A Canadian crisis of conscience

For his role defending the indefensible notion of slavery, statues of Confederate General Robert E. Lee have come toppling down across the United States. Slavery is often considered America’s original sin. And such sinners, we’re told, have no place in our modern world.

Canada is also experiencing a crisis of historical conscience, most notably in Halifax, where a statue of Edward Cornwallis is in peril of a similar fate, and for an equally ugly past.

In 1749, shortly after disembarking as governor of Nova Scotia and founder of the first British settlement at Halifax, Cornwallis blundered into a nasty fight with neighbouring Mi’kmaq tribes. In response to their initial attacks, Cornwallis issued a now-infamous proclamation, stating that his nascent colony would pay “a reward of ten Guineas… for every Indian Micmac taken, or killed, to be paid upon producing such Savage taken or his scalp.” The reward was good for men, women or children.

Cornwallis’ scalp bounty has become the key piece of evidence in the case for removing his statue from downtown Halifax. Such a proclamation, critics such as Mi’kmaq author Daniel Paul claim, is proof of “his attempt to exterminate a race of people using barbarism.” Surely someone who paid cash for the scalps of dead natives has no place in the public square of a Canadian city.

Yet there’s more to Cornwallis’ story than the seemingly blackhearted actions of one villain. While there’s no debating the horrific nature of his scalp bounty, or how it conflicts with current Canadian sensibilities, scalping for profit was once common practice throughout this country. And unlike slavery, it was embraced by all parties. Recent academic research shows both French and British colonial governments paid for scalps long before Cornwallis landed in Halifax. And many Indigenous peoples were “lifting the hairs” of their enemies for centuries before that. If scalping is Canada’s original sin, then everyone’s a sinner. often claimed scalping was a European invention imposed by rapacious colonialists. “Indians fought each other for a thousand years and never took scalps,” Hollywood actor Iron Eyes Cody told The Washington Post in 1976. Such an argument found traction in pop culture and academia, and still kicks around the Internet today. But while a great many atrocities can be laid at the feet of Canada’s European ancestors, scalping is not one of them.

On his second voyage up the St. Lawrence River in 1535, Jacques Cartier noticed “the skins of five men’s heads stretched on hoops, like parchment” in native camps. Archeological evidence also reveals telltale scoring on pre-Contact era skulls that could only come from stone knives. Even linguistics points to scalping as a uniquely Indigenous custom. While early explorers such as Cartier and Samuel de Champlain struggled to find appropriate words to describe the practice (Champlain used the term “head-leathers”), many native languages had specialized expressions

Early European explorers initially reacted with horror at these Canadian traditions, but eventually both British and French colonial officials accepted head-leathers as a useful and intimidating military practice. And in typical European fashion, they added an economic angle — payment upon delivery.

Puritans in New England were the first to offer scalp bounties in 1637. Forty years later, Connecticut established 20 cloth coats as the going rate. By 1703, it was £40. “The English tended to view scalp bounties in a transactional manner,” says Lozier. Bounties appeared during wartime to encourage greater military participation; when a war was going poorly, the rates could hit £100.

In Canada, scalp bounties were first introduced in 1691 by New France governor Comte de Frontenac. But while English colonies typically paid bounties to white military volunteers for native scalps, the French tended to pay native warriors for the procurement of white, English scalps. Also, unlike the English colonies, the French rate was stable, permanent and meant as a subsidy to maintain native loyalty. Provided in the form of trade goods, it was equivalent to about four months salary.

Scalping for profit in Canada reached its zenith in the Seven Years War (1756-1763), when France and Britain battled for control of the continent by any means possible. Afterwards, the practice became less common, although it continued throughout the American Revolution and War of 1812. In the American West, scalp bounties remained a grim fixture until the late 1800s.

Given this context, perhaps Cornwallis deserves to be seen not as an isolated example of a horrific practice, but rather as one of its most easily identified practitioners. Thanks to his current-day critics, the text of his lamentable declaration can be found instantly via Google. On the other hand, Lozier’s important work on the proliferation of scalp bounties throughout colonial-era Canada is available only through a French-language academic journal. While his actions were once considered standard military procedure — and widely accepted across all early North American societies — Cornwallis has lost the modern battle of reputation.