Document

Ok, my name is Gabriel LeBlanc. I am a retired teacher. An amateur historian in the area of Acadian history and I've been retired now a year and I am doing research on, especially folklore, as a tool to teaching. Today, I want to share with you the story of the second Deportation of the Acadians at Île Madame and this happened around 1758-59. The American militia was on their way to Louisbourg, where they were going to really squash the fortress and put it in a rubble of stones, and on their way to Louisbourg, they sought out any kind of habitation, French habitation that were around. In Île Madame, here we had in Petit-de-Grat especially, we had our own parish, la paroisse Sainte-Claire, and we had also quite a few citizens, a couple of hundred, which was a lot in those days in the fishery. And everything was put, you know, set afire. The Acadians here ended up going to live with the First Nations, the Mi'kmaq inside the Bras d'Or Lake, where the Mi'kmaq looked after us, where they also gave us shelter, gave us food and kept us really and taught us a lot of their ways in order that we could survive in the wilderness. And the outcome of that, of that second deportation is that a lot of families here from Île Madame can trace, if you want, to go First Nation blood in their veins, you know, from five generations down. Also that, the way we think was greatly influenced by how the First Nations thought. Also all the natural signs that First Nations observed, we were quick to recognize its value and adopt it as our own. For example, my father as a fisherman didn't listen to the weather forecast. He looked at the signs of nature and he could predict very well if it was worthwhile going to sea or not. And these are all, if you want to know, knowledge that the First Nations passed on to the Acadians. We also see a lot in our every day language many terms that, First Nations terms, we always thought that they were French but when you do, you know, precise work on it or research on it, you find out that their roots are in the First Nations. And also with the First Nations, they adopted a lot of our terminology as well. So even today, we still have very, very close contact with First Nations so there was always an intimate or a respectful, common respect for one another. First Nations felt comfortable to come amongst the Acadians and also that's the reason why in Nova Scotia, or especially in Québec, we have no Métis, because we never separated. You were welcomed in any community. If you were First Nation, it didn't matter. The Acadians would bring you up as one of their own, and if you were Acadian in a First Nations community, they would bring you up as one of their own, which is really unique for, you know for two people to be like that.