Thousands of cemeteries nationwide have paupers graves where no headstone is found. And with the older cemeteries, there are often no records. It’s possible to at least partially reconstruct who might be buried in any particular cemetery using death certificates, funeral home records, and even newspaper notices. However, this is a very difficult task, as most of these documents, if indexed at all, aren’t indexed by burial place. Following is a teaser from a very interesting article in the January 21, 2009 edition of the News & Observer.
Sarah Burton, 35, place of birth and family unknown, died of the disease pellagra in 1914 in Raleigh, and was
buried in the Wake County Home Cemetery.
Hundreds of other people without money or relations were buried in the same spot, a cemetery near Five Points that the county operated for more than 60 years before closing it in 1979.
Read the full article by Thomas Goldsmith.