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Project Halted After Grave Is Unearthed |
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Written by DeadGirl
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Wednesday, 29 June 2005 |
Old atlas indicates cemetery existed in block where paving is under way
SMYRNA -- Faye Stocum admonished a TV cameraman not to film her as, barefooted and crusted with dirt, she crawled out of a pit covered by a blue canopy.
"I don't want to be on TV like this," she said.
But once she was out of the hole, she dusted herself off and made herself available for an interview. The exposure just might help with the task at hand -- identifying the occupant of a grave that was unearthed as the David C. Harrison Post 14 of the American Legion in Smyrna undertook an extension of its parking lot.
By JAMES MERRIWEATHER / The News Journal
As an archaeologist with the state Division of Historical and Cultural Affairs, Stocum is obliged to try to find the next-of-kin of the grave's occupant and to determine if other grave sites might be in the area. She said the 1868 edition of Beer's Atlas of the State of Delaware indicates that a cemetery for blacks once occupied at least half of the block on which the post is now located.
So the parking lot expansion, just behind the post, at 107 W. Glenwood Ave., has been on hold since June 20, the day the grave was uncovered by the contractor, Green Paving and Excavating of Townsend.
"When the equipment operator realized he was excavating more than soil," she said, "he stopped" and called police, who called Stocum's division and the state medical examiner's office.
"We quickly agreed that this was under our jurisdiction," Stocum said of the discovery of a wooden coffin inside a brick vault. "This is obviously ... not a recent criminal situation."
Stocum said the remains and any others found at the site might remain in place or be relocated -- a decision that would be dictated largely by descendants of the graves' occupants.
Jackie Blisard, 72, of near Clayton, said during a stop at the grave site that if it is indeed a cemetery, the parking lot work should be halted and the graves should remain in place. She recalled a time during her childhood in Chester, Pa., when at least one Quaker cemetery was relocated to make way for commercial buildings.
"It was a disgrace," she said.
Cemetery traced to church
The American Legion post's vice commander, Bill Prouse, said the site was purchased in 1976, about 30 years after the post acquired the half of the block on which the post building sits. He said members of the post had been unaware of the distant history of the block.
"This was many years ago, so you got a lot of history behind it," said Prouse, who's running the post while its commander, Allan Post, is away on active military duty.
Janet Vinc, community revitalization coordinator for the town of Smyrna, traced the cemetery's origins to Asbury Methodist Church, established in 1786 in the block just southeast of the American Legion post's property. She said various publications indicated that, at the time of an expansion in 1818, both white and black residents attended the church, with the balcony reserved for black worshippers.
In 1844, Vinc said, the white worshippers moved to a new location on Mount Vernon Street. A year later, the old church was divided into halves, with one going to the church sexton and the other half going to the black members.
According to Vinc's research, the black members physically moved their half of the church northwest across what is now North Street and onto the block now in question. They worshipped there for five years before a minister lured part of the congregation to what is now Bethel AME Church on East Commerce Street. Eventually, she said, the remaining black worshippers established Centennial United Methodist Church on East Mount Vernon Street.
Vinc, who joined Stocum in sifting dirt for clue-bearing artifacts, said she intended to ask members of the various churches for any information they might have to share.
Stocum said that, after the July 4 holiday, workers and volunteers would turn up soil in the parking lot extension area for indications that other graves might be there. She said the color, composition and texture of soil might indicate whether the ground had been turned for graves.
Once the site investigation is complete, notices of the findings will be published in local newspapers. That will trigger a 30-day comment period in which relatives could come forward to demonstrate their relationship to occupants of the graves.
Stocum and Vinc said the remains were essentially intact, which bodes well for determining age and gender and for providing clues to the time of burial. But, Stocum said, it's not a sure bet that the grave occupant will ever be identified. "It's never a sure thing that we're going to get the next-of-kin to come forward," she said.
Source:The News Journal |
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