TRENTON, Canada

A First Nation community in northern Manitoba, Canada, has found 187 possible unmarked children’s graves at and near the site of a former Indian Residential School.

There were 150 anomalies (disturbed earth) at the site of the former St. Joseph’s Residential School run by the Catholic Church and another 37 anomalies were found more than a kilometer away, the Pimicikamak Cree Nation announced at a press conference Wednesday.

“It's quite shocking to hear that many (anomalies), because you wonder how many missing children are there,” Chief David Monias said, CBC News reported.

The search using ground-penetrating radar began two years ago. Old record searches also uncovered the documented deaths of 85 children at the school, which opened in 1912 and closed in 1969. Some of the deaths were the result of overcrowding at the school, including the outbreak of highly contagious tuberculosis in 1943.

Beginning in the 1820s, about 150,000 First Nation, Inuit and Metis children were forced into an estimated 130 Indian Residential Schools built across Canada. Many of the children were taken against the will of their parents, and in some cases, the children were never heard from again. Some were subjected to physical, psychological and sexual abuse and suffered malnutrition. At least 4,500 died.

The idea was to stamp out Indigenous culture and replace it with that of white culture.

Monias said rituals will be performed to honor the dead who may lie in those 187 anomalies.

“In response to these findings, the nation will conduct ceremonies…to honor those who may be buried and those who never returned, to help their souls find peace in the spirit world,” he said.

“Each anomaly/unmarked grave represents a life and a story that was unjustly silenced.”