In the spring of 1950, the Red River plains inhabitants were living a flood like never before. As the waters kept on rising, the citizens of these plains and the cities of St. Boniface and Winnipeg were evacuated to higher terrain in the countryside.
The parishioners were praying for divine intervention.
Floodwaters had by now entered the grounds and were approaching     

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the basilica when suddenly the rising of the waters stopped. The precious basilica was saved from the flood.
Later, as it was the year Rome proclaimed a dogma of Our Lady of Assumption, followers firmly believed she had intervened to save the cathedral, the cemetery, St. Boniface and Winnipeg from further destruction.
On the grounds of the basilica, a monument dedicated to Our Lady was then erected at the location where the floodwaters started to recede.
Today, Our Lady greets visitors and oversees the Red River from her position at the cemetery entrance.

A dogma is a belief or doctrine held by a religion to be authoritative and beyond question...

The term dogma should not be confused with the word miracle.

Louis, the first child of Louis Riel (père) and Julie Lagimodière, was born on October 22, 1844 in St. Boniface, Manitoba. His mother, Julie, was the sixth child of Jean-Baptiste Lagimodière, a coureur de bois and Marie-Anne Gaboury, the first white woman to settle in the Canadian west.

Convicted of high treason, he was hanged November 16, 1885 in Regina by the federal government.
On November 19, 1885, a high mass was celebrated for the repose of his soul at St. Mary's Church in Regina.
On December 9, his body was returned to St. Vital where it lay in state for 2 days in his mother's house. A few days later, on December 12, a requiem mass was sung at St. Boniface Cathedral and his body was laid to rest in the churchyard.
In life, he was close to God and the Métis people, and in death, he is close to God and the Métis people.

Every year on November 16th, the anniversary of Louis Riel's death, people from across the Métis Homeland gather at his gravesite to remember the man, his cause and his legacy. They speak about past injustices suffered at the hands of governments, present day difficulties, plans for their future as a people, and the death of Louis Riel.
Thus lived and died a man who is recognized today as the founder of the Province of Manitoba and defender of the rights of the Métis and of French Canadians.
Such a humble gravestone for such a great man...

Tragedy befalls Saint Boniface College in November 1922 as the building containing its classrooms, chapel, assembly hall and resident students’ dormitory is totally destroyed by fire.

TO 
THE MEMORY
OF THE JESUIT BROTHER
AND
THE STUDENTS
VICTIM
OF THE FIRE
AT COLLÈGE
DE
SAINT-BONIFACE
25 November 1922

R.I.P.

The residential college lost nine students and one Brother that horrific night... To this day, the cause is a mystery.

C H I E F    O N E    A R R O W
Signatory to treaty #6
K A - P A Y A K - W A S K U N A M
1810  -  1886

CHIEF ONE ARROW, chief of a Willow Cree Tribe along the Saskatchewan River, was incarcerated at Stony Mountain for his participation in the North-West Rebellion of 1885. He was released and died shortly thereafter in Arch-Bishop Taché's residence, St. Boniface, Manitoba, April 25, 1886.

His last words to the Government of Canada were
"Do not mistreat my people."

Chief One Arrow and his men joined Louis Riel in March 1885 and took federal Indian agent John Bean Lash prisoner. The battle of Duck Lake ensued. The Indian chief was then taken prisoner because of his association with the Métis and his alleged participation in the rebellion. He was charged and then tried for treason / felony in Regina on August 13, 1885.
He was sentenced to three years   

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in the Stony Mountain Penitentiary in Manitoba and, after seven months, was released due to age and failing health.
Upon hearing that the man couldn't even walk, Bishop Taché took him in and gave him bed and board.
Today, Chief One Arrow's grave oversees the bishop's residence in St. Boniface.

Father Jean-Pierre Aulneau (April 21, 1705 - June 8, 1736) was a Jesuit priest active in Canada. Recruited from France in 1733, he came to Fort St. Charles with Pierre de La Vérendrye in 1735. The following year, Father Aulneau, Jean-Baptiste de La Vérendrye (son of Pierre de La Vérendrye) and nineteen French voyageurs headed from Fort St. Charles (Lake of the Woods) to Montreal via Fort St. Pierre.
On their first night out, they were killed apparently by warriors on a nearby island in Lake of the Woods.
The date was June 8, 1736.
When their bodies were discovered, the heads of the nineteen voyageurs and the bodies of Jean-Pierre and Jean-Baptiste were returned to Fort St. Charles and buried under the altar of the chapel at that location at Lake of the Woods.

"The churches of Saint Boniface 1818 - 1968"

"The 16th of July 1818. Saint Boniface of the Red River becomes the cradle of the christian civilization for the west when Fathers Provencher and Dumoulin establish the first mission across "The Forks" of the Red and Assiniboine rivers. Five churches were constucted at this beautiful location: three by Mgr Provencher, the first chapel in 1818, a church in 1819, and, in 1832, the famous church with two steeples immortalized by the poet Whittier, the single steeple church by Mgr Taché in 1862 and the church-basilica by Mgr Langevin in 1906-08."

"Saint Boniface Historical Society     July 16, 1968"

The top block (with the above script) was erected in 1968 while the bottom (with the Latin script and the sculpture) was done in 1953.
The Latin script roughly translates into "Provencher - Pastor and Leader who transformed the church from its infancy into adulthood"  Born 1787  Died 1853

For years now, in summer, many of the above mentioned characters come to life in the early evening. First heard in the cemetery are distant feeble voices which get increasingly louder; then the personae escape their tombs and emerge one after another all dressed as they were when they passed into death. Oddly. they seem to know each other; strangely, you see them, but they cannot see or hear you as they are oblivious to the sounds, the looks and the feel of the surroundings. 

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After the theatrical performance, these ghostly figures become subdued and return to their graves till the next night. Including church attendees, some two hundred thousand visitors a year come to these grounds in part to witness this incredible transformation in the catacombs of death and life in the cemetery of St. Boniface Cathedral.
Our only warning, be ready, and enjoy the open-air summer evening...