Article content continued

Like the U.S., Canada is experiencing a crisis of historical conscience

Cornwallis’ scalp bounty has become the key piece of evidence in the case for removing his statue from downtown Halifax. Such a proclamation, critics such as Mi’kmaq author Daniel Paul claim, is proof of “his attempt to exterminate a race of people using barbarism.” Surely someone who paid cash for the scalps of dead natives has no place in the public square of a Canadian city.

Yet there’s more to Cornwallis’ story than the seemingly black-hearted actions of one villain. While there’s no debating the horrific nature of his scalp bounty, or how it conflicts with current Canadian sensibilities, scalping for profit was once common practice throughout this country. And unlike slavery, it was embraced by all parties. Recent academic research shows both French and British colonial governments paid for scalps long before Cornwallis landed in Halifax. And many Indigenous peoples were “lifting the hairs” of their enemies for centuries before that. If scalping is Canada’s original sin, then everyone’s a sinner.

***

The question of who invented scalping was once hotly debated. Throughout the 1970s, native activists and sympathetic white liberals often claimed scalping was a European invention imposed by rapacious colonialists. “Indians fought each other for a thousand years and never took scalps,” Hollywood actor Iron Eyes Cody told The Washington Post in 1976. Such an argument found traction in pop culture and academia, and still kicks around the Internet today. But while a great many atrocities can be laid at the feet of Canada’s European ancestors, scalping is not one of them.