Gabriel Dumont was born in St. Boniface (Red River) in 1837 and was the fifth child of eleven (five girls and six boys). His father, Isidore Dumont, was a farmer at the time of Gabriel's birth. At the age of two, Gabriel's family moved to the Fort Pitt area in Saskatchewan. His father traded with the Indians, hunted buffalo and traded for the Hudson's Bay Company.

Although unable to read or write, Dumont could speak six languages and was highly adept at the essential skills of the plains: horseback riding and marksmanship; he learned to shoot with deadly accuracy with the bow used by his grandmother's people, the Sarcee. He began to go on the buffalo hunts with his father when he was young and became an expert on knowledge of the land and became an excellent guide. These abilities made Dumont a natural leader in the large annual Buffalo hunts that were an important part of Metis culture.

Gabriel's family moved again in 1848, back to Fort Garry (Red River). During the trip, Gabriel was given his first gun due to an act of bravery he performed on the trip. Gabriel told his father there was a Blackfoot raiding party heading toward the Metis camp and asked for a rifle to help with the oncoming fight. It was soon discovered it was a herd of buffalo, but Isidore was very proud of his son for his bravery and presented him with his first gun. Gabriel named his rifle "le Petit" or "The Little One". This name (of this and all other guns he owned) became just as famous as the name Gabriel Dumont. To state the name Gabriel in this time would have everyone knowing that you meant Gabriel Dumont.

Gabriel fought in his first battle around the age of 14. During the great buffalo hunt of 1851, a skirmish ensued between the Metis and their traditional rival, the Teton Sioux: known as the Battle of the Grand Coteau. It was during this battle that Gabriel passed through one of the experiences seen in his world as a recognition of manhood. Gabriel moved back to Saskatchewan and became a buffalo hunter. At the age of 25 he was elected Leader of the Hunt, a huge accomplishment and a position of respect within the community. The next summer on a visit to a Blackfoot camp, Gabriel negotiated a lasting peace with the tribe.

In 1858, Gabriel married a Scottish Metis woman named Madeleine Wilkie. By all accounts it was a close relationship although they fought often and Madeleine was a strong stubborn woman. They had no children together, but they did adopt a girl named Annie and a second cousin of Gabriel's (Alexis Dumont) lived with them. Gabriel was passionately protective of Madeleine and if you insulted her, you insulted him.

Gabriel's chief sources of income from 1869 to 1874 were from trading with the Hudson's Bay Company, trapping, fishing and occasionally working as a guide for newcomers in the area. Gabriel was astute enough to notice the changes occurring in the Northwest and felt that the wild days of the Metis lifestyle were coming to an end. He realized that to sustain a family in the old way was becoming impossible: the buffalo ranged further and further afield, hunting and fishing were more difficult, and housing was limited. Gabriel Dumont decided to try farming on a site ten miles south of Batoche, where the trail from Humboldt and Fort Carleton crossed the Saskatchewan River.

Dumont was a respected leader of this group of hunters living in the Fort Carleton area. In 1872, he took advantage of the growing traffic on the Carleton trail and opened a ferry across the South Saskatchewan River and a small trading store upstream from Batoche (the only home in the Northwest that could boast a billiard table). The Ferry crossing was named Gabriel's Crossing. He was a natural leader that the community gravitated to whenever a crisis or problem erupted. He was often selected to lead the buffalo hunts, settle disputes within the community and lead on local issues. When the surveyors came, the Dumonts got in line to apply for ownership of their land. Edouard, Eli and old Jean applied for river lots while Gabriel and his Father claimed land under the sectorial survey Gabriel filed claim to sections 20 township 42 range 1 on March 1st, 1883. For some reason he never received his land. All the other Dumonts had their claims granted.

In 1873, he was elected as president of the Council of St. Laurent, a short-lived local government created by the Metis living on the south branch of the Saskatchewan. In 1877 and 1878, Dumont chaired meetings which drew up petitions to the federal government asking for representation on the Territorial Council, farming assistance, schools, land grants, and title to already occupied lands.

Dumont was ask to lead a delegation into Montana to convinced Louis Riel to return to Canada and plead the Metis case to the federal government.

Louis Riel and the community formed a provisional government in 1885 and Dumont was named "Adjutant General of the Metis people." He proved himself an able commander and experienced some success against government forces at Duck Lake and Fish Creek. The Canadian militia in the Battle of Batoche, however, proved too large and too well equipped for Dumont's army, which collapsed on 12 May 1885 after a four day battle.

Dumont avoided capture by escaping into the woods around Batoche. Stayed to stabilize the community and assist in leading the women and children to safety. He had an intimate knowledge of the people whom he led into battle and of the battlegrounds where he fought. His lifestyle, more so than Riel's, embodied the lifestyle of the Metis of that era. He refused to surrender, so along with his close friend Michel Dumas, he left Madeleine with his Father at St. Laurent, and headed south to Montana. Gabriel had lost heavily after the battle. His home and store had been looted and burned by the army, his brother died at Duck Lake, he was separated from his wife and relatives.

Dumont was a fugitive and upon reaching Montana was put under arrest and confined to a room in the barracks of Fort Assiniboine. The Fort Commander sent a telegram to his superior asking for instructions on what should be done with these two Canadians. The Secretary of State, then President Cleveland, ordered the release of the two men. After their release they headed for Spring Creek, the most prosperous Metis settlement in Montana.

Madeleine arrived from Batoche, but her news was bad, Gabriel's father, Isidore was dead. He had died in his sleep. As well, many homes had been looted and burned. They heard news that Riel had been taken to Regina to the NWMP cells. Gabriel began to plan a jail break to free his former leader and returned briefly to Canada. Upon his return, he found bad news. Madeleine had died. Father Ebouville told him she had died in her sleep the week previous. In 1886, he accepted an offer to demonstrate his marksmanship by performing in Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show.

Gabriel joined Buffalo Bill's Wild West show and toured the United States for the next year. Gabriel toured with the show for about three months, from June to September 1886. His duties were relatively light at first, consisting mainly of riding in parades and posing with his famous rifle, "le Petit", remembering all the time lo look fierce., He was billed as "Gabriel Dumont ... The Hero of the Half Breed Rebellion." Later in the tour he had a chance to show off his riding and shooting skills in the main arena. While touring with the show, Dumont was visited by two of his old adversaries, Major Crozier of the NWMP and Lieutenant Howard. Lieutenant Howard claimed "...that he had always been careful at Batoche to aim his Gatling gun above Gabriel's head."

On July 22, 1886, Buffalo Bill Cody informed him that the Canadian government had proclaimed an amnesty. At the end of September, 1886, Gabriel left the show. For part of the next two years he spent time in buffalo hunting camps in Montana where, at one point, he was attacked with a knife by an unknown assassin. He also journeyed once again to Quebec to try to raise funds for the impoverished Metis survivors of the resistance and wrote his memoirs. In 1893, he returned permanently to Saskatchewan and applied for patent to the lands he had originally occupied near Gabriel's Crossing in 1872. He built a small cabin on the farm of his grand-nephew Alexis Dumont. Almost 10 years later, on January 2, 1902, he finally received title to his lands. Rather than being an isolated case, this was typical of the way the Canadian government dealt with the Metis land claims. He slipped into the old ways of hunting and fishing.

On Saturday May 19th, 1906, Gabriel went for his usual walk along the roads and trails of Batoche. He had returned from a hunting trip to Basis Lake a few days before and had complained of pains in the chest and arms. Returning from his walk, he ate a bowl of soup at his nephew's, got up from the table to go to his cabin, but fell forward dead. Father Moulin conducted the services with hundreds of Metis and Indian friends overflowing the church. From the church the pallbearers carried him across the deep ravine to a spot in the graveyard overlooking the fields he so gallantly defended in 1885.

Gabriel Dumont spent much of his life as a Metis traditionalist. He was known as "the Prince of the Prairie". Dumont was heralded as a brilliant military strategist and his methods and abilities to lead are studied today. He spoke six Aboriginal languages and survived through his skill in trapping, hunting, fishing and farming. A known Frontiersman, a marksman of unequaled ability, a true Canadian Legend Gabriel Dumont, Metis hero, lives on today.