After being part of racist experimentation, 19 New Orleanians' remains return home
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Craniums of 19 people are prepared to be returned to New Orleans from the University of Leipzig. Photo: Courtesy of University of Leipzig
Remains from 19 people whose craniums were shipped to Germany for racist pseudoscientific experimentation in the 19th century have now come home to New Orleans.
Why it matters: The Dillard University-based committee responsible for their return is hosting a public jazz funeral on Saturday as the remains are finally interred.
What they're saying: "This is not simply about bones and artifacts. It is not only about injustices. This is about restoring and, in many ways for us here, celebrating our humanity," said Dillard University president Monique Guillory in a press conference Wednesday.
- "It is about confronting a dark chapter in medical and scientific history, and choosing instead a path of justice, honor and remembrance. And we will do so in the most sacred way we know how: in a true New Orleans fashion, with a jazz funeral that shows the world these people mattered. They belonged. They belonged here, and now they are home."
Flashback: The 19 people died in New Orleans at Charity Hospital between Dec. 5, 1871, and January 1872, according to Dillard historian Eva Baham, who chaired the Repatriation Committee.
- They ranged in age from 17 to 70 and included both women and men of mixed descent, as well as two unknown people.
- By the 1880s, New Orleans doctor Henry D. Schmidt had sent their craniums to Emil Ludwig Schmidt of Leipzig, Germany. There, they were catalogued as "specimens" and used to further research into the now-discredited belief that a person's personality, intelligence and virtue could be determined by the differences in their skulls, Dillard University says.
- The location of the rest of the 19 individuals' bodies remains unknown.
Two years ago, the University of Leipzig reached out to New Orleans city officials, hoping the known remains could be returned home.
- In the time since, a partnership between officials from Dillard, Xavier, LCMC and the city ultimately resulted in the 19 individuals' remains being returned to New Orleans about a week ago.
- When they did, they were brought to Rhodes Funeral Home for a brief private ceremony to recognize their return.
The intrigue: The committee was unable to find descendants of the 19 people, Baham said, due in large part to how little information was catalogued about them before they died.
- They also had been in New Orleans for varying lengths of time — records show one person was here for only about an hour before dying, Baham said — with some coming from other states.
- In the end, Baham said, "we are serving as the families of these people."
If you go: The jazz funeral on Saturday is open to the public, Baham said, so that New Orleanians can "be a part of bringing dignity to people from whom it was taken."
- A viewing begins at 9am Saturday at Lawless Memorial Chapel at Dillard University, with a service at 11am.
What's next: The remains of the 19 people will be later privately interred at the Hurricane Katrina memorial on Canal Street.
Who they were
Zoom in: This is what is known about the 19 people whose remains have now been returned to New Orleans, according to research shared by Dillard:
- Moses Willis, 23, a Virginia native who died Dec. 5, 1871.
- Isaak (or Isaac) Bell, 70, a native of North Carolina, who died Dec. 5, 1871.
- Henry Anderson, 23, a Missouri native who died Dec. 10, 1871.
- Henry Williams, 55, a North Carolina native who died Dec. 14, 1871.
- Prescilla Hatchet, 19, a Virginia native who died Dec. 16, 1871.
- Alice Brown, 15, a Louisiana native who died Dec. 17, 1871.
- John Tolman, 23, a South Carolina native who died Dec. 17, 1871.
- Samuel Prince, 40, a Louisiana native who died Dec. 20, 1871.
- Hiram Smith, 22, a Virginia native who died Dec. 22, 1871.
- Marie Louise, 55, a Louisiana native who died Dec. 24, 1871.
- Hiram Malone, 21, a Tennessee native who died Dec. 24, 1871.
- Henry Allen, 17, a Kentucky native who died Dec. 26, 1871.
- Mahala, 70, a Virginia native who died Dec. 26, 1871.
- William Pierson, 43, a Louisiana native who died Dec. 27, 1871.
- John Brown, 48, a Louisiana native who died Dec. 27, 1871.
- Adam Grant, 50, a native of Tennessee who died Dec. 31, 1871.
- William Roberts, 23, a Georgia native who died Jan. 10, 1872.
- Two unidentified people.