Current Magazine

Feature
A SHOT RINGS OUT across what remains of Isle de Jean
Charles as the sun drops behind the gnarled skeletons of
what once were massive oak trees. Rifle in hand, Howard
Brunet, 14, stands on the deck of his uncle’s stilted house
looking down at the rabbit he shot on the far edge of the
property. His sister Juliette, 13, leaps down the stairs to
retrieve the body — since neither of the boys will touch it.
Next comes rabbit stew. It’s a normal evening at the Brunet
household. The kids are tough. The water forces them to be.
“We have to be careful with the .22; we need those
shells for food,” their uncle, Chris Brunet, who is raising
Juliette and Howard, said as the siblings set out empty
laundry-detergent containers for target practice with
their cousin Reggie Parfait, 13, who lives down the road.
“At one time, water was our life
and now it’s almost our enemy
because it is driving us out, but
it still gives us life”
Since 1955, the Isle de Jean Charles band of the Biloxi-
Chitimacha-Choctaw tribe has lost 98 percent of its land to
the encroaching Gulf waters. Of the 22,400-acre island that
stood at that time, only a 320-acre strip remains. The tribe’s
identity, food, and culture have slowly eroded with the land.
In response, on January 21, 2016, the Department of
Housing and Urban Development awarded the tribe $48
million to relocate through the National Disaster Resilience
Competition. But moving isn’t a simple solution.
“We don’t have time,” tribal chief Albert Naquin, who
spent the last 15 years advocating to relocate his people,
said. “The longer we wait, the more hurricane season
we have to go through. We hate to let the island go, but
we have to. It is like losing a family member. We know
we are going to lose it. We just don’t know when.”
The Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaws are receiving funding,
but the fight to save their culture is not over. The federal
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