Archives 1999
BARRIE EXAMINER
August 13, 1999
Hurons headed home after 350 years
Return of remains to proper place fulfills man’s dream
By Carey Moran
MIDLAND- The Huron people will return to Huronia this month after a 350-year absence. And they will mark their homecoming with a ceremony to return the remains of ancestors, removed from a sacred burial ground decades ago by archeologists.
Michel Gros-Louis, a young Wendat of Huron descendant living on a reserve in Wendake, Quebec, is behind the initiative. He was visiting the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto as a child when he first discovered that the skeletal remains of about 500 of his Huron ancestors had been excavated from a Huron burial ground near Perkinsfield.
He dreamed even then of eventually returning his ancestors to their rightful place. "I started working towards that 10 years ago, when I first asked the museum to return the human remains to the Huron Nation," he said. "I feel it is my duty to do that out of respect for my ancestors."
Gros-Louis and other members of the Agondachia Association, a Wendat Huron cultural association, took one step closer to that dream last year, when officials at ROM agreed to allow the Huron people to rebury their dead.
The remains will be interred August 29, at the Wendat Ossuary near Perkinsfield, a small village west of Midland.
Attending the emotional Feast of the Dead ceremony will be representatives of all four Huron Nations, who will come together in Huronia for the first time since they were dispersed from the area in 1649.
Gros-Louis is expecting 500 to 1,000 of the estimated 30,000 Huron descendants to attend from all over Canada and the United States, including the four Huron reservations in Quebec, Oklahoma, Kansas and Michigan.
For many of the Hurons, it will be the first time they have visited their ancestral home.
On the Saturday before Sunday’s Feast of the Dead, the chiefs of all four Nations will arrive, by canoe, and carry candles on to the bank of the Wye River in the shadow of the Martyr’s Shrine. They will be accompanied by chiefs of other First Nations, including the Iroquois.
"They will also have with them ashes from their sacred fires to mix together as a symbol of the homecoming, before they smoke the peace pipe," said Gros-Louis.
There will be displays by Huron artisans, of both traditional and contemporary artwork and crafts. If organizers manage to obtain $40,000 in funding (they were turned down by Heritage Canada and Indian Affairs), organizers would like to host an evening of Huron entertainment, Saturday night at the Papal Altar at the Martyrs’ Shrine field.
BARRIE EXAMINER
September 4, 1999
Ceremony marks return of Huron bones to final resting place
By Brian Baker
PERKINSFIELD- In an emotionfilled ceremony the bones of the original North Simcoe Huron Indians removed from the Ossossane Osuary just south of Perkinsfield by archeologists for study and exhibition at the Royal Ontario Museum and elsewhere in the mid-1900's, were returned for reburial at the original site of discovery just west of County Road 6 on the Sunday August 29th.
The event was attended by descendants of the original Wendat Indian Nation, today commonly known as the Hurons, of North Simcoe, returning from Lorette Quebec, Kansas, Texas, Oklahoma, Wisconsin and elsewhere, supported and attended by local First Nation People and friends.
In a seemingly endless procession, designated tribal people of all ages carried some 500 boxes of Huron bones from a moving van, through the trees some 235 metres to the re-excavated bone pit.
The subdued chanting by a guard-of-honor- of elders an chiefs, and visitors, "Hi,hi,hi. Hi, hi, hi," the soft beating of a drum and rattles, most appropriately cast a contagious and eerie spell over the scene.
The roadside Ossossane Bonepit memorial board erected by Huronia Museum gives a brief history of the original ossuary site: "Huron Indians gave temporary burial (usually on above- ground scaffolds) to the dead. Later, the bodies reburied with great ceremonies in a communal pit.
Father Jean Brebeuf witnessed a mass burial of over 1,000 individuals mear the Huron village of Ossossane in 1636. Long sought, this pit was located by the archaeological researches of F. Ridley. Royal Ontario Museum excavations found the contents as described by Brebeuf. The pit lies in the field 250 yards behind this marker. Library reference: Brebeuf 1636, Ridley 1947, Kidd 1953."
Honored guests followed the final box in solemn procession to the reburial site, and the rest of us fell in behind, each cleansing ourselves with traditional sweetgrass smoke before entering the sacred burial site.
Following impassioned speeches, the boxes, each one individually blessed, were handed in relay down the ramp into the huge re-excavated pit over three metres (10-11 feet) deep and 20 metres across at the top. Reverently, the bones were placed in a great, flat metre-deep pile with a depressed centre for the ceremonial burning of sweetgrass, limb bones in bundles like sticks of firewood, skulls, and masses of smaller bones, all set upon the sandy floor lined with dozens of beaver pelts. Pots of food would serve the dead on their final journey.
Taking part in this ceremony, and ceremonies that took place the previous day at Ste-Marie Park beside the Wye River, were Chief Lorraine McRae of Rama First Nation, and elders Sue Anderson, Athol Hart (White Eagle), and Merle Beedie of Christian Island and the Barrie Native Friendship Centre.
"The late Professor Kenneth Kidd would have been thrilled to have seen the return of these remains," commented Jamie Hunter. "Over 400 of these bones came from our own Huronia Museum."
"This is a once-in-a-lifetime event; it is emotionally over-whelming," remarked Anderson. "It is an awesome experience, and words alone cannot describe what we are witnessing!"
Brian Baker is a writer and local historian.
THE FREE PRESS
THE FREE PRESSAugust 31, 1999
Published by
Hollinger Canadian Newspaper Limited Partnership
284 First St. Midland, Ontario L4R 4K6 526-5431
Published Tuesdays and Fridays
JOHN W. GRIFFITHS, publisher
COMMENT
Solemn ceremony rights a wrong
Over the weekend past, a solemn ceremony attended by hundreds of Huron-Wendat
descendants from across North America brought to an end what should today be
considered a thoghless deed.
The descendants were here to rebury the remains of 500 Hurons, who lay in the
ground of their ancient homeland for three centuries until 1947-48, when they
were dug up by archaeologists. The Sunday ceremonyb at a pit near Perkinsfield
comes two years after native leaders asked the Royal Ontario Museum, which
possessed the remains, to return them for reburial. The museum cooperated, and
Sunday's ceremony mony - which was private - followed.
Looking from the light of today, it is gratifying to see that ROM was so eager
to cooperate. And looking from the same light, perhaps it would be harsh to
condemn those original archaelogists who removed the remains in the first place.
But nonetheless, it was wrong of them to do so.
It must have been painful indeed for the descendants of those original Hurons,
to live with the fact that their ancestors had been removed from their resting
place in such a fashion. Mostly certainly, no culture today would consider doing
such a thing without a good reason.
Our native Canadians are a spiritual culture, well-connected to the land, the
sea and the air. Their religious ceremonies are as sacred to them as those to
adherents of other religions. One would hope the days of whole-scale removal of
the remains from ancient burial sites have long past.
Many aboriginal visitors to the weekend activities, which included a canoe
flotilla up the Wye River to Sainte Marie among the Hurons for ceremonies
Saturday, spoke of the peace of mind the reburial would bring to the
descendants.
The weekend ceremonies and service serve as a useful reminder that past
injustices have occured, and also that they can indeed be remedied.
Thanks
Historic homecoming celebrated
Letter to the editor :
On Aug. 28th, the Huron / Wendat people, who are now scattered throughout North America,
celebrated an historic homecoming to their ancestral home here in Huronia. The homecoming
celebration, and the reburial of Wendat remains at the Ossossane ossuary, were joyous and
emotional events for our people.
No funding was provided by any level of government to the Wendat people to assist them with this
return after their dispersal 350 years ago. We would like to publicly thank the following
individuals, businesses and organisations, who made us feel so welcome and whose help was
essential to make our gathering so succesful. Thanks to the Martyrs Shrine and the Jesuits for
their tremendous support, confortable accomodations and assistance in so many ways; thanks to
St-John Ambulance organization for attending our three events; thanks to Wye Heritage Marina for
allowing the Huron / Wendat people to launch canoes from their property for the ceremonial
voyage up the Wye River; thanks to friend of Ste-Marie for providing lunch to our chiefs,
elders, and special guests; thanks to Ste-Marie-Among-The-Hurons for your support, co-operation,
and advice during the planning stages, and the use of your staff and equipment during the
homecoming weekend; thanks to the Wye Marsh and Wildlife Centre for the use of their Voyageur
canoes; thanks to camp Simpresca for use of their canoes; thanks to Girl Guides of Canada,
Silver Birch Area for the delicious supper given to all the Huron / Wendat people thanks to
Chappel Farms for their donation of 50 dozen corn; thanks to A & M Super Food Store of Barrie
for their donation of pop water; thanks to Midland OPP Detachment for their assistance and
cooperation; and thanks to members of the public who came out to Ste-Marie Park to welcome us.
In the history of Canada, the story of the Huron / Wendat people and the Jesuits / French is on
Page One, the very beginning of this country. Our homecoming was a post script to Page One,
which can now read " and the Wendat people did not return for 350 years. "
Michel Gros-Louis, Michel Savard, Annette Vincent
INDIANS REUNITE TO BURY THEIR DEAD
TORONTO STAR August 30, 1999
Huron Wendat get bones from Royal Ontario Museum
By Roberta Avery
Special to the star
PERKINSFIELD- About 400 Huron Wendat came together yesterday, reuniting their people for the first time in 350 years, to bury their dead in a solemn ceremony near this Midland area community.
One by one, boxes filled with the bones of more than 500 Huron Indians were unloaded from a van and carried to the burial pit. Passed down into the pit along a human chain, each box was smudged with the smoke of burning sweetgrass before being opened to reveal human bones sorted by type.
Yellowed with age, skulls that appeared to be of small children were carefully laid to rest next to larger adult skulls. Rib cages were piled next to leg bones as the pile steadily grew during the day-long ceremony.
"It felt like we were suspended in time and place. I feel a oneness with all my brothers and sisters here with me now, and those who went before," said Janith English, chief of the Wyandot of Kansas.
Her people were one of four groups of descendants of the Huron-Wendat Indians who gathered this weekend for the first time since their ancestors were dispersed across the continent in 1649 by conflict, disease and famine.
The Royal Ontario Museum returned the bones to the Indians to be reburied in the pit from where they had been excavated by archaeologists in 1947 and 1948.
Among those present was Michel Gros-Louis of the Wendake First Nation reserve north of Quebec city, who formally asked the ROM to relinquish the bones in 1997.
Mima Kapches, head of the ROM’s anthropology department, called the ceremony "a very special event."
The task completed, the Indians headed off to celebrate the rebirth of their confederacy, leaving two of their people behind to act as guards over the remains until the pit is filled in some time today.
On Saturday, in celebration of the reunification of the Huron Wendat confederacy, about 200 descendants in traditional dress paddled canoes along the Wye River - once their people’s route to their hunting grounds.
As the canoes passed, Riel Lamarche, 11, and his brother Louis, 9, of Victoria Harbour, descendants of Métis leader Louis Riel, stood on the bank. Riel Lamarche had no trouble understanding the significance of what they were seeing. "They’ve come home," he said.
Reunion brings tears of joy, sense of belonging
By Roberta Avery
Today correspondent
MIDLAND, Ontario- They came from far and wide, but from the moment they put their paddles in the river they knew that finally, after 350 years, they were traveling in the wake of their forebears.
"My ancestors are here. I feel that," said Jim Bland Second Chief of the Wyandotte Nation of Oklahoma. His people were one of four groups of descendants of the Huron-Wendat Indians who were reunited the last weekend in August in their ancestral homeland, on the southern shores of Georgian Bay.
They returned to the land known as Huronia from as far away as Alaska, Virginia, California, Michigan and Quebec.
It was the first reuniting of the Huron Wendat confederacy since their people were dispersed across the continent in 1649 by conflict, disease and famine.
The chiefs and clan mothers of the Wyandot from Kansas, the Huron Wendat of Wendake, Quebec, the Wendats from Michigan joined the Wyandottes for a ceremonial canoe trip down the Wye River.
The canoes arrived at a landing place on the Wye River, below the hilltop Martyr’s Shrine and a short walk from the reconstructed 17th century Sainte-Marie mission.
The shrine and the mission were built in memory of that fateful year 1649 when the Jesuits died at the hands of the attacking Iroquois - and Wendat society disintegrated.
The exact number is not known, but it is estimated that there are more than 10,000 descendants of the original confederacy living in the United States and Canada today.
There are descendants among more than 50 different Indian nations such as the Mohawk, the Seneca, the Shawnee, the Delaware, the Ottawa and the Navajo.
"Many years ago when our people left this beautiful land on the shores of Georgian Bay, our hearts were heavy, our people were very, very sad," said Janith English Chief of the Wyandot of Kansas.
"Now we can give thanks to the creator that this healing has taken place."
About 200 descendants wearing traditional dress paddled canoes along the river that was once their people’s route to their hunting grounds.
On shore to welcome them was Chief Lorraine McRae of the Chippewas of Mnjikaning at the Rama Reserve near Orilla, Ontario. Her people accepted from the fleeing Huron-Wendat the stewardship of the fish weir at Atherley Narrows near Orillia, she said.
"Our peoples met thousands of years ago and I feel so honored to be sharing in this homecoming," said McRae as the Wendat symbolically rejoined their nation by burning ashes from ceremonial fires from their villages in Quebec, Michigan, Kansas and Oklahoma.
The ceremonial rejoining of the confederacy was in preparation for the highlight of the three-day homecoming reunion - a Feast of the Dead.
In 1947 archaeologists from the Royal Ontario Museum dug up the skeletal remains of at least 500 Huron Wendat from an ossuary near Midland where they had been buried together in 1636.
In 1974 Michel Gros-Louis of the Wendake reserve visited the site and was horrified to learn that his ancestors’ bones were on a shelf in a museum 50 miles to the south in Toronto.
He made a promise to his father to get them back and return them to the ossuary near the site of the former Wendat Confederacy capital of Ossossane.
In 1977, he formally asked the museum to relinguish the bones, the largest collection of humain bones it owned.
Although none has ever been displayed the museum agreed last year - in a spirit of sensitivity to Indian culture - to return the remains.
Gros-Louis’ promise to his father - now deceased - was fulfilled when Mimi Kapches the museum’s head of anthropology transported them back to the ossuary in a rented truck.
One by one the boxes full of the bones were unloaded from the cube van and carried to the burial pit.
Passed down into the pit along a human chain each box was smudged with the smoke of burning sweetgrass, then blessed by the oldest descendent in attendance 90-year-old Madeleine Gros-Louis of Wendake - with three taps on the lid - before being opened to reveal human bones sorted by type.
Standing at the bottom of the 8-metre-deep pit Michel Gros-Louis first helped place beaver skins and then artifacts including copper kettles and shell beads in the pit.
Then as he helped open the boxes and gently placed some of the bones in a circular pile, he appeared at times to be fighting back the tears.
"I feel at peace seeing my ancestors returned to their rightful resting place," he said later.
Yellowed with age, the skulls apparently of small children were carefully laid to rest next to the larger adult skulls. Rib cages were piled together next to leg bones as the pile steadily grew larger during the day-long ceremony.
Young and old, some wearing traditional clothes, looked on. For Sallie Andrews of the Wyandotte of Oklahoma standing by the 75-foot wide circular pit looking at the bones of her ancestors was overwhelming.
"It’s an emotional experience of great sadness, it’s more than words can say," she said.
Even Kapches called these ceremony "a very special event."
"It’s quite moving," she said.
"Our rebirth will come as we return the remains of our ancestors to mother earth," said Stephen Gronda a representative of the Wendats of Michigan.
"It felt like we were suspended in time and place. I feel a oneness with all my brothers and sisters here with me now, and those who went before." English said.
The task complete, the people headed off to celebrate the rebirth of their confederacy leaving two of their members behind to act as guards over the remains until the sandy pit was filled in the next day.
The museum not only returned the bones but also handed over possession of the burial ground to Quebec’s Wendake Band Council.
‘It’s my hope that this place will become a place of peace and healing for all who come here," said English.