Chiefswood National Historic Site of Canada
Six Nations Grand River Reserve, Ontario
Historic photograph
© Library and Archives Canada / Bibliothèque et Archives Canada, C. P. Meredith
Address :
Highway 54, Ohsweken, Six Nations Grand River Reserve, Ontario
Recognition Statute:
Historic Sites and Monuments Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. H-4)
Designation Date:
1953-05-26
Dates:
-
1853 to 1856
(Construction)
-
1856 to 1884
(Significant)
Event, Person, Organization:
-
George Johnson
(Person)
-
Pauline Johnson
(Person)
-
Six Nations Confederacy
(Organization)
Other Name(s):
-
Chiefswood
(Designation Name)
Research Report Number:
1992-048, 1992-014, 1984-041, 1960-045
Plaque(s)
Existing plaque: Road 54 and Pauline Johnson Road, Ohsweken, Ontario
Completed in 1856, Chiefswood owes its importance to its architecture and the prominence of the people who lived here. Derived from the popular Italianate style of the Picturesque movement, the grandeur of the house reflects the status of its builder and owner, Chief George H.M. Johnson, a Mohawk chief of Six Nations and an intermediary with non-Aboriginal society. His daughter, the celebrated poet Pauline Johnson, drew inspiration from the years she spent in this house.
Description of Historic Place
Chiefswood is a small gem of an Italianate villa set in a picturesque treed landscape on the banks of the Grand River in the heart of the Six Nations Grand River Territory, in Ontario. Its location is key to its historic meaning as the home of the Johnson family, especially poet E. Pauline Johnson. The formal recognition refers to the interior and exterior of the house.
Heritage Value
Chiefswood National Historic Site of Canada was designated because it speaks to the Johnson family's role as intermediaries between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal cultures.
Built between 1853 and 1856 for Six Nations Chief George H.M. Johnson (1816 - 1884), Chiefswood was the birthplace of poet Emily Pauline Johnson and the Johnson family home until George Johnson's death in 1884. Johnson was prominent socially and politically, serving as official government interpreter, thus bridging both the British colonial and First Nations worlds. He built his home on farmland he purchased along the Grand River, close to the Anglican mission church near Tuscarora (Middleport). While not the only mansion built by First Nations families during the nineteenth century, Chiefswood is the only one of such a grand scale and architectural sophistication known to have survived.
Source: Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada, Minutes, June 1992.
Character-Defining Elements
Aspects of Chiefswood that contribute to its heritage value include those elements which speak to the Johnson’s family role as intermediaries between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal cultures, namely:
— the location of the house on the Six Nations Grand River Territory;
— its intimate relationship with its natural setting, the river and the surrounding landscape;
— its use of the Italianate architectural vocabulary as a sophisticated and fashionable manner illustrated by the symmetrical elevation, two-storey volume with truncated hip roof and chimneys, deep bracketed eaves, stucco finish, sash and French windows, classically inspired frontispiece, and standard, centre-hall floor plan with surviving, classically inspired trim.