5 November 2008
Taking it to Their Graves
Yale British Columbia - The Sto:lo people who live in the
shadow of British Columbia's Fraser Canyon feared that the spirits in the afterworld were angry.
Ancestral remains of hundreds of people buried 70 years ago in four coffins in a corner of the isolated Eayem reserve, about 175
kilometres east of downtown Vancouver, were being treated disrespectfully.
First, the plaque commemorating the burial ceremony in 1938 went missing.
Then, the imposing stone monument on which the plaque had been attached was ripped out and tossed over a nearby cliff.
The fence around the tiny cemetery, about 20 metres by 10 metres, was torn down.
These events make up the most recent flare-up in a continuing bitter dispute between the Sto:lo people and the
neighbouring Yale First Nation.
The two groups are at odds over land and the lucrative fisheries in the Fraser Canyon.
On a more personal level, they are also fighting over their identity and accounts of their history.
However, the Sto:lo felt they had to resolve a more pressing matter before responding to what they believe was a desecration of their
cemetery.
"We were fearful our ancestors on the other side would be really upset", Tyrone McNeil, vice-president of the
Sto:lo Tribal Council, said in an interview yesterday.
Last weekend, the Sto:lo's spiritual workers held a "burning ceremony" to appease their ancestors.
While 12 RCMP officers stood by, about 50 Sto:lo members offered "food and things I cannot share with you", Mr. McNeil said.
The ceremony was held "so nothing bad would happen", he added.
Afterward, the spiritual workers advised the people that their ancestors were satisfied with the ceremony.
"That was very comforting for us", Mr. McNeil said. "That was our biggest fear. We did not want them angered".
Now the Sto:lo Tribal Council, which represents about 3,000 people, are talking about how to reclaim the graves.
The Eayem cemetery holds remains of many generations that were initially buried closer to their aboriginal villages, Mr. McNeil said.
The Canadian Pacific Railway transferred the remains to the current cemetery in the 1880s after deciding to run the railway
line through the burial grounds.
Hundreds of bodies were put in four caskets.
The monument marking the four graves was erected in 1938.
The plaque on the monument disappeared four years ago.
The Sto:lo decided to replace it in a ceremony held on 26 Oct 2008. When they arrived at the cemetery, however, they
discovered the monument was gone. "We were shocked - and hurt", Mr. McNeil said.
They placed the plaque on a cement slab on the ground and returned the following week for the burning ceremony.
But the Yale First Nation of about 145 people says the cemetery was part of their reserve.
The band's Chief Robert Hope declined to be interviewed yesterday. However, he told the Chilliwack Progress newspaper last week that
many of his relatives have been buried in the cemetery. The Yale First Nation does not want a Sto:lo plaque on a cemetery on its
reserve, he said.
Mr. Hope also told the newspaper that members of his band dragged the monument away with a backhoe. Sto:lo members were trespassing on
Yale land when they erected the plaque and monument, he said.
Federal Indian Affairs, which is close to completing treaty negotiations with the Yale Indian Band, supports the band's claim to the
land.
Rhonda Chaput, a communication adviser for the department, said yesterday the monument was on reserve lands that belong to the Yale
band.
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