Antoine Nation Territory

Core Territory of the Antoine Nation

The Antoine Nation’s territory radiates outwards from the confluence of what are now known as the Mattawa and Ottawa Rivers, to encompass a large area north and south of the Mattawa River, and east and west of the Ottawa River, including lands in what is now the provinces of Ontario and Quebec.

The attached map delineates the Antoine Nation territory including the northern portion of Algonquin Provincial Park that is represented in the Algonquins of Ontario (AOO) treaty negotiations territory.  This map was created for the purposes of those negotiations, but the actual Antoine Nation territory extends further west, north and east of the AOO negotiations territory.

Our hunting grounds, fishing spots, tree and plant harvesting areas, mineral extraction sites, and living and gathering places were and are present throughout the Ottawa River watershed, especially along the Mattawa and Ottawa Rivers.

Antoine Nation Place Names in Territory

Among the places Antoine Nation families have lived at included Boullion Rock, on the edge of the Ottawa River just east of Mattawa, and Klock, found east of Mattawa along the Ottawa River.

“Another spot too would be down by Klock there, there was a small community down there at one time, I think, on account of the railroad, or whatever, but ah, all, it was sort of flat-lying land there too, and a little bit of island, and that, good fishing down there, easy to catch, whether you were netting them, spearing them or catching them on the rod, or whatever you know, it was easy to access there. A lot of people liked that, it was flat land, somebody did, used to do a bit of farming down there too, and blueberries were good down that end too, 'cause it was an old burn through there too.”

- Antoine Nation Member Alex Butler, born 1948

“… and all along Aumond Creek and that there, people lived there, all along there, the Indian community, mostly ah Algonquin Native people. But Klock was, consisted of most of the Native people back then.”

- Antoine Nation Member Carl Lefavre

Another place inhabited by Antoine Nation Members was Antoine Creek, which meets the Ottawa River at Jawbone’s Bay, just north of Mattawa. Jawbone Antoine was a son of Nhee-goo-zhance Antoine, the forefather of the Antoine Nation. Jawbone and his brothers, Francois and Alexander, were recorded on the 1881 Census as hunters residing in the Mattawa North district, where Antoine Creek is located.

Antoine Nation Continuous Use of Natural Resources in Its Territory

Antoine Nation families had hunting, trapping and fishing territories that were well defined. The influx of setters into our territory and imposition of provincial hunting, fishing and trapping regulations upon us, without our consent, led us to increasingly share resource territories among families. We continue to hunt, trap, fish and harvest throughout our territory, and continue to resist the imposition of unjust Crown regulations which deprive us of our traditional way of life. We have recognized the importance of land and resource conservation from long before the arrival of settlers into our territory.

The unilateral establishment of Algonquin Provincial Park in 1893 by the Crown in Right of Ontario as the oldest provincial park in Canada, where the Crown not only failed to consult with us but elected to actively ban us from our own territory, is a prime example of the Crown’s disregard for our rights which the Crown is obliged to honour and protect. It is perhaps the ultimate irony that the Ontario Crown elected to appropriate the Algonquin name from us to establish what is commonly known as the jewel in the provincial park system, implicitly recognizing our habitation of and claim to the Park territory, and then ejected us from our namesake.

The Commissioner of Crown Lands at the time of the Park’s establishment concluded that we needed to be excluded from the Park:

“It will be a ticklish business to prevent Indians from killing wild animals in the park where they have been in the habit of hunting, and their ancestors before them. I am free to say this Indian hunting did not occur to me at the time the whole matter was under discussion. Now I see nothing for it but to exclude the Indians as well as the white men. But great care and tact will be required to handle these people so as not to embitter them or leave them feeling they have a substantial grievance. They will be much more dangerous and difficult to watch than a white man. They have not had a chance to know what we are doing or the object in view, and their being stopped will probably be the first intimation of a Park reserve they will have … Parks Commissioner Wilson advocated ‘put[ting] down poaching with a strong hand’ as the only method for conserving and protecting birds and wildlife.”

- A.S. Hardy, Ontario Commissioner of Crown Lands

Our ancestors relied extensively and sometimes exclusively on our lands and resources to sustain our families and make a living. Our Members grew up helping their parents, grandparents and great-grandparents hunt, fish, trap and gather materials in our territory that are necessary for our survival and cultural wellbeing, including: wood and bark; leaves, roots, sap, nuts and berries for food and medicine; fish and fowl for food; mammals for food, medicines, fur, and hides. Forest products used by elders for traditional medicines included jewelweed, goldenrod, trillium bulb, and the bark of birch, willow, cherry and hemlock trees.

The historical record is replete with examples of the Crown attempting to exclude us from our traditional activities in Algonquin Provincial Park. For example, George W. Bartlett as the third and longest-serving superintendent of Algonquin Park (1898-1922) described meeting a group of Algonquins camped just outside the Park boundary on the water route leading from Eau Claire to Lake Koshkokwi early in his career. He later that day met the head of the Algonquin family who explained he had come into the Park to gather roots and bark for medicines :

“After tea we heard the dip of a paddle and as we were now in the Park, I [Bartlett] had the right to inquire, 'Who goes there? ' I blew my whistle and hailed the passing canoe. Ah-ha, we found it was the Indian from the camp we had visited earlier in the afternoon. The poor chap was very uneasy and explained that he had been in the Park getting roots and bark for medicine. This statement was corroborated by the contents of the canoe and by his own appearance. We warned him and let him go, telling him we had noticed the moose shanks in his camp.”

- George W. Bartlett, Superintendent of Algonquin Park

On the same trip Bartlett likewise described meeting another Antoine Nation Algonquin family who had made 450 pounds of maple syrup, where the sugar bush was within the boundaries of Algonquin Provincial Park. They sold the products to nearby lumber camps to support themselves.

In addition to tapping trees to make maple syrup, we made use of forest resources for fuelwood, shelter and manufacturing important equipment. Wood products were used for building cabins and outbuildings such as sheds and smokehouses, for crafting canoes, snowshoes, sleighs and toboggans, and for heating and cooking. Log houses were still being used as primary residences in the late-twentieth century. We were unlawfully forced by the Crown to hide our hunting, trapping and fishing activities from conservation officers after Algonquin Provincial Park’s creation, and as more and more of an unlawful regulatory burden was imposed upon outside the parks boundaries as well, cruelly limiting our ability to feed and support our families.

The forest and bush of our territory was and is an integral part of our subsistence as hunters, gatherers and trappers. Firewood and wood for shelter were and remain of primary daily importance. Our elders recall gathering wood for the winter's fire around the present site of the LaCave (Otto Holden) Dam. After the construction of the dam and attendant flooding, we could no longer obtain wood from this site. Sharing firewood between families was a much-valued practice in difficult times.

The cutting pulpwood for sale was also an ancillary occupation on the trap line. The lumber industry also provided much-needed wage labour opportunities for Antoine Nation Members, where we worked cutting wood in the bush, and our fathers and grandfathers supported their families in part by driving logs and working for lumber companies, such as driving logs from Timiskaming to Pembroke. One of the few jobs an Indigenous man could obtain was working in the lumber trade.