Research Paper On The Williams Treaty Of 1923

For this essay, I will be primarily focusing on the Williams treaty(ies) of 1923. The treaties outlined within the Williams agreements primarily affected these communities which; Alderville, Curve Lake, Hiawatha, Scugog, Georgina Island, Beausoleil, Mnjikaning, and the Mississauga’s of the New Credit First Nation (Switzer, 2012). The Treaty focused and affected Indigenous nations right to the land for hunting and fishing, which can be directly related to the health and eating habits of the nations. The Williams treaty was signed in 1923 and was originally made to rectify disagreements and discrepancies that were caused by the numbered treaties, The Williams treaties include and encompasses parts of treaty twenty. Overall the Williams treaties

The Indigenous groups involved in previous treaties found that the government of Canada and Ontario were not living up to their promises and that settlers were encroaching on non-negotiated land in their northern hunting territories. The government then assigned a commission in 1923 that was comprised of Sinclair, McFadden and Williams (Hall, 2011). The treaties were then negotiated as people had already settled on the territory of the eight communities of Indigenous people that were involved. The Williams treaties were comprised of two separate treaties each looking at different land masses, the one directly related to our geographical location being the second signed between the commission and the Mississauga communities, this land stretched from lake Simcoe to the shore of Lake Ontario. The Williams treaty also included the land that was originally within the gunshot treaty, but unfortunately did not include the Mississaugas of New Credit First Nation whose ancestors who were a part of the original treaty. This is said to be due to “a combination of oversight and negligence regarding confusion between the Toronto Purchase and the Gunshot Treaty” (The Rouge River, Pp. 30, 2015). Overall, this treaty was built on foundations of distrust and miscommunication foreshadowing the outcome of the Williams