GREY OWL.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 114, 17 May 1938, Page 5

GREY OWL.

jINDIAN OR ENGLISH? JCONTROVERSY RAGES STILL. STRANGE ROMANTIC STORY. Grey Owl —loved Indian writer of the things of the wild, lecturer, chief conservation officer of Dominion parks in Canada? Or Archibald Stansfeld Belaney, well-educated young Englishman, who adopted the ways of the wild and became so nearly an Indian that he deceived Indians? It is a curious problem that has been exciting Canada, and England, too. It has been settled definitely several times, and it is not yet settled, and by the wayside of investigation many curious facts have been unearthed. There was no better-known man, no more romantic character in Canada than Grey Owl, the Indian. Son. he alleged, of a Scot named MacXeill and an Apache woman, he emerged on to the world scene in the years of the Great War, when he served with the Canadians and was wounded at Vimy Ridge. He came to English notice as a lecturer on the things of the wild, and as an author, whose booksf "The Last Alan of the Frontier," "Pilgrims of the Wild," "Tales of the Empty Cabin," made a great impression. Now he is dead, who was a greatly honoured figure while he lived, and about his name has raged a storm of controversy. Born at Hastings. Grey Owl has been declared by a number of people close to hi in to be an Englishman, Archibald Stansfeld Belaney, born in Hastings, England, educated at Hastings Grammar School. He is remembered by "old boys" of that school because of his fondness for playing at Indians, and collecting frogs, rats, grass snakes and the like. An aged woman, living in Devon, wrote to her sister-in-law, Miss Clarrie Belaney, when Grey Owl died: "I write with regret of the passing of my beloved son. It is the passing of a great man, with a soul."

I Miss Belaney, who. with her sister, I looted after and educated Archibald | Belaney from boyhood to 17 years of | age. has shown a reporter copies of I Grey Owl's books (one of them dedicated | to her), each bearing the name "Belan••>•"! in the author's handwriting on the flvleafs. "We always knew he \va« Grey Owl. and his mother used to send us circulars respecting his lectures," she said. "We moved our address several times since Archie's boyhood days with us; they were spent in St. James' Road, Hastings. He had the top bedroom, and he used to fill it with snakes and things— all sorts of little animals. They used to get out of the window and frighten people who did not know thev were , harmless." "Married" Four Times. It has been declared that Grev Owl married four times—to Angele Belaney. a full-blooded Ojibway Indian, in Canada in 1908; to Ivy Mary Holmes, an Englishwoman, in Sussex in 1917, when Grey Owl was serving in the Canadian forces in the name of Belaney; to Anahareo, a beautiful Iroquois Indian, who accompanied him in 1925; and to Yvonne Perrier, married in Montreal in 1925. The first of those "wives"' has stated j that she was definite her husband was an Englishman. On the other hand. Grey Owl has stated that the reason why he took the name Belaney while in the army was that he was brought up by a Mrs. Belaney, sister to his [ I father. , Whatever the truth of the matter, if Grey Owl was an Englishman, his life J story would be one of the most romantic in the world. He was accepted by ' Indians without question as an Indian. and he knew the ways of the wilds as few other men knew them. "Lone Eagle's" Cousin. ? Yvonne Perrier and Anahareo have 1 both declared their faith in him as anj , Indian; and a Red Indian guide from j . London. Ontario, lias claimed that Grey| tlOwl was his first cousin. This Indian.: (Howard "Lone Kagle'" Seymore. .I that Grev Owl was the son of a full-j 1 blooded Indian of the Algonquin tribe! r named John Joseph Howard Seymore i John Joseph, the father, died soon f after Grev Owl's birth, he added. Thej mother, who was also largely of Indian, » blood, took the child to live with an English family at the Hudson Bay Irad-J

ing Post, who had befriended her in her childhood. This family took Grey Owl to England and educated him there. When he returned to Canada he was a grown man. Seymore declares that he has papers tracing the family history, and that he was himself - named after (irey Owl's father. Anahareo, declaring "He cannot fight his case now," stated that there was undoubtedly Apache blood in the late naturalist's vein*, and caMed to his publishers: "I have always taken Grey Owl's word relative to his ancestors which were Apache and Scotch, and that j is what he will always be to me. This would not be the time for me to doubt it even if I could."' I Gratefully Remembered. It is a strange story, and a newspaper commenting on the controversy has stated truely: —"Those who know the happiness he has given to children the world over and the contribution he has made to a kindlier view of the animal world will feel that the facts of his life which are not in dispute are much more important than those 'hat ; are. j "Whatever his origins, lie devoted hi~J life to the understanding of Nature and | the considerable fortune hi* writing atulj lecturing brought him t<> ilie relief of! the suffering of animals, and in a younger generation that read his books;, I with affection he was able to insjiireji something of his own passion for j"* l ', jdealing with the creatures of the wild. l{ For this he will be gratefully reniemIbered when speculation aa to nis birth-j place and his race is forgotten." :