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Unmarked grave found while digging new sewer

Posted 11/3/21

Crews working on the city’s current sewer replacement project received a macabre surprise when they located an unmarked grave near the Fayette City Cemetery. Work was briefly halted on Tuesday, …

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Unmarked grave found while digging new sewer

Posted

Crews working on the city’s current sewer replacement project received a macabre surprise when they located an unmarked grave near the Fayette City Cemetery. Work was briefly halted on Tuesday, October 19, in an area between Highway 240 and the cemetery fence.

Workers were laying new sewers from the city’s wastewater plant, that run parallel to the north side of the highway. The grave was found in an area between the road and the fence at the edge of the Fayette City Cemetery. 

Work immediately stopped and the city was notified. The wooden coffin was located approximately eight feet below ground level and within a few feet of the highway. Two more coffins are suspected to lie within inches of the exposed coffin but were left unearthed. 

Police Chief David Ford said he spoke with the city’s attorney, Nathan Nicholaus, who in turn contacted an archeologist with the state. It was determined that since no graves had been exhumed, they could rebury the remains.

The city is now working with MECO Engineering, the firm that designed the project, to reroute the sewer in that area, so as not to disturb any other graves that may be buried there. Don Jenkins, a representative from MECO, discussed the matter with the Fayette city council at its meeting on Tuesday, October 23. He had been in contact with Terracon, a company with an office in Columbia, about scanning the area with ground-penetrating radar. 

“I think the whole area could have graves in it,” Danny Dougherty, Fayette’s director of public works, told the council. 

Initially, the council voted to spend $3,000 to have the section along the proposed dig sites scanned. On Monday, Dougherty said that Terracon will scan the whole area.

It was hoped that Terracon could begin using the ground-penetrating radar on Monday, but scanning will hold off until the ground dries out.

The age of the grave is unknown and cemetery records do not extend to that section of ground. Highway 240, which becomes Church Street that runs north and south through Fayette, was constructed in the early 1930s, according to the Missouri Department of Transportation. Previous to the highway’s construction, traffic entered Fayette along South Main Street that runs between the cemetery and the industrial park.

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