Canada First Nation tribe locates 169 potential unmarked graves

By Barry Ellsworth

TRENTON, Canada (AA) - A Canada First Nation tribe said Tuesday that it has located 169 potential graves at the former Grouard Mission site, a residential school known for serious abuse of pupils.

The graves were located using ground penetrating radar and a specialized drone, Kapawe'no First Nation officials said at a press conference Tuesday.

The mission, also called the St. Bernard Mission School, is in the northern part of the province of Alberta and it was run by the Catholic Church from 1894 to 1961.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which spent years investigating former Indian Residential School abuse, said in its final report in 2015 that only 10 graves had been reported at the mission.

"Finding one grave is too much," said Kapawe'no Chief Sydney Halcrow. "Finding (169) is incomprehensible."

It is the latest in dozens of investigations underway by various First Nations tribes. As of Jan. 25, more than 1,800 unmarked graves at former residential school sites have been located. About 150,000 First Nation, Metis and Inuit children went to the 139 schools starting in the 1820s. They were taken from their families, sometimes by force, and made to attend the schools in a bid to eradicate Aboriginal culture.

Former students of St. Bernard told the Truth and Reconciliation Commission there was serious sexual and physical abuse and manual labor, while illness was rampant.

A former student said one boy who had problems with his bowels was forced to eat his own excrement.

Kisha Supernant, director of the Institute of Prairie and Indigenous Archeology at the University of Alberta, which led the search for the Kapawe'no, said she had family members who died at St. Bernard.

“Each of these children was a beloved part of a family, and no one has been held accountable for their deaths,” she said.