FRANKFORT — Bulldozers and power shovels leveling a city block for a state office building have also dug up a mystery — dozens of unmarked graves, perhaps 200 years old, within a stone's throw of the former state Capitol.

        So far, 162 sets of remains have been uncovered. The number increases almost daily, as does speculation about their origin.

        The old state penitentiary, razed in the late 1930s, once stood a block away. Some theorize that the dead may include inmates.

Entertaining speculation

        Cholera ravaged Frankfort twice in the early 19th century. People who died in epidemics were buried quickly, their graves often tenuously marked.

        A workhouse, where debtors and petty criminals were sentenced to labor, was known to have been in the neighborhood. Could the dead have been paupers? Could they have been slaves?

        The archaeologist overseeing the excavation says it all makes for entertaining speculation.

        “You wonder who they were and what they did during their lives,” said David Pollack, staff archaeologist for the Kentucky Heritage Council and director of the Kentucky Archaeological Survey, a collaboration of the heritage council and the University of Kentucky.

        But relatively little is known so far. Mr. Pollack said he and the rest of his team think the graves probably date to at least 1850, perhaps to 1800.

        No headstones or other markers have been found. Nor is there any record, or even anecdotal evidence, of a cemetery in the neighborhood.

        “We don't have anybody coming forward to say, "My ancestor is buried up there.' That's another curious thing. With all the genealogical research done in Kentucky, you'd think somebody would have come forward,” Mr. Pollack said.

Fancy coffins

        Compounding the mystery, Mr. Pollack said the site may be two cemeteries, not one, and each of the popular theories has a hole in it.

        Mr. Pollack said the remains appear to include “a fair number of children,” which would contradict a prison-inmate theory. He said he can tell from wood fragments and metal fittings that many of the dead were buried in coffins, some fancier than others, which would not seem typical of pau pers or workhouse debtors.

        With some of the graves, “they put a lot of effort into it,” Mr. Pollack said. Many were lined with limestone, forming a type of vault, which would not indicate an emergency burial, such as in an epidemic, he said.

        Nor does the site appear to have been a slave cemetery, Mr. Pollack said.

        “The African-American community that was nearby dates later than the cemetery does,” he said. “There is no indication that this is a slave cemetery, and the effort that went into it would suggest this is not.”

More children

        The site, which had private homes and a Civil War-era warehouse, is being cleared for construction of a headquarters for the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet.

        The site is two blocks from the Old Capitol, now a museum, where the General Assembly met until 1910. And that invites another question: How could so many graves, so close to the seat of government, have become lost?

        “It's a disaster whenever that happens,” said Nicky Hughes, curator of historic sites for the city of Frankfort.

        “It's a shame when (a grave) gets obliterated,” Ms. Hughes said. “You lose memory of the people, too. If nothing else, you have a nice marker. But in this instance — Poof! — you're gone.”

        The graves were discovered March 11 after a construction worker spotted bones in a truck load of dirt at a dump site. Franklin County Coroner Mike Harrod and state medical examiners were summoned first. Mr. Pollack's team, including university archaeologists Kim McBride and Gwynn Henderson, soon went to work.

        Mr. Pollack said two “clus ters” of graves have been found, at different elevations, possibly indicating separate cemeteries.

        The upper site has evidence that more time and effort went into the burials. It may also contain more children, though Mr. Pollack said “those impressions may change” as work progresses on the lower cluster.

Several walks of life

        The remains will be reinterred, as required by Kentucky law. First, however, they will be cleaned, cataloged and analyzed at the anthropology department of the University of Kentucky. Mr. Pollack said the work could take two years.

        Ron Bryant, a Kentucky history specialist at the Kentucky Historical Society, predicted that researchers eventually would find people from several walks of life.

        “More than likely it is a mixture,” Mr. Bryant said. “A mixture of convicts, mixture of the workhouse and probably some paupers, too. ... The bones themselves are going to have to tell the story.”

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