6,000 kids died in residential schools: Canada Truth and Reconciliation Commission
Mary Annette Pember wrote this article, originally published by Indian Country Today Media Network, as a 2014 National Health Journalism Fellow, with support from The Dennis A. Hunt Fund for Health Journalism. Other stories in her project series can be found here:
‘The Great Hurt’: Facing the trauma of Indian boarding schools
We have to know it to heal it: Defining and dealing with historical trauma
What are you hiding? How one brave woman pushed past the pain of abuse
A fearless fight against historical trauma, the Yup’ik way
Lakota turn to crowdfunding after spate of suicides
Trauma may be woven into DNA of Native Americans
Cultural genocide,' Truth and Reconciliation Commission calls residential schools
JUSTIN TANG/THE CANADIAN PRESS Truth and Reconciliation commissioner Murray Sinclair, in a black suit, marches along with Assembly of First Nations Chief Perry Bellegarde (in headdress) in an Ottawa march on Sunday that was part of the closing events of the commission's work. Between 7,000 and 10,000 participants marched.
As nearly 10,000 walkers thronged through the streets of Ottawa on May 31 to recognize the suffering of residential school students, it was acknowledged that the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which received testimony from hundreds of former students who survived sometimes brutal treatment, was just the beginning.
Rather, it paved the way for dialogue going forward. The commission will release its final report on Tuesday June 2.
Left unanswered is the central question of how many children died at the schools during the 150 years of their operation, commission head Justice Murray Sinclair told theCanadian Press. In 1920 or so, the chief medical officer at the Indian Affairs department was fired after flagging an alarming rate of deaths at the schools, the Canadian Press said. An earlier draft of the report put the number at 4,000. There were over the course of 150 years about 150,000 students all told.
“The government stopped recording deaths of children in residential schools, we think, probably because the rates were so high,” Sinclair said, adding that up to 6,000 children may have died. “We think this is a situation that needs further study.”
There are 80,000 survivors from among the 150,000 First Nations, Inuit and Métis children who the Canadian government took from their families and sent to residential schools between the late 1800s and the 1990s. The TRC was created after residential school survivors sued the Canadian government for the trauma and abuse they had suffered, and won. Over the past five years its members have heard testimony from 7,000 survivors in hundreds of communities, the Canadian Press said.
The ceremonies unfolding from May 31 through June 2 include Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Minister Bernard Valcourt, as well as other dignitaries and indigenous leaders. The proceedings are being livestreamed by theTruth and Reconciliation Commission.
"It's a dark chapter in Canada's history, no question. It was cultural genocide," said Bellegarde toCBC Newsas he took part in the walk on May 31. "There's a lot of young ones that didn't come home to their families, communities. There's a lot of death there. We've got to remember and honor those [deaths], that we learn from that and honor their spirits."
Indeed, the commission’s investigative and witnessing work may be over, but the conversation has just begun, advocates said.
Eighteen foundations, charities and philanthropic organizations signed a declaration promising to fund programs that would help close the gap between Indigenous Peoples and non-indigenous.
“Now it’s our time to play our role in the reconciliation,” said Andrea Nemtin, who runs the Inspirit Foundation, toThe Star. “Moving forward, we need to all be there to form a new relationship between aboriginal and non-aboriginal people.”
See footage below from the Reconciliation Walk from ICTMN's contributor on the ground, Mary Annette Pember.