The Icelanders: 'He is an old man now, with curly grey hair, a face which may be properly called beautiful, and fine clear eyes...in this neat and shining sitting room.'

The Chinese and Japanese are referred to as 'the Oriental problem.'

The Scots: 'Everywhere the Scottish people have succeeded, in city, in village, on lonely farm, and in Indian trading post, until you cannot mark their special place in Canada.'

The English: 'They are handsome of face, charming of manner, sportsmen all, maintaining civilization in the wilderness and as the Englishman does everywhere, organizing society, entering public service...'

The Doukhobors: 'But strangest of all are the Doukhobors :...they marched chanting through the prairie snow, stark naked, to meet Him... What agony the Wrestlers have suffered for the Spirit, marching naked through the snow of winter and the summer heat... locked up in foul jails by bewildered constabulary, who couldn't persuade them to put on their clothes, imprisoned on a lonely island in the sea because they would not send their children to school, defying the laws of Canada as stubbornly and dumbly as cattle!...that perennial nuisance, the naked Doukhobor.' First published in THE UNKNOWN COUNTRY in 1942, then published in school books in 1951 and reprinted many times.

If this is the information that school children receive, one cannot be surprised as to what is acceptable in the popular media - think too, of the effect of such 'lessons' on Doukhobor children who learn of their own history in such a fashion.

When a Doukhobor elder [Michael Verigin, Cowley, Alberta] wrote to him and informed him that: 'neither my great grandfather, my grandfather, my father, myself or any of my children have ever marched naked, or burnt anything or defied the laws of Canada, and neither have 99% of the Doukhobors in Canada. Not only has any of my family never marched nude, we have not ever even seen a nude march, and neither have the greater majority of Doukhobors in Canada.

Yes, as all other people have and had, there were a group of religious fanatics, who numbered less than 1% who had marched in the nude, but why condemn all, the more than 25,000 law abiding citizens for the actions of a very few? There are bombings and murders being committed in Ireland today between the Catholics and Protestants, do you condemn all Protestants and Catholics in the world? Today in Canadian prisons, there are murderers, no doubt from every race and religion, do you condemn all the people of their faith and race? If not, why after 80 years in Canada, you still discriminate against us?'

Not one to offer humility and contriteness when not necessary, Hutchinson responded in his own column in the Vancouver Sun: 'After more than two score years the Doukhobors of British Columbia and Alberta suddenly discover that THE UNKNOWN COUNTRY was racist...They insist records of the minority's earlier offenses must be removed from the public school texts and, if possible, from all books of history as if the offenses had never happened.'

Obfuscation and side stepping the issue. Hutchinson became the Editor Emeritus of the Vancouver Sun and as the leading paper in British Columbia, set the standard and the tone for other papers in the west.

A further letter from a Doukhobor scholar [this writer] in 1985 to the editorial pages of the Vancouver Sun states, in part: '...Les Bewley, a writer noted for his unpopularity among unbiased readers, passes off as fact a mere unproven rumour. He says of Doukhobors that they "set fires and blew up trains". Yes, some radical Doukhobors did set fires, but it has never been proven that they blew up trains.

This entire document is available for download in .pdf format here.