Funeral directors in Delaware struggled 35 years ago to quickly bury and cremate the remains of more than 900 people who died in Jonestown, Guyana, but officials have discovered that not all were brought to a final resting place, The Associated Press reported.
Many of the 900 people who died as a result of the 1978 murder-suicide were followers of the Peoples Temple, and had imbibed cyanide-laced punch prior to the event.
Officials revealed Thursday that the cremated remains of nine Jonestown victims were discovered in a decrepit, now-shuttered funeral home in Dover.
But the discovery has reopened wounds.
While hundreds of decomposing bodies were brought from Jonestown to the Dover Air Force Base military mortuary in 1978, some were buried in a mass California grave, while others were never claimed or identified.
"All the survivors in touch with me are traumatized because that door had been closed," Jonestown survivor and now retired teacher, Laura Johnston Kohl, told AP.
Referring to the California mass grave, Kohl said, "Whatever journey the ashes took in the U.S. is secondary. The first issue is how do we settle it to make sure the ashes are where they belong ... at Evergreen where everybody is."
A California man says he is glad to finally claim his wife's remains,The Associated Press reported.
Twenty-eight-year-old Maud Ester Perkins' remains were among the ones found in the abandoned funeral home.
Her husband, 64-year-old Ray Perkins told AP on Friday that he had been unable to determine what happened to his wife's remains until Delaware officials contacted him a day before.
Hundreds of children, along with a U.S. congressman died at Jonestown; 911 decomposing bodies were brought to Dover Air Force Base, which is home to the U.S. military's largest mortuary.
The military asked almost half a dozen local funeral homes to help the families make arrangements as the victims were identified.
But the Delaware Division of Forensic Science said Thursday that the ashes of nine victims were found last week neatly packaged and clearly marked with the names of the deceased and the place of their death on accompanying death certificates. No names were publicly released because relatives hadn't been notified, according to AP.
"It's just so sad, for me as a survivor," said Yulanda Williams, now a 58-year-old San Francisco Police Department sergeant. Williams spent a decade with the People's Temple and was in Jonestown for three months. Fortunately, she left with her 8-month-old daughter before the massacre.
"You constantly wind up finding yourself trying to heal but having your wounds opened up again when new information is given," Williams said.
Funeral director William Torbert Sr., 79, said, "We would do what they wanted, either cremation or send the bodies back home. Most of them were sent back home."
But funeral directors say it isn't uncommon for family members to never retrieve cremated remains.
The Jonestown remains were found at what used to be Minus Funeral Home after a bank, the property's current owner called, according to Dover police and public records. Also found were 24 other containers of marked, identified remains, and five containers of unidentified remains, Kimberly Chandler, spokeswoman for the Delaware Division of Forensic Science, said.
The dilapidated former funeral homw had a padlock on the double front doors, while a floral design was still etched in glass panes at the entrance. AP said dead vines hung from the building's white plaster walls and blue tape held together cracked windows.
Jim Jones ran the Peoples Temple in San Francisco in the early 1970's. He emerged as a political force after founding a free health clinic and drug rehabilitation program. But Jones moved the settlement to Guyana, the only English-speaking country in South America, after allegations of wrongdoing mounted. Hundreds of followers went.
On a remote jungle airstrip on Nov. 18, 1978, gunmen from the group ambushed and killed U.S. Rep. Leo Ryan of California, three newsmen and a defector from the group, all of whom had been visiting Jonestown on a fact-finding mission to investigate reports of abuses of members.
Jones planned a ritual mass murder and suicide at the group's agricultural commune, ordering followers to drink cyanide-laced grape punch. Most did, although survivors described people being shot, injected with poison, or forced to drink the poisoned beverage when they resisted.
Many of the bodies decomposed and couldn't be identified, AP stated. Additionally, several cemeteries refused to take them until Evergreen Cemetery in Oakland, Calif., agreed to accept 409 bodies in 1979.
The remaining victims were cremated or buried in in family cemeteries throughout several months after the massacre.
As for Perkins, he says he plans to put his wife's ashes on his mantle.
