Re: Cemetery Remains
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In reply to:
Cemetery Remains
William Thoendel 7/05/07
Hi Bill,
In the Czech Republic, it is comon practice to keep re-using graves due to lack of space in cemeteries. If you have a family plot, usually 2 graves side x side, you bury all following deceased one on top of the other alternating. They don't use caskets as we do, nor do they usually embalm. Its kind of like put in the body (in a cardboard coffin) and throw some lye in there and hope that when the next 2 people die, there will be time to put another on top.
So, chances are your family's remains are still in the plot where they were interred. When a family dies out and there are no more members, the graves usually will be assigned to another family. In your case, after the war, German families were removed, left, died out, so the graves took on an "abandoned" status. As for the stones, this is not unusual for cemeteries when the people interred were not to be "remembered".
If you know where the plot was, assume they are in there with a host of others. A for the stone, get a photo of it at least, make a rubbing. You could ask if they could not use it as a building block, but chances are you would have to supply a new prop.
Paul Valasek