Loyalists and Six Nations strengthen their bonds
The irony? An organization with ‘Empire’ in its title is addressing imperialism’s wrongs
You hear it often these days. People gathering and, regardless their backgrounds, prefacing the business at hand with an acknowledgment the land they’re meeting on is traditional Indigenous territory.
But it’s not necessarily something you expect to hear at the beginning of a meeting of the United Empire Loyalists’ Association of Canada.
Then again it’s not every meeting that the Loyalists’ Hamilton branch has as its guest speaker a man like land claims expert Phil Monture.
He is addressing the branch this Thursday on the subject of Land Claims and the Grand River Tract.
The invitation originated with Pat Blackburn, president of UELAC, Hamilton, with the followthrough taken up by Neil Switzer, who says Pat will be doing the territorial acknowledgment at the opening of the Thursday meeting.
That might make them the first — literally — to acknowledge that a Loyalist Hamilton meeting is happening on territorial land, but they’re also the first — figuratively — to admit there’s an appearance of irony.
Here is an organization with the word “Empire” in its title (and the symbol of the crown prominent in its iconography) hosting someone so often at odds with the Crown over Indigenous land claims and trying to redress injustices of “imperialism,” i.e., empire.
But in any case the invitation was made in the spirit of the Calls to Action of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
“It is only fitting to promote this meeting as a means to support the Calls to Action,” says Neil.
“Phil speaking here is an important event.
“What we want to do is foster better relations. Canada inherited a duty to maintain obligations under the treaties.
“It doesn’t do honour to the Crown to be seen not to maintain those obligations. We want to foster (restoring) the honour of the Crown.”
What is sometimes overlooked is that there are, says Neil, “deep historic roots and connections of many Loyalists to the Six Nations.
“Not only were we close neighbours and economic partners in the Upper New York state and Mohawk Valley prior to the (American) Revolutionary War, but many also learned to speak the Indigenous language, with intermarriage not uncommon.
“During the war we were brothers in arms and after the war we both suffered confiscation of our previous lands/possessions and both ended up as refugees to Canada.”
Neil is not, of course, equating the experiences of the Loyalists and the people of the Six Nations.
But there is a bond, illustrated by Molly Brant (Joseph Brant’s sister), who had eight children by Sir William Johnson, the British superintendent of Indian affairs and who came to British Canada as a Loyalist.
But, says Neil, that bond has not adequately been nurtured.
“The question may be asked as to where were the Six Nations’ Loyalist friends when gross liberties with and breaches of treaty rights were being perpetrated?
“Maybe this meeting, though overdue, will in some small way help to restore past personal relationships as well as recognize the obligations of our government under the principle of The Honour of the Crown.”
Phil Monture, who is a Mohawk from the Six Nations of the Grand River, will be focusing in his address on Six Nations land and revenues held in trust by the Crown for Six Nations since 1784 and the many cases arising from violations of that trust and the Crown’s fiduciary duties.
Phil has spent 40 years researching and advancing Indigenous land claims, not only on behalf of Six Nations but throughout the world, in locations such as Central America.
He could not be reached for comment for this column as he was in New York City on work with the United Nations.
Neil says that, interestingly, there have in the past been some rekindlings, or at least one rekindling, of the spirit behind the old Loyalist-Mohawk alliance of the pre-Revolutionary and Revolutionary War days.
One hopes the time is ripe for, as Neil puts it, a “renewal, based on mutual recognition and respect.”