Michigan tribal school survivors recount ‘hell on Earth,’ rapes, beatings

Michigan boarding school survivors recounted abuse, deaths in a report commissioned by the state
In many cases, the memories of survivors are the only accounting of abuse
The report has not been released publicly.

A 300-page report on Michigan’s Native American boarding schools that the state declined to publicly release is filled with survivor accounts of physical and sexual abuse and intergenerational trauma.

The $1.1 million report, requested by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and funded by the Legislature, was blasted as “shoddy” by the Department of Civil Rights. State officials also said they were concerned that survivors and descendants interviewed in the report could be identified.

Read the report

A House committee plans a Feb. 27 hearing on the shelving of the report, which Bridge has obtained.

The report from Oregon-based Kauffman and Associates includes interviews with 139 descendants of survivors and 28 survivors. Of the 28 survivors, 26 attended Holy Childhood of Jesus Catholic Church and Indian School in Harbor Springs, which in 1983 was the last state boarding school to close.

The schools were created by the federal government and used nationwide for more than 100 years to assimilate Native Americans. The schools forbid the use of native language or attire and abuse was sometimes common.

In a letter to the Legislature, the Michigan Department of Rights cautioned that, in some cases, there is no evidence to bolster the accounts of survivors or their relatives.

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Here are some quotes from survivors and their descendants included in the report.

Survivor: “I was the only one that wasn’t raped, and I don’t know why.”

Survivor: “I was quiet. My sisters were there, and I couldn’t even see them or hug them. I hardly got to see them.”

Survivor: “[My family member] was punished for sneaking a hug with her sister, had to sleep on cement floor, no blanket.”

Survivor: “Students who survived school together became extended family. The students did still speak together at night in whispers … a practice that continued into adulthood where the old ones would speak Anishnabekmow’in, but in whispers when we were supposed to be sleeping … all the way into the ‘80s and ‘90s.”

Descendant: “My grandmother was tortured by being forced to kneel on rice, hold books at arm’s length for hours, being beaten with rods or even the heavy crucifix carried by clergy, and always the fear of being sent out back from which no one returned. She told me about the unmarked graves that sometimes were dug by the other children, in which those who attempted escape were buried.”

Descendant: “My mother had a little sister, my aunt, and she protected her when she could. There (were) times that she told me that the nuns would come into her room and sexually molest her. And when those same nuns would look at my aunt, her younger sister, she would get up from the bed and tell them to take her, so that her baby sister wouldn’t receive the same treatment.”

A wide, historical photo of the Mt. Pleasant Indian Industrial School in Michigan. — A historic photo circa 1910 of the Mt. Pleasant Indian Industrial School. (Courtesy of the Library of Congress)

‘Dirty, dumb savages’

Survivor: “Two of the nuns were cruel to two little girls. When they peed the bed, they were spanked with a brush. One morning, the nun broke the hairbrush on the little girls’ butt.”

Survivor: “They were nuns — very mean, hateful — and tortured and beat kids. We were known as dirty dumb savages daily; our minds were pretty messed up living in hell on Earth.”

Survivor: “Darker Natives — you were the worst abused.”

Survivor: “I just want to cry sometimes. Like, why … I didn’t even really say anything sad right now, and I just want to cry. Looking out the window. Looking out the window and just thinking and hoping that your dad would come and get you, wondering what he’s doing. Picturing the house, picturing them watching TV, picturing them cooking, making soup or feeding us. Just wishing and wanting it. But you’re just stuck there, and you can’t go anywhere.”

Survivor: “They wanted us to dress like them and talk like them, and walk like them and work like them, and pretty much follow the crowd. And we always put on these masks, this mask for today and this one for tomorrow. So, we felt we could meet maybe some of their expectations and be accepted. I know one of the difficult things in my life was trying to be accepted, even among my youthful classmates, but I remember a textbook they were reading from in our early years of history. It was a history class, and they read in there about heathen savages and the bloodthirsty pagans. That wording was in those books.”

‘Traumatization has bled through generations’

Descendant: “I’ve heard only nightmarish horror stories about the time they spent there, and they still have a difficult time talking about. I’m ashamed that such predators could ever be involved in the upbringing of our children. The lasting effects as a result of their various forms of abuse have deeply rooted predatory behavior in our communities, undermining our abilities as parents and left us with scars that we likely are never to recover from. This was never the way we were meant to live.”

Descendant: I’m in disbelief when thinking that my grandparents and generations before them (almost my own mother) were forced to attend the boarding schools. It’s so dehumanizing, upsetting, sickening… I’m angry, sad, and horrified at the history. It’s ultimately led my family in Michigan … to being separated from their family, land, and culture. The traumatization has bled through generations, leaving open wounds to be filled with drugs, alcohol, abuse… nobody to help.”

Survivor: “Taking kids from their homes and stealing their language and our right to our own religion. That alone was harm, and they need to make a public apology to Indian children. The State robbed us of our dignity.”