Story Outline & Timeline Schedule
of The Expulsion of Acadians
It’s also known as the Great Upheaval,the Great Expulsion, the Great Deportation, and the Deportation of the Acadians. From 1755 to 1778, the British sent thousands of the Acadians to the 13 colonies, and a large number of them died of disease and starved. That in 1755, the English demanded that each of the Acadians should take an oath of allegiance to England, if not, then all of them would be deported. Within the oath, it included taking up arms against enemies of the British, and the result was all Acadians in Nova Scotia refused to declare British allegiance.
The cause of the whole expulsion was the refusal to sign the oath of allegiance of the British which would make them loyal to the crown that irritated the English. The majority of the Acadians decided to stay on their land because they were French and Catholic, but their new sovereign was Protestant and English.
Once they refused to sign the oath, approximately 11,500 of them were deported, and at least 5,000 of them died of diseases, starvation, and shipwrecks. Whether men, women or children, they were all being forced to leave their homeland which they've farmed for a century.
The story begins basically with a family of Acadians, father, mother, and two kids. They were happily living a peaceful life, but one time the parents saw some unexpected ships and boats going this way to their island. They then are nervous, and worried, so they pack their food and hide their stuff. Once the boats came, they knew from the leader that they were English, and the leader assembled all the residents to meet the guests. “We got the instruction and are here to have a little conversation with you, the Acadians, to sign the oath of allegiance, or else, you all will be deported.” After a long time of consideration, the English came again, but this time, the leader and all of the residents protested to sign the oath, and with a gunshot, it scared the kids of our main family while they were playing with their friend piggy. Their scream got the attention of the English, and the leader carried a gun walking toward the children, no matter how the parents shouted and tightly held him, they were being kicked away. The leader got the two kids, and threw them away to the other soldiers, and the soldiers put them on wooden boats, away from the parents. The kids cried, they didn't know what happened, they saw their houses were burned in fire and their parents cried in despair. On the horizon, the other Acadians saw each other being shipped away from their homeland. After a long silence, the camera turns to where the parents are, their mother is crazy, she lies on the deck and says nothing since she got there, even that, their father still goes to get food for her and comfort her, “they won’t do anything to kids, you should hope.”But she still don’t say a thing. For the children, they are in a ship where there are all kids, they don’t know anything, they see other kids sleeping on deck and not make a sound, and their bodies are skinny as there are only bones. Both the parents and kids are being shipped to many places to work for the others, this takes them so many years. Finally, the British government heard of these citations, so they decided to pass an order-in-council to permit the Acadians legally return to the British Territories, which they set them in the 13 colonies. The camera went back to the parents, the mother is extremely pale, she survived just hoping to see her kids again. After they get off the ship to a new place, she desperately looks for her kids, but she can’t find them. In the very end, she hugged her husband tightly and cried, actually they both cried, screaming their kids’ names, and The End, with a black background and white word of years on it, 1778.
Solim Pottier was a bus driver but is also a psycho. He has delusions about all the passengers on his bus. Suddenly, he saw the past himself, and one car accident changed everything. Next moment when he opens his eyes, he is on a ship. There are plenty of Acadian people around him, including his passengers. After he figured out what is happening here, he tries to change the history, however, he is unable to do so. Under the helpless feeling, he finished the experience with a sense of loss. When he got off the ship, he turned around and raised his head to look at the ship, he saw him, the modern him. All of a sudden, his mind goes blank, then he wakes up again, this time he sees the ceiling and doctors stand beside him. He heard the doctors talk about the car accident, and mentioned there’s only one person inside the bus. And then he evoked that on his bus, there is only one person as the doctor has told, that person is him.
