Riel had demanded that an example be…

Riel had demanded that an example be made of Boulton, who is tried and sentenced to death for his interference with the provisional government.

Intercessions on his behalf by Donald Smith and others had resulted in his pardon, but only after Riel obtained assurances from Smith that he would persuade the English parishes to elect provisional representatives.

However, the prisoner Thomas Scott, an Orangeman, interprets Boulton's pardon as weakness on the part of the Métis, whom he regards with open contempt.

After he repeatedly quarrels with his guards, they insist that he be tried for insubordination.

At his trial, which is overseen by Ambroise-Dydime Lépine, he is found guilty of insulting the president, defying the authority of the provisional government, and fighting with his guards.

He is sentenced to death despite the fact that these are not considered capital crimes at this time.

Smith and Boulton ask Riel to commute the sentence, but Scott is executed by a firing squad on March 4, 1870.

Historians have debated Riel's motivations for allowing the execution, as they consider it his one great political blunder.

Upon receiving news of the unrest, Bishop Taché had been recalled from Rome.

He arrives back in the colony on March 8, whereupon he conveys to Riel his mistaken impression that the December amnesty will apply to both Riel and Lépine.

On March 15, he reads to the elected assembly a telegram from Joseph Howe indicating that the government has found the demands in the list of rights to be "in the main satisfactory".

Following the preparation of a final list of rights that include new demands, such as a general amnesty for all members of the provisional government and provisions for separate francophone schools, delegates Abbé Joseph-Noël Ritchot, Judge John Black and Alfred Henry Scott depart for Ottawa on March 23 and 24.