Ancestral Remains Unearthed at Nootka Lighthouse

When 1,000 year old ancestral remains were unearthed at Nootka Light Station in 2018, Mowachaht/Muchalaht elders made plans to reinter them with a private traditional ceremony. It's thought the remains were moved unknowingly to the light station by keepers preparing a garden bed on rocky San Rafael Island.

The bones belong to a woman and an adolescent. Mother and child?

Elder, Ray Williams, who's lived at Yuquot all his life on the same land his ancestors lived, suggested a traditional pre-Christian cave burial. Read the full story here.

Caves with Mowachaht and Spanish burial sites exist in the area of Friendly Cove. This is a special place. If you ever find remains, please do not disturb them. These graves are sacred. This land is sacred. 

This 1946 photo of the pebble beach shows the existing cemetery.

Here's a wonderful archived photograph of the Yuquot summer village.

The Washing of Tears by Hugh Brody is a heartwarming NFB film about the people of Yuquot.

I can't explain how touched I am by this place.

Uchuck III Cruise to Nootka

My experience working as a lighthouse keeper at Nootka was one of the best I had. This is an incredibly beautiful place with a complex history. When I decided to write a paranormal mystery set at a lighthouse, naturally Nootka or Yuquot as it's known to the indigenous people who live there, was the setting I thought of first. Now, as I'm working on this story, I'm going back through my lighthouse journals and old photos, many of which are posted on this blog. What I didn't post were the photos from my research trip back to Nootka the summer of 2018.

The state of the world is in flux, but Canada still has many beautiful wild places we treasure. At the time of writing the Uchuck III is still sailing to Nootka Sound. The Uchuck III delivers cargo, food, and supplies to many people in remote places who depend on her. That is why, I imagine, she's still sailing. If you're interested, check Get West Adventure Cruises for updates and to call for reservations.

Because it's a day trip, we stayed overnight in Campbell River (on Vancouver Island, British Columbia) and drove out early the next morning to meet the ship at the dock in Gold River.

Uchuck means healing waters. “The Uchuck III can move along at twelve knots, and carry up to 100 day-passengers and 70 tons of general cargo including three or four cars” (Get West.) We watched from the upper deck as the crew loaded supplies using a crane for the folks at Yuquot. This included a new red ATV that was immediately put to work when we arrived.

When we were underway at last, the two-hour cruise took us through Muchalaht Channel past controversial fish farms and logging swaths, around Bligh Island (named for a young Captain Bligh of Bounty fame), and through Cook Channel into Friendly Cove.

We were fortunate. It was a perfect day of sun and fair breezes and the calm waters certainly felt healing. The captain said that humpback whales often come into Muchalaht Channel. All around Nootka Sound, salmon fishermen were hoisting their catch to show off their prizes.


In 2014, I lived at the Nootka Light Station for two months (in April/May) while working as a relief lighthouse keeper. Although it was a short stint, catching sight of the white and red Coastguard buildings felt like coming home. We had three hours to explore the Yuquot site, which includes an amazing pebble beach, a portion of the Nootka Trail that leads past a graveyard and rentable cabins at Jewitt Lake, the old church which has now been reclaimed by the Indigenous community as a cultural centre, and of course, the light station.

The long pier was teaming with people as the Mowachaht/Muchalaht community was holding their annual Spirit Summerfest campout in the grassy area near the church and many friends and relatives had come out aboard the Uchuck III to visit. There was also a celebration in the church as this year marked the 240th Anniversary of Captain James Cook’s arrival at Nootka Sound.

As the story goes, Cook arrived in what he first called King George’s Sound in the spring of 1778 with the Resolution and Discovery. Making the usual European blunder, he named the people and the place based on his suppositions. The Indigenous people—who’d been living here for thousands of years—called out and told the captain to go around to avoid the reefs. More precisely, it happened like this:

“Captain Cook’s men, asking by signs what the port was called, made for them a sign with their hand, forming a circle and then dissolving it, to which the natives responded ‘Nutka’. No.tkak or no.txak means “circular, spherical” (Sapir and Swadesh 1939:276) in The Whaling People. 

Though the village was teaming with people, Cook claimed the land for Britain. The British soon called all the people there, the Nootka, though there were 1500 Mowachacht people living in villages in the area. Yuquot was the summer home of Maquinna’s people and they wintered down the channel in Tahsis. The Mowachacht—“people of the deer”—began a lucrative (especially for the British) trade in sea otter pelts. In the cultural centre (the old white church) you can see yellowing photographs of the original village.

Captain Cook’s claim on Yuquot set the stage for later conflicts between the Indigenous people; as well as the Spanish who built Fort San Miguel on the rocks beside the lighthouse. Sadly, within forty years, the sea otter disappeared.

On our return voyage, we sailed through the more turbulent waters of Zuchiarte Channel. I went up to the wheelhouse to ask about the ship, but Captain Adrien said that he’d only answer my questions if I took a turn at the wheel. So, under his direction, I steered the Uchuck III through King’s Passage.

The wheelhouse is beautiful and it was a thrill to turn the wheel two spokes starboard and then back to port to straighten her out while keeping my eyes on the bow.

The fabulous photo below was taken by Low Light Mike, August 28, 2010. One of the crew had just polished the engine-telegraph (to the left of the wheel) a piece from BCCS's Princess Victoria,a River Clyde vessel that sailed around Cape Horn in 1904.



We arrived back in Gold River at 5:30pm. It was a long glorious day, and I recommend taking a voyage aboard the Uchuck III so you can get a taste of history firsthand. Below is a site map of Yuquot and a directional map to Gold River. All maps Friendly Cove and Map to Gold River

As I write my book, my mind naturally drifts back to my experiences at Yuquot.

The Trail of Graves

Cast up by an angry sea, lying haphazardly on the beach, is a rusty propane tank, detritus of the 9.0 earthquake and tsunami that devastated Japan on March 11, 2011. Approximately 1.5 million tons of debris are still floating in the Pacific Ocean. This tank is a testament to the nearly 16,000 lives lost in the event. A rusty reminder that the Earth is alive and we two-leggeds are not in control. 

Beyond the undulating pebble beach, protected by a pine windbreak, lies the graveyard trail. Cemeteries captivate me. I dragged my daughter all over Ireland, stopping to marvel at names and dates on stones, colossal Victorian crypts, the flowers (tended and not), the weather-beaten toys. This is a human need, this marking and remembering. Even our Neanderthal kin buried their dead with precious bits of life some 250,000 years ago. We need to know where our loved ones lie. We ask that their remains come home. We ask that we be buried together. 

This is a peaceful place, swept by the sea breeze, carpeted by verdant plants. It is private, yet public: the path hikers tread as they begin or leave the Nootka Trail. 

The graves are marked in various ways: etched stone crosses overgrown with moss, piles of beach stones, hand-tied sticks. One bears a carved totem taller than me. 

Twentieth century dates...1919, 1946, 1965. 


The name “Margaret” appears often. 

I am connected to this name, Margaret. When I trace my father’s ancestry back to the Eighteen Century, Bolton by Bowland,Yorkshire, Margaret and Stephen are the two names that appear most often, rippling through successive generations. The name gives me pause.

Margaret “derived from Latin Margarita, which was from Greek μαργαριτης (margarites) meaning "pearl", probably ultimately a borrowing from Sanskrit मञ्यरी (manyari).

Saint Margaret, the patron of expectant mothers, was martyred at Antioch in the 4th century. Later legends told of her escape from a dragon, with which she was often depicted in medieval art. The saint was popular during the Middle Ages, and her name has been widely used in the Christian world.” http://www.behindthename.com/name/margaret

Was the first Margaret given this name by a priest, or when she went to Residential School?


One thing I know. All of the Margarets died young, too young. The oldest of four was only 31 years old. 


There is a tragic beauty to this place that makes me think of those who once walked here, as I do. These women...these pearls.

Further up the trail are several cabins--one that hovers between the sea and an inland lake where the whalers once bathed before venturing out to hunt. From the veranda, you can see these fabulous pine-topped rocks. 

At low tide, starfish and urchins appear between intervals of rushing water.

















One of the cabins has a notice: Jewitt Lake is a sacred place. Do not go there. 

The English blacksmith, christened The White Slave, perhaps by his publisher close to a century later, was adopted by a Maquinna in 1803. His journals publicized this place, these people, and their culture. Now, he is immortalized in the land. 

I wish it were summer, and I could swim here in the pine-swept lake.

The cabin smells like a cedar sauna, and can be rented.

Perhaps, one day I will. 

The White Church (Part 3)

The steep cracked cement steps are caked with moss. A mottled brass plaque inside the wooden doors reads:

This church, dedicated to Pope St Pius X, erected 1956 to the Glory of God and in memory of Padre Magin Catala, OFM, first missionary to Friendly Cove, 1793 and in memory of the historic meeting of Capt. George Vancouver, RN and Commander Bodega Y Quadra of the Spanish Navy in Friendly Cove, 1792, and the Nootka Convention Treaty, was sponsored by His Excellency, Bishop James M. Hill of Victoria, directed by the Rev. F. Miller OMI Parish Priest, assisted by Rev. T. Lobsinger OMI with the approval and assistance of Chief Ambrose Maquinna and his band at Friendly Cove.

So many to acknowledge, and yet the actual people, who have lived here since time immemorial, and on whose territory the church stands, barely make it to the last line. In the vestibule are stained glass windows sent by Spain, framed yellowing photographs, and a model of a longhouse. 

The hall itself, I am pleased to say, has been reclaimed by the First People of Yuquot. Their art, their totems, and their symbols now inhabit this space.

The only symbol that remains of the Spanish church, apart from the cross atop the steeple, is the large Latin/English bible that rests on a wooden table.

Flanking the table are carved and painted poles.

The historical presence at Yuquot was rather brief, yet remarkably intense. In the 1780s, Nootka Sound was the most important anchorage on the Pacific Northwest coast--contested space, sought by Russia, Britain, and Spain. Thousands of Nuu-chah-nulth families lived here in scattered communities, as their people had for millennia. Of course, that didn't stop the Europeans from trying to "claim" the territory or exploit the people for their resources. It never did.

The historic meeting and treaty mentioned on the plaque were the result of a crisis in 1789, fueled by a hot-tempered Spaniard named Martinez. The story goes something like this:

In 1788, John Meares, a Brit, builds and launches--with the help of many Chinese workers--a 50 ton barque, North West America, in the cove, west of the village. (The first Spanish church is later built there.) Martinez, who has established a fortified post in Friendly Cove, seizes the ship, along with three others: Iphegenia, Argonaut, and Princess Royal, and sends them off to San Blas, Mexico (the centre for Spanish operations). During one skirmish, Maquinna’s relative, Callicum is shot and killed--again, this involves Martinez. As tensions escalate, Martinez requests 200 infantry. Before they can arrive; however, he abandons Nootka Sound.

With no Internet, this news does not reach anyone of consequence. The King of Spain had issued a Royal Order on April 14, 1789, requiring the establishment at Nootka to be maintained. So, Flores, the Viceroy of New Spain orders the First Free Company of Volunteers of Catalonia, under Alberni, to move north. In 1790, Alberni’s soldiers reoccupy the fort, under the command of Eliza. The Catalonians rebuild and enlarge Fort San Miguel, and the settlement, Santa Cruz de Nuca.

Things stabilize somewhat. Maquinna’s trust is regained, and trading goes on.

In 1792, Quadra is sent to command the base and the famous Nootka Convention Treaty (mentioned on the plaque) is signed with the British. George Vancouver represents England.

Santa Cruz de Nuca has barracks, a hospital, and fantastic gardens. Quadra is respected by the Yuquot people; in fact, Maquinna often stays overnight at Quadra’s residence, and enjoys his famous silver plate banquets, wines, and brandies. Life is good.

The first missionary, El Padre Magin Catala, arrives in 1794, and assimilation commences. 

(These two paintings were donated by the Government of Spain in 1957.)

But, within three years, the Europeans abandoned Nootka Sound. 

Maquinna tore down the fort. What followed for the people of Yuquot was a time of tension and declining wealth, due to the lessening fur trade.

All that remains of the Spanish are names on a map: Quadra, Flores, Alberni... 

At the back of the church, carvings hang from the ceiling, a testament to Nuu-chah-nulth reclamation. The eagle resembles the carving that adorned Chief Maquinna's burial site (1902).

The church/museum feels lonely this time of year. Come summer, when hikers hit the Nootka Trail and the Uchuck III begins its tours from Gold River, it will fill occasionally with curious tourists. The old buildings have sunk into the moss, and the people have all but gone. I wish I could hear them...singing, dancing, laughing, explaining what all of this means, and telling their story of this place.

The White Church (part 2)

The weathered church that stands today in Friendly Cove was erected in 1956, for the purposes of “educating” the people of Yuquot. In the vestibule, old plaques and photographs are displayed, memories and keys to the significance of this place. One article in particular captured my attention. It tells a familiar story; one of loss, and betrayal, and exploitation.

In 1904, the entire Nootka Whalers’ Washing House, a 5x6 metre building, plus its contents was “purchased” from two elders and spirited away under cover of night. It was whaling season, and most of the community was off at work. A shady deal, no doubt, that the whalers would have objected to had they known. George Hunt, working under the famous anthropologist, Franz Boas, orchestrated the deal, which reportedly gained two men $500.00 but lost a community something sacred and precious. It ended up in the American Museum in New York, and has stayed there, in the basement, for the past century. This is an image of the contents:

What follows is a partial transcript of a framed article hanging inside the church. “Reviving Dark Forces” was written by Mark Hume and published in the Vancouver Sun, Saturday, May 25, 1991.

The shrine includes 60 carved human figures, 25 human skulls and two wooden whales. Native legend says the prayers and rituals practised by shamans gave hunters the magic they needed to find whales; it also made the sea send dead whales to the beaches around Nootka Sound.

What the magic was, and how it worked, may be beyond comprehension today, but Inglis says that looking on the faces of the shrine it is easy to believe it once had immense power. [At the time of writing, Richard Inglis was Head of Anthropology at the Royal BC Museum in Victoria.]

The people of Nootka Island who used the shrine believe it still has that power. One of the native concerns now under discussion is whether such dark forces should ever be brought into the open again.

“It’s incredibly powerful stuff,” says Inglis of the magic attributed to the shrine.

“One of the issues is whether you want to bring that power out again.”

The shrine, a magic house that was considered “a great treasure” of the Nootka people, was in continual use for 300 years before it was collected by the American Museum in 1904.

Generations of Nootka whalers performed rituals at the shrine which at times drew its black magic from human sacrifice and grave robbing.

Inglis, who has been researching the monument for several years, says the native community has mixed emotions about the shrine.

Some want it returned to Yuquot, to be shown in a museum or cultural centre. Others think it should never be put on public display again. 

European mariners turned whale hunting into a deadly, highly mechanized science that brought world populations to the verge of extinction. But in the native world, during the shrine’s centuries of power, killing whales was a dangerous job that required the help of spirits.

Anthropologists say the Nootka developed the most spectacular sea hunting techniques on the entire Pacific coast. Travelling in large, ocean-going canoes, they killed whales with harpoons that had cutting heads made of mussel shells; sealskin buoys were connected to long lines made from animal sinew.

The techniques for hunting—and the magic—were cherished family secrets passed down from chiefs to their sons. In addition to the hunters, the Nootka had whale-ritualists, shamans so powerful it was said they didn’t have to hunt whales at sea, but magically drew to shore those that had died from natural causes.

Tsaxwasap,a man with great shamanistic powers, was one of those who first used the shrine. He intensified the power of the magic house by bringing dead bodies to it, and live infants stolen from their mothers. When Tsaxwasap inherited the shrine it had only four human skulls.

In her book, From the Land of the Totem Poles, Aldona Jonaltis, of the American Museum, says Tsaxwasap kidnapped infants and robbed graves to build the shrine’s power.

“He began removing from graves the skulls of men who had been long dead and then placed 40 skulls on the right-hand side of the shrine, 40 skulls on the left-hand side, eight skulls atop sticks on the right side, eight skulls atop sticks on the left, and four in front of the house to serve as watchmen. Then Tsaxwasap found 12 dried up corpses of people and placed them in two rows in the centre of the structure facing the door. After this, he kidnapped 120 more infants and placed them, in their cradles, in his house. This magical house served its purpose well, for many, many whales came to Tsaxwasap.”

The shrine, which dates back to 1700 and could be much older, was used by at least eight generations of whale ritualists. After the third generation of use, wooden figures were substituted for human skeletons.

There were only 14 skulls at the site when it was collected in 1904.

The wooden figures appear in the photograph above. I suspect the 25 human skulls may be all that remains of the crew of The Boston, killed by Maquinna's warriors in 1803, but who knows? Friendly Cove was once the most important point of anchorage on the Northwest Coast.

As far as I know, the items in question are still housed in the American Museum. An article in the Vancouver Sun, April 2013, states that the museum has tentatively agreed to repatriate the shrine. One challenge is financial; moreover, what should the community do with the shrine once it is returned? This is a complex issue. The Nuu-chah-nulth people hope to build a Cultural Centre here, but to do so takes a great deal of money. Also, the cove is only accessible by boat or floatplane. Still, it makes no sense to me that this powerful, sacred treasure should be crammed in the basement of a New York museum. What do you think?

The White Church (part 1)

Emily Carr is a woman I admire. Passionate and true to herself, she rejected Victorian decorum to explore the world. This was something that young women just did not do at the turn of the century. She travelled to San Francisco, London, and Paris to learn her craft. Heavens! She even dared to ride horseback like a man.

courtesy of bcheritage.ca

Fearless, determined, and open-minded, Emily is so much more than her art. Travelling by boat and canoe, often with only a guide and her wee dog, she explored the West Coast, sketching and painting Haida, Salish, and Nuu-chah-nulth villages. Like a west wind, whispering and screaming with paint, she drew our gaze to vanishing peoples and cultures.

An independent women, Emily supported herself as best she could by teaching art, and running a boarding house; though these chores must have stifled her creative process. Still, through it all she survived, and she painted. And, when she could no longer travel or camp or even move around much, she began to write.

In 1929, Emily Carr visited Friendly Cove. In a famous quote, she described the Nootka Lightstation as a “strange wild perch” on a “nosegay of rocks, bunched with trees, spiced with wildflowers.”

I do, at times, feel akin to the eagles who careen by my windows or perch atop the rocks.

She painted the original small white Roman Catholic church.

courtesy of the Art Gallery of Ontario --  ago.net

The rows of crosses in the picketed churchyard speak to the devastation that engulfed this community. Between 1778, when Captain James Cook appeared in Friendly Cove, and 1900, the population of the First People living here was reduced by nine-tenths. Disease, carried by the European traders and explorers, was the main culprit.

Built in a cove at the west end of the village, the original church burned down in 1954. You can just see it (the small site mark) near the centre of this photograph.

courtesy of the Art Gallery of Ontario -- ago.net

I’ve been drawn to that cove since I arrived—I can see it through my windows—and finally walked there yesterday with my companion, Lucy. I’ve tried before, but couldn’t get past the barricade of barnacle clad rocks. The tide must be very low. This is how it looks today. 

Emily's trees still hug the beach, and spring water cascades down the rocks between the driftwood logs. At the time, I didn’t know it was the space once claimed by the white church and the graveyard. Are the graves still there, crumbling beneath the trees? And the spirits? The energy was incredibly peaceful and comforting. It felt…homey. Then, Lucy got distracted by something in the trees. 

I turned, and at the last second, realized it was Raven. 

On Coming to Nootka

At last, I'm back working as a relief lightkeeper, this time at Nootka. I was going to write a blog to describe the geographic area and provide some background (this is a hotspot for Canadian history); however, a friend sent this one to me. It's quite well written, so I'm just going to post it, thank Heike, and thank the sailors who took the time to write it.

http://www.seabc.com/friendlycove.htm

I arrived on Thursday. The weather was gorgeous…sunshine, warmth, no wind…needless to say, the helicopter ride from Victoria was picture perfect. Just me and the pilot cruising quietly up the coast.

Riding shotgun is awesome because you get such great views.

Even the waves were perfect!

We stopped in at Carmanah Lighthouse to drop off some mail. The sun was shining directly behind the light here.

Later, we put down at Tofino airport to refuel.

Anyone who's ever hiked or kayaked the West Coast likely knows Ucluelet. Here's a photo coming into town from the south. Like other communities on this rugged coast, Ucluelet is built on the ancestral territory of the Nuu-chah-nulth First Peoples. They lived "all along the mountains and the sea" which is what Nuu-chah-nulth means. 

Here's our first sighting of Friendly Cove and Nootka Lightstation.

Some Mowachaht/Muchalaht folks are sharing this beautiful space with us. The Williams family is still living on the beach behind the lightstation, where the Yuquot village once stood.

The last two days, it's been raining off and on, light and heavy, pretty much nonstop. Today is a perfect day for listening to that crazy Icelandic band, Sigur Ross…knitting, collecting thoughts, sea-gazing, and drinking tea. I'm so glad to be back.