Hundreds Of Bodies Discovered Under Rhode Island Highway During Search For Gravesite

Hundreds Of Bodies Discovered Under Rhode Island Highway During Search For Gravesite

Earlier this year, Rhode Island resident Maria da Graca contacted a local news team for help investigating where her great-great-grandfather was buried. He had died at a state-run institution for the poor in the town of Cranston, and she'd been told he was buried in one of the cemeteries affiliated with it. But when she tried to locate the exact grave, she couldn't find it. And when investigators looked into it, they discovered nearly 1,000 bodies that had been buried under a highway. Then, they found an additional unmarked mass grave with 577 bodies that had been relocated in 1975 — and da Graca's great-great-grandfather was one of them. CRANSTON, R.I. (WPRI) — A Rhode Island woman’s search for her relative’s displaced gravesite led to the discovery of nearly 1,000 people buried beneath a local highway and an unmarked mass grave containing hundreds of bodies. Both discoveries were connected to state institution cemeteries in Cranston, where more than 5,000 of Rhode Island’s poor, sick or mentally ill residents were buried between 1875 and 1953. Maria da Graca has been searching for her great-great-grandfather’s final resting place for more than a decade. WPRI obtained documents showing her relative, Antonio Coelho, was originally buried in State Institution Cemetery No. 3 in 1941. He was then one of 577 bodies the state dug up and reburied in an unmarked mass grave in State Institution Cemetery No. 2 in 1975 to make way for an industrial complex. She said she was told at one point that Coelho was buried in State Farm Cemetery. In the 1960s, the state built Route 37 through part of the cemetery, and da Graca was worried her relative was buried beneath the state highway. In 2006, human remains were found by the side of Route 37, resulting in 71 people being reburied in State Institution Cemetery No. 2. But Pegee Malcolm, chairwoman of the Rhode Island Advisory Commission on Historical Cemeteries, said that many more people were originally buried under Route 37 and that 800 to 1,000 bodies are still buried under the highway. According to the R.I. Department of Transportation, tens of thousands of people drive on Route 37 every day. When asked if RIDOT was aware there may be nearly 1,000 people buried under Route 37, spokesperson Charles St. Martin responded: “Yes, RIDOT is aware.” Malcolm showed WPRI the location of the overgrown unmarked mass grave, where Coelho was reburied in 1975.