Conflict

"From the beginning of the gold rush, British Columbia's Native Peoples, particularly those along the Cariboo Trail (Okanagan) and in the Fraser Canyon, were confronted with an influx of miners, packers, cattle drovers (cowboys), and settlers that could only be seen as an invasion of their territory. The majority of these incomers were from California or other areas of the Pacific Northwest, where the attitude toward the Native Peoples was distinctly racist. . . inevitably incidents arose in British Columbia from a lack of appreciation on the part of newcomers from the south that the Native Peoples were regarded as equals under British law."

Ken Mather, Trail North The Okanagan Trail of 1858-68 and it Origins in British Columbia and Washington

"In a few days, we got to Okanagan Lake. Our advance guards saw some Indians just leaving their camp and across the lake in canoes for fear of us. The boys saw a couple of their dogs at their old camp ground, and shot them down, and they saw some old huts where the Indians had stored a lot of berries for the winter, black berries and nuts, fifty or a hundred bushels. They helped themselves to the berries and nuts, filling several sacks to take along, and the balance they just emptied into the lake destroying them so that the Indians should not have them for provisions for the winter. I, and a great many others, expressed their opinion that it was very imprudent and uncalled for, and no doubt the Indians would retaliate. But they only laughed and thought it great fun to kill their dogs and destroy and rob them of their provisions. Most everyone but those who had done it disapproved of the whole affair…

[Further up the lake] As soon as the Indians saw the whites, they were so frightened that some turned back and ran towards their boat, some fell down on their knees and begged for them not to shoot, as they had no arms at all, and they threw up their hands and arms to show that they had nothing. But the whites all commenced to fire and shoot at them, and ran out to the lake after those who were getting in their canoes, and kept on shooting till the few that got into the canoes got out of reach of their guns and rifles. And lots jumped into the lake and was shot in the water before they could swim out of reach of their murderers– for they were nothing else, for it was a great slaughter or massacre of what was killed, for they never made an effort to resist or fired a shot, either gun, pistol, or bow and arrows, and the men were not touched no more than if they had shot at birds or fish. It was a brutal affair, but the perpetrators of the outrage thought they were heroes, and were victors in some well-fought battle the Indians knelt down and begged for life, saying they were friends. There must have been 10 or 12 killed and that many wounded, for very few got away unhurt. Some must have got drowned, and as I said before, it was like killing chickens or dogs or hogs, and a deed Californians should ever be ashamed of, without counting the after consequence."

D. B. NUnis., ed., The Golden Frontier: The Recollections of Herman Francis Reinhart, 1851-1869

"[Speaking to the miners near Yale Governor Douglas says he] spoke with great plainness of speech to the white miners, who were nearly all foreigners . . . [that] they were permitted to remain there merely on sufferance; that no abuses would be tolerated; and that the laws would protect the rights of the Indian, no less than those of the white man."
                                                        Governor Douglas to Lord Stanley, 1858

"Tensions boiled over in August 1858 when a miner raped a Nlaka'pamux woman. In response, the community killed him and dumped his body into the Fraser River. Miners organized volunteer militias to  mount a show of force."
Keith Thor Carlson, The Power of Place

[See Canyon War, British Columbia, 1858]

"Our people tried to work with them [the road workers]. When people who worked in the same camp were lining up to eat, they came out and said, "You guys hungry? You guys wanna eat? And they just threw the food down on the ground.  Our people weren't gonna eat that, so they went hunting, and they had no choice but to leave their wife and kids behind. When they were gone, the miners and all those people who got drunk back in those days messed around with the women. Your asking for war when you do that, and that’s how the war broke out."
David Setah in Lorraine Weir with Chief Roger Williams
Lha Yudith'in We Always Find a Way.

"Klatassin claimed that they were at war with the invaders, and that it was the threat of smallpox the drove their action."

Stephen Bown, Dominion The Railway and the Rise of Canada

"In the summer and fall of 1862 the Tsilhqot'in people died by the thousands. At least 70 percent of the whole population perished from one cause alone [smallpox]. . . This was a truly great calamity. . . Native people universally believed settlers had imported and spread smallpox among them for their land. . .  The British Crown hung five Tsilhqot'in officials. This was one of the most dramatic moments in all Canadian history. BC Colonial officials had chosen to pretend these Tsilhqot'in were common criminals. Murderers. The Tsilhqot'in people knew them instead as martyrs. True noble men who died serving their people by faithfully following the established law and by honorably defending the people in a just war against a proven aggressor."
Tom Swanky, The True Story of Canada's "War" of Extermination On the Pacific plus The Tsilhqot'in and other First Nations Resistance

"We meant war not murder."

War leader defence

"The Tsilhqot'in were induced by a false promise [a peace conference with the Governor]."
Matthew Baillie Begbie

"Madame Speaker, I stand here today in this Legislature, 150 years later, to say that the province of British Columbia is profoundly sorry for the wrongful arrest, trial and hanging of the six chiefs and for the many wrongs inflicted by past governments. . . Smallpox, which by some reliable historical accounts there is indication was spread intentionally. . . To the extent that it falls within the power of the province of British Columbia, we confirm without reservation that these six Tsilhqot’in chiefs are fully exonerated of any crime or wrongdoing."
Premier Christy Clark,  2014

See New France, Loyalists/War of 1812, Riel and Manitoba and Riel Rebellion themes