In 1837, as the Cherokee people of Georgia and the Carolinas
were being rounded up for their “Trail of Tears” relocation west of the
Mississippi, similar plans were underway for the Ojibway tribes of Canada. But
one man took the case of the Great Lakes Indians all the way to Queen Victoria
to secure deeds to Ojibway ancestral lands along Lake Ontario. That man was Peter
Jones, a Welsh-Ojibway missionary, known as Kahkewaquonaby – “Sacred Feathers”
– to the Mississauga Ojibway.
Throughout
the 19th century, as the European population of Canada expanded,
aboriginal peoples were forced to surrender more and more land to the Crown. Methodist
missionary Peter Jones became one of the strongest advocates for Indian rights
in Canada. Jones was born on January 1, 1802, near the western tip of Lake Ontario
to Augustus Jones, an American-born surveyor of Welsh descent, and Mississauga
(Ojibway) mother Tuhbenahneequay. Until age 14, Peter lived in his mother’s
community on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario, where he learned the
language and traditional religion of the Mississauga. Augustus Jones, as a
colonial surveyor among Indian tribes, had accepted the Mississauga and Mohawk
practice of polygamy, taking both Ojibway and Mohawk wives. As the region
became more populated with European Christians, Augustus found that he had to
conform to the prevailing mores. He separated from Peter’s mother and went to
live with his legal wife, the Mohawk Sarah Tekarihogan. At age 14 Peter moved
to Paris, Ontario, on the banks of the Grand River to live with his father and
stepmother. There he learned the Whiteman’s language and culture and became
proficient in farming. He made such a powerful impression on the Mohawks that
they inducted him into the tribe and gave him the name Desagondensta, meaning, “he stands people on
their feet.”
Peter Jones’s
life took on new meaning and direction when he was twenty-one. He had been
baptized earlier as an Anglican, but the conduct of the white Anglicans – their
drunkenness, "quarreling, fighting and cheating the poor Indians, and
acting as if there was no God" (Wikipedia) – belied their profession of
faith, and Jones submitted to baptism only for the societal benefits it
provided.
The Methodists,
however, were different. Jones was attracted to their holy mode of life,
particularly their teetotalism. At a
Methodist revival meeting, he converted to Christianity and gained a vision for
the evangelization and betterment of the Indians of Upper Canada (as the Great
Lakes region was known).
The
brilliance and talents of Peter Jones were quickly recognized by both Methodist
and tribal leaders. The Methodists saw Jones as someone who could bridge the
cultural gap between European Christians and the Indians of the region. Tribal
leaders looked to him as an able advocate for aboriginal lands and rights.
Soon after
his conversion, Peter “began a career devoted to spreading Christianity among
the Ojibway and other tribal groups, serving as interpreter, translator, and
missionary.” (Hirschfelder and Molin) After
the death of John Cameron, chief of the Credit River Mississauga, Peter was
appointed chief of that band.
Peter Jones
made three trips to Britain to raise funds for the mission and to advocate for
Indian rights. On one of those trips he met Eliza Field, whom he married in
1833. In 1837, he gained an audience with Queen Victoria as an official
representative of the Credit River Mississauga Ojibway. He returned to Britain
in 1845 to raise funds for a boarding school and model farm.
Jones
translated the Gospel of Matthew into
Ojibway and assisted his brother John in the translation of the Gospel of John. He also translated hymns
and other Christian literature. Peter’s linguistic work laid the groundwork for
other missionaries’ translation efforts. Yet despite his obvious ability, a
turn of events threatened to sideline this outstanding and dedicated
missionary.
In 1833, the
very year in which Peter Jones was ordained a Methodist minister, the Canadian
Methodists united with the British Wesleyans, and British ministers and
missionaries were favored for all posts of leadership. Supervision of
translation work was handed over to missionaries who knew little or no Ojibway.
The Rev. William Case, whom Jones had considered a mentor, now removed all
translation work from Jones and assigned it to James Evans, a missionary of
inferior linguistic ability. Stripped of nearly all his responsibilities, it
seemed Jones’s ministry was finished. But he would be called upon again as
Canada’s aboriginal peoples faced the threat of major upheaval.
Lieutenant
Governor Francis Bond Head proposed to London that all the Indians of Upper
Canada be relocated to Manitoulin Island. Some tribal leaders favored the
proposal since they wished to be insulated from all White culture. Jones,
however, opposed it. He feared that the removal of his people to the poor
farmland of Manitoulin Island would permanently alter their lifestyle and
threaten their livelihood. So in 1837 he and his wife set out for Britain to
persuade Colonial Secretary Lord Glenelg to issue permanent deeds to the tracts
occupied by the Mississauga Ojibway community. In spite of a libelous letter of
opposition from Francis Bond Head, Glenelg granted Jones’s request and even
arranged an audience with Queen Victoria.
Jones
appeared before the queen dressed in Ojibway regalia and presented the
petition, which was written in decorative Latin script and signed with
pictographs by the tribal chiefs. Upon returning to Canada, however, Jones
found himself anything but a hero. Opposition from provincial politicians,
dissention among tribal leaders, and divisions between the British and Canadian
Methodists combined to make life difficult for Jones. The new Lieutenant governor,
George Arthur, failed to produce the deeds that were promised and Indian agent
Samuel Jarvis failed to provide reports on Indian trust funds or answer the
Indians’ letters.
The strain
of these conflicts, along with the birth of his first son after two
miscarriages and two stillbirths, curtailed Jones’s missionary activities. In
1845, Peter Jones made a third fundraising tour of Britain. Dressed in
traditional Ojibway garb, Jones drew huge crowds who gathered to hear this North
American Indian Christian. The tour raised £1,000,
two-thirds of which came from Scotland. On August 4, 1845 Jones was
photographed in Scotland as Kahkewaquonaby, the first Native American Indian to
be photographed in Great Britain.
Jones
returned to his missionary work in the Credit River Mississauga community, but
his health had been failing for some time. The Credit River Mississauga were
forced to relocate to land along the Grand River, where they founded the
community of New Credit. Jones resigned from the mission but, defying his
doctor’s advice, continued his itinerant ministry. In December 1855 Jones
contracted an illness from which he never recovered. He died in his home near
Brantford, Ontario, and was buried in the Greenwood Cemetery. His wife Eliza
supervised the posthumous publication of Peter’s Life and Journals and History
of the Ojibway.
Thanks to
Peter Jones – Sacred Feathers – there would be no Ojibway or Mohawk “Trail of
Tears.”
Resources
Hirschfelder, Arlene and Paulette Molin. Encyclopedia of Native American Religions. New York: Checkmark
Books, 2001.
First published in Ninnau and Y Drych Welsh-American newspaper, Nov-Dec 2017.
