The discovery of suspected unmarked graves at the site of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School in B.C. in 2021 prompted other First Nations in Canada, including in Alberta, to search the sites of former Residential Schools to determine if they could be concealing unmarked graves, too. 

As well as searching the former residential school sites, Indigenous investigators dug into the written records of residential schools to identify children who died there and also learn more about the causes of child mortality at residential schools.

This week, residential schools investigators and researchers met at the Acimowin Opaspiw Society’s National Investigation Methodologies symposium to exchange their experiences conducting inquiries into residential schools and share best practices. 

The amount of records that researchers have to examine is “astronomical,” said Florence Loyie, the Indian residential schools project administrator at the Confederacy of Treaty Six First Nations. 

“It’s not something you’re going to get done in a year,” she added. A researcher could spend a decade in the archives and still find information, Loyie said at the symposium, which is being held at River Cree Resort & Casino in Enoch.

This work requires specialized skills and knowledge, Loyie said. Many residential school records from Catholic–run schools are hand-written in old Parisian French and need to be deciphered and translated. 

“My French is high-school French,” Loyie said. “I can pick out a few words, but I need a translator to look at and say this is what it is.”

This is followed by cross-referencing the names.

“They could be talking about one student, and you find that name somewhere else.”

Church has lots of documents

The Catholic Church in Canada possesses a large amount of useful documents thanks to the Church’s record-keeping practices.

When people come to church for sacraments — to have their children baptized, to get married, or for a funeral — the church collects certain information about these events, said Father Andrew Schoenberger, a priest at the St. Paul Cathedral in St. Paul, Alta. 

“We have the basic information of people. And we try to keep that updated throughout,” he said. “It’s mostly dates, names. We don’t have personal stories, for the most part, in the sacramental registers.”

Records that belong to the deceased people are stored in secure archival rooms, Schoenberger said.

Unless the buildings burn down, these records are never destroyed, he said.

Though the information the church records contain may be basic, it’s still sensitive and subject to privacy laws, with a risk of the records being misused for the purpose of identity theft, he added. 

“So, we need to be very careful with personal records.”

For this reason, these documents are difficult to obtain.

Leah Redcrow, the CEO of Acimowin Opaspiw Society and the director of the Blue Quills Missing Children in Unmarked Burials Inquiry, recommends that intergenerational survivors diplomatically approach the diocese that has the records they require.

By doing so, Redcrow managed to obtain a considerable amount of documents pertaining to her own family history with residential schools.

There is a relief in knowing that history, she said.

“It’s a very special kind of feeling, when you’re able to feel happy, feel relieved that you can get this.”