RIEL, LOUIS (1844-1885), Canadian agitator, son of Louis Riel and Julie de Lagemaundiere, was born at St. Boniface, on Oct. 23, 1844, according to his own account, though others place his birth in 1847. Though known as a half-breed, or Metis, and though with both Indian and Irish ancestors, his blood was mainly French. From July 1866 he worked for two years at various occupations in Minnesota, returning in July 1868 to St. Vital, near St. Boniface. In 1869 the transfer of the territorial rights of the Hudson's Bay Company to the dominion of Canada gave great uneasiness to the Metis, and in October 1869 a party led by Riel turned back at the American frontier the newly appointed Canadian governor ; in November they captured Fort Garry (Winnipeg), the headquarters of the Company, and called a convention which passed a bill of rights.
In December a provisional government was set up, of which on Dec. 29, Riel was made president, and which defeated two attacks made on it by the English-speaking settlers of the vicinity. So far the Metis had been within their rights, but Riel was flighty, vain and mystical, and his judicial murder on March 4, 187o, of Thomas Scott, an Orangeman from Ontario, roused against him the whole of English-speaking Canada. An expedi tion was equipped and sent out under Colonel Garnet, later Lord Wolseley, which captured Fort Garry on Aug. 24, 187o, Riel decamping. (See STRATHCONA, LORD.) He was not arrested, and on Aug. 4, 1871, urged his countrymen to combine with the Canadians against a threatened attack from American Fenians, for which he was publicly thanked by the lieutenant-governor.
In 1872 for religious reasons he changed his name to Louis David Riel. In October 1873 he became member of the Dominion parliament for Provencher, came to Ottawa and took the oath, but did not sit. On April 16, 1874, he was expelled from the House, but in September was again elected for Provencher; on Feb. 1o, 1875, he was outlawed, and the seat thereby again vacated. In 1877-78 he was for over a year a patient in the Beauport asylum for the insane, but from 1879 to 1884 he lived quietly in Montana.
In 1884 in response to a deputation from the Metis, who had moved west to the forks of the Saskatchewan river, he returned to Canada to win redress for their wrongs. His own rashness and the ineptitude of Canadian politicians and officials brought on a rising, which was crushed after some hard fighting, and on May 15, 1885, Riel surrendered. He was imprisoned at Regina, was tried and on Aug. I found guilty of treason, and on Nov. 16 was hanged at Regina, meeting his fate with courage. His death was the signal for a fierce outburst of racialism in Quebec and Ontario, which nearly overthrew the Conservative government.
See J. S. Willison, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, vol. i.; George Bryce, His tory of the Hudson's Bay Company (I900) and the Canadian daily press for 1885.