A flood of immigrants from eastern Europe came to this area of Manitoba beginning in the late 1890's as land was surveyed and opened to homesteading. In the spring of 1899, a group of about 400 immigrants from the Ukraine made the grueling sea voyage and overland trip by train to Strathclair, Manitoba. They arrived as a late cold spell descended on the area, with sickness and death close behind. Three small children had died on the train ride to Stratchlair and were buried somewhere along the railroad. On May 10, the group were moved from Strathclair to a primitive tent camp and quarantine along Patterson Lake. Here, the immigrants waited for their homesteads to be surveyed, in the cold rain and snow, and with inadequate food and shelter. Children became sicker as scarlet fever and measles took hold in epidemic proportions.

For two weeks, the epidemic raged. Each day saw several deaths. There was no time, or tools available, to dig individual graves in the frozen ground. As the weather warmed and the disease abated, 42 children and three adult women had succumbed and lay in the mass grave. It is said that the original homesteader of the land was so saddened by the sight of the many small wooden crosses that he abandoned this homestead and headed further west.

About 50 years later, the remains of the stricken were reinterred at the present location, approximately 100 metres north of the original burial site, and a small cairn replaced the simple birch cross. In 1981, a newer monument containing the names of the dead was blessed by leaders of the Ukrainian faiths. The site was declared a Municipal Heritage Site in 1990 and a large granite and bronze monument was installed to commemorate the centennial of Ukrainian immigration to Canada in 1991. The Ukrainian Pioneer Cemetery continues as a place where descendants and others can honour the sacrifice, sadness and survival of the original immigrants.

Land Description: SW 22-19-23 W1 in the RM of Rossburn.