Newfoundland Stories (16 page)

And then they discovered something else. There was strong evidence of Beothuk habitation in the area. Cull and his men came across signs of the natives' existence in several locations. With that knowledge, a malicious thing came alive in Cull, and, forgetting everything else, he wanted to hunt them down and destroy them. The others may not have been as eager as Cull for the venture, but nevertheless went along with him as he pursued his cruel quest. Although there were five of them, they were intimidated by Cull, knowing well his explosive nature and his volatility when things did not go his way.

They scoured the bottom of the inlet for two full days, taking care not to give away their own presence lest they themselves be ambushed, and in the early morning hours of the third day their persistence was rewarded. They came upon a Beothuk encampment whose eight occupants were just rising for the day. When the surprised natives attempted to flee into the nearby woods, Cull opened fire. His companions, whether they had intended on being willing participants in the subsequent massacre, now had no choice, and their guns too took part in the assault. When the barrage was over, the eight Beothuk lay dead.

The massacre at that point was cruelly routine, this sort of thing had been carried out countless times. It was the grisly scene that followed that made this one infinitely worse. Cull insisted that the bodies be dragged to the shore and loaded onto the shallop. Once again his companions complied with his wishes, and when the vessel began its homeward journey, the eight corpses lay in a tangled heap in its stern. Then the sadistic Cull went to work.

Pulling one of the bodies from the pile, he took out his knife, ran it across the dead man's brow, cutting deep, and pulled the flesh and hair back until it came off in a bloody mess in his hand. Then he threw it overboard. In a similar manner, he desecrated the remaining seven bodies, cutting the throats of some of them as well, and mutilating others in unimaginably obscene ways. The wake of the shallop ran red with Beothuk blood. The other men, as hardened as they were, looked on in horror and disgust, nauseated by what they were witnessing. When Cull's gruesome act finally ended, he washed his hands and his knife in the sea, and sat back on the aft thwart and rested. One of the mutilated bodies left in his wake was that of Mamasut, the prudent chieftain who had led his people from Trinity Bay to this part of the island where they would be safer.

Mamasut and his family were just a few of the natives to die at the white settlers' hands. By that time hundreds of other Beothuk all around Newfoundland had fallen victim to the aggression of the ever-encroaching newcomers. The settlers had also brought with them diseases common to Europe, such as measles and tuberculosis, that had never before existed in Newfoundland, and countless natives succumbed to these new threats as well. And sometime during that century yet another nemesis entered the picture to make the Beothuk's existence even more tenuous. Mi'kmaq Indians, who during some earlier period had made their way from Nova Scotia to Newfoundland, and who had historically enjoyed good relations with the Beothuk, now became their enemy. This reputedly occurred because French fishermen from Newfoundland's west coast, plagued by theft and damage by the Beothuk of that region, conscripted the Mi'kmaq to their cause, armed them, and paid them a bounty for every Beothuk head they brought to them.

Wadawhegsut, the chieftain of a Beothuk tribe in the St. George's Bay area, was one of the first to find out about the treachery of their Mi'kmaq neighbours. One story recounts how a group of seven Mi'kmaq, travelling through Beothuk territory with the severed heads of a number of Beothuk hidden in their canoes, was invited by Wadawhegsut to partake of a feast with his people, traditional wilderness hospitality which the Mi'kmaq readily accepted. While the two groups were eating, some Beothuk children discovered the grisly contents of the canoes and informed their chieftain. Now wise to the Mi'kmaq's deed, Wadawhegsut strategically placed one of his own warriors between each visitor. At his signal, his men fell upon the unsuspecting visitors and stabbed them to death with their knives. From that day forward, hatred and open warfare existed between the two races which would end only with the Beothuk's eventual extinction.

Already beset on all fronts, the lot of the Beothuk people was soon to get worse – to deteriorate beyond their deepest fears. As European settlement proliferated and spread into Notre Dame Bay in the mid to late 1700s, the Beothuk were effectively denied access to their traditional coastal food resources and forced farther and farther back into the interior. Eventually, the entire Beothuk population, which some estimates place as low as three or four hundred by that time, ended up in the Red Indian Lake region at the head of the Exploits River.

The fur trade and the salmon fishery were by then flourishing in Notre Dame Bay, and increasing numbers of white settlers were attracted to the area to pursue these occupations. Valuable fur-bearing animals abounded in the forests of the region, and its rivers and streams teemed with the silver fish that the appetites of St. John's and Europe craved and demanded. In the eyes of many, there was only one impediment to the success of these important enterprises – the Beothuk. Furriers and fishermen alike routinely found their traps and nets stolen or damaged or their boats and premises and other properties destroyed. The elusive native raiding parties wreaking this havoc were difficult to catch, and the entrepreneurs of the area resorted to other means to protect their property. There is some contention that it was during this time, the late 1700s and early 1800s, that the slaying of Beothuk became systematic. The random and sporadic killing that previously existed gave way to something more deliberate and organized. Excursions into the interior, often organized under the pretext of recovering lost gear, were routinely planned and carried out, usually with fatal consequences for the Beothuk.

It was during these years, as well, that a breed of men openly called Indian Killers, plied their deadly profession. Most of these men were fur trappers by occupation, and their intimate knowledge of Notre Dame Bay's forests and wilderness areas enabled them to slaughter the native inhabitants whenever and wherever they encountered them. It is unclear whether these men operated on their own initiative or were employed by others for the task. Either way, the carnage they were able to inflict upon the already dwindling Beothuk population was enormous.

Included in this group were three men – Noel Boss, Old Man Rogers, and Tom Rousell–who together accounted for upwards of two hundred Beothuk deaths, possibly more. Boss openly boasted about his achievements, and kept count of his killings. His own stated objective was to kill an even one hundred Beothuk before he was through. Gender mattered little to him as he shot native men and women without distinction. Rogers, living near Twillingate at the time, admitted to killing “sixty or more of the savages,” while Rousell killed indiscriminately at every opportunity.

Despite the extent of their carnage, the Indian Killers were probably relatively few in number. Most people in Notre Dame Bay at the time, in fact, considered their actions reprehensible and barbaric. John Peyton, Jr., the renowned salmon merchant and magistrate from Exploits who is recognized in Newfoundland history as a benefactor of the Beothuk, is believed to have been such an individual. Astonishingly though, his own father, John Peyton, Sr., is reputed to have openly participated in the persecution and butchery. It is alleged that Peyton, Sr., often accompanied excursions into the interior and that on one such occasion he was among those who slaughtered an encampment of twelve sleeping Beothuk whose mamateeks they stumbled upon. It is said that Peyton himself bludgeoned one of the defenceless natives with the stock of his gun until the walls of the mamateek were slick with the man's brains. Reports of his barbarity were so widespread and his reputation so fearsome that Magistrate John Bland of adjoining Bonavista Bay issued a standing order that Peyton never be permitted to set foot in any part of Bonavista Bay, and recommended that he should be ordered to leave the Bay of Exploits as well.

In 1810, the government of the day, which had hitherto turned a blind eye to the persecution of Newfoundland's aboriginal people, enacted laws to prevent further slaughter. The killing of Beothuk by white settlers was at last made a crime punishable to the full extent of the law. Finally awakened to the fact that the Beothuk race was on the verge of extinction, the government scrambled for ways to restore these people to some semblance of their former state. To achieve this, they employed a strategy of trying to capture a small number of native men and women to immerse them for a short while in the white man's culture, after which they would return them to their own people with the hope that they would assure their kinsmen of the government's good intentions toward them.

But it was too late. In 1819, the last of a number of ill-fated expeditions into the Red Indian Lake area, this one organized to recover stolen property and sanctioned by the government, would prove to be the dying gasp of a doomed race.

At that point in their demise, another Nonosbawsut was the chieftain of the few Beothuk still surviving. A twelfth generation descendant of his ancestral namesake, he would be the last chieftain of his race, the leader of a mere twenty-seven individuals, many of whom were riddled with tuberculosis and other diseases. Like his ancient predecessor, his main strategy was to avoid the furriers at all costs, and to that end he and his handful of followers led a nomadic existence, moving from place to place to escape detection.

On the clear morning of March 5, 1819, he was lying awake in his mamateek on the frozen surface of Red Indian Lake, near North East Arm, contemplating whether he should arise or stay a little longer. Lying beside him was his wife, Demasduit, with their infant daughter nestled to her breast. Although the sun had risen some hours before, he and his family and others in mamateeks nearby were taking refuge from the frigid temperature outside. It was a typical March morning, and by resting and sleeping for long periods of time, Nonosbawsut and his people were able to keep warm and conserve their waning strength and energy. Embers from the night fire still glowed, waiting to be blown upon and fanned once again into flames, and the usual early morning sounds brought a small measure of comfort to his troubled mind. The dire plight of his people was never far from his thoughts.

Then, as he began to doze again, his senses were alerted by something that didn't seem normal. Suddenly wide awake, he waited and listened, his nerves bristled and his body tensed. The small songbirds had stopped their usual morning choir, and stillness filled the air. His every instinct told him that something was wrong. Without disturbing Demasduit and the baby, he rose from the sleeping bench and left the mamateek.

What he saw filled him with dread. Seven armed white men, less than a thousand yards away, were rapidly converging on the encampment. Realizing that he had been spotted, he re-entered the mamateek, shook Demasduit awake and told her to get up and run. Then he shouted to warn the others. His roars reverberated in the early morning air, and curious heads popped out of the other mamateeks to see what was happening. Within seconds, the encampment was in chaos and confusion.

The Beothuk, including Nonosbawsut with his infant daughter in his arms, fled to the woods on the nearby shoreline, the invaders in close pursuit. Only Demasduit, still weak from having recently given birth, failed to reach the safety of the forest. Nonosbawsut watched in dismay as she fell to the ice, unable to run any farther. Before she could recover and move on, her pursuers reached her and pulled her to her feet. He saw her resist, and then, as she realized the futility of her situation, submit and passively permit herself to be led away. He watched her attempts to shake the hands of her captors, and her gestures as she tried to communicate with them. At one point she bared her breasts to indicate to them that she was the mother of a still suckling infant.

The sight of his wife being manhandled by the white men was more than Nonosbawsut could bear. He left the woods and approached her captors. He held the tip of a fir tree to his forehead, the traditional Beothuk symbol of peace, but the white men, ignorant of its significance, ignored his offering. Like Demasduit, he shook their hands, and let them know with gestures that he wanted his wife back. At that point he was doing everything within his power to recover her without resorting to violence. He approached the man holding her and attempted to extract her from his grasp. He was prevented from doing so by three of the man's companions, who grabbed him and threw him off, knocking him to the ground.

Now angered, he arose and extracted a small axe from inside his cloak and, brandishing it over his head, ran to the nearest man and attempted to wrestle the man's gun from him. Again he was pulled off, and with several guns now trained on him, he had no choice but to relinquish his weapon. Then, as his rage consumed him, he darted and took another of his tormentors by the throat. With Nonosbawsut's iron grip on him, the man was sure of his intention to kill him unless his companions rescued him, which, with much difficulty, they were able to do. Failing to pull Nonosbawsut away as before, they resorted to battering him with the butts of their rifles. Even that did not work and he was deterred only when one of the white men sunk his bayonet deeply into Nonosbawsut's lower back, and drove him to his knees.

He still wasn't finished. By some monumental effort of will he ignored his injuries and got to his feet again and attempted to resume strangling the same man. Three shots were fired, and three bullets entered Nonosbawsut's body, sending him to the ground for the third time. This time he did not rise. His shattered body shuddered for several seconds and then went still. The last Beothuk chieftain was dead, his slate-grey eyes staring vacantly into the morning sky.