Newfoundland Stories (15 page)

It didn't take long for the persecution to begin. In 1500, just four short years after Caboto's landfall, King Manuel I of Portugal, encouraged by the discovery, sent his own explorers, Gaspar Corte-Real and his brother Miguel, westward in search of new territories and islands for Portugal. The Corte-Reals are thought to have reached Labrador sometime in 1501 before finally landing on the shores of Newfoundland later that same year. It is recorded that the Corte-Real brothers, unlike Cabot, did encounter Beothuk and managed to engage them in a friendly meeting, exchanging presents and sharing food with them. Having lulled the natives into their confidence, the Corte-Reals invited the Beothuk aboard their ships, the likes of which the natives had never seen and in which they showed great interest. Fifty-seven Beothuk, including most of Nonosbawsut's own family, took the brothers up on their invitation and were rowed out to the two Portuguese ships which lay anchored a short distance from the shore. The rest, waiting on the beach, were puzzled when the rowboats, after unloading their kinsmen, were lifted on board. Their confusion turned to disbelief and bewilderment when the sails of the vessels were unfurled and the two ships sailed away into the distance.

Once on board, the unsuspecting Beothuk were quickly overpowered by the Portuguese crews, shackled, and locked away below deck before they realized what was happening. They were taken back to Portugal where the Corte-Real brothers presented them to King Manuel as a gift. Some of the natives died before reaching Portugal.They were, perhaps, the fortunate ones. Several others who did survive the voyage were employed as slaves in King Manuel's court, while some, including Ashut, were put on display in carnivals and circuses throughout the country, where they were objects of ridicule and great curiosity. The captured Beothuk chieftain, if given the choice, would willingly have chosen death himself over the kind of life he was now forced to live.

It is believed that many of these Beothuk, removed from their natural environment and subjected to white man's diseases like smallpox, measles, and tuberculosis, died within a very short time, and that none of them lived very long in their captivity. Thus the Corte-Real brothers would, in effect, be the first of a long succession of persecutors who would eventually see the Beothuk race driven to extinction.

Because of the tragic circumstances of the capture of Nonosbawsut's people, he, having passed only twenty summers, suddenly found himself the leader of his tribe. With the loss of Ashut, their chieftain, and the other fifty-six members of the tribe who had been so cunningly spirited away, the remaining people instinctively turned to Nonosbawsut as their new chieftain. Their choice was based partly on the fact that Nonosbawsut was Ashut's son and his logical successor. It was prompted more so, though, by their recognition of the young man's ability to lead them through the difficult times ahead, for they realized that a new and terrible element had entered into their lives.

Nonosbawsut was equal to the task. Three attributes in particular marked him for the role. He was a natural leader, already wise in his ways, and he had learned much from his father. Secondly, he was extremely tall, towering well over the other men of his clan, and his strength and daring, despite his relatively young age, were already legendary. Lastly his eyes set him apart, unfathomable slate-grey pools which masked his emotions and lent him an air of aloofness and authority, and differentiated him from any other person in the tribe.

He led his tribe wisely until his death of natural causes eighteen years later. Under his guidance his people prospered and gradually recovered from the loss of so many of their members. Disciplined and resourceful, he made sure that they followed and respected the laws and ways of the ancestors, the ancient tenets that had sustained them for thousands of years, and when it was needed he meted out justice fairly and equitably. While he believed in and enforced the old ways, he had introduced one new cardinal rule: avoid the whitefaces at all costs. The kidnapping of his father and the others was never far from his mind and the ruthlessness he had observed that day had cemented his judgement of the white-skinned intruders.

His caution was well-founded, for that period saw the arrival of a succession of European ships which, following the lead of Gaspar and Miguel Corte-Real, came to Newfoundland's shores each year to capture Beothuk and bring them back to Europe as slaves. Several countries besides Portugal, including England and France, participated openly in this enterprise. The slave trade would undoubtedly have continued indefinitely but for one fact: the Beothuk people did not make suitable slaves. A chronicler of the time, Charlevoix, perhaps summed it up best when he said, “There is no profit at all to be obtained from the natives, who are the most intractable of men, and one despairs of taming them.”
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When that conclusion was reached by all concerned, the slave trade finally ceased. Nonosbawsut could be counted as perhaps the only Beothuk chieftain who had not lost a single person to this vile practise.

For more than a hundred years following Caboto's landfall, long after Nonosbawsut had passed on to the afterlife, permanent settlement in Newfoundland was prohibited. The fishing industry carried on in Newfoundland waters by England, France, Portugal, and Spain was strictly seasonal, with the fish-laden ships of these countries returning home to Europe each fall. During this period, contact between the Beothuk and the European fishermen appears to have been sporadic. The natives, wary because of their earlier experience at the hands of the slave traders, avoided the Europeans and resisted most overtures made toward them for trading. They preferred instead to pilfer objects that interested them from the temporary fishing premises left behind each year by the Europeans. They were particularly attracted to anything made of iron, which could be melted and reshaped into other tools and implements.

Still, hostility did exist during this period, and there are many tales of bloody encounters and grisly acts of revenge and reprisal by both sides. Some historians, including noted Newfoundland politician and author Harold Horwood, assert that European fishermen routinely shot the native inhabitants on sight during these years, sometimes just for the sport of it. Despite this, however, there were also a number of successful attempts aimed at peaceful interaction between the Europeans and the Beothuk, although these seem to have invariably been negated by some subsequent hostile act of cruelty, all of which soured any lasting relationship between the groups.

It wasn't until 1610 that the first attempt to establish a permanent European presence in Newfoundland was undertaken when John Guy, a Bristol merchant, was authorized by the English government to found a colony at Cupers Cove (Cupids) in Conception Bay. In the fall of 1612, two years after he laid the foundation of his Seaforest Plantation in Cupids, Guy organized an expedition from his new settlement into adjoining Trinity Bay based on information he had received that Beothuk Indians resided there. After exploring Trinity Bay for some time, he and his party eventually came upon a deserted native village in the area now known as Spread Eagle, where they left gifts and presents before resuming their search. Several days later, in the location now named Sunnyside, Guy was surprised when his vessel was approached by two canoes carrying eight Beothuk men waving white flags and making friendly overtures.

Although Guy and his men were unaware of it, their activities had been monitored during the previous three days. Beothuk eyes had carefully scrutinized their every movement. Much discussion had taken place among the elders of the tribe to decide what course of action should be followed. The decision, after much deliberation, was finally reached to make contact with the white settlers. The Beothuk's covert observations had convinced most of the tribe's members that the intentions of the visitors were amicable and that an opportunity existed to establish a new relationship with them and end more than a century of hostility. Eighteen-year-old Edusweet, the great-great-great grandson of Nonosbawsut, had watched with great interest as the debate unfolded around the night fires. Because of his age, he was not encouraged to participate in the dialogue. His slate-grey eyes did not betray his excitement, but stories about the whitefaces, passed down through the generations, rang in his mind, and more than anything else he wanted to be in one of the canoes when contact was made.

A friendly encounter subsequently ensued between the Beothuk and the whites which lasted several days, during which the Europeans exchanged hatchets, knives, needles, and other items for Beothuk furs, and the two parties even shared a number of meals together. Edusweet, successful in his endeavour to be part of the welcoming party, partook of bread and butter for the first time in his life, and had at one point been able to shake the hand of the white chieftain himself. Looking into the eyes of the white leader, John Guy, he saw nothing but honesty, friendship, and respect.

Upon parting, Guy made arrangements with the Beothuk to meet them again at that same location the following year, and Edusweet, exhilarated by his encounter with the whitefaces, vowed that he would once again do everything in his power to be present for the occasion.

The next year, at the appointed time, an English ship did appear in the designated area of Trinity Bay. The excited Beothuk, including Edusweet, eager to meet Guy again, approached the vessel in their canoes only to be met by a hail of cannon fire. From his position in the rear canoe, Edusweet watched in horror and disbelief as the bodies of his uncle, Shebohut, and two others disintegrated in an explosion of blood and viscera. The captain of the ship, who was unaware of Guy's earlier meeting with the Beothuk and his commitment to meet them again, had thought that he and his crew were being attacked by the natives, and therefore opened fire. The Beothuk who were not slain fled, Edusweet among them, believing that they had been betrayed and deceived. This incident would virtually wipe out any chance of the Europeans ever establishing a lasting relationship with the Beothuk.

During the next century, the proliferation of European settlers arriving to set up permanent residence in Newfoundland, especially on the east and northeast coasts, made life for the Beothuk very difficult, and hostilities between the two groups escalated to new levels. Edusweet's descendants, having now to contend with the settlers while harvesting coastal food supplies such as salmon, codfish, mussels, and seabirds, frequently found themselves embroiled in bloody encounters with the newcomers. Stories of barbaric acts perpetrated against the Beothuk by the settlers and retaliatory scalpings and beheadings of whites by the natives abound during this period.

It was for this reason that Mamasut, the chieftain of the tribe at that time, assembled his people on a hill overlooking Trinity Bay one fine summer afternoon late in the seventeenth century. The yoke of leadership weighed heavily on his tall shoulders, and his intent was to tell his people that they would soon be leaving this area to go farther inland where they would be safer from their white tormentors. It was his intention, as well, to convene a telling, the traditional recounting of the stories of their past. By these measures he would be fulfilling his responsibility to ensure the safety of his people and guarantee that their history was passed on and preserved for future generations.

As the elders of the tribe spoke about their origins and the exploits of their ancestors, Mamasut listened as raptly as the youngest child there, and his grey eyes never once strayed from the speakers' faces. He was reliving the days of his ancestors. He was walking with his forebears, beside them every step of the way, lost in time.

Many of the stories told by the elders involved the whitefaces, for by then two hundred years of the Beothuk's own history was intrinsically entwined with the barbaric encounters with the strangers who had come to their shores. Perhaps the most chilling of the stories told that day was the Trinity Bay tradition that four hundred Beothuk were once herded out unto a long point of land, which afterwards became known as Bloody Point, in Hant's Harbour, where they were forced out into the water where every man, woman, and child was murdered by any means. As he listened, Mamasut could hear the screams of the victims and experience their anguish and terror as they were killed one by one in the bloodied sea. He had no way of knowing that within the space of three short years he too would become a victim of the white invaders.

The beginning of the eighteenth century saw little to improve the lot of Mamasut and his people or the rest of the island's aboriginal people. Right from the outset, in 1700, a man named Cull, along with five companions, set the tone for much of what was to follow. They left Notre Dame Bay early one morning, rounded Cape Freels in their small shallop, and entered Bonavista Bay. Then, following the coastline, they made their way southward until they eventually entered a long narrow inlet known today as Alexander Bay, one of the smaller bays situated in Bonavista Bay's southwest corner. The true purpose of their trip is unclear, but before it was over, it would result in an atrocity of the worse order.

When they reached the bottom of the inlet they went ashore near a location now known as Cull's Harbour, today a small community of a hundred people or so. Their intention was to explore the surrounding countryside. The area they were seeing for the first time was bountiful almost beyond imagination. The small bay, bounded on both sides by massive stands of spruce, fir, birch, and pine, boasted rivers that teemed with salmon and trout, and evidence of pine martin, otter, beaver, and other fur-bearing animals was everywhere. Cull and the others would have undoubtedly recognized the fishing, trapping, and logging potential of the area.