The reverberations of the grim discovery at a former Kamloops, B.C. former residential school are still stirring emotions in Whitehorse and the Yukon a week after the news broke.

Last month’s discovery of a mass grave containing an estimated 215 bodies of children has brought up some bad memories for Adeline Webber of Whitehorse.

The well-known Tlingit activist and elder is searching for a way to acknowledge the death of her brother Albert at the former Carcross residential school in September 1942.

She was not born at the time of his death, but she said it haunted her mother, Carrie Jackson, for the rest of her life.

Webber said Thursday she has been told Albert contracted measles, and staff at the school moved him to the laundry facilities for treatment.

The treatment didn’t go well, and he passed away.

His body was never returned to the family, as was the case all too often with residential school victims.

Webber told the Star she believes he was buried on-site in an unmarked grave.

“His remains are definitely there.”

Another brother, Joe, was sent to a residential school in Alberta until he was 15.

Webber and her three sisters were sent to a school here in Whitehorse, where they attended together.

She said her mother was living in Teslin when Albert was taken away to the school in Carcross.

Subsequently, the family relocated to Whitehorse, where it has remained.

Webber said her mother spent many years trying to get officials to acknowledge the death of her son without success.

Now, Webber has taken up the cause.

She simply wants an acknowledgement of what happened to her brother, in both Carcross and Teslin, so her mother’s grief and efforts aren’t forgotten.

“We just want to acknowledge his existence,” she said. “That would bring some closure to us.”

Webber and the remaining family haven’t made a formal request yet, but are making plans to do so.

She said it was believed her mother had made such a request years ago. It’s unclear if she did so, and it wasn’t acted upon if she had.

Webber said the family has always deferred to the residents of Carcross to erect some kind of memorial, but is now prepared to take independent action.

Meanwhile, Kwanlin Dün First Nation Chief Doris Bill has released this statement.

“I am reaching out to our citizens and our community today because I know our people are hurting,” she said.

“With the recent deaths in our community and the devastating news we heard from Kamloops about the 215 children ... as young as three years old … that were taken away and never came home.

“Forever lost to their parents, their families and their communities.

“I know I am hurting too. I am also a survivor of two residential schools. My thoughts in the past few days have been of my former school mates and the ones that didn’t make it home.”

“Now is the time to hold each other up. Be kind to one another.”

Bill quoted Murray Sinclair of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and his estimates that more than 6,000 children were lost to residential schools.

To help us on this journey we must take, there will be a sacred fire at the Kwanlin Dün Cultural Centre. It will burn for four days for those lost children and all the lost children that have yet to be found.

“Come to the fire and grieve with us.”