Betsey Ramsay's Grave
SE 11-23-4E,
Riverton area

Designation Date: September 13, 1989
Designation Authority: The R.M. of Bifrost
Present Owner: The R.M. of Bifrost

John Ramsay, a prominent member of a Saulteaux Aboriginal band in the Lake Winnipeg region, and his family, were instrumental in assisting the first Icelandic immigrants who arrived in Manitoba in 1875. The Ramsays provided the settlers with meat and instructed them in local survival skills (the building of warm log cabins and local fishing and hunting techniques). A smallpox epidemic that struck the settlement in 1876–77 also affected local Aboriginals, including the Ramsay family. John lost his wife Betsey and four of his five children. All were buried in the Sandy Bar cemetery.

The loss of his beloved wife was a devastating blow to John Ramsay, and in 1880 he undertook a pilgrimage to Lower Fort Garry, where he traded furs and purchased a marble gravestone for Betsey's grave. He hauled the stone all the way back to Sandy Bar, set it on the grave and built a fence around the site. In 1989, as a centennial project, the community of Riverton restored the grave and rebuilt the white picket fence.