They are fighters. They are not shy. Unexpectedly, without a lawyer, four Mohawk citizens managed to put an 850 million dollar building project on hold so that excavations could be carried out near a former Montreal hospital suspected of harboring anonymous graves of abused children.
These traditionalist activists, who call themselves the “Mohawk Mothers”, agreed to confide in the Duty in their office in Kahnawake, on the South Shore. These women, aged 51 to 83, told how — and why — they convinced a Quebec Superior Court judge to temporarily halt work on the former Royal Victoria Hospital, on the side of Mount Royal, to look for unidentified graves at this historic site.
“We are fighting for the memory of our children,” said Kahentinetha, 83, one of the strong figures in this legal battle.
“We did not trust the justice system, but we trust ourselves! Our cause is just. We decided to speak without fear and with frankness,” adds this activist, who has dedicated her life to defending the rights of Indigenous peoples – she went to Buckingham Palace in London to denounce colonialism.
We fight for the memory of our children. We didn’t trust the justice system, but we trust ourselves! Our cause is just. We decided to speak without fear and with frankness.
The Mohawk Mothers are convinced that patients, hospitalized willingly or by force, were buried near the Royal Victoria Hospital and the Allan Memorial Institute. Next door, psychiatric experiments, financed in particular by the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), gave rise to electroshocks, lobotomies and treatments with hallucinogenic drugs in the 1950s and 1960s.
Their legal battle also aims to seek possible traces of occupation of the territory by their Iroquoian ancestors before the arrival of Europeans.
David versus Goliath
When these women, supported by two men from their clans, took their case to the Superior Court of Quebec in 2021, no one would have bet on their victory. Alone, without a lawyer, they faced about fifteen big names from the Bar representing the institutions they consider to be “colonial”. There were so many opposing lawyers that several of them had to sit in the seats reserved for the public in the courtroom.
Their adversaries were not the least: the attorneys general of Quebec and Canada, McGill University and its hospital center, the Société québécoise des infrastructures and the City of Montreal pleaded against the suspension of the construction site of the Royal Victoria Hospital. . For them, the uncertain presence of anonymous graves did not justify disrupting this ambitious research center project at McGill University.
The Mohawk Mothers have nevertheless won a series of milestones in their quest for truth and reconciliation. The construction site was suspended by the Court in the fall of 2022. An agreement on how to conduct the archaeological research was approved last month by the court.
“The judge recognized that we had put forward credible facts. It creates a precedent that validates Indigenous laws,” says Kwetiio, the youngest of the Mohawk Mothers at 51.
The activists filed 141 pieces of evidence in court to defend their case – including archival documents and testimonies that support their arguments that this historic site contains anonymous graves.
A life of struggle
These four indigenous women are used to fighting against the colonial “system”. They became very young activists against the British monarchy, against the Catholic religion and against band councils, which they see as institutions funded by Ottawa to assimilate Aboriginal people.
“We have no connection with the band councils. They were created by Canada for a specific purpose: to get rid of us [les Autochtones]. They are part of the genocide. This is all a comedy. Band councils only have administrative powers. They manage sewers, snow removal, waste collection and social and health services,” says Kwetiio.
The Mohawk Mothers demonstrated against Pope Francis during his visit to Quebec last summer. They still feel a resentment against a school system that sought to make them lose their culture.
“We had to learn to survive as students who weren’t Christians. We were stronger, we were faster than the other kids [non-Autochtones]. It was playing hard,” Kwetiio recalls.
“I didn’t speak English in my first years in class. I was forbidden to speak my language, but I refused to speak English. I was beaten with belts by my teachers,” says Kahentinetha.
Peaceful Warriors
This grandmother, born in New York in 1940 (but whose family moved to Kahnawake shortly after her birth), spent her life campaigning for Indigenous rights. At 17, she wrote to the Queen of England by registered mail denouncing colonialism. Having become a model, she took advantage of her notoriety to knock on the door of Buckingham Palace in the late 1960s.
In another of her battles, she “expropriated” McGill University in 2015, again by means of a registered letter. She has long denounced the forced sterilization of Aboriginal women – notably through experiments with the contraceptive pill in the 1960s.
Kahentinetha was a negotiator during the Oka crisis in 1990. She and her colleagues are inspired by the Warriors, the armed militants who were at the front during this famous confrontation. However, the Mohawk Mothers have methods that they describe as “complementary” to those of the men. They preach “gratitude and harmony”, which does not prevent them from fighting hard to obtain respect.
From her real name Kahentinetha Horn, she is now called by her traditional name of the bear clan in Kahnawake, Kahentinetha. Unprecedentedly, she and the three other Mohawk Mothers convinced Superior Court Judge Gregory Moore to testify under their traditional names — not under their legal identities found on their birth certificates. They even signed the court documents with a simple drawing illustrating their respective clans, like a turtle.
“We did not ask permission [d’utiliser nos noms traditionnels], we just did it! laughs Kwetiio.
The Office of the Independent Special Interlocutor — created in June 2022 by the Trudeau government to help shed light on missing Indigenous children — intervened in court in the Mohawk Mothers case. Julian N. Falconer, legal counsel for this federal institution, believes that this case represents a “historic turning point” which will facilitate the steps taken by Aboriginal people before the courts.
Orphans of Duplessis
Anthropologist Philippe Blouin accompanies the Mohawk Mothers in their quest for truth. “I have the greatest respect for these women. They never let go. They are like grass growing in cracks in the cement,” he says.
The independent researcher led the collective work The Mohawk Warrior Society. Handbook for Sovereignty and Resistance, released last fall. Philippe Blouin is convinced that anonymous cemeteries remain to be discovered in Quebec, and that these places have not only welcomed people of Aboriginal origin.
It is no coincidence that the Mohawk Mothers have at first glance improbable allies in this story: the orphans of Duplessis, also sent against their will to “boarding schools” and psychiatric hospitals in the last century, support Aboriginal women in their fight for justice. Solidarity is reciprocal.
Kwetiio gets emotional talking about these wounded men, who were forcibly taken from their families. “The Duplessis orphans are like us: they need to be heard in order to find peace. They deserve to know the truth. We must do everything to find the anonymous graves. »