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fter the signing of La Grande Paix in 1701, ending the French and Indian Wars, the Sulpicians set up a mission at Lake of Two Mountains ostensibly to maintain peace between the Iroquois and the Algonquins. In exchange for this noble and selfless act the French crown gave the Sulpicians exclusive fur-trading rights to the territory. The Sulpicians sold off these rights to French entrepreneurs and did their best to convert the Iroquois and Algonquin to Catholicism. Later, in the war with the English that led to the loss of the colony, many of the Iroquois, previously the allies of the English, actually fought for the French.

In 1763 when the colony was transferred, the English king refused to recognise Jesuit and Récollet titles over large tracts of land. Encouraged by this, an Iroquois at Deux Montagnes decided to sell his house to an English businessman. He hoped to demonstrate in this manner that the Iroquois owned their property, and gambled that the Sulpicians would fear confiscation of their lands if they challenged the rights of this Englishman to buy. The Sulpicians were more afraid of the Iroquois strategy than of the English. They petitioned Governor Burton to recognise their clear title. Burton accepted to respect the Sulpician property rights if the latter would swear homage to George III, King of England, which of course they did. Thus the Iroquois/Englishman sale fell through and Sulpician titles were recognised.

From 1763 to 1936 the Iroquois and Sulpicians continued to fight this legal battle over their lands. The Iroquois were very creative in their fights. They invited a Methodist pastor to run their mission in 1852, thereby threatening to convert to Protestantism rather than Catholicism. This scheme backfired when the pastor abandoned his mission in the face of the indifference the Iroquois, Algonquin and Nipissing showed to his religious ideas. After subsequent attempts, a Methodist temple was built, but the Sulpicians got a judgement and had it dismantled. Over this period many Iroquois became Methodists and their attempts to break the Sulpician hold over their land can be credited for the creation in 1877 of Montreal's Civil Rights Association to promote religious freedom.

The Sulpicians set up villages for the Iroquois and for the Algonquin and succeeded in encouraging them to live in a spirit of cooperation. This was not hard, since they both had similar feelings for the Sulpicians. The sparse populations of these two peoples became centred near Lake of Two Mountains, and the rest of the area began to fall to settlers. There was nothing the Iroquois could do to get the same rights to the land as the settlers were getting. Neither the French nor the English crown seemed to be willing to recognise them as anything more than wards, non-citizens who had to be encouraged to move away, somewhere. There was clearly no interest in their culture, history or political structure, yet, from the Iroquois perspective, it is their unwritten constitution, the Great Law that was the inspiration for Western democracy. Their symbol, the eagle, and their democratic laws were copied by the 13 American colonies in the creation of the United States.

Their goal was always to try to find a middle position between the French and English colonists. They were a people of six nations, the Mohawk, Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, Oneida and Tuskaroras. The sixth was actually adopted by the other five, according to their oral history, around the time the Europeans were first arriving in America. I had occasion to have a long discussion with Tom Morris of Kahnawake, and was fascinated to learn the Iroquois perspective. It lends credence to George Woodcock's statement that our salvation will be found in the philosophies of the indigenous peoples.

In 1853 Queen Victoria ordained that 250,000 acres should be set-aside for the 'Indians', and so the Doncaster Reserve, a square of land six miles on a side, was created. It is doubtful that Queen Victoria actually chose the name. More probably it had to do with connections of a functionary or with the surveyor who first measured out the township. Doncaster is the name of a city in England's industrial heartland on the Don River. At that time the townships of Beresford, Wolfe and Doncaster were just starting to be surveyed and the Indian land was pretty far away, fulfilling the primary criterion of being 'somewhere else'. Another, larger reserve, Maniwaki, having an area of 58,975 hectares (over 150,000 acres) was also established, and over the next 25 years the Algonquin moved there, having tired of the endless legal battles with the Sulpicians.

The name Doncaster subsequently became associated with the township, the Doncaster River, a tributary of the North, and Doncaster Park in Ste. Adele, however today the Mohawks who use the reserve call it Tiowero:Ton (pronounced tiowerö' do).

Joseph Graham has written a book that features a select number of stories of Laurentian places and how they got their names. To learn more, click here.

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This material may not be reproduced in whole or in part without the written permission of the author. © Joseph Graham