Work on the new distribution center of the Société des alcools du Québec (SAQ) will be able to resume, after an archaeological inventory did not find any human bones on the site.
This was announced by the state-owned company in a press release on Thursday.
Work carried out by the archaeological consulting firm Arkéos revealed that no burials were found on the land located near the former Saint-Jean-de-Dieu hospital.
Bones were indeed found on the site, but they were more of animal origin. According to archaeological experts consulted by the state company, the investigated area was used strictly for agricultural purposes, until its sale to the SAQ.
The construction site has been on hold since the beginning of January, at the request of the Committee of Institutionalized Orphans of Duplessis and Kanien’keha:ka Kahnistensera, a group of indigenous activists commonly called the “Mohawk Mothers”, who suspected the presence of human remains on the site.
Read “Graves on SAQ land? »
The $300 million work planned for the center’s expansion will resume the week of May 13.
The end of a doubt
The SAQ’s distribution center and head office are located in the east of the city, near the Louis-Hippolyte-La Fontaine bridge-tunnel. The expansion work will allow the SAQ to increase its online offering to reach 20,000 products, accelerate the speed of execution in the warehouse and offer delivery within 24 hours.
In a letter sent to the SAQ last January, the two signatory groups suspected that the land of the new center had served as an informal cemetery for unclaimed bodies of patients who died at the Saint-Jean-de-Dieu hospital.
“In addition to including anonymous burials of children, namely the Orphans of Duplessis, there is a strong probability that indigenous children were also buried on the site,” they suggested, asking the SAQ to suspend the work, time to put “basic precautions” in place.
In addition to Arkeos’ archeology experts, the SAQ called on two bioarchaeologists external to the firm and a zooarchaeologist, who analyzed the bones and bone fragments according to different criteria, such as their color and size.
Although human bones were not found, the state corporation announced in its press release that it would build a commemorative space in collaboration with the two signatory groups, in order to recognize the “painful part of history” which the field could have been the scene.
The archaeological inventory work took place entirely in the presence of observers representing the institutionalized orphans of Duplessis and the Mohawk Mothers, according to the SAQ.