The city of New York is the place that they say is where dreams are made. There's no mistaking how iconic it is, how breathtaking the architecture is, from the stunning landmarks such as the Empire State Building, the beautiful yet poignant memorial to the victims of 9/11, right through to the breathtaking New York Public Library. The city is steeped in history and has many famous occupants, as well as all of these positives, the city has sure seen it's fair share of heartache and struggles over the decades. The horrific events of 9/11 knocked this lion of a city off of it's feet and it was utterly devastating but in what seemed like a short space of time, the rest of the world watched in awe as we saw the people of New York get back on their feet, work together and almost re-build their city not only after such destruction but also in strength, determination and patriotism. We were inspired and I've always had a love for New York since I was a child and used to draw pictures of the twin towers. Watching how they faced such horror and the lives who were sadly lost, the bravery and kindness of people just left a mark on me that will never leave. To this day I still have a huge admiration for New York and it's people.
I mentioned recently that I was going to be including some more Dark History posts to this blog. If you're a regular reader of mine (thank you, I love you!) you will already be aware that I have covered various historical events and stories in the past to positive feedback. I've now decided to have this as a regular addition to my blog, the true crime, serial killer posts will continue but every now and then I will cover some dark history just to add something a little different to my work/blog.
In this post I will be delving into the other side of New York, a side that not many people know (especially outside of the city) and a place that people, not native to New York will have heard of. On the other side of the beautiful architecture, the flashing lights, the hustling and bustling streets of the big apple, the city that never sleeps....is an island not that far from the glitz, glamour, the yellow taxi cabs and breathtaking skyscrapers, and it is called 'Hart Island'. A place that is not spoken about but inhabits over 1 million people, over 1 million deceased adults and babies to be exact and I hope my description doesn't come across as sounding morbid but that is a sad fact.
Those who know New York like the back of their hand will know all about Hart Island but yet there are some people who have lived in the city all of their lives and never knew it existed. It has always been a place that people didn't want to discuss, it was a dark place, a haunting place and a very sad place. It was a place that nobody wanted to go and nobody wanted to end up. Native New Yorkers would be told that the island was a place where people who were unloved would go when they passed away with nobody to claim their remains and it instilled a fear and a determination never to end up there.
I initially thought that my research into Hart Island was due to the heartbreaking connection to the late child star, Bobby Driscoll (who was buried on Hart Island after months of his remains now being identified) who I have just written about in my previous post but I was thinking about this a few days ago and realised that Hart Island was first brought to my attention some years ago during the Covid pandemic. I remember feeling horrified when videos emerged online of what was being reported as 'mass graves being dug in New York', there was clips going around social media declaring that New York had run out of places to bury people who had died from complications connected to Covid. It was frightening but I was soon informed by a New Yorker that the burials were indeed due to Covid but that the place where the burials were had been there for decades and that this was standard procedure (as heartbreaking as it was) for deceased people who had no family or friends to claim their remains. The hell we all went through with Covid was an experience that I'm sure none of us enjoy looking back on but with the usual goings-on of life, Hart Island somehow fell to the back of my mind but it was brought to the forefront again this past few weeks because of Bobby Driscoll
So, after what seems like a lengthy introduction, I think we need to look back at the history of Hart Island and it is an isolated island that is located at the western side of Long Island Sound in New York. It's not an easy location to get access to and to get on to the Island you have to use a ferry. Hart Island, although known today as New York's greenest cemetery and one of the largest publicly funded cemeteries in the world, it has been a location for various different things over the decades, from a prison, to a workhouse, a hospital to a site purely used for burial. It's also an eerie fact to learn that Hart Island was looked at as a possible location for a theme park at one point in history. To think of it as a place where people would go to have fun and be full of positivity to have it be the way it actually became which, for a long time was a very dark place full of sorrow.
Don't get me wrong, a cemetery is a place that is not known for being a place of sheer happiness, it is often a very sad place which invokes feelings of grief, regret and memories of loved ones no longer with us but we go to pay our respects and have time to reflect at our loved ones graves. The difference with Hart Island in an area known as 'Potter's Field' is that the majority of the deceased buried there, died unidentified, for a lot of these poor people there are no names, no history for them, they sadly died penniless on the streets of New York and were placed there because authorities had nowhere else to put them and no family to take care of their funeral arrangements. It wasn't only homeless people who were buried there, stillborn babies who were born to substance addicted mothers were placed there too in tiny boxes. Every week the number of the deceased would grow and grow to the point that prisoners nearing the end of their sentences were given the task of partaking in the heartbreaking weekly burials of the less fortunate New Yorkers.
In the beginning, 20 Union Army soldiers were said to have been the first people to have been buried on Hart Island. Around 1868, members of the public began to be buried there, the first person to have their remains placed there was a woman by the name of Louisa Van Slyke. As time went on and more and more people were buried there, the name of the burial location was then known as 'Potter's Field' and by 1958 records show that more than 500,000 people had been placed there, a lot of them babies. The majority of the decedents were homeless, stillborn babies and people who just couldn't afford to pay for a burial. As mentioned before, to keep up with the constant weekly influx of boxes of bodies arriving by ferry to the Island, prisoners were paid a small fee and given the task to dig trenches and bury the makeshift wooden coffins. It was very hard work as well as traumatising and upsetting.
Anyone who has had the experience of working on the Island will tell you that the thing that always got to them the most was the burials of the babies. The tiny boxes with no names, just numbers, all stacked on top of each other or side by side (not like we have with a usual burial). The sight of a coffin in general at a funeral or even in this case, a make-shift wooden box is never a pleasant experience and when it is that of a baby it is something that is too heartbreaking for words. Though years may have past and certain people may no longer work on the Island, the memory of the babies forever endures and people shed tears and your heart goes out to them but there's also a gratitude towards them because it showed that they cared and those babies were buried by someone who really felt for them and that means a whole lot.
On a personal note I remember the day of the funeral of my niece Chloe, she was a stillborn baby and her coffin was the size of a shoe box. I was younger at the time and was trying to get my head around it all but the moment the tiny coffin was placed into the grave, I (and everyone there) was overcome with grief and I have never forgotten that moment. I remember my Dad saying that there was something even more heartbreaking about the death of a baby, it's hard to lose a loved one who's an adult but there's a bit of comfort in knowing that they had a bit of life where as a little baby hasn't had the chance to live and grow up and experience all that life has to offer and it's so heartbreaking and unfair. Seeing the coffin of a baby is something you never forget and I cannot imagine what it must have been like for all of these people who faced that every week and were responsible for burying these poor babies. Taking also into consideration that these babies didn't even have a start in life and were nameless, it's just so terribly sad.
Hart Island was off-limits to the public for a very long time, the general public was not allowed to go there and it was all kept very secretive but the weekly burials continued. In time, some members of the public had relatives who were buried at Potter's Field and were able to prove their identity, those relatives were allowed to visit now and again but it was a regular thing and only a very small number of people were allowed. Authorities were very strict about visitors.
So, for a very long time the homeless and forgotten people of New York were placed in unmarked mass graves at Potter's Field, in the 1980's a lot of victims who had died from AIDS related illnesses were also buried there as well as later on, Covid related decedents being added to the numerous souls on the Island. For years, the relatives and friends of the deceased that were identifiable and known 100% to have been buried on the Island were campaigning for changes to me made, they wanted it to be more accessible for friends and family. An incredible woman by the name of Melinda Hunt who had been one of the very few to have visited the island with permission in 1991 to take some photographs for a book she was working on with her colleague, Joel Sternfeld, had met a woman who's baby had been previously buried on the Island. The lady explained about what happened to her baby and how she had been in the hospital when she was told her baby was sadly deceased and that they would take care of the burial arrangements without further details. This was a common practice in New York at that time for stillborn babies, some who were unidentified and some who's mothers had been in the hospital with no financial means of arranging a suitable burial for their child. The women put their trust and faith in the system but soon found that they had to fight to be able to visit their child's grave and in many cases it was difficult for many babies to be identified, some were told it would never be possible because unfortunately their baby was placed with others in a mass grave.
Hart Island, despite the heartbreak of the reality is a truly beautiful place and the very few who have been on the Island have said that it did give them some comfort (despite not knowing the exact location of the burial of their loved one or to know the reality that their relative was there) that this beautiful and peaceful place was were their loved ones were laid to rest.
Melinda put her heart and soul into campaigning for more access for the public and for changes to be made, to preserve Hart Island, to give it the proper respect the location deserved as well as the deceased, to maintain it and treat it as a historical site with the focus on identifying as many people as possible. She also wanted to make sure that the people who were identified were remembered.
In 2019, huge changes came about thanks to Melinda and her fellow campaigners, she had created the site The Hart Island Project which focused on what I previously mentioned and also with the ideal that everything be transferred over to the NYC Parks Department which is what finally happened. Hart Island was finally getting the respect that it deserved and although there was some hardships along the way especially with the Covid pandemic, Melinda and her team pushed through and a lot of important changes continued to be made, all of the decayed buildings were removed and the surroundings maintained giving the Island more of a beauty spot feel rather than the dark and cold place that it appeared to be before because of the old ruins.
The Hart Island Project continues to work on keeping the Island as natural and maintained as possible and believe that the burial process on the Island should remain to continue, which it does. The Project believe that the burial process which has been the procedure for decades is more natural, affordable and better for the environment. They want this process of burial to be available for everyone in New York no matter a person's status or background. Their plan is to have people from all walks of life to be buried there to help remove the stigma that the Island has. The truth is as Melinda has previously stated, the Island actually has people buried there from all different parts of New York, anyone can become homeless or fall into substance misuse. A lot of the deceased on Hart Island were once in a more stable financial situation in their lives, some had professional positions but maybe lost a job or became ill and couldn't afford to pay for their homes etc. One man's story I had read about, had a family and was a successful businessman but he suffered from alcoholism and it took over his life to the point he lost everything and ended up on the street. Despite this man having people who loved him (but could never find him because he would vanish for long period of time) he still ended up on Hart Island. There's all kinds of heartbreaking stories related to Hart Island and the majority of New Yorkers do know someone who's buried on there, whether it be a former work colleague, a distant relative or maybe a close loved one because not everyone can afford to pay for a funeral.
As it stands, with all of the changes coming into place, the prisoners no longer work on the Island, those roles were taken over by the Parks Department. Relatives are able to visit but it is by appointment only and on certain dates of the month (which is two days of the month and it must be either a Saturday or Sunday). Despite some of the positives that have happened thanks to Melinda, The Hart island Project and the Parks Department, the visiting routine is still an issue. The process is very much like going to visit someone in prison. You have to fill in an online form with plenty of notice beforehand, you also have to prove that you are a close relative to the deceased. You are allocated a time and two hours only which is also taken up by the ferry journey. There are occasions where people will turn up at the gates for the ferry and it won't show up or come late, which takes time off of their visit. It's not the ideal situation and the Project are hoping for this to be improved. The visits right now are a sort of pot luck situation, some people get their requests through in time and some have to wait. If you don't show up or can't show up for your visit or are late, they will strike you off the visiting record for about 6 months and only after then will you be able to fill in a request form again.
Despite some of the teething problems with visiting, everything seems to be having a step in the right direction, the project and the Parks department have been issued more funds and improvements are continuing to be made. There are a lot of positives that have come out of all of what was once a heartbreaking and very dark situation. With the kind hearted people who have worked so hard to improve the Island and make it what it is today as well as showing their care for the people who are laid to rest there, it really does show how beautiful and kind a lot of human beings can be. I think Melinda and all who are involved with the care and maintenance of Hart Island are truly angels on this earth.
I have included below a documentary about Hart Island that you may wish to watch, I highly recommend that you do. I've also included some other clips as well as articles you may find interesting and don't forget to check out The Hart Island Project where you can find out all sorts of information, it's an incredible site, there are also photographs on there as well as ways to donate and updates on news if you wish to follow what's happening with improvements etc.
So I hope that this post gave you more knowledge of what Hart island is all about and this once heartbreaking place which is now being respected and appreciated for what it is and what it stands for. All of us are on this earth for a limited time and all of us will die, we know how hard life can be at times and how easy it can be to fall on hard times. Any one of us could end up in a similar situation and in this case as I mentioned at the beginning of this post, New York's people have shown themselves to be some of the warmest and kindest people on earth with what they've been able to achieve with all of this. It would be so easy for people to turn a blind eye and do nothing but Melinda recognised a mother's suffering and the suffering of so many others and chose to go out of her way to devote her time and energy into helping people. God bless Melinda and all those who have worked and continued to work on Hart Island.
RIP to all of the countless babies, children, men and women who are buried on Hart Island, you will never be forgotten.
Further Reading & Sources:
- The Life & Death of Bobby Driscoll | True Crime With Caledonian Kitty
- AIDS/HIV in New York City | Wikipedia
- And The Band Played On | Book by Randy Shilts
- NYC Correction History | NY Correction History Society
- Covid-19 Pandemic in New York City | Wikipedia
- List of Cemeteries in NYC | Wikipedia
- Basic Facts About Homelessness | Coalition For The Homeless
- Homelessness in New York | Wikipedia
- Homelessness & Poverty in NYC | The Bowery Mission
- The Untold Story of New York's Hart Island (Documentary)
- Hart Island Documetary | Vox/Youtube
If you've made it this far in the post, I really appreciate you taking the time to read my work, if you enjoy my weekly content and would like to donate to help with research materials, keeping my blog online etc, you can do so Here or on my Kofi page. You can also contact me via the form on the right or by email at jocaledoniankitty@gmail.com
I welcome any comments and requests, just drop me a line in the comments section or by email. All of my social media platforms can be found here
Please stay safe and I hope you will join me in my next post x
