Farrand: No CJ in Chilcotin

[David Robertson]

I've been curious about CJ use among Chilcotin people.  (Dene or Athabaskan 
group who neighbour the Shuswaps.)  

There are strong hints in Kamloops Wawa that Chilcotins were initially 
resistant or indifferent to the CJ-speaking Catholic missionaries based in 
northern Shuswap country.  Here's some information gleaned from CJ texts in 
K.W.  

There are warnings in K.W. about medicine men active in Chilcotin country 
(March 1895).  The same issue, in the mini-newspaper within K.W., "The 
Sugarcane Bell", tells about Chilcotins driving the personified S.B. (I 
presume Father Le Jacq, the priest who wrote it) away right at the river 
that bordered their lands.  The image of Chilcotin country as a wild no-
man's land is reinforced by news of outlaws like Red Bluff Charlie fleeing 
there after committing an attempted double murder at Dog Creek (May 1894).  

And Kamloops Wawa represents Chilcotins as talking in nonstandard CJ mixed 
with bits of English.  (Mixed up "like soup", to use a phrase from December 
1902.)  For example (March 1895), "Ai don no, nsaika ilo komtaks maika 
kapho, chi alta nsaika kolan ukuk nim Kamlups Wawa" ("I don't know, we 
don't know about your big brother, this is the first we've heard this name 
Kamloops Wawa").  

The reports of Chilcotins' attitudes specifically toward Jargon, though, 
are mixed.  This ethnic group is reported in K.W. as well-disposed toward 
shorthand CJ, but to have failed to learn it because they had no paper(!) 
(15 April 1894).  A similar report emerged a year and a half later (August 
1895).  (Mention of an early K.W. subscriber named Billy Chilcotin (01 May 
1892) is not clearly affiliated with the Chilcotin ethnic group; who knows 
but it might turn out to be one of the kinds of name often seen in BC at 
the time, comparable to Oregon Jack or Red Bluff Charlie [below].)  

Yet soon after these reports, K.W. reproduces two "temperance pledges" in 
shorthand CJ that were adopted by Chilcotin communities (April 1895)!  
Suddenly seven K.W. subscribers are reported for that region (September 
1895).  Chilcotins start to be mentioned as participating in the big 
religious gatherings in Salish country (September 1895, December 1901), 
constituting at least 1/3 of those present at a Sugarcane Reserve (Shuswap 
country) gathering (May-August 1917, August 1917).  After just a few years 
K.W. is commenting that any reports of medicine men among the Chilcotins 
should be taken "cum grano salis" ("with a grain of salt") (January 1916).  

Some Chilcotins certainly learned CJ and wrote it in shorthand.  A 
colleague of mine from one of their communities has two audio tapes of an 
elder singing the Catholic CJ hymns from Le Jeune's hymnal.  (I've heard 
one of these tapes and identified the songs.)  This same person's 
grandfather reportedly sat down each year and wrote a calendar in 
shorthand.  The people referred to in both cases must have learned their CJ 
in the very early years of the 20th century, at the latest.  I've recently 
heard of a possible third Chilcotin person who may have kept a shorthand CJ 
diary, which has yet to be confirmed.  If true, this would be the most 
extensive known text of its kind from an Indigenous person; the longest of 
the letters I've found is around four pages long.  

This leads me to Livingston Farrand.  On page 3 in the 1900 Introduction 
to "Traditions of the Chilcotin Indians" (New York: Memoirs of the American 
Museum of Natural History v. 4 pt. 1 / Jesup North Pacific Expedition v. 2 
pt. 1, retrieved from www.candiana.org), he describes the Chilcotins as 
having mostly resettled on reservations in the eastern end of their 
territory, which is closest to CJ-using neighbours like the Shuswaps.  He 
terms them very acculturated to Euro-Canadian ways.  Yet Farrand says of 
his 1897 research trip:  

"The conditions were not particularly favorable for the work, for the 
Indians were by no means cordial at the outset, and good interpreters were 
not to be had.  That great resource of ethnological work in the Northwest, 
the Chinook Jargon, was also not available in this tribe."  

(He goes on to thank the "residents of the Chilcotin valley for many 
kindnesses during his work in the region", but it becomes clear that this 
probably refers to non-Indigenous people, e.g. "Mr. Charles Crowhurst['s] 
valuable assistance among the Indians".)  

I wonder what to make of this picture.

--Dave R.

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