New York City buries its poor on an island off the Bronx. About 1m people lie there, in all
sleeps there had a dollar to their name in life…the bodies interred here are as utterly forgotten and wiped away as if they never existed.” This is how thedescribed Hart Island in 1874, five years after the city began burying its poor on the island off the Bronx. A century and a half later the poor and unclaimed are still buried in pine coffins, usually marked only with numbers, not names. These are stacked three deep in a trench, three feet below the surface.
Jurisdictions across America are wrestling with what to do with their unclaimed dead. A state fund in West Virginia, which has been hit hard by opioid overdoses, ran out of money to bury the unclaimed dead last year. Some cities, including Los Angeles, cremate the unclaimed after a certain period, which is cheaper than burial. In North Carolina unclaimed bodies are cremated, then stored for three years before being scattered at sea.
The island, which has a stark beauty, is under the jurisdiction of the city’s Department of Corrections. Four days a week eight inmates from Rikers, New York’s biggest jail, travel to the island to dig graves and lower coffins into them. They are paid a $1 an hour. Because of Hart Island’s close connection with jail and prisoners, it is difficult for relatives to visit. “It is clear to me we can do better, much better for the people buried on Hart Island,” says Corey Johnson, the Speaker of the city council. “This needs to be changed immediately.” He is backing a bill that would transfer operations to the Parks Department, create an office to help those who need help with a burial and make travel to the island easier.
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