slavery or to push back them in reserves. One could even assert that the “official” function of evangelization of the autochtones conferred on the News-France constitutes on behalf of the French a tacit admission of equality between the “white” and the autochtones, by considering them “worthy” to be evangelized.

Nations present at the signature

Iroquois

Onneiouts
Onontagués
Goyogouins
Tsonnontouans
Tuscaroras

Algonquiens

algonquin
Outaouais
Potawatomi
Abénaquis
Cries
Ojibwa
Miami

Huron-Wendat

References

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