FRANKFORT, Ky. — Bulldozers and power shovels leveling a city block for a state office building have dug up a mystery — dozens of unmarked graves, perhaps 200 years old, within a stone's throw of the former state Capitol.
So far, 162 sets of remains have been unearthed. The number increases almost daily, as does speculation about their origin.
No headstones or markers have been found. Nor is there any record, or even anecdotal evidence, of a cemetery in the neighborhood.
"You wonder who they were and what they did during their lives," said David Pollack, director of the Kentucky Archaeological Survey. "We don't have anybody coming forward to say, 'My ancestor is buried up there.' "
Pollack said he and his team believe the graves probably date to at least 1850, perhaps to 1800. Compounding the mystery, Pollack said the site may be two cemeteries, not one.
Some theorize the dead may include inmates from the old state penitentiary, which stood a block away before it was razed in the late 1930s.
Others believe the graves could hold victims of Cholera, which ravaged Frankfort twice in the early 19th century. People who died during the epidemics were buried quickly, their graves often tenuously marked.
Also near the area was a work house, where debtors and petty criminals were sentenced to labor.
Pollack said the remains appear to include several children, which would contradict the inmate theory. Wood fragments and metal fittings suggest that many of the dead were buried in coffins, some fancier than others, which would not be typical of paupers or work house debtors.
Many were lined with limestone, forming a type of vault, which would not indicate an emergency burial, such as in an epidemic, he said.
Pollack also said there was no indication the remains are from a slave cemetery.
The site, which had private homes and a Civil War-era warehouse, is being cleared for construction of a headquarters for the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet. It is two blocks from the Old Capitol, now a museum, where the General Assembly met until 1910.
The first graves were discovered March 11.
The remains will be cleaned, cataloged and analyzed at the University of Kentucky before they are reinterred.