06/10/2025
Who was Chief Pierre Louis Constant Pinesi?
A large number of Algonquin living today in the Ottawa Valley count themselves among the proud descendants of Grand Chief Pinesi.
It is specifically on the (unceded) traditional land of Chief Pinesi and his family that much of our nation’s capital sits today.
Chief Pinesi was respected by his people and was recognized by the British government as Grand Chief of the Algonquins.
During the War of 1812, Chief Pinesi and fellow Algonquins travelled more than 500 kilometres westward as allies to the British to help defend Canada.
During his lifetime however, Chief Pinesi sadly saw the irreversible destruction of his people’s way of life.
Prior to the arrival of settlers to the area, the hunting grounds of Chief Pinesi and his extended family were said to be bounded on the north by the Ottawa River and extended approximately 20 kilometres both east and west of the Rideau River, extending as far south as present day Kemptville.
This area (pretty much today’s City of Ottawa) represented about 1,800 square kilometres of the total 100,000 square kilometre traditional lands claimed by the Algonquin people, stretching from Montreal to near to North Bay.
Forests covered the lands of Chief Pinesi and his family before the first farmers and loggers began to appear.
There were no roads, so Summer travel was by birch-bark canoe on the Rideau and Ottawa Rivers.
There were no stores. In the Winter, Chief Pinesi and his extended family had Winter camps from which they hunted on snowshoes for animals such as moose, deer, elk (killed off by overhunting in the early 1800s), beaver and rabbits.
Among the first Europeans seen by Pinesi would have been the annual fleets of Montreal fur traders, portaging over the Chaudière Falls as they canoed through the area on their way westward.
Before the Rideau Canal was built — raising the level of the Rideau River by as much as 13 metres at Hog’s Back — the Rideau River had many more rapids and fish, was edged by forest, and was a canoe route from the Ottawa River to the St. Lawrence River.
During his lifetime, Chief Pinesi saw all of this change — the transition of their hunting grounds from forest to fields as waves of settlers arrived, chopped down the trees, killed off the animals and transformed the landscape.
Chief Pinesi did not sit idly by. He put his faith in earlier government promises and his trust in British justice.
Between 1795 and his death four decades later. Pinesi dedicated his life to convincing the British to recognize Algonquin ownership of their traditional lands to acknowledge that these lands had never been sold and legally transferred to the British government.
Chief Pinesi submitted petition after petition after petition.
It was, unfortunately, a losing battle, as Pinesi and his family struggled to continue their way of life and faced increased poverty.
Grand Chief Pinesi passed away in 1834.
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This post includes excerpts from an article written for the Lowertown Echo by historian Jim Stone.
Jim has worked closely with representatives from the Pikwakanagan First Nation to complete a more extensive account of Chief Pinesi’s remarkable legacy.
Jim Stone shared Chief Pinesi's story for the HSO Speaker Series in 2023. Here is the recording of Jim's presentation in collaboration with Merv Sarazin of the Algonquins of Pikwakanagan Band Council.
https://www.historicalsocietyottawa.ca/resources/videos/chief-pinesi-and-his-pursuit-of-justice
