Archaeological Exhumation of Burials in the Baldwin Hall Portion of the Old Athens Cemetery, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia Final Report

In November 2015 a human skull was dislodged during construction of a proposed new addition to Baldwin Hall, which lies just south of the extant portion of the Old Athens Cemetery on the University of Georgia campus. The Old Athens Cemetery was the original public burying ground for the town where anyone could be buried at no fee. There are almost no official records for the cemetery, and thus much is unknown. It began about 1800, officially closed in 1856, but continued to be used at least until the early 1880s. With the unexpected discovery of human remains, construction ceased, state officials were consulted and a program of archaeological search and exhumation of graves in the area of potential effect ensued, led by the local archaeological consulting firm of Southeastern Archeological Services. Graves were sought with ground penetrating radar followed with ground inspection. Field work was conducted intermittently from November 2015 through January 2017, and analysis continued until February 2017. The remains were reinterred in a ceremony at Oconee Hill Cemetery on March 20, 2017.

Historic research showed that the Old Athens Cemetery was formerly 6 to 7.625 acres, once extending further north and south of the 2.25 acre extant portion seen today. As the only cemetery in the town until 1856, it was the primary burial place for most Athenians, including enslaved persons of African descent. Enslaved persons composed roughly half the population of Athens from its incorporation in 1806 to emancipation. African Americans continued to bury their dead in the cemetery after its closing in 1856 until the opening of three African-American cemeteries in the early 1880s. Housing first encroached onto the abandoned cemetery in the late nineteenth century, and then in the twentieth century University buildings were built over portions. The largest incursion into the cemetery was when Baldwin Hall was built in 1938.

The 2015-2018 project that is the subject of this report exposed 105 graves, of which eight could not be exhumed because they partially underlay Baldwin Hall's foundations. We calculate grave density at 700 per acre. An unknown number of graves had been removed by past construction activities and 23 graves had been partially or largely disturbed by these activities; two of these had no remains. In addition to the 95 graves with contents, we recovered fragmented remains of ten individuals that probably were disturbed during initial construction of Baldwin Hall. Thus, there were 105 reinterments. Skeletal and coffin preservation was poor and variable. The results of archaeological, osteological and DNA analysis presented in this report indicate that the graves in the 0.3 acre project area were of enslaved persons of African descent (1800-1865) or emancipated African Americans (after 1865). DNA in three graves had indications of Asian or European ancestry, but given the spatial context, and the fact that so far, only genetic information from the mother's lineage has been analyzed, we believe that all interred were perceived in the nineteenth century as being of African descent. Almost all of the graves were dug with a secondary vault, a burial type brought over by enslaved Africans and used widely in the South by African Americans and European Americans alike in the nineteenth century. Graves were neatly prepared, most employing hexagonal coffins fastened with nails. Eight coffins had white metal handles or hardware indicative of burials after 1865. Where evidence was available, 59 percent of the graves were of infants and children. Thirty-two graves contained buttons, hook-and-eyes or other evidence of clothing; the others had straight pins or nothing, indicating burial in a winding sheet.