Indigenous Peoples and Human Rights

January 25, 2023

Genocide at Blue Quills School at Saddle Lake


Blue Quills Residential School operated by Catholic Church until 1970.

Genocide 
at Blue Quills School at Saddle Lake

By Brenda Norrell

Censored News

Trauma alert. Genocide.

Children were murdered at Blue Quills Residential School in eastern Alberta, by the Catholic staff pushing them down stairs and feeding them poisonous raw milk, contaminated with bovine tuberculosis.

Leah Redcrow said, "I myself didn't know that my grandfather had 10 siblings die in this school."

Today the search for the unmarked graves of children murdered at Blue Quills school continues.

The Pope admitted that the Catholic Church committed the crime of genocide.

"Yes, it's genocide," the Pope told Brittany Hobson of Canadian Press on the plane leaving Canada on July 30 after he viewed residential schools. The words are published in The Vatican news.

On August 23, the Pope told all Catholic institutions to transfer all financial assets to the Vatican Bank, also reported in its own Vatican News.

After the genocide of Indigenous Peoples globally, and specifically the widespread murder of Native children, the Catholic Church obviously knew it would be sued.

Fifteen years ago, Russell Means reported mass graves to Censored News, including Blue Quills.

"Saddle Lake: Blue Quills Catholic school (1898-1970), building intact, skeletons and skulls observed in the basement furnace. Mass grave reported adjacent to the school."

Canada passed a law mandating that churches seize Native children. The children were kidnapped by the Catholic Church and other churches and incarcerated in residential schools. The children died of starvation, disease, assault, sexual abuse, medical experiments and murder. 

Today the search continues for the hidden graves of Native children who were victims of genocide.

Edmonton CTV News reports:

The Acimowin Opaspiw Society (AOS) released details of its preliminary report Tuesday into "missing children and unmarked burials" at Blue Quills Residential School.

"The investigation's theory regarding the missing children of the Saddle Lake site, is that they are buried in undocumented mass graves," the report states.

The report includes allegations that a "disciplinarian" who worked there from 1935 to 1942 was seen killing children.

"The investigation has received disclosures from inter-generational survivors, whose parents witnessed homicides at the Saint Paul site," the report states.

That staff member is accused of pushing boys down the stairs, killing them.

"[He] would then threaten to kill the boys that witnessed if they said anything," it says.

The report states the accused died in 1968.

Leah Redcrow, executive director of AOS, also believes that many of the children at the school died after they were forced to drink unpasteurized milk that was contaminated with bovine tuberculosis.

"How I know it's deliberate is because the school administrators weren't dying, the children were. And the school administrators didn't eat the same food as the children," Redcrow told reporters.

"A lot of what this is, is getting spiritual justice for our family members who are missing. I myself didn't know that my grandfather had 10 siblings die in this school."

"The amount of missing children is extensive...The institution was strife with violence, illness, starvation, abuse and death," said Eric Large.

Read the full article:


In French, at ICI
https://ici.radio-canada.ca/nouvelle/1950668/pensionnat-blue-quills-alberta-tuberculose-lait

Russell Means: Location of 28 Mass Graves, 2008: Published 15 years ago and being updated:



Leaders of the Star Blanket Cree Nation are deciding how best to investigate the 2,000 anomalies found by ground penetrating radar searches around the site of its former residential school. Around the site of the former Qu’Appelle Indian Residential School, ground penetrating radar (GPR) technology detected human remains, underground rooms and more than 2,000 anomalies underground.
https://regina.ctvnews.ca/here-s-how-star-blanket-cree-nation-plans-to-investigate-2-000-ground-anomalies-near-former-residential-school-1.6229849

BBC reports: Star Blanket Cree Nation: 2,000 possible unmarked graves at Qu'Appelle School

SASKATCHEWAN -- An indigenous nation in Canada said it has discovered evidence of possible unmarked graves on the grounds of a former residential school.

Star Blanket Cree Nation said a ground-penetrating radar had revealed the jawbone fragment of a small child and more than 2,000 "areas of interest".

Those are not yet confirmed to be evidence of human remains.

But the fragment "is physical proof of an unmarked grave", project lead Sheldon Poitras said on Thursday.

The discovery from the Star Blanket Cree Nation in Saskatchewan follows a wave of investigations into possible unmarked graves at the sites of former residential schools in Canada. Ground searches starting in the spring of 2021 have uncovered evidence of more than 1,100 such graves across the country.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64225855


CBC reports: St. Joseph's Mission School, Williams Lake First Nation, B.C.: More graves and abuse

St. Joseph's Mission Residential School, located near the core of the Williams Lake First Nation community, was torn down 26 years ago, but left a painful legacy for survivors and their families. (Indian Residential School Resources)


The lead investigator for a B.C. First Nations has announced its ongoing probe has revealed at least 28 children died on the grounds of a former residential school and identified 66 more potential burial sites.
Whitney Spearing, along with the Williams Lake First Nation (WLFN) investigation team, spent the last year interviewing survivors, gathering documents and surveying approximately 0.18 square kilometres of the grounds of the former St. Joseph's Mission site.

St. Joseph's Mission School

The phase 2 results used ground penetrating radar technologies to identify more possible burial locations, bringing the total number on the grounds to 159.


"It is also clear that many of the children and infant babies born at the mission as a product of child sexual assault were disposed of through incineration on and off-site at the mission."

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/williams-lake-first-nation-releasing-090000180.html 


Notes:

Photo: Blue Quills (Saddle Lake, Sacred Heart, formerly Lac la Biche), St. Paul, Alberta. Roman Catholic.
Blue Quill's Indian Residential School opened in 1862 in Lac la Biche. This building was located on the corner of the Saddle Lake Reserve. Moved to Brocket in 1898 (Sacred Heart Indian Residential School; Saddle Lake Boarding School). Moved lastly to St. Paul in 1931 (St. Paul's Boarding School). In 1970, and became the first Native-administered school in Canada.


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