There was a time when Dollard was, on his allegorical float, one of the stars of the Saint-Jean-Baptiste parade. He had his own day. Celebrations were dedicated to him at the end of May, from Edmonton to New England. The mayor, the bishop, the deputies gave speeches, laid wreaths of flowers, blessed flags. Soldiers from the Canadian army stood at attention, choirs sang patriotic songs, all sprinkled, at nightfall, with fireworks. It was the 1920s. Dollard des Ormeaux, who died in battle to defend the small Montreal colony in May 1660 against the attack of 700 Iroquois, was unanimous. (Except among the Mohawks, descendants of the Iroquois who, invited to one of the ceremonies, appeared pale.)
There was a time when we fought to stop the celebration of Dollard. No less than 85 demonstrators from the Rally for National Independence, outraged both by Victoria Day and by Dollard, were arrested in front of a monument to his memory in 1964, 213 in 1965. Even the Quebec Liberation Front, the following year, devoted a bomb to it! From being consensual, Dollard became polarizing. To the point where in 2002, it was kicked out of the calendar, replaced by National Patriots Day.
The roller coaster of identity in which the deceased was plunged is almost as fascinating as the fight in which he participated. Historian Patrice Groulx tells this story in To put an end to Dollard (Boreal). I conclude that poor Dollard deserved neither the veneration to which he was subjected nor the opprobrium with which he was heaped. All things considered, he is not even the central figure of the fight in which he participated.
How is he deserving? A Canadian army recruiting poster for the First War sums it up: “Canadians, follow the example of Dollard des Ormeaux. Do not wait for the enemy at the fireside, but go out to meet him. » At 25, Dollard was a soldier, newly arrived in the small Montreal colony of 400 inhabitants, designated by Maisonneuve as commander of a garrison. Rumor had it that the Iroquois were preparing an all-out offensive on the colony. Dollard and 16 of his soldiers decided to wage “the little war”, therefore a targeted attack, from ambush, as their Huron and Algonquin allies had taught them. What we don’t yet call guerrilla warfare.
Like everyone else, the Iroquois returned from their winter of hunting, canoes full of skins, therefore more difficult to maneuver, gunpowder exhausted, therefore in a weak situation. Dollard wants to weaken the enemy, not take them head-on. Would he have appropriated the skins? It was practice.
He chose a place that he believed to be favorable, at Long-Sault, on the Ottawa River. But as fate would have it, instead of surprising a group of isolated hunters from the north, he came across nearly 200 warriors from the south, preparing a real assault on the French colony.
He also participates in a war other than his own. The Hurons took part in the confrontation. They have their own objective: to avoid the annihilation of their own. In the previous decade, the Iroquois had almost all exterminated or taken prisoners, then forcibly integrated them among their own. The survivors of these assaults were gathered on the island of Orléans by the Jesuits. Fearing a new offensive, perhaps a final one, their leader Annaotaha leaves with 40 warriors to also meet the enemy.
Rumors were founded. The Iroquois attack was planned. The 200 warriors who arrived at Long-Sault requested reinforcement from 500 others, camped in the Richelieu Islands. In front of these 700 warriors gathered, Annaotaha knows the outcome of the battle: they will all die or be taken prisoner. He decides to negotiate his surrender with the victors. Iroquois captives were sometimes tortured and killed, others adopted, and others held as hostages for future negotiation.
This type of negotiation was common. Annaotaha even said that he was considering asking, in exchange for his surrender, that the Iroquois let the French leave. The French, uninformed of Annaotaha’s project, saw the Iroquois approaching their position and convincing the Hurons to desert immediately. Rightly feeling betrayed, the French opened fire. The inevitable carnage follows.
Wanting to spare them torture, one of the French killed some of his wounded compatriots with an axe. Annaotaha, dying, asks that her hair be burned, so that the Iroquois do not make a trophy of it.
Dollard’s hagiographers report a glorious defeat, causing a large number of Iroquois deaths. The available sources instead report around twenty losses of life among the enemy. Out of 700, that’s not a lot. This battle is in fact the culmination of the annihilation of the Hurons by the Iroquois (the word genocide did not exist), and this is where it finds its real historical significance. From the few hundred Hurons remaining on Île d’Orléans comes the current vibrant community of Wendake.
Did Dollard really save the colony? Yes, but the way Inspector Clouseau solved crimes: by chance, without wanting to, thanks to circumstances that escaped him. After the battle, the Iroquois returned to their villages. This withdrawal marks the end of their anti-French and anti-Huron campaign of spring 1660. The colony is saved. It’s just a reprieve. The Iroquois would return in the fall, with 600 warriors. But fate still favors the French, because the Iroquois commander dies before the battle. The warriors return empty-handed. In 1661, they returned to the charge, killing 100 French people, but without achieving a total victory. The attempts did not stop until 1667, with the arrival of 1,300 soldiers and officers from the Carignan-Salières regiment. The balance of power is reversed. The Iroquois are ready to negotiate. This will be the signing of the Treaty of the Great Peace in 1701.
Why was he made a hero? Because it was one. Volunteer to face real danger, at the risk of his life. The Church greatly appreciated knowing that he and the French were pious, praying morning and evening. The colonial elites saw in him a fighter for European civilization against “the savages”, the biased, successive stories evacuating the courage of the Huron allies.
Why was he made a plague victim? For modern Quebec nationalists, notably Jacques Ferron, Dollard was the symbol of the status quo, of colonialism, of religious obscurantism, of Canada itself. It screened those who should really be celebrated: the patriots, moderns, democrats, anti-colonials, denounced by the senior clergy as rebels and — sacrilege — advocating secular schools. The fight to replace Dollard’s celebration with that of the patriots stems from this logic.
What should we say about it today? What is striking is the conjunction of interests and values of the French and the Hurons, represented by Dollard and Annaotaha. They each risked their lives to protect their respective peoples against an enemy who wished them to disappear. This improbable couple, immersed in a common destiny, finding death a few meters from each other, does it not represent the same desire, indigenous and Quebecois, to resist, fight and survive the most terrible bad weather? Of the history ? And to succeed? Isn’t there, ultimately, a beautiful binational story?