If there's a story in Canada, which represents in all its horror and cruelty, the abuse of adults towards children, it is the "Duplessis Orphans". For nearly three decades (the 40s to 60s), thousands of children like Jean Messier on the picture, have been placed in psychiatric institutions at their young ages and was declared mentally retarded. Most of these unfortunates were from outside marriage link which was a tragedy for the mother at that time. Upon their arrival in these institutions, the worst abuse that ensued can imagine: repeated rape and brutal assault causing death in many cases.

Have to remember the reign of Duplessis to understand this story. Maurice Duplessis was premier of the province of Quebec during the 40s and 50s. It often refers to this period as "The Great Darkness" in reference to strict political regime, hunting communists and was also one of the most corrupted period of Quebec. The Catholic Church, together with the government of Maurice Duplessis developed a strategy, to obtain federal subsidies, namely: orphanages reclassified as mental institutions with the complicity of the medical authorities at the time.Thus, thousands of children in low ages in orphanages, met with no diagnosis, where classified as "mentally ill". All this in order to receive the generous federal subsidies. It took the death of Maurice Duplessis in 1959 for things began to change and end this reign of terror.

An estimated of more than 17 000 children where diagnose as mentally retarded and interned in psychiatric institution. How many of them are dead following brutal assaults? Very hard to tell because at the time, the secrecy was required. The only witness to this past is what has been called "The pig's hole". When children died because of mistreatment, they threw them in a mass grave called pig's hole to avoid investigations and possible criminal prosecutions. The hospital "Mount Providence" in Montreal is the institution most notorious for the abuses committed with orphans.The religious authorities have always denied any involvement in the scandal and still refuses to date any form of apology to the victims claiming that at the time they were acting for the betterment of these children with the means at their disposal.

by: Yves Choquette, Montreal