Brunswick House First Nation

Brunswick House First Nation is a growing community that is being led by dedicated members who are working hard to build on past successes and develop potential future natural resource opportunities. The First Nation has overcome many challenges in its past to arrive at its present situation as a successful and thriving community.

 

Brunswick House FN was established through Treaty #9 which was signed by government representatives and First Nation leaders in 1905 and 1906. In late July 1906, treaty commissioners met with the First Nation people who lived in the area of the Hudson’s Bay Company post called New Brunswick House on the north end of Missinaibi Lake.

 

In 1925, the Chapleau Game Preserve was established as a 7,000 square kilometer area for the protection of wildlife. The new game preserve surrounded Missinaibi Lake, including the land that New Brunswick House had been allocated. When the preserve was created, hunters and trappers including First Nation people who followed a traditional lifestyle were no longer allowed to pursue their subsistence activities in the area. As a result, the people of New Brunswick House had to relocate to a new land base outside the game preserve.

 

For the 22 years following the relocation, the band had no consistent land base. In fact, the community’s lands were changed three times. The first was to near Kapuskasking to about 50 acres of land. This attempt at establishing a community was thwarted when a local pulp mill operation declared it had the superseding rights to the area.

 

The community was relocated a second time to an area known as Loon Lake (now called Borden Lake), near the town of Chapleau. This relocation was contested and the community was forced to move elsewhere.

 

In 1947, a 36 square mile land base was finally allocated to Brunswick House First Nation in the township of Mountbatten. Mostly swamp land, it was the traditional trapping ground of then leader of Brunswick House First Nation, Chief Joe Davis.

 

In 1970, one square mile of the land base was traded for an equal portion 10 kilometers east of the town of Chapleau on Highway 101, off of Borden Lake. The final move to the community’s present location was made due to health reasons and to gain improved access for members to essential health and education services.