(Vancouver) A First Nation in British Columbia announced Tuesday that ground-penetrating radar has detected 17 suspected burial sites around the site of the former Alberni Indian residential school.
Updated yesterday at 21:16.
Chuck Chiang The Canadian Press
The Tseshaht First Nation said its interviews with survivors, historical records and other documents also show that 67 students died at the school.
“We have to remember that all of these students were just kids,” said Tseshaht’s elected chief councilor Wahmeesh, whose English name is Ken Watts.
“They were just kids. So…for those of you who aren’t from our communities, I want you to think, think about what would happen today if five-year-olds were taken out of their homes.
“This is the reality our communities have to live with,” added Wahmeesh, who wore a traditional cedar headband.
The announcement was preceded by drums and chants, and portions of the event were blacked out during the live broadcast due to cultural sensitivities.
Many of those who attended the ceremony wore orange, the color that represents the deceased and boarding school survivors. Dozens of women danced slowly to the beat of the drums, spinning in place in their orange shawls.
Children from at least 90 communities from more than 70 First Nations attended the school when it operated from 1900 to 1973.
Since last July, surveyor GeoScan has been working on the project, using ground-penetrating radar to spot possible burial sites at the old school.
According to Brian Whiting, head of GeoScan’s geophysics division, 17 would be the minimum number of suspect graves found on 12 of the 100 acres they’ve searched since last summer.
Lead researcher working with historical records and testimony from survivors, Sheri Meding, says many of the 67 children died from disease.
Ms Meding added that there were a number of recurring themes in interviews with survivors at the school, including forced abortions, multiple unidentified burial sites, students finding skulls and human remains at the site, and seeing small coffins falling out of the ground at night buildings came.
Independent judicial investigation required
Wahmeesh said it’s important to embark on what he calls “this journey of truth,” even though the process is difficult for survivors.
He said any forensic examination should be carried out by an independent body with Tseshaht’s approval and not by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) because of the police’s role in hostels and removing children from school.
He also called on Canada to conduct a review to determine the RCMP’s role in the Alberni school.
“We can’t just get over it because it takes more than a generation to turn the page of over 150 years of colonization and abuse of our people,” Wahmeesh said.
The Port Alberni site is the latest of several Canadian sites to be excavated for possible unmarked graves of children who died while being forced to attend boarding schools.
In January, Williams Lake First Nation officials in British Columbia’s Cariboo region said they had uncovered additional “footprints” marking possible graves during the second phase of the search at the former Saint-Joseph Catholic Mission 66.
This number was in addition to the 93 possible burial sites already discovered at the former boarding school.
This is not the first time that the Alberni Indian Residential School has been at the center of the national discussion about the treatment of First Nations children.
In March 1995, Arthur Henry Plint, former manager of the dormitory, pleaded guilty to 18 counts of indecent assault between 1948 and 1968.
Plint, then 77, was sentenced to 11 years in prison.
British Columbia Supreme Court Justice Douglas Hogarth described Plint as a sex terrorist while comparing the boarding school system for Indigenous children to “a form of institutionalized pedophilia”.
Alberni’s school was also one of six residences where children were subjected to federally sanctioned feeding experiments without parental consent.
During the experiments from 1942 to 1952, the children were sick and malnourished. Some received lard, broth and bread, others flour mixtures with vitamins.
Kimberly Murray, the federally appointed independent special contact to work with Indigenous communities at unmarked graves near residential homes, said they must keep fighting to uncover records that would answer “tough questions” like the identity of the missing children and how they died.
Ms Murray said at a nationwide rally in Vancouver in January that dorm survivors have a “right to know” and that “deniers will continue to deny” with no documentary trail documenting the genocide of indigenous peoples.
The issue of unmarked graves in dormitories exploded publicly in May 2021 when the Tk’emlups te Secwepemc First Nation announced that more than 200 suspected unmarked graves had been identified on the site of a former school in Kamloops, BC.
The Indian Residential Schools Resolution Health Support Program has a telephone hotline to assist boarding school survivors and their families who are experiencing trauma brought on by memories of past abuse. The number is 1-866-925-4419.