A human femur!

Saint-Paul Church bones still a mystery 

 

Laurent Robillard-Cardinal

A Quebec coroner’s investigation report, of which the Bulletin obtained a copy in February, contradicts what the Gatineau Archdiocese recently announced. The latter had said the bones found on the construction site of the new Saint-Paul Church in Aylmer were of animal origin.

 

The document, signed by the coroner on December 10, 2014, indicates that a bone found on the site and examined on July 15, 2014, was human. “There is an adequately identifiable femoral head in these bone fragments. The bones are probably older than 100 years. The undersigned  (the coroner) did not believe necessary to undergo further analysis to try to identify these remains to a particular person”, indicates the coroner’s report.

 

When questioned on these new elements brought forth by the report, Daniel Dezainde, Gatineau Archdiocese spokesperson for this unusual file, was surprised to see that a coroner had published a report and its results. “The archaeologists we hired had proven that the bones were animal bones”, he says.

 

Oddly, the coroner’s report mentions that “the bones were brought to the present cemetery and put in a mass grave in which other bones found in the past already lay.” On the other hand, the coroner determined that the individual had probably died of a natural cause.

 

Before the opening of the present cemetery, located at the corner of Aylmer Road and Samuel Edey Street, Saint-Paul’s Church used a cemetery just next to the church and its presbytery which was blessed in 1841 by Father Désautels.

 

The old cemetery was located just north of the old church. In 1875, Monsignor Joseph-Thomas Duhamel suggested the parish council find another site. Not long after, Father Antoine Brunet bought the land on Aylmer Road, a few kilometers away from the original church cemetery.

 

In 1896, the Superior Couirt granted a request from the church to permit the remains to be relocated. The parish council asked parishioners to transfer their relatives and friends to the new cemetery, butit is common knowledge that the exhumation was probably incomplete.

 

The old cemetery lot remained untouched until it was paved in 1957.