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CELPIP Practice Reading: Reading for Information ID: #63141 Hard Acadian deportation memory and commemorations

Read the following passage.

A. Families from France first settled in Acadie in the 1630s. From about 1682, Acadians farmed around the Minas Basin, where they built dykes to drain large areas of salt marsh. By 1750 Grand-Pré, with an estimated 1,350 people, was the largest single settlement in Acadie. Most Acadians followed a policy of neutrality in the struggle between Britain and France. In 1755 the Council of Nova Scotia and the acting governor chose to force them to take an unqualified oath of allegiance and to deport them if they refused. The Acadian representatives did refuse.

B. Lieutenant-Colonel John Winslow from New England was put in charge of the removal from the Minas area. Some 2,200 Acadian men, women and children were deported from there, about a third of the nearly 6,000 sent away from Nova Scotia in 1755. The removals went on until 1762. In 1764 the British finally allowed Acadians to return to Nova Scotia. New England Planters had settled their former lands in the meantime, so Acadians were forced to make homes elsewhere in Nova Scotia and in New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Québec.

C. Grand-Pré is linked with the deportation more strongly than any other site, partly because Winslow kept a detailed journal there in 1755. In 1847 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow published Evangeline, a poem about a young couple from Grand-Pré who are separated by the deportation. Millions of readers were drawn to the story, which changed how many people across North America understood the Acadian past and gave Acadians new pride in their history. In 1881 the first National Acadian Convention, held in Memramcook, New Brunswick, chose August 15 as the Acadian national holiday. Three years later, a second convention adopted an Acadian flag and chose Ave Maris Stella as the anthem.

D. In 1907 John Frederic Herbin bought the old church site at Grand-Pré, and in 1922 a Memorial Church was built there with money given by Acadians across North America. The Government of Canada acquired the park in 1957 and made it a national historic site in 1982. In 2005, to correct historical errors, the Deportation Cross was moved to Horton Landing, the actual place where Acadians boarded boats in 1755. A proclamation issued in December 2003 made July 28 of every year A Day of Commemoration of the Great Upheaval, starting in 2005. It notes the trials and suffering of the Acadian people but says it is not a recognition of legal or financial responsibility.

E. Not given in any of the above paragraphs.

Decide which paragraph, A to D, has the information given in each statement below. Select E if the information is not given in any of the paragraphs.

- 1.
A long poem about two parted lovers made Acadians prouder of where they came from.

- 2.
Of all the Acadians forced out that year, about one in three came from around Minas.

- 3.
Acadians picked a date in August for their holiday to mark the month when the removals began.

- 4.
Before 1755, most Acadians tried not to side with either Britain or France.

- 5.
The official act that set up a yearly day of remembrance does not accept any duty to pay.

- 6.
The journal written by Winslow during the removal was printed as a book before the poem by Longfellow came out.

- 7.
Acadians who came back after 1764 found other settlers living on their old land.

- 8.
Acadians faced a demand to swear loyalty with no conditions or be expelled from the colony.

- 9.
A cross showing where families were put on boats was moved because its first spot was wrong.

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