It was the first residential school operated by the Government of Canada with the aim of assimilating Indigenous people into the society of the settlers.

Prior to that, the federal government had provided only small grants to boarding schools in Ontario and the Northwest that had been founded and operated by Christian missionary organizations.

[2] Battleford Industrial School was run by the Anglican Church with Department of Indian Affairs / Government of Canada funding from 1883-1914 when it was closed.

[3]: 57  The senior officials of the Department of Indian Affairs arranged for various religious denominations to administer and operate the schools.

: 197 The TRC linked the creation of the Battleford, High River and Qu'Appelle schools to a 1879 report authored by Nicholas Flood Davin.

[4]: 197  Now known as the Davin Report, the Report on Industrial Schools for Indians and Half-Breeds was submitted to Ottawa on March 14, 1879, and made the case for a cooperative approach between the Canadian government and the church to implement the "aggressive assimilation" pursued by President of the United States, Ulysses S.

[4]: 197 Staff and students abandoned the school during the North-West Rebellion of 1885, and the building was used for a time as barracks by the military.

[citation needed] Later that year on November 27 the students were taken to Fort Battleford to witness the hanging of eight Indigenous men convicted of murder during the uprising.

For the boys, they would be involved in blacksmithing, carpentry, shoemaking, printing, and farming under the tutelage of dedicated instructors and hired teachers.

[12] The Battleford Industrial School Cemetery was marked with a cairn, chain fences, and numbered grave markers on August 31, 1975.

[13] The cemetery was noted at page 119 in Volume 4 of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada final reports: It is unknown exactly how many children died at Battleford Industrial School during its operation.

Seventy-four bodies were found to be buried in the Battleford Industrial School Cemetery when the site was exhumed in 1974 by five anthropology students working with Professor Patrick Hartney from the University of Saskatchewan: Marlyss Anderson of Naicam, Dianne Carlson of Saskatoon, Joan Beggs of Weyburn, Jane Plosz of Canora, and Jean Prentice of Abbey.

[20] On September 27, 2024, a monument commemorating the school was unveiled in North Battleford by Lieutenant Governor of Saskatchewan Russell Mirasty.