UK UK - West Midlands, Human remains found near a Land Rover factory, Nov'20

[Susikatze]

It is likely bones from a forgotten burial that were dug up or surfaced through agriculture or landscaping activity. Happens all the time.

 

[ChatteringBirds]

I feel for Patrick and David's relatives, going through this.

 

[pokerowan]

134-208 years! If anyone finds out how they arrived at such specific dates, please post it here as I'd love to know.

Brownie points for anyone who can find a list of missing people from the 1800's

Oh! I actually know the answer to this!

Radiocarbon dating gets a bit fuzzy around the 1950s, due to all the carbon being released into the atmosphere from nuclear testing. But it's remarkably accurate before that point. So from around 1950-1963, during nuclear testing periods, it becomes nearly impossible to get an accurate radiocarbon date. Hence the upper and lower bounds on the years - that extra range of around 70 years is to account for the point when the waters are muddied. Hope this helps!

 

[iulia]

Mystery as 16 bodies dug up near Jaguar Land Rover factory

It is believed the remains were found near the Jaguar Land Rover plant in Solihull, West Midlands, in November last year and since then, police have been trying to work out their origins.

But despite a large investigation, West Midlands Constabulary and archaeologists were unable to identify the people - except one woman, understood to have been called 'Sarah'.

[...]

George Cutler, who owns the funeral firm, said: "There were no identifiers among the remains apart from part of a headstone. However the parts that we would normally need to ID the remains like the surname and the dates weren't there.

"We could see that it said 'Sarah, the wife of' so we based our searches on that and started looking at survey maps, however there was never a cemetery in the spot where they were found. It was a bit of a mystery."

A carbon dating test concluded the bones belonged to people who died some time between the 18th and 20th centuries. The coffin handles were then dated back to the 1800s.

Using ancestry, old survey maps and details on headstones in the area, researchers surmised the people had originally been buried in the nearby Elmdon Churchyard - although questions remain as to why they ended up so far away from their intended resting place.

[...]

The team retraced the bloodline of 'Sarah', the woman whose headstone was found among the remains, but discovered her only daughter had died.

The other 15 people could not be identified.

 

[Thelastleg]

Mystery as 16 bodies dug up near Jaguar Land Rover factory

It is believed the remains were found near the Jaguar Land Rover plant in Solihull, West Midlands, in November last year and since then, police have been trying to work out their origins.

But despite a large investigation, West Midlands Constabulary and archaeologists were unable to identify the people - except one woman, understood to have been called 'Sarah'.

[...]

George Cutler, who owns the funeral firm, said: "There were no identifiers among the remains apart from part of a headstone. However the parts that we would normally need to ID the remains like the surname and the dates weren't there.

"We could see that it said 'Sarah, the wife of' so we based our searches on that and started looking at survey maps, however there was never a cemetery in the spot where they were found. It was a bit of a mystery."

A carbon dating test concluded the bones belonged to people who died some time between the 18th and 20th centuries. The coffin handles were then dated back to the 1800s.

Using ancestry, old survey maps and details on headstones in the area, researchers surmised the people had originally been buried in the nearby Elmdon Churchyard - although questions remain as to why they ended up so far away from their intended resting place.

[...]

The team retraced the bloodline of 'Sarah', the woman whose headstone was found among the remains, but discovered her only daughter had died.

The other 15 people could not be identified.

Thank you for posting this. I found it very sad that these bodies had been disrespected but all credit to the funeral directors for giving them the burial they deserved.