Shanawdithit

Shanawdithit ( probably * 1801, † June 6, 1829 ), and Nancy April, was probably the last survivor of the native to Newfoundland Indians tribe of the Beothuk.

She was captured with her mother and her sister from a group of English settlers in 1823. It is believed that she was born in 1801. In the spring of 1823, her father died when he collapsed on the run from a group of white hunters in the ice. Hungry and without male protection wandered around the three women until they met on white. They brought the Beothuk women to St. John's, where Shanawdithits mother and aunt died of tuberculosis.

Shanawdithit, now called Nancy April, was brought to Iceland exploits and worked there as a maid at John Peyton Jr. In September 1828, she was taken back to Saint John's to William Cormack, the records made ​​about her life at the Beothuk. He taught them the English language and recognized her talent for drawing. Very soon, she could be with him, supported by drawings, communicate in English. However, it is only a portrait of Shanawdithit known. She remained in Cormack's care until his departure from Newfoundland in the spring of 1829.

Shanawdithits health was unstable in the years before and since then deteriorated rapidly. Dr. William Carson took care of in the last weeks of life around them. She died on June 6, 1829 at St. John 's Hospital of tuberculosis. After her death, her skull was brought to study in the Royal College of Physicians in London, where he was lost in World War II in an air raid. Their remains have been buried in the old cemetery in the south of Saint John's. The cemetery was relocated in 1903 due to a railway construction, but there is a monument at this point with the inscription:

Shanawdithit is very popular with the Newfoundlanders. In 1999, they chose the readers of the newspaper The Telegram to the most remarkable Ureinwohnerin the last 1,000 years.