A new Acadian holiday needed? Historian proposes honoring memories of thousands of people who died during deportation By 2005 - the 250th anniversary of the start of the Acadian deportation - Stephen White would like Acadians to observe Dec. 13 as a day of remembrance for those who lost their lives during the period of "great upheaval." The Acadian population in the Maritimes had been growing at rate of 3.5 per cent annually in the years before the deportation period (1755 to 1763), according to White's estimates. Had the expulsion, and the associated loss of life through disease and shipwrecks, not occurred, the Acadian population in the Maritimes could have been nearly 40,000 by the end of the eighteenth century, White said, a genealogist with the Centre for Acadian Studies at l'Université de Moncton. Instead, the Acadian population was about one-tenth that. He estimates between 5,000 and 6,000 people died during the deportation period, but notes that some people would have died anyway. With a population, according to White's research, that had a median age of 15, meaning half were older than 15 and half were children, many of the dead were children. That's not an image of the population, he said, that's represented in the paintings depicting the deportation. "There's a great deal of loss of life throughout all of this," he said. The genealogist first suggested the date, which he said would be an equivalent to Remembrance Day, two years ago at the annual meeting of the Federation of Associations of Acadian Families. Yesterday, during the annual general meeting of the Federation of Associations of Acadian Families, members of the group voted in favour of White's proposal to have the group promote the acceptance of the date with other Acadian organizations. It's a motion Dieppe city Coun. Jean Gaudet, a member of the association, said Saturday that he was willing to second, should someone else not beat him to it. "I think this is a notion we have not known or not paid attention to the fact that so many of the people died during the five or seven years of the deportation," he said. The significance of Dec. 13 as a day to remember those who died during the period relates to the roughly 850 deaths that occurred in December 1758, on three ships that set off from Isle Saint Jean, now Prince Edward Island. The Violet sank on Dec. 12 and the Duke Williams sank on Dec. 13, while the Ruby ran aground in the Azores Dec. 16. "These three ships taken together represent the largest loss of Acadian life," White said, within such a short time period during the deportation era. White said his idea is not to have a government proclaim the day. He also pointed out having a day to remember those who died during the deportation period has "nothing to do with any kind of laying of blame or criticism." It would be no different than Remembrance Day as a day to remember those who lost their lives. White has worked as a genealogist at the Centre for Acadian Studies for 28 years reconstructing the Acadian population of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. And his work has involved tracing the families during the deportation period. "My work has been largely a matter of, if we can't put a face on these people, at least we can give them names and ages," he said. The Canadian government is finalizing a royal proclamation to recognize the Acadian deportation. Last month, Heritage Minister Sheila Copps said the proclamation would coincide with marking July 28 as the anniversary of the signing of the first deportation order in 1755. Lucie LeBlanc Consentino Acadian & French Canadian Ancestral Home www.acadian-home.org <http://www.acadian-home.org/> Am-Can Gen Soc www.acgs.org <http://www.acgs.org/> CMA 2004 - www.cma2004.com Grand-Pré - http://www.grand-pre.com/ www.umoncton.ca/etudeacadiennes/centre/cea.html <http://www.umoncton.ca/etudeacadiennes> <http://www.grand-pre.com/>