page_title: Jean-Baptiste Cope
section_title: Peace Treaty (1752)
hierarchical_section_title: Jean-Baptiste Cope / Father Le Loutre’s War / Peace Treaty (1752)
caption_attribution_description: English: Monument Peace Treaty 1752, Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia
context_page_description: Jean Baptiste Cope was also known as Major Cope, a title he was probably given from the French military, the highest rank given to Mi’kmaq. Cope was the sakamaw of the Mi'kmaq people of Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia. He maintained close ties with the Acadians along the Bay of Fundy, speaking French and being Catholic. During Father Le Loutre’s War, Cope participated in both military efforts to resist the British and also efforts to create peace with the British. During the French and Indian War he was at Miramichi, New Brunswick, where he is presumed to have died during the war. Cope is perhaps best known for signing the Treaty of 1752 with the British, which was upheld in the Supreme Court of Canada in 1985 and is celebrated every year along with other treaties on Treaty Day.
context_section_description: After eighteen months of inconclusive fighting, uncertainties and second thoughts began to disturb both the Mi’kmaq and the British communities. By the summer of 1751 Governor Cornwallis began a more conciliatory policy. For more than a year, Cornwallis sought out Mi’kmaq leaders willing to negotiate a peace.  He eventually gave up, resigned his commission and left the colony.
  With a new Governor in place, Governor Peregrine Hopson, the first and only willing Mi’kmaq negotiator was Cope.  On 22 November 1752, Cope finished negotiating a peace for the Mi’kmaq at Shubenacadie. The basis of the treaty was the one signed in Boston which closed Father Rale's War (1725). Cope tried to get other Mi’kmaq chiefs in Nova Scotia to agree to the treaty but was unsuccessful.  The Governor became suspicious of Cope’s actual leadership among the Mi’kmaq people. Of course, Le Loutre and the French were outraged at Cope’s decision to negotiate at all with the British.
caption: Monument to the Treaty of 1752, Sipekneꞌkatik First Nation, Nova Scotia
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