1889: Jack or Donald “Truths”, Revelstoke, BC
I’m not catching the reference in the headline, are you?
(Image credit: Ormsby Review)
But I do discern traces of frontier cop Jack Kirkup’s reputation for unconventionally direct law enforcement here — the sort of behavior that we nowadays see as prejudiced.
It sounds to me like he patronized and bullied a group of Native people into leaving town, minus some of their rightful property.
These events take place in the Kootenays area of British Columbia, where Chinuk Wawa maintained a presence longer than in most other places.
Donald “Truths.”
Never was there delivered from the forum of ancient Rome a more impassioned oration than that delivered from the stoop of Revelstoke’s hall of justice by [policeman] Jack Kirkup on Wednesday last. While those of Rome were rendered in classic Latin, Jack’s was spouted in pure Chinook. The weighty question argued was who stole two horses and one squaw from a band of Indians that strayed into Revelstoke’s precincts. Jack satisfied the band that no one did it, and they departed on their way rejoicing.
— from the New Westminster (BC) Weekly British Columbian of May 22, 1889, page [10], column 2
