The community of Hebron was forcibly relocated 65 years ago. This woman still feels the impact
Labrador community was closed without consultation in April 1959
This April marked 65 years since the Inuit of the northern Labrador community of Hebron were forced to leave their homes, their lives and their land behind.
Residents of the town, one of the Big Land's northernmost communities, found themselves in unfamiliar territory in new communities like Nain, Hopedale, Happy Valley, Goose Bay and Makkovik.
Hebron was closed without consultation, causing trauma that has crossed generations.
Maria Merkuratsuk of Nain's parents were born in Hebron and experienced relocation. She spoke with Labrador Morning host Rhivu Rashid about Hebron, what she learned about her parents' journey, and how it still affects her over six decades later.
This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Q: You have been visiting Hebron all your life, but growing up you didn't know the full history of its relocation. So when you learned more details about how your parents and others you know were resettled, how did you feel?
A: At that time I felt angered, hurt. I don't know. The words that you would not like to feel when you hear about your parents as being relocated from their hometown.
What are some of the stories you heard from your parents and other Hebronimiut about how this happened 65 years ago?
When we would go up, I thought it was just, like, just the normal way of life of going up. And then when I started to go at the very young age to Hebron, I always wondered why they were, like, just deserted buildings and all that. I didn't ask questions at the time, just 'cause it felt like that I wasn't supposed to talk about it. I started to learn later on, during the years, years later, what has happened.
And so it hurt me in a way that it felt like a dream, actually. And my mother would talk about it here and there, but not a whole lot. Nobody wanted to talk about it, really. And then when I started to learn that what has happened, I did not want to go to Hebron. I did not want to be part of it. At that time, I didn't realize that my anger was starting to really be affecting my life. Right up until I had some kids, my kids. I had five kids and I didn't want to talk about it as well.
Down the road I started to go to school. Social work. I started to learn about how my father carried his hurts and I carried them for him. And that even led me to be an alcoholic in a way that I didn't realize that I was doing. And when my parents, my father especially, were hurt because he didn't know the land, when he had to go down to the south,and it was everything that he lived for.
But when we came to Nain, alcohol drinking took place. And then my life started to go down. Down, down, down. But later, later on when I started to get some help, [I] start to realize, like, what is going on. And then it all came back. It all returned every time. That relocation has hurt my life, has hurt my family, has hurt the way that their life was turning out to be.
I got so tired of living. I got so tired of being angry. I got so tired of blaming the government. As the saying goes, I broke the chain of my family within myself. To stop being angry, stop drinking. I haven't touched a drink now for 29 years. And that led me to do more healing of, you know, "I gotta stop. I gotta stop blaming. You gotta stop being angry. I gotta try to live to be a better person."
I started to see my parents in a way that they lived in Hebron in a good way. And I started to go to Hebron and I started to see things differently. After not wanting to go there, after not wanting to see the place anymore, It turned out to be a very beautiful place.
When I go there, I imagine dog teams coming and going, people hunting and children's playing and all that. It was a beautiful life that they had. It's like the beautiful life that I want from my grandkids, grandchildren here. And I'm trying my best to to be out on the land in that way.
Hebron has happened. And I come to realize that it was not only Hebron that happened, it was other communities throughout the world as well. It comforts me to know that I'm not alone and people are not alone in a way that we had to go through. That hurt and hardship has continued.
The best way that I have dealt with the Hebron relocation has been in a way that I need help with it. I am not alone. And now all of people that is dying, dying out, that were living in Hebron before, it's, like, it's going with them. The stories, the hurts is going with them.
And I really believe that if you do get help with that, it could feel a lot better. it can turn out to be a very beautiful place. Very beautiful feeling of Hebron.
All the coast of Labrador has been affected by it. Even people [who have] not lived there or don't have relatives that live there, each community has a touch of people that has lived there. And the hurt and anger has grown grew from it. And from there, they could start to help each other and grow each other. It needs to be, it's got to be whole Labrador coast.
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With files from Labrador Morning
