By Sheila McLaughlin
The Cincinnati Enquirer

A Survey Monument Nearby sign is posted on the corner of Plainfield Road and Cooper Road near Carpenter's Run Pioneer Cemetery where Plainfield Road is being widened in Blue Ash. (Brandi Stafford photo) | ZOOM |

BLUE ASH - The demands of progress have sent this Hamilton County community on a journey to unlock the past.

Twenty-five graves from the early 1800s - 14 of them belonging to small children - were carefully excavated as part of a $1.7 million widening project at Plainfield and Cooper roads, which is the pathway to the Raymond Walters College and the new Blue Ash Elementary.

Now city historians, archaeologists and anthropology students from the University of Cincinnati are working to solve a mystery about the graves at Carpenter's Run Pioneer Cemetery that were sitting precariously close to the road.

They want to know: Who are these people?

No descendants have come forward, despite legal ads placed by the city before the graves were dug up.

The Blue Ash Historical Society already had information identifying many of the remains in the graveyard through headstones and family histories. But not these.

Several of the markers were merely field stones, probably placed there by a family with little means to pinpoint the location of a loved one's grave. Of 10 markers, only three inscribed headstones are readable.

Nestled away in a secure area inside the police impound lot, their worn inscriptions give way to a mere snippet of their lives.

One headstone belongs to Sarah Brown, daughter of Arnold and Elizabeth Brown. The others marked graves of Sarah's brother, John Brown, who died Aug. 31, 1836, at age 20, and a boy named Lewis Taulman or Taubman, who died 12 days after his first birthday. No legible dates of death could be found on the headstones of Sarah Brown and the infant.

Bev Mussari, historical society president, said she has no idea what role they played among the area's earliest families.

She had mixed feelings about unearthing the graves, but didn't want to miss the opportunity to uncover more about the past.

"I still have a mystical feeling about disturbing anyone who was buried there," Mussari said Friday while looking over some of the remnants from the graves. "But, I thought if it's not done now, who's to say in the future that anyone would want to do this?"

Dennis Albrinck, Blue Ash service director, said the city took great care to arrange excavation of the graves because unearthing the dead is such a touchy subject.

"We wanted to do it right and be as respectful to the dead buried there as we could," he said.

Not only did city officials have to seek a judge's permission, they also hired an archaeology consultant to ensure that the graves and their remnants would be preserved and handled with respect.

The 2-acre graveyard, divided by Plainfield Road and probably a carriage path before it, dates to the turn of the 19th century. Until last week, historians thought it belonged solely to Carpenter's Run Baptist Church, which was founded in 1797. But graduate students from UC's anthropology program, who began studying the cemetery a year ago, discovered through the 1850 census that the land also was used by a church called St. Anthony's.

The students located the graves using ground-penetrating radar and are currently mapping the cemetery and researching its history.

Jeannine Kreinbrink, senior archaeologist with Natural & Ethical Environmental Solutions in West Chester, was hired by the city to excavate and recover what was left of the graves.

Her job entailed climbing down sometimes 5 feet into the graves with a crew of helpers and sifting through the dirt with dust pans and spoons in a tedious and time-consuming task that produced little.

They found pieces of wooden or woven coffins, a glass viewing piece from a casket, casket hardware, a few fragmented bones and teeth. UC students will attempt to piece the bone fragments together to determine the ages and sex of some of the dead. All of the items will be reburied at another spot in the cemetery next spring.

Kreinbrink is hopeful that the few recovered items, coupled with findings from UC's cemetery study, might provide names for the people buried there.

"They could be sorted into family groups," Kreinbrink said referring to UC's mapping project. "That information will help them determine who these people might have been."

Anthropology Professor Alan Sullivan said he expects his students' research - and their skills at tracking genealogical information through the Internet and the U.S. Census - might offer the best leads.

But don't expect answers anytime soon. "It's a process of elimination and location of the gravestones," Sullivan said. "We might ultimately be able to identify a lot of these people. But it takes a lot of research."

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E-mail smclaughlin@enquirer.com