More than 3,100 Native American children died in boarding schools

This is a toll three times higher than the figure officially put forward. At least 3,104 Native American children died in boarding schools in the United States, taken from their families to be forcibly assimilated, the report said on Sunday. Washington Post.

In these establishments, some of which were religious and which existed from the beginning of the 19th century to the 1970s, many children suffered physical, psychological or sexual violence, according to a recent government report which estimated the number of students at at least 973. having died there. At the end of October, US President Joe Biden apologized to Native American people, calling these atrocities “a sin that stains our soul”.

“Dark chapter”

According to the Washington Postwhich investigated for a year, 3,104 students lost their lives in these establishments, between 1828 and 1970, in what the daily describes as “a dark chapter in American history which was ignored and largely concealed for a long time “. And the toll would actually be much greater according to historians, adds the newspaper.

The Washington Post said it “determined that more than 800 of these students were buried in or near school cemeteries where they attended, highlighting that, as in many cases, the children's bodies were never released to their family or their tribe.

According to documents consulted by the daily, “the causes of death included infectious diseases, malnutrition and accidents”.

“Prison camps”

Dozens of Native American students died under suspicious circumstances, the article continued, “and in some cases, the documents show indications of abuse or mistreatment that likely led to the children's deaths.” These boarding schools “were not schools” but “prison camps, work camps,” Judi Gaiashkibos, director of the Nebraska Commission on Native Americans and whose relatives were sent there, told the newspaper.

Joe Biden's government has implemented a series of measures to support Native American nations and improve relations with the federal state. In neighboring Canada, where the same practice of residential schools for indigenous young people existed, the country has also opened its eyes in recent years to this dark page of history.