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October 26, 1864, 7 A.M.: the High Sheriff reads the sentences, the traps open, and five Tsilhqot'in fall the distance between life and death. The Chilcotin War is over. "It seems horrible to hang 5 men at once," writes the presiding judge, Matthew Baillie Begbie, "yet the blood of 21 whites calls for retribution."
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To the extent that they have looked at these events, historians have repeated the interpretation put on them by the colonial government 140 years ago. "Little short of marvelous," in Governor Frederick Seymour's words. Law had triumphed over savagery, colonial power stood triumphant over native peoples.
A more careful look at the events of 1864 suggests a different, even opposite, meaning of that October dawn. The war had started in March of that year, when Alfred Waddington's crew returned, after a winter break, to cutting a road from Bute Inlet on the coast...