Indigenous Communities

The province of New Brunswick is located on the land of the Wolastoqey, Mi’gmaw, and Peskotomuhkati peoples. Indigenous peoples living in the province were more likely to die from influenza than their white counterparts. Hazardous living conditions, such as overcrowding and insufficient ventilation, along with poor nutrition and oppressive colonial policies resulted in Indigenous peoples’ increased likelihood to contract influenza (Lux, Medicine that Walks, 4; 185). Canada’s overall death rate of influenza was 6.1 per 1000 cases, resulting in approximately 50,000 deaths within a population of around eight million (Jenkins, “Baptism of Fire,” 319). Comparatively, historian Maureen Lux cites “a crude estimate of the mortality among Canadian Native people from the 1918 epidemic was 4,000 deaths, or 37.7 per thousand population” (Lux, Medicine that Walks, 185).

Federal agencies, such as the Immigration and Colonization Department and the Department of Indian Affairs, assumed responsibility of Indigenous health matters. Instead of examining social determinants of health, the federal government believed Indigenous peoples were more likely to become ill due to their race and alleged biological inferiority (Lux, Medicine that Walks, 4). Their lack of health care was an expression of the scientific racism that dominated Canadian policy at the time (Lux, Medicine that Walks, 6-7). This set of beliefs also justified the implementation of residential and day schools across the country. One of the featured sources in this collection refers to the Devon “Indian School,” a day school at St. Mary’s operated by the Roman Catholic church between 1883 and 1985 (Gowling WLG (Canada)). Deputy Superintendent of the Department of Indian Affairs Duncan Campbell Scott, also featured in this collection, was one prominent figure who supported residential schools and the forced assimilation of Indigenous peoples. He is perhaps best known for his quotation: “I want to get rid of the Indian problem. I do not think as a matter of fact, that the country ought to continuously protect a class of people who are able to stand alone … [o]ur objective is to continue until there is not a single Indian in Canada that has not been absorbed into the body politic and there is no Indian question, and no Indian Department” (Duncan Campbell Scott, Library and Archives Canada, Record Group 10, vol. 6810, file 470-2-3, vol. 7, 55 (L-3) and 63 (N-3)).

Apathy largely characterized the public’s reaction to Indigenous peoples’ experience of influenza. Appealing for financial compensation from the federal government after nursing Indigenous patients, Dr. William F. Roberts writes “…the local people would have nothing to do with them and the Indians were practically left alone” (RS136-L5b: Records of the Deputy Minister of Health). In addition to public indifference, Indigenous communities often lacked adequate supplies to mitigate a health crisis. Roberts’s letter and a featured newspaper article point to how affected communities desperately lacked provisions and professional staff. The sources refer to a shack in Hampstead and a Devon day school converted into makeshift hospitals.

The following newspaper articles and correspondence between government officials offer a glimpse into how the pandemic affected the province’s Indigenous communities. The featured pieces touch on Hampstead, Devon, Oromocto, and Kingsclear. Unfortunately, this category lacks Indigenous viewpoints, with all the sources originating from a white-settler perspective. Sources contain language, such as the term “Indian,” common at the time. Today, this vocabulary is recognized as harmful – an expression of the misconceptions of Indigenous peoples rampant throughout the country during the twentieth century.

Further Reading: There has not been much written on Indigenous people’s experiences during the Spanish influenza within New Brunswick. However, to learn more broadly about the history of Indigenous peoples' treatment in relation to healthcare in Canada, please consult the following sources: Mary Jane Logan McCallum, “Starvation, Experimentation, Segregation, and Trauma: Words for Reading Indigenous Health History,” The Canadian Historical Review 98 (2017): 96-113; Maureen Lux’s Medicine that Walks: Disease, Medicine, and Canadian Plains Native People, 1880-1940 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001); Mary-Ellen Kelm’s Colonizing Bodies: Aboriginal Health and Healing in British Columbia, 1900-50 (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1999); and James Daschuk’s Clearing the Plains: Disease, Politics of Starvation, and the Loss of Aboriginal Life (Regina, SK: University of Regina Press, 2013).