Office of the Independent Special Interlocutor

In 1896, the annual report noted that, since the school had opened, four students had “absented themselves.” This number evidently does not include students who ran away but were either returned to the school or discharged afterwards. Since it was opened in 1891, one hundred and eighty pupils have been enrolled. The demise of twenty-one of them has been reported and thirty-one boys and thirty girls have been discharged and four have absented themselves without leave…

By 1893, Deputy Superintendent General of Indian affairs Hayter Reed was deeply concerned over the number of students who were running away from the school, writing to E. McColl, the local Indian Affairs Inspector about …the frequent desertions of the pupils from the institution. I am also informed that, although your office has been notified of this unsatisfactory state of affairs, no steps have been taken to remedy it.

Sessional papers of the Dominion of Canada: volume 10, sixth session of the seventh Parliament, session 1896 (Ottawa: S.E. Dawson, 1896), 109. https://www.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.9_08052_29_10/831

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