Interactive Website About the Chilcotin War

This week in my BC First Nations class we are discussing the impact of colonialism on aboriginal cultures in 19th century British Columbia. Part of the discussion centres on the relationship between immigrants in search of minerals or land and the native groups they encountered.

A poignant example of this interaction is the ‘Chilcotin War’ of the early 1860s. This skirmish is presented on a website called Klatsassin and the Chilcotin War. Designed and produced by historians, the website offers visitors access to both primary documents related to these events and interpretations of them. It was produced with students in mind and is incredibly informative and user-friendly.

This passage, from the website, entices visitors:

The blood of the twelve men spilled into the Homathco River before dawn on the morning of April 29th, 1864 was only the beginning. By the end of May, 19 road-builders, packers and a farmer would be dead. It was the deadliest attack by Aboriginal people on immigrants in western Canada, before or since. Within six weeks an army of over 100 men were in the field to hunt down the killers.

…

On this website you fill find a comprehensive collection of documents, newspapers, paintings, photos, even music, that relates to the events of the 1864 killings and the aftermath. You are invited to become an historian, to study the evidence and come to your own conclusions about the causes, outcomes and guilt. You will find other mysteries here too, not the least of which is, who was Klatsassin? The name means: “we do not know who he is”.

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