Albert Lacombe - A Broader Mission

A Broader Mission

In 1864 he was tasked with evangelizing the Cree Plains Indians, and from 1865 to 1872, he traveled extensively throughout the prairies. It was during this time that he brokered a peace between the Cree and the Blackfoot. In 1872 Lacombe was sent to Fort Garry (modern Winnipeg, Manitoba) to promote the colonization of Manitoba, and to this end traveled throughout eastern Canada and the United States. He became the Vicar of Saint Boniface, Manitoba, in 1879. It was during this period that he began his association with the Canadian Pacific Railway and extended his ministry to the navvies working on the right-of-way.

In 1882, he relocated to Calgary following the retirement of Father Constantine Scollen from the Southern Alberta missions. When the CPR was preparing to lay track through Blackfoot territory against their wishes, he negotiated an agreement with the Blackfoot leader Crowfoot that allowed the railway to pass through Blackfoot land. Crowfoot was famously given a lifetime pass to travel on the railway by CPR president William Van Horne, as was Lacombe. When the North-West Rebellion erupted in 1885, Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald enlisted Father Lacombe's assistance in assuring the neutrality of the Blackfoot Indians. Although Cree braves commanded by Poundmaker and Big Bear were involved in the fighting, Crowfoot, believing the rebellion to be a lost cause, kept his warriors out of the conflict.