The Turner Siblings: Métis Connection Builders

Familial relationships, including those between brothers and sisters, are the glue that binds Métis communities together and the bedrock that distinguishes the Métis from other communities. These foundational connections, such as those within the Turner family of Moose Factory, can often grow and evolve across geography and time, connecting siblings and their extended families across generations.

On June 30, 1822, three Turner siblings, Philip, Joseph Jr., and Elizabeth, were baptised together into the Anglican Church at Moose Factory, forming an indelible connection from their formative years that grew and flourished throughout generations.

As adults, several Turner siblings entered Hudson’s Bay Company service, expanding their Métis family connections westward across much of the Métis Homeland, from the Upper Great Lakes to Fort Saskatchewan. 

Joseph Turner Jr., for example, worked more than 1,000 kilometres west of Moose Factory in the HBC’s Island Lake and Cumberland Districts, building connections throughout the Métis Homeland, such as with his son Peter’s birth in Fort a la Corne, Saskatchewan, before eventually retiring to the Métis community in the Red River.

Philip Turner also worked for the HBC in Moose Factory, instilling the values of personal growth and connection-building in his own children, including his son, Joseph Alexander Turner, who later moved west to Alberta and applied for Métis scrip at St. Albert in 1886.

Elizabeth Turner also ventured southwest, where she married Charles Roussain, a fellow Métis, and settled into the life and relationship networks of her new Métis community at Roussainville, north of Sault Ste. Marie. Soon after, Elizabeth was joined in Roussainville by her sister Harriet Turner’s daughter, Josephine, further strengthening their family’s connections between Sault Ste. Marie and Moose Factory’s Métis families.\

Another Turner sibling, Charlotte Turner, also journeyed westward in the footsteps of her brother, Joseph Jr., ultimately applying for Métis scrip in St. Andrews, Manitoba in 1875, identifying herself and her parents from Moose Factory as “halfbreeds”.

Their other sister, Jane Turner, remained in Moose Factory, marrying Métis HBC employee Alexander McLeod, and continued deepening her family’s relationship both to place and community. Several of Jane Turner’s descendants, including William and George McLeod, were signatories to the 1905 Moose Factory Métis Petition, asserting their distinct Métis rights and identity based on having been “born and brought up in the country”.

Like Jane, the siblings’ other brother, John Turner, remained close to the family’s Moose Factory home, where he worked for the HBC. Later in life, he and his family relocated to Temagami, where their descendants would marry into the Teme-Augama Anishnabai community.

Together, the Turner siblings of Moose Factory exemplify the rich tradition of connection-building across both time and place that continues to bind families, communities, and Indigenous peoples throughout the Métis Homeland to this day.

See Our Sources

• Turner Sibling Baptism Records, 30 June 1822

• Turner Family Vignette

• Scrip Record of Joseph Alexander Turner

• Scrip Record of Charlotte Harper (nee Turner)

• Joseph Turner Jr. HBC Bio Sheet

• Philip Turner’s HBC Bio Sheet

• 1905 Moose Factory Métis Petition

• Charles Roussain’s 1861 Census Record

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