Over 170 'plausible burials' detected in search for unmarked graves at former Kenora residential school site
CBC
Warning: This story contains distressing details.
Wauzhushk Onigum Nation says ground-penetrating radar (GPR) has detected more than 170 anomalies during a search for unmarked graves at the site of a former residential school in Kenora, Ont.
The anomalies, referred to as "plausible burials," were found in cemetery grounds associated with the former St. Mary's Indian Residential School, Wauzhushk Onigum Nation said in a media release Tuesday.
The search began in May.
"With the exception of five grave markers, the remaining are unmarked by any grave or burial markers," the release said. "The site has been secured consistent with the Nation's Anishinaabe protocols."
Wauzhushk Onigum Chief Chris Skead told CBC News the searches of the site are "survivor driven."
"Here in Wauzhushk Onigum, we have a little over 50 survivors that would have attended in the '40s, '50s, '60s, and basically when it closed," he said Tuesday. "They were difficult discussions, obviously, because you're going back in time [to] when they were children, which obviously wasn't a safe time to be Anishinaabe, just with the policy from the Crown government."
Skead said those discussions with survivors led to the identification of areas that were searched.
Wauzhushk Onigum said it plans to investigate the anomalies further and conduct searches at additional sites "that have been identified through survivor testimony, archeological assessment and archival investigations that show burial rituals being conducted by former residential school staff," the release said.
St. Mary's Indian Residential School was operated by the Roman Catholic Church from 1897 to 1972. The National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation (NCTR) says at least 36 students died while attending the school.
Wayne Mason, whose father attended St. Mary's, said the negative effects of the schools are "intergenerational."
"My dad came back hurt and abused," Mason said. "We're still struggling, and our family has had to live through that."
"We continue to try to help people ...," he said. "There's a lot of people that have been talking about it for a long time now, but there's some people that are just starting to talk about it."
"There's a lot more coming out, and there's going to be people that finally put some closure to what happened to their their loved ones. But there's going to be a lot of work to be done to heal from all that."
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