The federal government is mapping burial sites at former residential schools as researchers try to identify how many of the estimated thousands of native children who went missing from the schools are buried in unmarked or anonymous graves.
Cemeteries scattered across Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario have been identified by researchers. Some of the graves have single white wooden crosses bearing no name. Others do not include even a cross.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission asked for the material before its head, Mr. Justice Harry LaForme, resigned unexpectedly last week after accusing the two other commissioners of being too focused on the commission's mandate to uncover truth about residential schools, at the expense of reconciliation.
Cemetery research is part of an attempt by the federal government to understand precisely what happened to the residential school students who disappeared.
It is a massive and sensitive issue. Native leaders and successive federal governments have said they simply do not know who or how many students of the residential schools even died, never mind where they might be buried.
While many community leaders, including elders and a former United Church minister, have spoken of unmarked graves on the sites of residential schools before, this is the first time federal researchers have attempted to compile documentary evidence as to the extent of these discoveries.
The material obtained by The Globe and Mail was completed by two researchers at Indian Residential Schools Resolutions Canada.
Their findings, submitted in an April, 2008, report, reveal several schools had cemeteries on school grounds.
The reason for the placement of cemeteries on the school grounds is not given in the research documents. But in the case of two schools in particular, the researchers found detailed documents describing graves without markings.
Indian Affairs documents reveal bodies were accidentally unearthed in 1992 on the grounds of the former Muskowekwan Indian Residential School in Lestock, Sask., which was run by Catholic missionaries. The graves were uncovered during a construction project to build a new sewer line on the property.
"On July 21, 1992, workers with N.I.S. Construction Ltd. uncovered three unmarked graves," the Indian Affairs document states. "On July 22, an additional 15 graves were encountered. They were located in a row paralleling the new gravity sewer main north of residence 0210-01. The contractor indicated there was evidence of another row of graves north of the first row encountered ... All remains unearthed were placed in plastic bags and stored in a locked building."
The document says the local band council was then notified and construction was halted. The band manager for Muskowekwan First Nation declined comment for this story, as did the manager of the youth centre now operating in the former residential school.
At another school, the St. John's Indian Residential School in Alberta (also known as Wabasca Residential School), the researchers found a document from 1961 describing how the principal came across an unmarked cemetery. A second letter indicates the unidentified principal ultimately cleaned up the site and erected 110 white crosses.
"The place was a terrible mess, so much underbrush," according to one of the letters. "Even though it is not finished, one can see a great improvement in it all, at least it is not woods now."
Anglican priest Richard Waye has been serving the Cree community of Wabasca for the past nine years. He said the community's large graveyard dates back to 1895 and is well maintained by the community, including support from the Big Stone Cree Nation. Rev. Waye said old crosses are replaced with new ones.
"I've never heard anything like that," he said when told of the 1961 entry by the principal. "If it ever happened that the cemetery had come into disrepair, I don't think that it would have been because of any lack of respect. ... Everything here is well maintained and it's respectful."
