[3] Victor Turek, a Polish-born scholar, wrote that the first Belarusians came to Canada in 1817 along with members of De Watteville's Regiment who settled in the Red River Colony in what became Manitoba.

Turek noted 10 Poles were among the settlers, and argued 3 of them were actually Belarusians.

[4] Belarusian immigrants likely first started coming to Canada at the end of the nineteenth century.

[5] Their numbers increased at the start of the twentieth century, though they were often classified as Poles or Russians.

[6] This further increased in the aftermath of the First World War, with scholar John Sadouski estimating that some 16,600 Belarusians came to Canada between 1927 and 1930 alone.