The strange death of Irish immigrants

In 1832, a group of Irish immigrants was tasked with building a railway section near the state of Philadelphia, USA. However, the work has just started to be done in a few weeks, suddenly they die in a series.

Mysterious deaths

The cause was determined by cholera and immediately, their bodies were buried in a mass grave. Since then, the families of these ill-fated people never know exactly what happened to them.

Nearly 180 years later, the researchers said, more clear information was found about the fate of those men.

The photo taken on August 2, 2010 shows a human skull
supposedly of the massacre victim.

However, their great effort in excavation and identification will be difficult because they cannot reach the grave. Even so, they still have enough evidence to prove that some of them are victims of a murder, not just death from disease, historian Frank and Bill Watson said.

While the ability to find skeletons is not high or they may have crumbled, making it difficult to verify DNA, a complete set of remains discovered outside the grave is the 'witness' that tells what What happened in the past.

The project began almost a decade ago with the aim of clarifying the true fate of 57 workers from Ireland who participated in the construction of Philadelphia and Columbia railroads.

The inscription on a stone monument east of the city of Whiteland recorded that immigrants died of diphtheria in 1834. However, according to some final information left by Watson's grandfather - who had working for the railway industry at the time after the Irish group's death - they died two years earlier. The cause is cholera.

But, it is worth noting that not all of them suffer from this disease. So what leads to the deaths of people who are not sick?

Death from being killed

The hypothesis is that while cholera kills many workers, the remaining victims may have been killed by Irish fighters, or perhaps due to fear if the disease spread.

Frank and Bill Watson worked with experts in the fields of anthropology, forensics and geophysics. The team began their search in a small valley.

In 1832, the railway construction site was located about 20 miles west of Philadelphia. More than a century later, in March 2009, scientists found a human shin bone. For the next two years, six other skeletons excavated along with the seventh set were destroyed, making Watson speculate that they were killed by guards when they found out they were sick and trying to leave the camp.

Anthropologist Janet Monge from the University of Pennsylvania also found evidence of a violent part of the injured skull and seemed to be a bullet wound.

Researchers are conducting surveys in the area near the mass grave.

According to the report, initially, the victims were buried separately in each coffin. But later, the rest of the deaths due to illness or violence were 'thrown' into a mass grave near the railway.

The location of the grave is very difficult. The radar system searching for land below the stone monument could not bring any results.

Recently, geophysicist Tim Bechtel with more sophisticated and modern techniques has discovered the remains of the remains capable of being near the monument but 9m deeper than the ground. Here another problem arises because if excavating will greatly affect the railway line, it is not possible to dig this area. However, Frank Watson was not disappointed because the most important thing was that history was no longer buried and licked.

With a small amount of artifacts, the team identified the identity of an 18-year-old victim named John Ruddy, based on bone size and a list of passengers traveling from Ireland to Philadelphia for 4 months. before they die.

Dennis Downey - Professor of Millersville University shared this discovery providing insight into attitudes towards immigrants in the 19th century in the United States.

In a new statement, Irish Ambassador Michael Collins in the US said he was impressed with the immigrant's story 'coming here with optimism and hope and dying in secret and tragedy'.

'Their stories need to be told. Many workers from Ireland contributed to the construction of the United States but they did not have a comfortable, easy life, " Collins added.