NathanA New Swimming Pool
In a place like New Orleans, you will often find yourself surprised by unexpected discoveries daily. Vincent Marcello was certainly shocked to find out something about his property when he decided to work on his French Quarter home to ass a pool. In 2010, he decided that Louisiana’s temperature was too hot so he needed a swimming pool.
A Little Expected
Since Marcello was living in a historic area Marcello was quite sure that his workers would dig up something interesting. In his own words, Marcello explains, “We didn’t exactly know what we were going to find. This is the French Quarter. No telling what’s underground.” He called upon an archaeologist from the University of New Orleans to do some research beforehand but his expectation would be superseded.
Burial Ground
Marcello already knew that his home was built on top of an old cemetery. His property, located in North Rampart and Toulouse Streets in the French Quarter was actually the city’s first burial grounds. The archaeologist that Marcello used was Ryan Gray. He started his research on April of 2010. As the work commenced, the shovels soon hit coffins, several of them…
A Bunch Of Caskets
Ryan Gray and his crew ended up digging out 13 caskets and two bodies from the St. Peter Cemetery. This had served as a burial site back in 1723. The cemetery was in use till the 1780s after there was no room left, even after coffins were stack atop one another. As Gray revealed, “Part of the reason why the cemetery was closed was that it was overcrowded and historical accounts and complaints revealed that people couldn’t dig anywhere without hitting earlier remains.” So then what?
A Huge Endeavor
There was a very strict law about taking care of human remains so indeed, the coffins proved to be something truly challenging to get rid of. “This is not easy,” Gray exclaimed, adding “an adult coffin, intact, probably weighs 600 to 800 pounds, and we were moving these without heavy equipment.” They were all removed from Marcello’s backyard and were given a reburial. They were about 250 years old and this reburial took place on April 18, 2015, at St. Louis No. 1 cemetery.
Who Were These People?
Through modern science, so much of the unanswered questions could be cleared even if the dead bodies could not talk themselves. There was pollen found as well which indicates the presence of flowers during their burial and even X rays helped too. Labwork stated they were “determined that they were people of African, Native American and mixed heritage — in other words, New Orleanians,”. The Catholic reburial ceremony included a Native American song and African drumming. What about the pool?