CHEROKEE COUNTY, Ga. — A pair of cemeteries in Cherokee County have dozens of unmarked graves that city leaders in Canton are trying to identify.
The city found 137 unmarked graves in the two cemeteries.
The stones and crosses were long gone, but now there's an effort underway to once again pay respects to those who were laid to rest.
"I have 25 of them now,” City Clerk Susan Stanton said.
Stanton has a large collection of tombstones now -- chunks of granite identically engraved, all to be sent to Sunnyside Cemetery.
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"Making a list of the folks who were buried in the cemetery, I realized I had a list of names that I could not find headstones for,” Stanton said.
It was once known as the paupers' graveyard, dating back more than a century.
Nearly 200 people were buried there, but half of the markers have long since disappeared.
So the city hired a specialist who used a ground-penetrating radar device to find the graves. %
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Eighty-two were discovered, including the final resting places of four babies.
Each is now marked by an orange flag, and those flags will be replaced with the simple headstones now stored at City Hall.
Dozens more will be purchased to see to it that those souls at Sunnyside, while nobody remembers their names, are not forgotten.
"None of us just want to fade away totally. So at least they'll be recognized as somebody buried there. Even though we can't identify who it is,” Stanton said.
Cox Media Group
