Some 50 elders and community representatives gathered in the Agora on Monday in Thunder Bay, Ont., for the National Indigenous Veterans Day Ceremony by Lakehead University’s Office of Indigenous Initiatives.
Established in 1994, Indigenous Veterans Day is recognized annually across Canada on Nov. 8, commemorating the military contributions and sacrifices of First Nations, Inuit and Métis people. It also acknowledges the historical injustices many of these veterans faced during and after serving.
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Elder Gerry Martin, a former gunner with the Three RCHA and First Locating Battery, said Indigenous veterans wanted to be separate from the general body of veterans for the day, as they aim to deal with the federal government on issues of support, followup payment, benefits and similar challenges.
“We were there, too,” Martin said.
“One of the important things that I try to carry and try to just remember is the great sacrifice that people make every day on behalf of this land in this country that we affectionately call Canada,” said Denise Baxter, the university’s vice-provost of Indigenous initiatives.
Indigenous peoples have given to the Canada area for several hundred years, Baxter said, so there has been a “long relationship of protecting sovereignty.”
A segment of the Indigenous Veterans of Treaty No. 3 exhibit in the university’s Agora, presented by the Fort Frances Museum and Cultural Centre in partnership with Glenn Jourdain from Couchiching First Nation and Kay-Nah-Chi-Wah-Nung Historical Centre–Rainy River First Nations. (Nicky Shaw/CBC)
She said it’s a time for the university community to come together to remember those who served and who are still serving — including staff and students — but also, more importantly, to recognize the holistic history of Indigenous people in allyship with the Crown.
“It’s really important for all of us to hear these stories, to recognize the important role that Indigenous people had and continue to have in the fabric of Canadian society.”
Baxter said people should also be hopeful, but recognize that freedom, air, water and land are important, and should be mindful about protecting them with the hope of not going to war over them.
David Thompson, the Native Veterans Association of Northwestern Ontario’s research developer, helped collect images for the association’s archive.
He said people don’t have to put on a uniform to be a veteran or a soldier.
“There are other ways to be a warrior — protecting the water, protecting the land, protecting the animals [and] protecting other human beings.”
As Anishinaabe people, he said, moving forward, they especially always have to remember who they were, who they currently are and where they “would like to go in the future.”
David Thompson, the Native Veterans Association of Northwestern Ontario’s research developer, speaks on the role of Indigenous veterans in Canada’s past, present and future. (Nicky Shaw/CBC)
“For the longest time, other people have been telling our story and they haven’t gotten it right yet. So in order to get it right, it has to come from us and some of the stories are not pretty,” Thompson said.
“They’re truths of our experiences of what we’ve endured. We went through a dark time with our relationship with Canada. We were being oppressed with residential schools, boarding schools and then onward into the Sixties Scoop.”
Thompson said they’re still recovering from those traumas, and trying to rebuild themselves and get their “colours back.”
“Even the laws that were being applied to us were very oppressive and racist. Our veterans couldn’t even go into the local [Royal Canadian] Legion to have a drink with their comrades. They’d always have to get served out in the back alley or the back door.”
“That’s a horrible way to be treated by the country that you signed on the dotted line with your life.”
Despite the communities of the Robinson-Superior Treaty area being a small portion of the overall population, he said, their story of contributing to Canada’s military efforts was immense, as most were volunteers.
Reconciliation “is going to take years yet, but before that happens, the truth of what we’ve experienced and what we had to survive through has to be told and people have to listen,” Thompson said.
People in the Thunder Bay area can learn more about these veterans through an exhibit open in the university’s Agora that’s for public viewing until Nov. 13, a modular travelling exhibit that will run from Nov. 10 to Jan. 31 at the Thunder Bay Museum, online or by volunteering and engaging at local legions.
