Auriat Island is a small island within

Cree Lake Cree Lake is a lake in Saskatchewan, Canada. The lake is the fourth largest in the province and is located west of Reindeer Lake and south of Lake Athabasca. There is no highway access, but the lake is reachable by float plane. Cree Lake (Crysta ...

in the northern part of the

Canadian province Within the geographical areas of Canada, the ten provinces and three territories are sub-national administrative divisions under the jurisdiction of the Canadian Constitution. In the 1867 Canadian Confederation, three provinces of British North ...

Saskatchewan Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada, western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on t ...

. The island is named after Jean Auriat who was a Canadian soldier in the North Shore New Brunswick Regiment during World War II. He was killed in action by shrapnel on 7 June 1944 while attacking a German radar station in Douvres, France.

Geography

Auriat Island is an island in an

Archipelago An archipelago ( ), sometimes called an island group or island chain, is a chain, cluster, or collection of islands, or sometimes a sea containing a small number of scattered islands. Examples of archipelagos include: the Indonesian Archi ...

on Cree Lake, which is in the Athabasca Plain ecoregion. The island is very rugged and the soil is not arable due to

permafrost Permafrost is ground that continuously remains below 0 °C (32 °F) for two or more years, located on land or under the ocean. Most common in the Northern Hemisphere, around 15% of the Northern Hemisphere or 11% of the global surface ...

underneath the soil. Cree Lake freezes over during the winters. Summers are short and mildly warm.

Name

Auriat Island is named after Jean Auriat, a Canadian soldier killed during World War II. The Auriat family operated a farm in Saint-Front, Saskatchewan. During World War II, four Auriats' joined the military. On 6 June 1944, Jean and Maurice Auriat landed on

Juno Beach Juno or Juno Beach was one of five beaches of the Allied invasion of German-occupied France in the Normandy landings on 6 June 1944 during the Second World War. The beach spanned from Courseulles, a village just east of the British beach Gold ...

with fellow Canadians. The following day, their regiment launched an attack on the a German radar station in Douvres, Normandy. Jean was hit with shrapnel, and Maurice used his entire medical kit, however, he was ordered to advance, leaving Jean behind. Jean is buried in the Douvres war cemetery with ten other Canadians. Maurice was wounded the same day. The rest of the family survived the war. Following the war, the Canadian government offered a program to honour veterans of the war by naming landmarks. The family filed a request and Auriat Island was named.

References

{{Authority control Uninhabited islands of Saskatchewan Lake islands of Saskatchewan