
Remains found at St. Jude construction site, medical examiner investigating
by: Shay Arthur, Lawrencia Grose
MEMPHIS, Tenn. — A bone was found at a construction site near St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and is being examined to determine if it’s human, Memphis Police told WREG.
At around 7 a.m. Tuesday, officers responded to a suspicious call at Lane Avenue and St. Jude Place. The Medical Examiner was called in to advise. Police say this is not being investigated as a homicide.
However, given the location of the site, it wouldn’t be too shocking if the bone turned out to be human.
Reports state that the location used to be a burial site.
The cemetery is now a park, yards from where construction is happening.
In fact, it was the first cemetery in Memphis and was established back in 1828 by the three original landowners: Andrew Jackson, James Winchester and John Overton.
“It’s our history,” Judith Johnson said.
Johnson is an architectural historian in Memphis. She talked to WREG about how the cemetery was established nearly 200 years ago.
“Mayor Winchester, was kind enough to donate 11 acres of his property since he owned so much of it, to be the city’s cemetery and at that time, it was the edge of the city,” Johnson said. “So, everybody went out there, the wealthy, the poor and all races and religions. There was no separation there at the time.”
But then years later, Yellow Fever hit Memphis.
“By the time Yellow Fever plagues hit in the 1870s, people were going down there and vandalizing it,” Johnson said. “I’ve seen photographs of people bowling with the tombstones and things – I mean, it was pretty sacrilegious. So, after the Yellow Fever was over, they reinterred all the bodies that they could find and moved them over to Elmwood.”
Established in 1852, Elmwood Cemetery at the time was on the other side of town, located in South Memphis.
“People would go out there on Sundays and visit the dead,” Johnson said. “They would go and take picnics and spend the whole day at the cemetery.”
Today, the former Winchester cemetery is now Winchester Park, welcoming families with a big, grassy lawn and playscape.
But, a few historical markers remind us of what was once here 200 years ago.
“Any bones that turn up now, they just missed them when they moved basically,” Johnson said.
Johnson said she hopes for answers following Tuesday’s discovery.
“It would be really cool if somebody could do forensics on that bone and find out if that person died of Yellow Fever, if they died of scurvy, if they lived to be of old age, was it male or female,” Johnson said.