Bones Bay

Bones Bay is located inside the territorial properties of the Namgiis indigenous peoples on a bay the north side of West Cracroft Island in the Johnstone Strait region of the Central Coast of British Columbia, Canada, on Clio Channel. It is historically important for serving as a quarantine refuge in response to the illegal expulsion of smallpox infected persons, all of whom were indigenous citizens from Fort Victoria during the introduced smallpox plague of 1862. The Naamgiis people prepared this quarantine site for 25 Haida canoes that had been forcibly removed under threat of weapons and after their homes in Ogden Point, Rock Bay, and Cadboro Bay had been burnt down by British police. Most but not all the Haida refugees died in the Bones Bay quarantine site but all were supplied with water, food, and shelter by the Naamgiis. James Douglas, the governor of the colony of British Columbia, contributed $100 to a Christian effort to build a pest house for the dying. Jewish merchants asked James Douglas to stop the expulsion. From 1952 through to 1963, it was recorded in Canadian history that a steamer landing on the Union Steamships schedule as a "summer call by request, served by Frank Waterhouse & Co. when freight is offering", and was reached via Minstrel Island. BC Pilot, a guide to the region's waters, in its Vol. 1, 1965 edition, said of it "...a former fishing settlement

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