WILLIAMS LAKE, B.C. – Grand Chief Ed John was a young lawyer when he spoke more than 30 years ago at the University of Victoria’s new law-school building named after Matthew Begbie, British Columbia’s hanging judge.
International scholars were present to discuss aboriginal issues and rights, but John said he was compelled to tell them they were gathered in a building named after the judge who sentenced many First Nations to hang, including Tsilhqot’in chiefs after the Chilcotin War.
“I said I want to raise a question about this law school and about this conference on aboriginal rights and I want to tie it back to what this school’s been named because I want to talk to you about Matthew Baillie Begbie, the so-called hanging judge,” said John, who now leads the First Nations Summit, B.C.’s largest aboriginal organization.
Six chiefs from B.C.’s central Interior Cariboo-Chilcotin region were hanged in 1864 for murder and for their parts in what is known as Western Canada’s deadliest attack by aboriginals on non-aboriginal settlers.