One of the darkest events in Canadian history is replete with the drama of war, politics and untold human suffering. Starting in 1755, 10,000 people of French ancestry were expelled from their homes along Canada''s east coast by a tyrannical British governor with the complicity of American sympathizers. Men, women and children were removed from their homeland at gunpoint and sent into exile. They were stripped of the farms that had nurtured and sustained their families for four generations. Their homes and most of their possessions were burned. Five thousand of these unfortunate people, maybe more, died of disease and deprivation or perished in shipwrecks. The destitute survivors were scattered along the east coast of North America or wound up in the port cities of England and France; some sought refuge in the jungles of South America or as far away as the windswept barrens of the Falkland Islands. While some Acadians returned home to try to evade capture and forge a living, others made their way to the Spanish colony of Louisiana, where they farmed and fished and began the vibrant "Cajun" culture that is renowned around the world.