75 days of healing gatherings at unmarked gravesites coming to a close in Enoch area

On Sept. 30, Lorelei Mullings and Andrea Jenkins will mark 75 days of gatherings at unmarked gravesites in the Enoch area.

The truth is painful, and for Lorelei Mullings and Andrea Jenkins, this last year has been filled with a lot of truth. They are grieving the discovery of unmarked graves found at former residential school sites across Canada.

“This is about the truth coming out and people understanding what Indigenous people have gone through — Metis, Inuit and First Nations,” Jenkins said.

The pair wanted to be able grieve and honour those lives. When the 751 unmarked graves were found in Cowessess First Nation in Saskatchewan, that is when they both knew they needed to do something.

“I am a school teacher, I work on my reserve with grade two students,” Mullings said. “Thinking about all these unmarked graves, and loved babies, and children being found was heartbreaking.”

Jenkins and Mullings started gathering at the former Camsell Indian Hospital in Edmonton, where there are also unmarked graves, both children and adults.

“A lot of the time when people died at Charles Camsell, they couldn’t afford to send them back home. But what was so upsetting was their families were never notified,” Mullings said.

Mullings said they expected to be at that site for seven days, wrapping up on Canada Day. As people kept showing up to ask questions or come to share, they realized people needed this.

For 50 straight days they held gatherings with whoever wanted to come.