Non-indigenous residential school survivor speaks about his childhood at St. Anne's

did I escape it because my skin was right I don't know I know that not all of my young friends got whipped or beaten or whatever not all of them my mother had the option of homeschooling us but she decided against that and and there was no other other option and the the I call them the PR nuns but when among when o'er mum and dad went over to to see about the possibility of us going to st. Anne's they were told by the PR nuns oh we we have the top cream of the cream of teachers here they're all have their education so just imagine in the morning I get up in it's it's home as a it's it's what I'm used to we're in afraid or canoe and now I've been whacked and pulled into st. Anne's kicking and screaming basically [Music] I found it wasn't my skin that that made me feel special it was I felt I was a little Prince of the Hudson's Bay Company I had learned class and learned about racism and suddenly I'm in a dormitory and I realize I don't think the Hudson's Bay Company can protect me here I don't know what to do am I like them two boys ran away they brought them back and they had perished they had died and they brought them back on toboggans and we were all assembled in the front yard just like a prisoner war camp and there were kids crying and and my sisters recount to girls especially that were just there are there tears where were flowing and the nuns were saying be quiet keep quiet as this happened I felt like I had to button down anything personal into my mind like lock it away because it doesn't apply here and you survive you got to survive it wasn't one thing that caused me to run away it was just I had to get out of there I told my sister I'm leaving tonight and I don't know whether she decided to leave because she wanted to get out well or whether she wanted to protect her younger brother I'm not sure but I remember there were snoring and people sort of looking at me and a few comments but it was you know it's getting to the point where people are falling asleep and I acted like I was going to the washroom when I shouldn't be and then I just went out the door clunk my coats hanging along the wall I get my coat on I my boots on and I then I go down to the main door and my sister's there this is the middle of the night and we're not sure if we're religious or not but we sure started to pray I'll tell you as the silent praise of prayers as we rushed as quickly as possible down the trail in the moonlight and every branch that I looked at through the undergrowth I thought might be a dog lunging towards me it was really scary was like walking through molasses so anyway we we go out onto the ice and then we just a skirt that the coast for I don't know maybe half a mile a mile we walked up the path and walked home and that was the first time we had ever stayed at awake all night and I thought this is this is great we're a home our parents will understand that this is serious and we had to get away so there we are knocking on the door my mother is you know just shocked and my dad is like a little perturbed like really I remember sitting there having breakfast and then seen the cleats suddenly appear over the snowbank and it was a swamp buggy breaking through the through the snow and coming into our yard and I knew that they had found us and my parents [Music] talked with them and the usual conversation I'm sure how could how could they do this and sorry to inconvenience you and who knows what they were saying but there was a lot of conversation and then suddenly my mother gasped because the Mother Superior said by the way there were polar bear tracks overtop of that your children's prints so anyway I thought well for sure we're not going to be sent back there but the decision was that it was time to go back to school [Music] you I thought well there's no hope then I I can't I can't escape and that's when I started banging my head on the wall to end it all and so I there's a I tried to kill myself a few ways one was to bang my head on and this is on the cement wall stuff the brakes or whatever I could find out my nose to stop my breathing and in outside and keep in mind this in the winter time it's way up north so it's pretty cold I would take off my jacket and sit in the snow bank to try to freeze myself and the nuns would have to come out and try to put my jacket on I don't think I did it like you know hundreds of times I think I probably did it maybe five to ten times probably some people would say you're acting crazy but I would say craziness is a is a natural reaction to a crazy situation there's a fear that if you say it to somebody and they don't care you would suffer that that hurt and that feeling all over again and so I know I had that feeling like will anybody care and so that is a fear that I I carry when I try talking about this and I think it's an important message I think the I have a perspective that's unique in history unique in Canadian history [Music] you

Channel: CBC News

Views: 623,441

Keywords: Non-indigenous residential school survivor, non Indigenous, residential school survivor, residential school, white residential school survivor, Indigenous, St. Anne's, Ron Gosbee

Id: SyVrohwsHX8

Length: 7min 22sec (442 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 23 2018