NATIONAL ACADIAN DAY - AUGUST 15, 2021 By Bernard Bujold -
If there is a symbol representing the Acadians, it is the trees! In fact, the first sentence of the legendary poem Évangéline begins with trees: "Salut vieille forêt...". Throughout the poem, trees are central to the story, either for their beauty or as a means of fighting the English military occupation.
I grew up surrounded by trees and for my father, a Gaspesian lumberjack, it was his life. He loved to walk on his woodlot and he had planted several trees around his house in the village of Saint-Siméon de Bonaventure, including two magnificent larches, the official tree of the Acadians, which were installed on each side of his driveway. He called his two trees "violins", the Acadian nickname for the larch.
My father (Léonard Bujold 1915-1976) was an Acadian descendant whose ancestors had taken refuge in the Baie-des-Chaleurs before the deportation of 1755. It should be remembered that the English army formally forbade the Acadians, under penalty of death, to leave the Grand Pré region, as it was feared that they would join the French soldiers in Quebec to fight against England. The English army therefore organized, in secret, a maritime deportation of the Acadians, first to Fort Beauséjour in August and to Grand Pré on September 5. They wanted to deport them as far away from the territory as possible in order to prevent them from reaching Quebec, but also to prevent them from returning to their Acadian land. However, a good number of Acadians managed to escape from the English military occupation, through the forest and by sea, at the risk of their lives, to take refuge at the French fort of Restigouche and then to settle everywhere east of the Baie-des-Chaleurs. My ancestors were among those who managed to escape. A dozen Acadian families founded the parish of Bonaventure in 1760, then Carleton in 1766.
It was more than 100 years after the deportation, in 1881, during the first Acadian national convention that took place in Memramcook, that the elites chose the date of August 15 to mark the official holiday of their people.
Personally, every time I look at trees, I think of my father and the Acadian culture.
Happy National Holiday 2021 to all Acadians!
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