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Neglected remains finally placed at rest

The graves were discovered more than 100 years after a Mass achusetts cemetery slid from maps.

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published October 23, 2006

WALTHAM, Mass. - All Kathryn Peirce knew about her mother's twin was that the baby died at birth and was probably a boy.

After years of research, her cousin uncovered a birth certificate that revealed the baby was actually a girl. They also learned she was buried at St. Joseph cemetery in Boston in 1923, though Peirce couldn't find a cemetery of that name in the city.

The mystery was solved this year when archaeologists discovered a forgotten burial site on the grounds of St. Joseph church in Boston's Roxbury section.

On Saturday, Peirce's aunt and the 1,237 forgotten others were honored at their new resting place at Calvary Cemetery in Waltham.

"We don't think the baby had a ceremony or a blessing, so this was nice," Peirce said of the ceremony led by officials from the Boston Archdiocese.

St. Joseph church was built in 1845 and the cemetery established soon after. By 1868 it had filled, mostly with young families of Irish immigrants who presumably fled their home country during the potato famine.

By 1882, according to the archdiocese, the cemetery had been wiped from city maps and tombstones had disappeared.

Earlier this year, the church property was sold to the Roxbury Charter High School. During preliminary surveys, an archaeological team found a human bone. The team, as well as members of the church, had mistakenly believed that the bodies from the cemetery were exhumed and reinterred elsewhere, said Kirk VanDyke, one of the field archeologists.

A statue of St. Joseph stands in a flower bed at the center of the new plot atop a podium that was found at the excavation site among the rubble of broken headstones.

Attached is a plaque with an Irish phrase that would have been common on a mid 19th century tombstone.

It translates to "To the right of God their souls will sit."

[Last modified October 23, 2006, 02:11:06]