Indian Affairs, Indian Pay Sheet Fisher River, 1878. Library and Archives Canada, Record Group 10 [Indian Affairs], volume 9353, reel C-7135 Library and Archives Canada, p. 132. Canadiana. https://heritage.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.lac_reel_c7135/673
Immediately following Treaty negotiations in present-day Western Canada, Indian Commission clerks created Indian Pay Sheets to record treaty payments and census data for each Band. These pay sheets are the first go-to for anyone doing First Nations historical research in the numbered treaties regions because they contain a significant amount of demographic data. For example, they serve as primary evidence for community histories, genealogy research, a range of specific claims including Treaty Land Entitlement, and more recently for Cows & Plows (agricultural benefits) and Treaty Annuity claims, and to help identify Indian residential school children.
The ancestors of the Ochekiwi Sipi (Fisher River) Cree Nation took treaty in September of 1875 in Norway House so they were originally listed as members of the Norway House Band. When they migrated to Fisher River a new paylist was created specifically for them. The document above is a portion of the first page of the pay sheet for the Fisher River Band which recorded their members and annuity payment distributions on July 18, 1878. The Indian Agent who completed the sheet organized them alphabetically, assigned Treaty numbers, recorded the demographics of each family household, and made notes to account for transferred members (to this or to other Bands), deaths, births, marriages, and later to record the number of children in each family attending residential schools.
These documents tell us much more than demographic data. Among other insights we can glean, they demonstrate the imposition of the patriarchy—male dominance—on our communities. Only the names of adult men (over the age of 21 years old) are recorded which clearly signifies them as ‘heads of the household.’ Women and children here have no names. Their names are not important to the government. This reflects how women were treated under the Indian Act—no personal autonomy, no rights to marital property, no rights to vote or run for Band governance offices, the property of their fathers until marriage transfers them to property of their husbands and so on. The only women’s names listed are widows with underage children—See No. 10 Mary Hart and No. 15 Charlotte Keeper—but often when their eldest son reaches the age of majority, the widows are moved to his number and listed as ‘other relations.’
Historical records left by government agents, missionaries, explorers, fur traders and others can tell us a lot about the past but they must be treated with caution and we must take the time to read between the lines. Always ask, what else is this document telling us?
Winona Wheeler
Fisher River Cree Nation
Associate Professor of Indigenous Studies
University of Saskatchewan