{"id":238452,"date":"2021-07-14T07:15:44","date_gmt":"2021-07-14T07:15:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=238452"},"modified":"2021-07-15T05:51:43","modified_gmt":"2021-07-15T05:51:43","slug":"more-than-160-unmarked-graves-found-at-site-of-former-residential-school-near-vancouver-island","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=238452","title":{"rendered":"More than 160 unmarked graves found at site of former residential school near Vancouver Island"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mike Rapt and Carla Wilson \u2013 Vancover Sun July 12, 2021<\/strong><\/h1>\n

The Penelakut Tribe says it has discovered more than 160 unmarked and undocumented graves on the grounds of a former residential school.<\/p>\n

In a July 8 memo written \u201cto our neighbouring tribes and organizations\u201d and on behalf of Chief Joan Brown, council and elders, the Penelakut Tribe identifies the Kuper Island Industrial School as the site of the discovery.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe understand that many of our brothers and sisters from our neighbouring communities attended the Kuper Island Industrial School,\u201d the memo reads. \u201cWe also recognize with a tremendous amount of grief and loss, that too many did not return home.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Kuper Island Industrial School was in operation from 1889 to 1975 and has been referred to as \u201cCanada\u2019s Alcatraz\u201d because of its remote location and difficulty to escape from. It was operated by the Catholic Church with funding from the federal government.<\/p>\n

Two sisters drowned while trying to escape in 1959<\/a> and another student died by suicide in 1966. The federal government took over administration in 1969 and shut the school down in 1975. Twenty years later a former employee admitted to three charges of indecent assault and gross indecency.<\/p>\n

It was not clear in the statement how or when what are believed to be grave sites were found on Penelakut Island<\/p>\n

The National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation at the University of Manitoba has records of 202 deaths of students at residential schools on Vancouver Island, including many from the Kuper Island school. First Nations survivors and researchers say greater numbers of children died as a result of neglect, tuberculosis and meningitis, fires and injuries from beatings and rapes, and those deaths were never recorded.<\/p>\n

Penelakut Tribe member Steve Sxwithul\u2019txw said Monday that he is only speaking for himself not the tribe. \u201cAs a survivor and somebody who has attended the former Kuper Island residential school of course I was upset.\u201d<\/p>\n

He is not surprised by the announcement, saying that when similar findings came out at the Kamloops residential school, he figured \u201cIt would be pretty much the same\u201d at other school sites.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor myself and my family, it is always upsetting when we hear [of] our lost loved ones that didn\u2019t come home from this institution and this is very tragic and sad,\u201d Sxwithul\u2019txw said.<\/p>\n

The Tk\u2019eml\u00faps te Secw\u00e9pemc First Nation used ground-penetrating radar survey to find what it estimates as 215 unmarked graves at the former Kamloops Indian Residential School.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Continues \u2026<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Following the discovery of 215 unmarked graves at the former Kamloops Indian Residential Schoo in British Columbial, another 160 unmarked graves have been found at the Kuper Island Industrial School, near Vancouver Island, Canada.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-238452","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-Hidden_and_Revisionist_History"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238452","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=238452"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238452\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":238744,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238452\/revisions\/238744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=238452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=238452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=238452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}