Two Spirit Lake Internees Remembered at St. Michael’s Cemetery, Alberta

Borys Sydoruk, Chair, Ukrainian Canadian Civil Liberties Foundation

The Ukrainian Canadian Civil Liberties Foundation (UCCLF) organized the installation of the interpretive panel at St. Michel’s Cemetery, near Myrnam, Alta., on Oct. 25. More than 25 people from the area attended the event.

The panel noted Canada’s internment operations during the First World War from 1914 to 1920. Over this period, more than 8,000 individuals—primarily Ukrainians who had been invited by the Dominion government to settle in Western Canada—were interned as enemy aliens under the authority of the War Measures Act. These internments were conducted in 24 camps nationwide and continued for two years after the war ended. During their confinement, internees’ possessions were confiscated, and not all items were subsequently returned.

A further 80,000 others were forced to register semi-regularly with authorities. They suffered, not because of anything they had done, but because of where they had come from. Many remained “in fear of the barbed wire fence” long after their release.
UCCLF worked collaboratively with the County of St. Paul No. 19, and the communities of Lake Eliza and Lac Bellevue, Alta., to organize the commemoration.

The panel also recognises Ann Hancheruk and Felicia Hancheruk, two Spirit Lake Internment Camp internees  interred in this cemetery. Both women were members of St. Michael’s Ukrainian Catholic Church in Montreal. The entire parish was arrested and relocated to the Spirit Lake Internment Camp in northern Quebec. Jerry Bayrak, an internee descendant from Edmonton, spoke about the profound impact the internment had on four generations of his family. Ann Hancheruk was Mr. Bayrak’s great-grandmother, and Felicia Hancheruk was his grandmother. His mother, Mary Bayrak, was born at the Spirit Lake Internment Camp.

Mr. Jerry Bayrak, whose family was interned at Spirit Lake Internment Camp, in Northern Quebec

“There cannot be reconciliation without education,” said UCCLF’s Borys Sydoruk. “The interpretive panel will inform the residents of Lake Eliza and Lac Bellevue and anyone else who arrives to see it.  and encourage thoughtful dialogue regarding historical events in Canada over a century ago. These events involved government actions affecting minority groups, such as Ukrainians and others, where laws were enacted in response to public concern and targeted specific ethnic communities.”

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