Tears flowed and a standing ovation followed the Canadian government’s long-awaited apology for the slaughter of sled dogs in Nunavik during the 1950s and 1960s. On November 23, Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Gary Anandasangaree asked Inuit in a crowded community centre in Kangiqsujuaq for forgiveness.
“Words are not enough to express the sorrow and regret we feel,” said Anandasangaree. “The actions and inactions that led to the mass killing inflicted deep pain and hardship on Inuit families that none should have had to endure.”
Canada also committed $45 million to promote reconciliation efforts in Nunavik communities. Ahead of the announcement, conversations with Elders helped the federal minister better understand the significance of this carnage. He acknowledged that dogs were killed in the 1950s under federal authority, which later failed to intervene when provincial police continued the slaughter.
“It was a relief to hear a formal apology for the atrocious acts and apathy,” said Lucy Grey from Makivvik, which represents Quebec’s Inuit. “Makivvik has been working for an apology since 1999. It was quite bittersweet because a lot of the Elders, the last of the nomads, are gone.”
Growing up, Grey knew that Inuit had a tradition of dog teams but, like residential schools, the slaughter was something that Elders never spoke about. She first heard about it as an information agent for Makivvik 25 years ago, when a woman in Kangiqsualujjuaq brought up concerns during a community tour.
Learning that this woman’s husband “became a mere window watcher” after his dogs were killed, Grey was tasked by Makivvik president Pita Aatami to discover if this had happened in other communities. After 200 interviews revealed a similar pattern throughout the region, Makivvik asked provincial and federal governments for an apology and compensation.
An RCMP report in 2006 denied wrongdoing, contradicting Elder testimony and exacerbating community tensions with police. However, Quebec gave retired judge Jean-Jacques Croteau a mandate the following year to investigate more thoroughly. After extensive research and visits to all 14 Nunavik communities, Croteau’s 2010 report validated the allegations and clarified governmental fiduciary obligations.
While determining there was no “conspiracy” for systemic dog slaughter, the conditions were established by the residential school system and resulting forced relocation into communities. Under pressure from non-Inuit, untied dogs were deemed a safety hazard. Around the same time, a disease outbreak contributed to decimating the canine population.
“Imagine there are 10 families moving to a community and each family has 10 dogs in a little square kilometre,” explained Grey. “The dogs had to be tied up, which made them even more dangerous because they’re not social anymore and didn’t have the space they had. There were a lot of domino effects.”
Croteau found that Quebec provincial police officers killed more than 1,000 dogs in Nunavik “without any consideration for their importance to Inuit families.” Although Quebec offered an apology in 2011 alongside $3 million in compensation, Grey said this felt incomplete without federal recognition and fell far short of mental health and social service needs.
One of the highest number of killings occurred in Kangiqsujuaq, where the federal apology took place. Over 200 dogs were reportedly killed there in a three-day period during the mid-1960s, their carcasses were piled on the ice and burned.
Aatami explained that dogs historically weren’t tied because they needed constant exercise to stay strong enough to pull sleds and lamented that the “issue was handled as though it were a municipal by-law violation.” Louisa Cookie’s experience in Kuujjuarapik was one of the most haunting stories he heard.
“I saw RCMP coming towards me, shooting all the dogs,” Cookie told CBC. “I panicked and went in front of the lead dog, and [an officer] almost shot me. He was so angry, he picked me up and threw me quite hard. I was yelling but so in trauma I lost my feelings.”
By that time in 1964, Cookie had been taught to care for her father’s and grandfather’s dogs, some of which fearlessly pursued polar bears and wolves. Capable of returning home through blizzard whiteouts and detecting seals or unsafe ice, qimmiit (sled dogs) were indispensable for Inuit hunters.
Cookie’s father retreated beneath blankets while the officer killed their 14 dogs and remained immobilized for days. While she convinced him to drink some water on the fourth day and tried to achieve closure by burying their dogs’ names, he was forever changed and became an abusive gambler and womanizer.
“He didn’t say anything much, but I could see he was emptied of his dignity, self-esteem, manlihood and love,” recalled Cookie. “Of course, all our neighbours changed as well. My grandfather’s teaching made me survive: don’t have grudges over anything – let god do the revenge.”
Qimmiit have slowly returned to Nunavik with huskies imported from Greenland and the annual Ivakkak dogsled competition, launched by Makivvik in 2001 to lift people’s spirits. However, community member Helen Atkinson said it couldn’t return last year because of dangerous ice conditions along the coast due to climate change.
Dog sledding was once fairly common in Cree coastal areas and the animals remain a valuable resource for many hunters. Waswanipi tallyman Paul Dixon recalled seeing dogs transport a whole camp across the ice in the 1960s and remembers his late father saying, “A great hunter owes half of what he killed to the dogs.”
The newly announced funding will contribute towards revitalizing the culture of dog team ownership in the region. Aatami said some will also go toward direct compensation, but that’s yet to be determined.
However, Grey said the funding isn’t nearly enough to achieve “social net-zero,” so that Nunavik isn’t constantly in crisis mode. She said some communities don’t have snowmobile repair shops or veterinary clinics that support animal wellbeing and humane population control.
“We were left on our own and Makivvik has been carrying that burden to replace the things taken away when the dogs were slaughtered,” Grey told the Nation. “Because we were resilient, we were able to survive that terrible era. We are ready to accept that apology so we can start healing.”