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It is possible that the skeletons found of recent years where not where they were originally buried. Frank Steele, who at one time owned the Island, used to relate that after a heavy storm he found many exposed bones which he reburied near the waters edge. Then through the years there has been a good deal of digging and searching near the place, so that the original burial spot has been greatly disturbed. Whether the land at the rear of the old school house lot and commonly identified as the site of the French burial-ground was in fact a burial-ground, rests largely upon tradition. It is known that so early as about 1850, those who were living at Tatamagouche believed that this had been a French cemetery, and at that time there were among them those who if they had not come with the first settlers about 1770, were at least of their first generation. These related that the crosses at the head of the graves were still standing when they came. Certainly no farmer of that period would, without a definite reason, for over forty years exclude from cultivation a little plot in a corner of his field. Nor can we believe that the several generations from the time of the first settlement could be mistaken in their identifying this particular spot as a French burial-ground. It is easy to understand how the tradition was kept alive; for many would be sure to be curious and inquire why in land cultivated all around it, a small patch was left as a sort of island wilderness. It, however, can never be scientifically established as the burial-place of those few Acadians, who died at Tatamagouche , until the area excavations are made and unequivocal relics discovered. Back |
