Hospital to stop digging up ‘holy ground’
Descendants of the thousands buried in 1800s cemetery want a memorial
SAN ANTONIO — A month after setting off controversy by unearthing the remains of about 70 people in a 200-year-old cemetery beneath the Children’s Hospital of San Antonio downtown, Christus Santa Rosa Health System has told descendants of those buried there that it will redesign a landscaping project so as not to disturb the graves.
Native American, Mexican, Tejano and Canary Island residents were laid to rest between 1808 and 1860 in the Catholic cemetery now under the hospital. After consulting with descendant groups, the hospital system, run by the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, sent them an email Wednesday saying it will not restart its removal of the remains and has ordered a redesign of a planned prayer garden on the site. Some remains relocated
Some of the remains had been relocated to the University of Texas at San Antonio’s Center for Archaeological Research. Trenches dug by UTSA archaeologists “have been covered with a layer of light sand,” the email said.
In an email Friday, hospital spokeswoman Melissa C. Krause confirmed the goals outlined to descendants, including the hospital’s intention to go back to state district court to undo what it first sought: have the hospital grounds no longer designated a cemetery.
Instead, it will ask a judge to preserve the cemetery designation, a central goal of the descendants. Without it, state law would have required the remains be reinterred in a perpetual care cemetery on the North Side. Descendants found that unacceptable.
“Our desire is an amicable resolution wherein we are able to provide a muchneeded prayer garden and play area for the children while respecting the wishes of the descendant groups. It’s a process we are collectively working through,” Krause wrote.
Archaeologists have unearthed bone fragments belonging to an estimated 70 people. Documents in the Archdiocese of San Antonio archives suggest that the cemetery might have held several thousand people. Cautious optimism
Representatives of descendants and other interested parties expressed surprise, pleasure and cautious optimism at the hospital’s reversal and said it reflected an understanding of their concerns and criticisms.
Reinterring remains back to the site is “definitely something we went in there asking for,” said Ramon Vasquez of the American Indians in Texas at the Spanish Colonial Missions, a nonprofit agency of the Tap Pilam Coahuiltecan Nation. “I’m pleased with it so far and with their communication.”
“We don’t have a lot of details,” said Mari Tamez, president of the Canary Islanders Descendants Association, who sounded more cautious. “But from what we hear right now, it does seem promising.”
Tamez and Vasquez said they want the redesigned prayer garden to include a recognition that the cemetery lies below.
“There are so many people buried in the campo santo,” Tamez said, using Spanish for holy ground. “They are there. We know they are there.”
Vasquez said he’d like to see the hospital erect a monument to the entire cemetery, not just the 70 remains that were found.
“We’re talking about at least 3,000 burial sites,” he said. “We want the hospital to at least recognize it as holy ground, as sacred ground.”
Anthony Delgado, whose ancestors were among the first buried in the cemetery, worries that more of the city’s history will be bulldozed over or remain unrecognized. He cited the redevelopment of Alamo Plaza, where many Native American residents of Mission San Antonio de Valero, or the Alamo, were buried.
Delgado said he hopes other entities learn from the hospital’s experience, “if nothing else that (those) that have development plans downtown recognize the area they occupy is historical whether or not the city, county or state has designated it.”