Hello. I’m Georgie McGuigen, and you’re watching Hammerson Peters. In this video,
we’re going to delve into an all-but-forgotten Blackfoot and Plains Cree legend which tells
of a monstrous water snake that once slithered up and down the waterways of the Canadian
prairies. This story appears in the book Mysteries of Canada: Volume II, which you can find by
clicking the link in the description. Without further ado, here is The Giant River Serpent
of Southern Alberta. Enjoy!
THE CITY OF MEDICINE HAT, nestled in the southeast corner of Alberta not far from the Saskatchewan
border, has many claims to fame. Hockey fans know it as the home of the Medicine Hat Tigers,
a ferocious junior hockey team which has produced NHL legends like Trevor Linden and Lanny McDonald.
Road-trippers may associate Medicine Hat with its iconic Saamis Teepee- an enormous steel
skeleton of a Plains Indian lodge which sits atop an old buffalo jump beside the Trans-Canada
Highway. Of all its distinctive features, however, Medicine Hat is perhaps best known
for its unusual name, which has its roots in a mysterious tangle of local native legends.
Medicine Hat was founded in 1883, when the Canadian Pacific Railway was built across
the South Saskatchewan River. In the early 1900s, huge deposits of natural gas were discovered
in the earth beneath it, prompting English writer Rudyard Kipling to famously remark
that it boasted “all Hell for a basement”. Its surfeit of natural gas, coupled with an
abundance of red clay which lies along the banks of the South Saskatchewan River, transformed
Medicine Hat into a major brick and ceramics manufacturing centre which once stood to compete
with northwesterly Calgary for the distinction of being Alberta’s most important city.
Despite a failed movement in the early 1900s to change its name to “Gasville” in an
attempt to attract industry, Medicine Hat has retained its strange name since its founding.
Its first citizens named the town after the old Indian name for the place, which, for
a century prior to the town’s founding, had served as a sort of boundary between the
territories the Blackfoot Confederacy and that of their hereditary enemies, the easterly
Plains Cree and Assiniboine. There are a great number of old Blackfoot
and Cree legends which purport to explain the origin of the name ‘Medicine Hat’,
most of which local historian Marcel M.C. Dirk diligently documented in his 1993 book
But Names Will Never Hurt Me. The majority of these legends are based on either a battle
between the Blackfoot and the Cree, a love story involving human sacrifice, a landmark
that looks like an Indian headdress, or some combination thereof. In spite of their differences,
every single legend has something in common, namely the inclusion of a medicine man’s
headdress, or ‘medicine hat’.
James Sanderson’s Story In 1894, a Scots-Cree frontiersman-turned-rancher
named James Sanderson, who was one of Medicine Hat’s first citizens, documented a particular
version of the ‘medicine hat’ legend in a series of articles for the Medicine Hat
News entitled Indian Tales of the Canadian Prairies. Sanderson’s tale is especially
interesting as it constitutes one of the only recordings of an all-but-forgotten creature
of Plains Indian oral tradition- an enormous supernatural river snake associated with the
Great Spirit. Sanderson began his tale by describing a certain
setting on the South Saskatchewan River which is almost certainly the area between what
is now Police Point Park and Strathcona Island Park, the former being opposite the river
from the latter. At this particular point, the river bends substantially, resulting in
a significant current which prevents the formation of ice “even during the most severe winters”.
At the centre of the bend is a small island, and to the east of the island are tall sandstone
cutbanks, or cliffs, which fall into the river. “This opening in the river is regarded with
great interest by the Indians,” Sanderson wrote, “as it is believed to be the breathing
place of the Great Spirit who lives in the river and who, when he shows himself, assumes
the form of a serpent…” After laying out the setting, Sanderson proceeded
to describe the legend: “Far back in Indian tradition, it is said
that one of a hunting party of Blood Indians was sent forward to reconnoitre the country
and see if the buffalo were to be met with any numbers. He was accompanied by his newly-married
wife and a favourite dog, the latter bearing the travois- a crosspole arrangement to which
the dog was harnessed- for the purpose of carrying some share of the travelling outfit.
“One evening, the Indian was camped by the river side and, as he was walking along near
the opening in the river referred to, the serpent appeared to him and told him that
if he would throw the flesh of his wife into the opening, he would become a great warrior
and medicine man. The Indian returned to his tepee and repeated to his wife the words of
the serpent. His wife at once expressed her willingness to die for the good of the tribe
and in obedience to the call of the Great Spirit. Her husband, however, was reluctant
and instead of his wife killed the dog. Carrying its carcass to the opening, he threw it in
with the request that the Spirit might be pleased to accept from him his dog as a substitute
for his wife. The Spirit refused to accept, and declared that, unless the Indian would
sacrifice the wife he could do nothing for him. The man returned and informed his wife
accordingly, and she again expressed her willingness to comply with the demand.
“Finally, she was sacrificed and her flesh given to the Spirit, who then directed the
man to stay all night on the island near by, to rise early next morning, and, as the sun
rose, to proceed towards the cutbanks lying to the east. At the base of one of the cutbanks
he would find a bag containing medicines and a hat trimmed with ermine. He was instructed
to bring back the medicine bag and the hat with him to the Spirit who would explain the
purpose of the hat and the efficacy of the medicines. The hat, he was told, was to be
worn only in war, and would ensure victory to the wearer. The tradition has it that the
Indian became famous as a medicine man and warrior.”
How Seven Persons Got Its Name Following the tale of the medicine hat, Sanderson
documented another Indian legend featuring the Great Spirit in the form of a huge water
serpent. This story takes place on Seven Persons Creek, a tributary of the South Saskatchewan
which enters the river immediately adjacent to the island mentioned in the previous story.
The tale purports to explain how the creek acquired its own strange name.
Before the coming of the North-West Mounted Police in 1874, the area of South Saskatchewan
River and its tributaries in the vicinity of present-day Medicine Hat was a dangerous
place frequented by raiding parties in search of trouble, and skirmishes and battles between
Blackfoot and Cree warriors were common there. In 1872, a renowned war chief named Calf Shirt
led a war party of Blood Blackfoot along Seven Persons Creek in search of enemies. Sanderson’s
tale describes an old Indian legend born of this particular excursion.
While crossing the creek a short distance above its confluence with the South Saskatchewan,
the war party came across: “… the dead bodies of seven men, lying
just as if they had been suddenly struck down when following each other in Indian file.
Although it was evident that they had been dead for some time, there was not a single
indication of decay about them, unless the absence of any vestige of hair upon their
heads might be regarded as such. They were not scalped; the hair had simply been removed
without any indication being left of the manner of its removal. There was no wound visible
on the bodies, nor could the Blackfoot tell whence they had come, or to what tribe they
belonged. “Being unable to explain this most mysterious
find, the braves made up their minds to watch the bodies, to see whether anyone would come
to claim them or give them burial. They waited patiently for five days in the neighbourhood
and watched the corpses closely, but there was no sign of any such party appearing and
the bodies continued in the same condition of non-decay.
“As they discussed various theories to account for the death of the men, someone suggested
that they had died of starvation, but a close examination of their equipment proved that
they had not been short of provisions. The final conclusion of the Blackfoot was that
the seven persons had, in some way, offended the Great Spirit who breathed through the
unfreezing opening in the South Saskatchewan, and that he had punished then by striking
them dead.” The natives reverently covered the bodies
with stones which, for many years, remained undisturbed by prairie wolves and other scavengers,
presumably remaining in their peculiar state of non-decay. Ever since, the waterway on
which the bodies were discovered has been called Seven Persons Creek.
Earl Willows’ Story Intriguingly, Sanderson’s tales are not
the only documented Plains Indian legends involving giant supernatural water serpents.
Blackfoot storyteller Earl Willows, for example, in a 2009 online article entitled “Earl
Willows Tells the Story of the Warrior that Ate the Horned Snake”, recounted a traditional
Blackfoot tale in which two warriors, on their way home from a raid, accidentally set up
camp over top of a snake den. In the morning, they discovered an enormous snake nearby and
burned it alive. Heedless of his companion’s warning, one of the warriors, named Weasel
Calf, ate some of the snake’s cooked meat which he plucked from the ashes.
The following morning, the other warrior, named Flint Knife, found that his companion
had transformed into a massive horned snake. Weasel Calf asked his friend to bring his
belongings back to his family, and urged him to maintain a healthy distance from him during
their travels for his own safety. The two continued on until they came to a large river.
Weasel Calf declared that this would be his new home, and asked Flint Knife to ask his
family to come and visit him there. Sometime later, the family of the metamorphosed
brave visited the river and were greeted by the huge serpent who explained how his transformation
came about. The snake then asked his family to leave, as he was afraid he would be unable
to control his strange urge to harm them. The Blackfoot left the river and never returned.
The Horned Serpent The Blackfoot and Cree legends of massive
river snakes appear to be part of a much larger pan-American tradition of supernatural horned
water serpents. From the Haida of the Pacific Northwest to the Mi’kmaq of the Maritimes,
First Nations and Native American tribes across the continent all tell similar stories of
powerful, often-horned water serpents imbued with supernatural abilities. For some reason,
which this author hopes to investigate in a future article, these creatures are almost
invariably considered the archenemies of Thunderbirds– legendary giant eagles which also enjoy a
prominent place in indigenous folklore across North America.
Perhaps the most compelling pieces of evidence connecting the prairie legend of the giant
water snake with this larger trans-continental tradition are the many striking similarities
between Sanderson’s ‘medicine hat’ story and a dark Ojibwa legend which appears in
the 1859 book Kitchi-gami: Wanderings Around Lake Superior. Kitchi-gami is a travel memoir
written by a German travel writer named Johann Georg Kohl, who spent the year 1855 living
among the Ojibwa, voyageurs, and missionaries of Lake Superior. Near the end of his book,
Kohl relates a local legend told to him by a Lake Superior native on the subject of the
‘Matchi-Manitou’– the evil spirit, whom the Ojibwa believe resides at the bottom of
the water. According to Kohl’s informant, a local Indian
once invoked the Matchi-Manitou, to the utter ruin of himself and his family. “When I
inquired more closely how this all happened,” Kohl wrote, “my bonhomme told me the following
story: “The man of whom he was speaking had once
dreamed ten nights in succession that a voice spoke to him, saying that if he wished to
have something very fine, which would make him happy, he must one night strike the water
with a stick and sing a certain verse to it. “He told this dream to his friends, who,
however, dissuaded him, and said, ‘Do not go, my friend- do not accept it.’
“On the eleventh night, when he dreamt the same thing again, he awoke his squaw, and
said to her: “‘Dost thou not hear in the distance the
drums clashing on the water? I must go there.’ The squaw assured him, on the contrary, that
she heard nothing; all was as quiet as mice. But he insisted that the drum could be heard
quite plainly from the water, and he felt an irresistible call.”
Heedless of his wife’s exhortations to remain in the wigwam, the Indian rose from his furs
and headed down to the lake shore. He produced a hefty stick, settled onto his haunches,
and began beating the water’s surface like a medicine man beats his drum, all the while
singing the gloomy incantation he had learned in his dream.
“The water began gradually moving beneath the influence of his drumming,” Kohl wrote,
“and at last a small whirlpool was formed. He struck more rapidly, and his song grew
quicker. The whirlpool became larger and more violent. The fish were at length drawn into
it, and soon after them the other water animals. Frogs, toads, lizards, fish of every description,
swamp and aquatic birds, with enormous swarms of swimming and flying insects, were drawn
into the whirlpool, and passed snapping and quivering before the eyes of the enchanter,
so that he nearly lost his senses.” As the whirlpool expanded, the water of the
lake began to rise. Swallowing his horror, the Indian continued to sing the magic song
and strike the roiling waters, his voice breaking into a shrill wail as the water crept higher,
first past his waist, then above his shoulders, and further up his neck. Finally, in order
to avoid drowning, the Indian fell silent. “The waters calmed down,” Kohl wrote,
“the whirlpool and animals disappeared, the enchanter stood once more on the beach,
and the water-king emerged from the placid lake, in the form of a mighty serpent.”
The giant snake informed the Indian that he would make him healthy, rich, and prosperous
in return for one of his children. When the Indian accepted the hideous offer, the serpent
bowed his head, revealing a fiery, flower-like object nestled between its horns. With shaking
hands, the native retrieved this item, which disintegrated into blood red powder in his
palms. The snake then informed the Indian that he
was to collect twenty pieces of driftwood, each of which was to represent a particular
desire. Whenever the Indian wished to satisfy a certain want, he would arrange the driftwood
pieces in a semicircle around him on the beach, and then sprinkle some of the red powder on
the piece representing the desire he wished fulfilled. Each time he did so, however, one
of his children would become the property of the serpent.
“With these words,” Kohl wrote, “the water-king disappeared in the depths. His
adept… went home, where he found his squaw, who had watched all his doings with horror,
already dead. Like her, the children were killed one after the other by the water-spirit.
The wicked husband and father, who gave way to such bad dreams, was, for a long time,
rich, powerful, and respected, a successful hunter, a much-feared warrior, and a terrible
magician and prophet, until at length a melancholy fate befell him, and he ended his days in
a very wretched manner.” Thanks for watching! If you enjoyed this video
and would like to help support this channel, please check out the book Mysteries of Canada:
Volume II, which you can find by clicking the link in the description.