May 11, 2025 • 44 mins
In 1989, construction crews in Augusta,GA made an unnerving discovery. Under an iconic building once used as an institution of higher learning were the remains of possibly hundreds of human beings. It wasn't the hiding place for a serial killer, nor a mass grave. So how and why were the bones found there?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
For over three hundred and fifty years, the state of
South Carolina has been the setting for some of the
most horrendous crimes ever committed. Some have gained global notoriety,
some have been forgotten, and others have been swept under
the rug completely. Now, two South Carolina natives and true
(00:25):
crime enthusiasts have teamed up to examine these heinous acts
in detail, giving their perspective of the evil that has
resided in the Palmetto State. You're listening to Carolina Crimes.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
And welcome back to Carolina Crimes, episode two twenty one.
We're over the moon thrill that you joined us here
for this Mother's Day episode. I'm one of your hosts,
Matt Hyres, and we actually have a guest in studio
to help us. We thought it would be fitting today
(01:03):
my mom, Paula.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
Hello there, podcast World. We're over the moon to be
here with that today.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
Yes, and we've had a nice Mother's Day, a nice
lunch and Danielle she's not on administrative leave. She's spending
time with her mom. Yesterday was her grandmother, Marie McGinnis.
Is a milestone birthday for her. But we wanted to
start out just by saying Happy Mother's Day to all
(01:34):
the mom's, the grandmother's, the stepmothers, the special ladies in
our lives. My wife Ashley, of course, my mom, Paula
Meyer's here, she's also Danielle's mother in law, and my stepmother,
Bonnie Hires, Kathleen McGinnis, Danielle's mom, and of course Miss Marie,
(01:56):
her grandmother's celebrating that birthday. But to all the moms
out there, you are so appreciated, you are so loved,
and we wish you the best day. Here from Carolina Crimes,
thank you so much.
Speaker 3 (02:09):
Yes, Happy Mother's Day to all.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Yes, and mom, we appreciate you being here. I think
this is a first. I don't know, this is the
first Mom's Son podcast I think I've heard, but let's
make it a good one. I appreciate you accepting.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
The invite, and maybe I'll be invited back. We'll see.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
You're on probationary status, so maybe maybe.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
Well I just had a visit with your step brother
and your brother in law and they told me they
gave me some pointers. How about that?
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Good? Good? Well, this week's episode is unique, not only
because of our co host, but this story now normally
as you all know, at the beginning of the story
or we talk about the setting of the of the crime,
of the situation that we're going to be in. But
we are going to hop around a lot today, both
(03:05):
in setting, in states, in time periods a lot, So
you're gonna have to bear with me. But this is
a remarkably wild story and it's incredibly macabre as well,
But nonetheless, this is a this is an interesting story.
When I ran across at I said, this is something
(03:27):
we gotta cover. So before we jump into that, just
our normal typical housekeeping that we're gonna do. If you're
not already following us on social media, check us out
over on Facebook at Carolina Crimes Podcast, also over on
Twitter at sc Crimespod. And also if you're looking to
support the show and you're listening on Apple iTunes or
(03:49):
Apple Podcast, check us out or on Spotify as well.
Throw us five star review, mash that purple subscribe button,
and tell us a little bit about something you like
about the show. Also, if you're looking to support the
show and get some sweet summer swag and some Carolina
Crimes paraphernalia for your back, check us out over at
(04:09):
Carolina crimestore dot com. So let's jump into this one.
It's episode two twenty one, and our story is going
to start off today in nineteen eighty nine. It's right
across the Savannah River in Augusta, Georgia at five ninety
(04:31):
eight Tailfair Street in Augusta. Now at that address stands
a large, two story Greek Revival stone building, complete with
the large pillars out front. It's a beautiful building, very
reminiscent of something you would see in Washington, DC, like
(04:51):
a federal agency or kind of in the I guess
kind of in the same family is like the Supreme
Court Building. Huge. It's a brick building but covered with stucco.
So if that gives you a little mental picture, we'll
put a picture of the building actually on our social media.
(05:11):
But in the summer of nineteen eighty nine, this building
was undergoing a facelift. It was getting a much needed upfit.
Renovations and construction crews were all over this massive structure
just trying to bring it back to life. It had
been used by several civic organizations, the Augusta Women's Garden Club.
(05:37):
They even had meetings there. I think a private academy,
a school held part of this building for a little while,
but it was originally built back in eighteen thirty five.
So the structure of this building was very sound. It
was a nice building. It had been around for quite
a while, well over one hundred years at this point.
(05:57):
So the construction crews they made their way down to
the basement of this building and they began to remove
the floor. There was a portion of the floor there
in the cellar that was earthen And they reached this
point and they suddenly had to stop excavation. One of
the diggers found what was obviously a human bone, a
(06:23):
curious find, indeed, But after more digging, several more human
remains started to turn up. And that's when they said, whoa, whoa,
whoa time out. We got to stop here, and they
thought it was best to call the corner and I
would have to. Well. When the corner arrived, it was
plain to see what was really at play here. It
(06:47):
wasn't a mass grave or the work of some prolific
serial killer that they didn't even know about. You see,
the building at five ninety eight Tailfair Street had been
the home of the Medical College of Georgia between eighteen
thirty five and nineteen thirteen. And the bones that were
(07:08):
found there were actually specimens for.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
Education, so they wasn't a skeleton, they were just different bones.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
Yes, bones, and in fact, there was over ninety eight
hundred bones jez Louise that were found there on site.
Now you think about it, in the human body, there's
two hundred and six bones, so at the very least
this was forty eight human beings. But when all was
(07:40):
said and done, they thought it to be over four
hundred and fifty individual bodies.
Speaker 3 (07:46):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Now many of the bones showed signs of dissection and
they were proven to be well over one hundred years old.
And I say signs of dissection and what I mean
by that or cuts, scrapes, brakes that were they were
very similar to you know, something had been done to
(08:10):
remove the flesh from the bones post mortem, yes, post mortem,
we hope no, but post mortem wounds or cuts. They
were able to see where the lacerations were done with
instruments instead of some kind of blunt force injury to
(08:32):
the bone, so they were able to discern that these
were dissected and not just thereby happenstance or by at
the result of a crime. So both the coroner's office
and they got an anthropologist from the University of Georgia,
they got actually students involved. They came and they were
(08:53):
able to determine that the found remains were from specimen
cadavers studied by some of the earliest medical students in
the South. But the question remained, why so many You know,
this was not a massive building, it wasn't a massive undertaking.
(09:16):
Not a lot of people made it to medical school
or would go to medical school, they would learn a
trade between the time that this was open, between eighteen
thirty five and nineteen thirteen, and this was just an
inordinate amount of human remains that they were finding an
unearthing down below this building. And another question that came
(09:36):
up was how did they get there? Now, who was
transporting these, who was putting them down here? And why
did they leave all these behind and especially down in
the floor under the floor of the basement. Well, now
here's going to come our first time. Jump mom, bear
with me. Here. We're going to go back to eighteen
(09:59):
fifty two when this building was operating as the Georgia
Medical College, and there was a seven member faculty, and
in eighteen fifty two. They were faced with a dilemma.
They were in desperate need of cadavers for their students
(10:20):
to study anatomy. I remember, I think the I think
the biggest thing I ever dissected was a was a cat.
In college. We did a pig, You did a pig.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
Pig we shared it, though.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
Yeah, well no, we had our own cats.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
We had to share that.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
But we never got to the medical I guess the
medical level of cadavers. Thank god, I would have fell
all over the floor. But the medical school needed these
bodies for the students to study. But the one thing
standing in the way, they're in Georgia of them getting
(10:57):
these bodies was a law. Aw it hindered them. It
said that a human dissection was illegal in the state
of Georgia. But the school had kind of skirted around
the law a little bit. They said, Okay, in the
name of science, you can obtain corpses of executed inmates
(11:20):
or in the very rare case, and I think this
was considered almost sacrilegious back then, was to donate your
body that science. Yeah, so they were Cadavers were few
and far between. You really didn't know the schedule of
the court, you could kind of maybe look at the
schedules of executions to see when you were going to
(11:40):
get some bodies in. But really they were at a strong.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Need because you didn't have refrigeration. Then yeah you had
when you got that cadiver, you had to get yeah,
get the work on it right.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
And that's actually going to come into play here that
the school they're in such need. They even purchased close
to one hundred cadavers at one point from the state
of New York. But I said, the archaic ways to
store the bodies, like you just said, it forced the
(12:19):
students to have to act quickly, and they were actually
shipped from from New York in barrels of whiskey to
try to preserve. Seemed like a waste, but yes, So
that's when this seven member faculty of the Medical College
(12:40):
of Georgia, they they hatched a plan. The seven men,
they pulled their money together and they took a trip
to Charleston, South Carolina. And now we're going to talk
about We've mentioned it several times on this show, and
it is it's a black eye on the history of
(13:01):
our state, the history of our nation. And that's the
institution of slavery. The seven member faculty. They went to
Charleston and their intention was to buy a slave. So
looking at this, this is a little side note for everybody.
If you're not familiar with our state, or with Charleston,
(13:21):
or have never been a lot of people have the
misconception that slaves were sold at the city market. They're
on Meeting Street. That's the one where the ladies with
the sweet grass baskets that you buy all the time,
and the crafts and everything. That was not the slave market.
And I've even heard it referred to when I was
(13:43):
down at the City of people say, oh done, there
are wild wings, you know, across from the slave market.
And I was like that, that's not what that is.
In fact, slaves were sold by the old Exchange building
where they have the dungeon on tour and there it's
at the corner of Broad Street and East Bay Street,
(14:04):
so there was a little open spot right beside there.
That's where a lot of this trading went down, a
little down further closer to the battery, not the city market.
So we always have some history. That's our history here. Well,
the men they ended up attending a public auction and
(14:28):
as disgusting as this sounds. One of the men caught
their eye. He was a large, very tall man, large framed,
gulla man that they suspected he was from West Africa.
Now I've read that he grew up on or was
born on a sea island plantation. Also one source said
(14:50):
that he came from Arkansas, but the majority of sources
that we read said he was originally born in West
Africa and transported to the United States. And this man,
he was huge, This was who they coveted. Well, the
man's name was Grandison Harris, and he was thirty six
(15:12):
years old, and he was known to have a wife
who was actually pregnant at the time of his sale,
and a son named George. Now the faculty from the
medical college they were successful in their bid, and that
it cost them seven hundred dollars to purchase a human being.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
So go ahead, did his wife and son? Were they
able to accompany him?
Speaker 2 (15:41):
No, he was separated from his family. As I mean,
that was the status quo. They slave traders gave no
consideration whatsoever to familial status or who you had in
your family, wife, children, whatever, But you were going to
serve their purpose. And they purchased him, and they took
(16:06):
Grandison back west across the Savannah River to the College
on Telfair Street. And right now we're going to take
our first break, and when we come back, we're going
to continue this macabre tale from across the river over
in Georgia involving the South Carolina balt slave Grandison Harris.
(16:29):
Folks will be right back after this quick word from
our sponsors, and welcome back to Carolina Crow, episode two
(17:01):
twenty one. Me and my mom here on Mother's Day
of bringing you this hello, making her debut, but we
appreciate you being here, and we're going to continue on
with this story we were talking about in the story
of Grandison Harris, the man that was purchased as a
slave by the seven member faculty of the Medical College
(17:24):
of Georgia and brought back to the Medical College. And
we'd already we'd already gone over that they were in
very desperate need of cadavers. But once they returned to
Georgia with Grandison, this story is going to take a twist.
(17:45):
It's not what you think. They're not going to kill
this man. That they spent what was in an exorbitant
amount of money seven hundred dollars is on. They're actually
going to put him to work. Now, he of course,
he was not subject to dissection himself, but instead the
(18:07):
men there at the college taught him to read, write,
and they taught him a little bit about anatomy to
some degree, all of which were considered highly illegal in
this time period. Well, they were surprised Grandison proved to
be an extremely intelligent individual. He would start picking up
(18:32):
on these skills. He picked up reading very quickly. He
was able to write things out, write notes for the
professors there, and he was a very fast learner, I
mean almost a savant they said. He was described almost
to have a photographic memory as well. So this was
(18:55):
very very surprising to these newly minted slaves owners and
the education of Grandison. It wasn't out of goodwill, and
it wasn't as benevolent as it seemed. So while his
job at the college was described as a janitor and
(19:18):
a porter, he was taught to read in order to
peruse the local obituaries and death notices. Now, Grandison's status
as a slave protected him somewhat from arrest, and it
(19:39):
also kind of put the faculty of the Georgia Military
College one step away if he were to commit a crime,
So he was somewhat protected if he was doing his
duty to I hate using the word master, but to
these men that had perched him to put him to work.
(20:02):
So Grandison, that status protected him and it worked perfectly
for the faculty's plan of what they had in mind
for him. His duties were unofficially changed to procure fresh
cadavers from the college through robbing graves whoa Now, grave
(20:28):
robbery was something that was very prevalent in Europe with
the medical schools over there. You're talking about Oxford, several
of the pop ups there in England as well. It
even got so bad in England that undertakers started building
cages almost like nowadays vaults to put around caskets to
(20:53):
prevent grave robbers from going in. Now, over there, they
would take the cadavers, but they would also take whatever
jewelry or gold teeth or anything they had in their
possession as well, and they were referred to in England
as body snatchers or resurrection men is what they called them. Now,
(21:14):
we were briefly discussing this over lunch today and you
said something about mentioned the grave robbery stuff and you
said something Mom about something in Ohio or something they
fashioned up to prevent this.
Speaker 3 (21:29):
In Ohio, this funeral home, they decided that they would
try to patent this and it was they called it
the torpedo. And if the grave snatcher came and opened
that casket, they had a shotgun in there and it
and it just well it went off. Well that didn't
(21:52):
really deter that many of the grave snatchers, but they
never got a patent on it, and so it just
kind of went away. But if you Google put that
in your Google machine, and they do have, you know,
the torpedo for the grave snatchers, and it was in
(22:12):
Ohio and they really had a problem up there.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
Wow. To start with, well, I'm sure it was something
similar to this where there's probably laws against the dissection
and procurement of cadavers. So this was what Grandison was
tasked with. And he would go across state lines into
South Carolina, but mostly his favorite hunting ground. It was
(22:39):
very convenient. Right there in Augusta was Cedar Grove Cemetery
now Cedar Grove. It was an African American cemetery which
proved advantageous to Grandison, because no one would really bad
an eye about this large African American man visiting an
(23:04):
all black cemetery. You know, maybe he was going to
visit a loved one. No one really associated with him
thought he might. You know, he was enslaved. Maybe he
was going to put flowers on a grave. You know. Okay,
black guy in a black cemetery. That's not gonna Bideenne and.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
The black cemeteries might have been in more remote locations, yes,
than the others.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
Yes, And some of the ones actually here in rock
Hill I've learned about, they were in more secluded areas.
They were off the beaten path. They weren't as celebrated
as the one writing downtown rock Hill with a big
wrought iron fences around it. They were more in wooded areas.
(23:51):
It was, unfortunately, all that those folks could afford at
that time and also kept them safe. Now around this
time we're talking eighteen fifty two. Of course, African Americans,
they were marginalized. You know, once they were in the ground. Okay,
they're in the ground, the white community really didn't care
(24:13):
much about them. Now the technique this is interesting that
Grandison used to get these cadavers was very interesting. It
was brains and brawn, because remember he was huge. He
(24:35):
would read the death notices or here through the grapevine
about an African American that could have died, a slave
at a nearby plantation, or that was working accidents, old age,
what have you. But he would find out about who
had died and if they were being buried, where they
were buried. After the funeral, he would go out out
(25:00):
and find that fresh grave with the freshly turned dirt.
And what he would do would he would dig near
the head of the grave where the headstone normally would be,
and open that end of the grave up. He would
have to move everything out of the way that was
left there. And the vast majority of these, I mean
(25:22):
ninety nine percent were pine coffins. They referred to him
as toothpick boxes, so just barely even a box something
that someone would put together, so they were very easy
to smash with his axe. He would smash the top
of the top portion of the casket open, and I'm
(25:43):
not talking about the lid per se, it is a
portion of lid. But up near the head was where
he would open these things out. He would stick his
arms down into the grave and drag the bodies out
by their shoulders. Wow, he's got strike, he's got strength.
I mean he's just pulling. I mean not saying this,
(26:06):
not trying to make a pun, but just dead weight.
He was pulling down and up out of the ground.
At this point, he would put the bodies then into
bags and put them in his wagon. And here's another
point where his intelligence came into play. He would cover
the grave back up like it had been undisturbed, and
(26:30):
he would his memory. He was able to, like I said,
he almost had a photographic memory. He was able to
place the flowers and all the little the trinkets or
tokens that were left on the grave. He was able
to place them exactly back where they were, so it
looked like nothing had ever happened. So the next morning,
the cemetery taker or whoever took care of the cemeteries
(26:52):
would come out and not think anything of it. You know,
all right, the grave's still here. Well, Grandison began to
get a a reputation around the African American community. He
was starting to be suspected of doing this. They kind
(27:13):
of feared him. Plus the rumors that you know, he
this guy's a slave, but he doesn't do hard work.
We never see him doing that. He's just over at
the college with these seven white guys, and you know
they were they were kind of jealous. Jealousy played a
(27:34):
role because they were like, you know, he's got freedom
to kind of go around town in that wagon, and yeah,
we really don't see him doing backbreaking labor, and nobody's
ever admonishing him, you know, what's the deal with this
huge guy. Well, also the students at the medical college
at Georgia, they called on to what Harris was doing
(27:57):
as well. And I don't want to say this is funny,
it's kind of some macabre levity here, but one night
after Grandison, Grandison was out Robin Graves, he was able
to steal a cadaver and when he finished his job
(28:17):
for the night, he already had the corpse. He had
put it in a bag, and he had a habit
of stopping by local taverns. He liked to enjoy a
like anybody after a hard day's work, he wanted to
have him a cold drink, so he would go in
and have a drink or two. Never any notes about
(28:38):
him getting intoxicated, but he enjoyed a drink, and he
would usually go to one of the local taverns that
allowed African Americans in now one night, he was doing
just that and some of the students they decided to
play a prank on him. While Grandison was inside the tavern,
the students went out to his wagon, removed the corpse
(29:01):
from the bag that it was in, and then one
of the students climbed in the bag himself. Oh my,
So when Grandison returned to the wagon, the students started
moving around and started moaning and wailing help, I'm cold,
and so a spook Grandison. He bolted off the wagon,
(29:24):
leaving everything there, only to return the next morning to
retrieve the body. So he ran off. Uhhh, he wouldn't
have any part of that.
Speaker 3 (29:32):
So they put the body back on the wagon.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
Yes, the body was somewhere in there, but I think
it was covered up in cloth or something. You can't
really ride around with a bag full of dead bodies.
But yeah, this student climbed inside and started moaning and
wailing help. So Grandison he bolted off, but came back
(29:55):
to get that the next morning, and his activity continued.
He I don't want to say worked, but he was
enslaved and his duties continued from eighteen fifty two to
eighteen sixty five, the end of the Civil War.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
Now, the Emancipation Proclamation was signed in January of eighteen
sixty three by the Thirteenth Amendment, officially abolishing slavery, wasn't
ratified until eighteen sixty five, and this finally gave Grandison
Harris his freedom. So he was finally deemed a freeman.
(30:39):
And this story is gonna keep going. It's not over yet,
far from over. We'll get to that when we get
on the other side of this break and this quick
word from our sponsors, folks will be right back and
(31:17):
welcome back to Carolina Crimes, Episode two twenty one. This
is Matt Hyres here along with my mom from Mother's Day.
Speaker 3 (31:24):
Alamier.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
Yes, but thank you for being here in this wild,
remarkable story from back in the eighteen fifties. I warned
y'all all up front this was going to be a
wild one, and it truly is. So when we left off,
the Civil War had ended, and after thirteen years being
(31:49):
property of the faculty of the Medical College of Georgia,
Grandison Harris was finally free. So after being freed from
slavery and his life of being forced to rob graves
sounds wild. Grandison Harris, he started to create quite the
(32:10):
remarkable life. Now, when he was freed, he was armed
with the one thing that nobody can ever take away
from that was an education, which the vast majority of
freedmen and African Americans at this point in time did
not have. So Grandison moved back across the Savannah River
(32:33):
to South Carolina, where he was actually reunited with his
wife and his son George. Wonderful, yes, now the Harrises.
They settled in a small town of Hamburg, South Carolina.
It was in Aiken County, which was originally part of
the Edgefield District over there.
Speaker 3 (32:54):
Now I knew Edgefield was coming in well.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Not too prominently, but now Hamburg initially prior to the
Civil War was a thriving town, but it had suffered
economically when the South Carolina Canal and Railroad Company extended
its line onto Augusta. So instead of Hamburg being a
primary stop there along the railroad where there were banks
(33:21):
that were built, a lot of commerce, you know, they
were just a stop now, just to blip on the map,
and everything ended up coming through Augusta, and in one
article that said Augusta siphoned commerce away from Hamburg, which
it really did, and a lot of people moved out.
So after the end of the Civil War, Hamburg was
(33:44):
repopulated with freedmen. Well. Once in Hamburg, Grandison Harris was
a well respected member of the community, alongside the likes
of Prince Rivers and Samuel Lee, who was the first
African American who was Speaker of the South Carolina House Representatives. Now,
(34:05):
this was of course much due to Grandison's education that
he received from his former owners at the medical College
at Georgia. Grandson Harris was so well thought of that
he was actually appointed the judge in Hamburg. It wasn't
(34:26):
clear that if he was a municipal judge or a magistrate,
but nevertheless, he became a judge there in Hamburg, and
he served in that position for almost ten years. And
he served in that capacity well until eighteen seventy six.
It was in July of eighteen seventy six that the
(34:49):
Hamburg massacre occurred, and we'll probably cover that in a
later episode, but give you a snapshot of what the
world was like in eighteen seventy six. The Reconstruction era
was coming to an end. And by that the re
instruction era was where the federal government and the United
(35:14):
States the Union. It set forth rules and procedures for
Southern states that they had to use and abide bye
to be re emitted back into the Union. Some of
these were that freedmen had the right to vote, and
that was something that the former Confederate soldiers of former
(35:37):
Friends of the Confederate Calls in South Carolina. They did
not like at all that freedmen would have the same
equal rights as they did and they couldn't stomach that.
So what they did was they started to use intimidation
tactics across the South. This is when you saw the
(35:58):
inception and the I guess the tarnished golden age of
the ku Klux Klan. They would force these people and
scare them to not vote. They began to exercise loopholes
in the laws for voting where they would require poll
(36:21):
taxes where you had to pay a certain amount to
be able to vote. They had poll tests where you
had to prove that you could read or write before
you were able to exercise your right to vote. And
basically this was the establishment of Jim Crow laws around
the South. Now, the Hamburg massacre that we mentioned it
(36:44):
was a series of bloody altercations carried out in the
summer of eighteen seventy six by Red Shirts. The Red Shirts,
we've mentioned them before in Carolina crimes. There were a
group of white men looking to regain control of the
state government and eradicate civil rights. So they wanted to
(37:07):
be able to control who voted. They wanted to take
a certain segment out of that voting population, and they
wanted to do that to kind of steer who ran
the state, and one of the candidates they liked the
most was Wade Hampton third. So in eighteen seventy six
(37:29):
there was a very contentious state campaign for governor, also
small house races around the state, and to suppress African
American voting, one hundred Red Shirts attacked the Hamburg National
Guard armory, which was guarded by thirty freed African Americans,
(37:49):
and they killed two black men. The next night they
went back and tortured and killed four more, with several
other men being wounded. Now this was around the time
Grandison Harris and his family they said, okay, we're going
to have enough of this, I know a place we
could probably go and we'd probably be welcomed back, and
(38:13):
I'd probably almost immediately have a job again. And that
was back in Augusta, Georgia. So Grandison and his family
returned and he went to work. Actually was on the
payroll of the Medical College of Georgia.
Speaker 1 (38:31):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (38:33):
His his pay was eight dollars a month to work there,
which in today's money was two hundred and forty six dollars.
Speaker 3 (38:46):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
But if you're not going to be a farmer a sharecropper,
have to answer to anybody. That's what Grandison had to do.
And so Grandison and his son George even went back
to robbing Graves for the school. They were labeled in
(39:08):
acquisitions was their job title. And a little footnote was
that George was not near as good as his dad
at Robin Graves.
Speaker 3 (39:20):
So he wasn't as big as his dad.
Speaker 2 (39:23):
Probably, yeah, Grandison, he was the man when it came
to Robin Graves, as odd as that sounds. So Grandison
not only was he going out at night and retrieving
these bodies for the college to use for free, but
he also became a teaching assistant. He had been around
(39:45):
long enough that he knew exactly what was going on
with these bodies. They're an anatomy. And the students actually
started referring to him, calling him judge. They had found
out about his profession in south care and they were
half serious, half ribbon him. They were backhandedly respectful. I
(40:07):
guess it would be the best way to put it. Well. Eventually, Grandison,
he retired from the Medical College in nineteen oh eight,
and he died in nineteen eleven at the age of
ninety five. Oh my goodness, So you're retired. Now, imagine
if you had to work what twenty two more years
(40:29):
and retire at the age of ninety two.
Speaker 3 (40:31):
I don't think so.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
Yeah, But for those three years he was retiring, I mean,
I'm kind of I'm looking at this, but uh, he
received a pension from the state of Georgia. So, I mean,
not many African Americans around that time I would be
willing to say had a pension, right. But he did
(40:54):
live to the age of ninety five, and all in all,
it speculated that Anderson Harris robbed over one thousand graves
in his life, making him the most prolific grave robber
in history.
Speaker 3 (41:10):
Going back to the start. How many bodies did they
say that they unearthed.
Speaker 2 (41:18):
They at the very minimum, I think it was forty eight,
and they said it was closer to four hundred and
fifty that.
Speaker 3 (41:24):
Out, okay, and he had on earthed a thousand.
Speaker 2 (41:29):
It was speculated. I mean, there was no real record.
They didn't keep a smoking gun, they didn't keep a
record of those.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
And ironically Grandison Harris was buried in the Cedar Grove
cemetery where he used to rob graves.
Speaker 3 (41:45):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 2 (41:47):
And there were great floods both in nineteen twenty six
and nineteen twenty nine that destroyed all the records of
Cedar Grove, So his final resting place is actually unknown,
so they don't know where he's at in there. And
even more ironically, after those bones were unearthed in nineteen
(42:08):
eighty nine, they were all buried back in Cedar Grove
as well, possibly with or next to the man that
had pulled them from the ground and displaced them for
over one hundred years. Wow. So that's the story of
the most prolific grave robber in the history of.
Speaker 3 (42:29):
South Carolina, of the world of the world.
Speaker 1 (42:32):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (42:33):
Yeah, So that's that's a macabre one for Mother's Day.
I have you on here, man. I didn't want to
do a gruesome one, nothing that would upset you or
anything like that, but that was a wild, remarkable tale
that needed to be told. Well, folks, we appreciate you
for joining us this week. Mom, thank you so much
(42:54):
for being here.
Speaker 3 (42:55):
Well, thank you for having me. This has been fun.
Speaker 2 (42:57):
Yes, and before we get just a quick word. If
you're not already following us on Facebook, you can check
us out at Carolina Crimes Podcast. Also over on Twitter
at sc crimes pod. Also, if you're looking to support
the show listening on Spotify, Apple iTunes, Apple Podcast, throw
us a five star review, mash that purple subscribe button,
and tell us a little something about yourself, about your animals,
(43:21):
your dogs. We'll have a lot of shout outs and
thank yous next week when Daniel returns. And also, if
you're looking, Mom wore her uniform today, she wore her
Carolina Crimes Podcast shirt, So if you're looking for some
sweet Carolina Crimes paraphernalia, head on over to Carolina Crimestore
dot com. We would greatly appreciate that as well. So
(43:42):
until next time, have a happy Mother's Day. We love
you all, Mom's special ladies, everybody out there that's cared
for us throughout our lives. Mom, I love you, Thank you.
Speaker 3 (43:53):
For being here, enjoyed it, thank you for having me.
Speaker 2 (43:56):
And until next time, We'll see you on Carolina Rhymes. Yeah,
For over three hundred and fifty years, the state of
South Carolina has been the setting for some of the
most horrendous crimes ever committed. Some have gained global notoriety,
some have been forgotten, and others have been swept under
the rug completely. Now, two South Carolina natives and true
(00:25):
crime enthusiasts have teamed up to examine these heinous acts
in detail, giving their perspective of the evil that has
resided in the Palmetto State. You're listening to Carolina Crimes.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
And welcome back to Carolina Crimes, episode two twenty one.
We're over the moon thrill that you joined us here
for this Mother's Day episode. I'm one of your hosts,
Matt Hyres, and we actually have a guest in studio
to help us. We thought it would be fitting today
(01:03):
my mom, Paula.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
Hello there, podcast World. We're over the moon to be
here with that today.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
Yes, and we've had a nice Mother's Day, a nice
lunch and Danielle she's not on administrative leave. She's spending
time with her mom. Yesterday was her grandmother, Marie McGinnis.
Is a milestone birthday for her. But we wanted to
start out just by saying Happy Mother's Day to all
(01:34):
the mom's, the grandmother's, the stepmothers, the special ladies in
our lives. My wife Ashley, of course, my mom, Paula
Meyer's here, she's also Danielle's mother in law, and my stepmother,
Bonnie Hires, Kathleen McGinnis, Danielle's mom, and of course Miss Marie,
(01:56):
her grandmother's celebrating that birthday. But to all the moms
out there, you are so appreciated, you are so loved,
and we wish you the best day. Here from Carolina Crimes,
thank you so much.
Speaker 3 (02:09):
Yes, Happy Mother's Day to all.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Yes, and mom, we appreciate you being here. I think
this is a first. I don't know, this is the
first Mom's Son podcast I think I've heard, but let's
make it a good one. I appreciate you accepting.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
The invite, and maybe I'll be invited back. We'll see.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
You're on probationary status, so maybe maybe.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
Well I just had a visit with your step brother
and your brother in law and they told me they
gave me some pointers. How about that?
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Good? Good? Well, this week's episode is unique, not only
because of our co host, but this story now normally
as you all know, at the beginning of the story
or we talk about the setting of the of the crime,
of the situation that we're going to be in. But
we are going to hop around a lot today, both
(03:05):
in setting, in states, in time periods a lot, So
you're gonna have to bear with me. But this is
a remarkably wild story and it's incredibly macabre as well,
But nonetheless, this is a this is an interesting story.
When I ran across at I said, this is something
(03:27):
we gotta cover. So before we jump into that, just
our normal typical housekeeping that we're gonna do. If you're
not already following us on social media, check us out
over on Facebook at Carolina Crimes Podcast, also over on
Twitter at sc Crimespod. And also if you're looking to
support the show and you're listening on Apple iTunes or
(03:49):
Apple Podcast, check us out or on Spotify as well.
Throw us five star review, mash that purple subscribe button,
and tell us a little bit about something you like
about the show. Also, if you're looking to support the
show and get some sweet summer swag and some Carolina
Crimes paraphernalia for your back, check us out over at
(04:09):
Carolina crimestore dot com. So let's jump into this one.
It's episode two twenty one, and our story is going
to start off today in nineteen eighty nine. It's right
across the Savannah River in Augusta, Georgia at five ninety
(04:31):
eight Tailfair Street in Augusta. Now at that address stands
a large, two story Greek Revival stone building, complete with
the large pillars out front. It's a beautiful building, very
reminiscent of something you would see in Washington, DC, like
(04:51):
a federal agency or kind of in the I guess
kind of in the same family is like the Supreme
Court Building. Huge. It's a brick building but covered with stucco.
So if that gives you a little mental picture, we'll
put a picture of the building actually on our social media.
(05:11):
But in the summer of nineteen eighty nine, this building
was undergoing a facelift. It was getting a much needed upfit.
Renovations and construction crews were all over this massive structure
just trying to bring it back to life. It had
been used by several civic organizations, the Augusta Women's Garden Club.
(05:37):
They even had meetings there. I think a private academy,
a school held part of this building for a little while,
but it was originally built back in eighteen thirty five.
So the structure of this building was very sound. It
was a nice building. It had been around for quite
a while, well over one hundred years at this point.
(05:57):
So the construction crews they made their way down to
the basement of this building and they began to remove
the floor. There was a portion of the floor there
in the cellar that was earthen And they reached this
point and they suddenly had to stop excavation. One of
the diggers found what was obviously a human bone, a
(06:23):
curious find, indeed, But after more digging, several more human
remains started to turn up. And that's when they said, whoa, whoa,
whoa time out. We got to stop here, and they
thought it was best to call the corner and I
would have to. Well. When the corner arrived, it was
plain to see what was really at play here. It
(06:47):
wasn't a mass grave or the work of some prolific
serial killer that they didn't even know about. You see,
the building at five ninety eight Tailfair Street had been
the home of the Medical College of Georgia between eighteen
thirty five and nineteen thirteen. And the bones that were
(07:08):
found there were actually specimens for.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
Education, so they wasn't a skeleton, they were just different bones.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
Yes, bones, and in fact, there was over ninety eight
hundred bones jez Louise that were found there on site.
Now you think about it, in the human body, there's
two hundred and six bones, so at the very least
this was forty eight human beings. But when all was
(07:40):
said and done, they thought it to be over four
hundred and fifty individual bodies.
Speaker 3 (07:46):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Now many of the bones showed signs of dissection and
they were proven to be well over one hundred years old.
And I say signs of dissection and what I mean
by that or cuts, scrapes, brakes that were they were
very similar to you know, something had been done to
(08:10):
remove the flesh from the bones post mortem, yes, post mortem,
we hope no, but post mortem wounds or cuts. They
were able to see where the lacerations were done with
instruments instead of some kind of blunt force injury to
(08:32):
the bone, so they were able to discern that these
were dissected and not just thereby happenstance or by at
the result of a crime. So both the coroner's office
and they got an anthropologist from the University of Georgia,
they got actually students involved. They came and they were
(08:53):
able to determine that the found remains were from specimen
cadavers studied by some of the earliest medical students in
the South. But the question remained, why so many You know,
this was not a massive building, it wasn't a massive undertaking.
(09:16):
Not a lot of people made it to medical school
or would go to medical school, they would learn a
trade between the time that this was open, between eighteen
thirty five and nineteen thirteen, and this was just an
inordinate amount of human remains that they were finding an
unearthing down below this building. And another question that came
(09:36):
up was how did they get there? Now, who was
transporting these, who was putting them down here? And why
did they leave all these behind and especially down in
the floor under the floor of the basement. Well, now
here's going to come our first time. Jump mom, bear
with me. Here. We're going to go back to eighteen
(09:59):
fifty two when this building was operating as the Georgia
Medical College, and there was a seven member faculty, and
in eighteen fifty two. They were faced with a dilemma.
They were in desperate need of cadavers for their students
(10:20):
to study anatomy. I remember, I think the I think
the biggest thing I ever dissected was a was a cat.
In college. We did a pig, You did a pig.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
Pig we shared it, though.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
Yeah, well no, we had our own cats.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
We had to share that.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
But we never got to the medical I guess the
medical level of cadavers. Thank god, I would have fell
all over the floor. But the medical school needed these
bodies for the students to study. But the one thing
standing in the way, they're in Georgia of them getting
(10:57):
these bodies was a law. Aw it hindered them. It
said that a human dissection was illegal in the state
of Georgia. But the school had kind of skirted around
the law a little bit. They said, Okay, in the
name of science, you can obtain corpses of executed inmates
(11:20):
or in the very rare case, and I think this
was considered almost sacrilegious back then, was to donate your
body that science. Yeah, so they were Cadavers were few
and far between. You really didn't know the schedule of
the court, you could kind of maybe look at the
schedules of executions to see when you were going to
(11:40):
get some bodies in. But really they were at a strong.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Need because you didn't have refrigeration. Then yeah you had
when you got that cadiver, you had to get yeah,
get the work on it right.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
And that's actually going to come into play here that
the school they're in such need. They even purchased close
to one hundred cadavers at one point from the state
of New York. But I said, the archaic ways to
store the bodies, like you just said, it forced the
(12:19):
students to have to act quickly, and they were actually
shipped from from New York in barrels of whiskey to
try to preserve. Seemed like a waste, but yes, So
that's when this seven member faculty of the Medical College
(12:40):
of Georgia, they they hatched a plan. The seven men,
they pulled their money together and they took a trip
to Charleston, South Carolina. And now we're going to talk
about We've mentioned it several times on this show, and
it is it's a black eye on the history of
(13:01):
our state, the history of our nation. And that's the
institution of slavery. The seven member faculty. They went to
Charleston and their intention was to buy a slave. So
looking at this, this is a little side note for everybody.
If you're not familiar with our state, or with Charleston,
(13:21):
or have never been a lot of people have the
misconception that slaves were sold at the city market. They're
on Meeting Street. That's the one where the ladies with
the sweet grass baskets that you buy all the time,
and the crafts and everything. That was not the slave market.
And I've even heard it referred to when I was
(13:43):
down at the City of people say, oh done, there
are wild wings, you know, across from the slave market.
And I was like that, that's not what that is.
In fact, slaves were sold by the old Exchange building
where they have the dungeon on tour and there it's
at the corner of Broad Street and East Bay Street,
(14:04):
so there was a little open spot right beside there.
That's where a lot of this trading went down, a
little down further closer to the battery, not the city market.
So we always have some history. That's our history here. Well,
the men they ended up attending a public auction and
(14:28):
as disgusting as this sounds. One of the men caught
their eye. He was a large, very tall man, large framed,
gulla man that they suspected he was from West Africa.
Now I've read that he grew up on or was
born on a sea island plantation. Also one source said
(14:50):
that he came from Arkansas, but the majority of sources
that we read said he was originally born in West
Africa and transported to the United States. And this man,
he was huge, This was who they coveted. Well, the
man's name was Grandison Harris, and he was thirty six
(15:12):
years old, and he was known to have a wife
who was actually pregnant at the time of his sale,
and a son named George. Now the faculty from the
medical college they were successful in their bid, and that
it cost them seven hundred dollars to purchase a human being.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
So go ahead, did his wife and son? Were they
able to accompany him?
Speaker 2 (15:41):
No, he was separated from his family. As I mean,
that was the status quo. They slave traders gave no
consideration whatsoever to familial status or who you had in
your family, wife, children, whatever, But you were going to
serve their purpose. And they purchased him, and they took
(16:06):
Grandison back west across the Savannah River to the College
on Telfair Street. And right now we're going to take
our first break, and when we come back, we're going
to continue this macabre tale from across the river over
in Georgia involving the South Carolina balt slave Grandison Harris.
(16:29):
Folks will be right back after this quick word from
our sponsors, and welcome back to Carolina Crow, episode two
(17:01):
twenty one. Me and my mom here on Mother's Day
of bringing you this hello, making her debut, but we
appreciate you being here, and we're going to continue on
with this story we were talking about in the story
of Grandison Harris, the man that was purchased as a
slave by the seven member faculty of the Medical College
(17:24):
of Georgia and brought back to the Medical College. And
we'd already we'd already gone over that they were in
very desperate need of cadavers. But once they returned to
Georgia with Grandison, this story is going to take a twist.
(17:45):
It's not what you think. They're not going to kill
this man. That they spent what was in an exorbitant
amount of money seven hundred dollars is on. They're actually
going to put him to work. Now, he of course,
he was not subject to dissection himself, but instead the
(18:07):
men there at the college taught him to read, write,
and they taught him a little bit about anatomy to
some degree, all of which were considered highly illegal in
this time period. Well, they were surprised Grandison proved to
be an extremely intelligent individual. He would start picking up
(18:32):
on these skills. He picked up reading very quickly. He
was able to write things out, write notes for the
professors there, and he was a very fast learner, I
mean almost a savant they said. He was described almost
to have a photographic memory as well. So this was
(18:55):
very very surprising to these newly minted slaves owners and
the education of Grandison. It wasn't out of goodwill, and
it wasn't as benevolent as it seemed. So while his
job at the college was described as a janitor and
(19:18):
a porter, he was taught to read in order to
peruse the local obituaries and death notices. Now, Grandison's status
as a slave protected him somewhat from arrest, and it
(19:39):
also kind of put the faculty of the Georgia Military
College one step away if he were to commit a crime,
So he was somewhat protected if he was doing his
duty to I hate using the word master, but to
these men that had perched him to put him to work.
(20:02):
So Grandison, that status protected him and it worked perfectly
for the faculty's plan of what they had in mind
for him. His duties were unofficially changed to procure fresh
cadavers from the college through robbing graves whoa Now, grave
(20:28):
robbery was something that was very prevalent in Europe with
the medical schools over there. You're talking about Oxford, several
of the pop ups there in England as well. It
even got so bad in England that undertakers started building
cages almost like nowadays vaults to put around caskets to
(20:53):
prevent grave robbers from going in. Now, over there, they
would take the cadavers, but they would also take whatever
jewelry or gold teeth or anything they had in their
possession as well, and they were referred to in England
as body snatchers or resurrection men is what they called them. Now,
(21:14):
we were briefly discussing this over lunch today and you
said something about mentioned the grave robbery stuff and you
said something Mom about something in Ohio or something they
fashioned up to prevent this.
Speaker 3 (21:29):
In Ohio, this funeral home, they decided that they would
try to patent this and it was they called it
the torpedo. And if the grave snatcher came and opened
that casket, they had a shotgun in there and it
and it just well it went off. Well that didn't
(21:52):
really deter that many of the grave snatchers, but they
never got a patent on it, and so it just
kind of went away. But if you Google put that
in your Google machine, and they do have, you know,
the torpedo for the grave snatchers, and it was in
(22:12):
Ohio and they really had a problem up there.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
Wow. To start with, well, I'm sure it was something
similar to this where there's probably laws against the dissection
and procurement of cadavers. So this was what Grandison was
tasked with. And he would go across state lines into
South Carolina, but mostly his favorite hunting ground. It was
(22:39):
very convenient. Right there in Augusta was Cedar Grove Cemetery
now Cedar Grove. It was an African American cemetery which
proved advantageous to Grandison, because no one would really bad
an eye about this large African American man visiting an
(23:04):
all black cemetery. You know, maybe he was going to
visit a loved one. No one really associated with him
thought he might. You know, he was enslaved. Maybe he
was going to put flowers on a grave. You know. Okay,
black guy in a black cemetery. That's not gonna Bideenne and.
Speaker 3 (23:24):
The black cemeteries might have been in more remote locations, yes,
than the others.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
Yes, And some of the ones actually here in rock
Hill I've learned about, they were in more secluded areas.
They were off the beaten path. They weren't as celebrated
as the one writing downtown rock Hill with a big
wrought iron fences around it. They were more in wooded areas.
(23:51):
It was, unfortunately, all that those folks could afford at
that time and also kept them safe. Now around this
time we're talking eighteen fifty two. Of course, African Americans,
they were marginalized. You know, once they were in the ground. Okay,
they're in the ground, the white community really didn't care
(24:13):
much about them. Now the technique this is interesting that
Grandison used to get these cadavers was very interesting. It
was brains and brawn, because remember he was huge. He
(24:35):
would read the death notices or here through the grapevine
about an African American that could have died, a slave
at a nearby plantation, or that was working accidents, old age,
what have you. But he would find out about who
had died and if they were being buried, where they
were buried. After the funeral, he would go out out
(25:00):
and find that fresh grave with the freshly turned dirt.
And what he would do would he would dig near
the head of the grave where the headstone normally would be,
and open that end of the grave up. He would
have to move everything out of the way that was
left there. And the vast majority of these, I mean
(25:22):
ninety nine percent were pine coffins. They referred to him
as toothpick boxes, so just barely even a box something
that someone would put together, so they were very easy
to smash with his axe. He would smash the top
of the top portion of the casket open, and I'm
(25:43):
not talking about the lid per se, it is a
portion of lid. But up near the head was where
he would open these things out. He would stick his
arms down into the grave and drag the bodies out
by their shoulders. Wow, he's got strike, he's got strength.
I mean he's just pulling. I mean not saying this,
(26:06):
not trying to make a pun, but just dead weight.
He was pulling down and up out of the ground.
At this point, he would put the bodies then into
bags and put them in his wagon. And here's another
point where his intelligence came into play. He would cover
the grave back up like it had been undisturbed, and
(26:30):
he would his memory. He was able to, like I said,
he almost had a photographic memory. He was able to
place the flowers and all the little the trinkets or
tokens that were left on the grave. He was able
to place them exactly back where they were, so it
looked like nothing had ever happened. So the next morning,
the cemetery taker or whoever took care of the cemeteries
(26:52):
would come out and not think anything of it. You know,
all right, the grave's still here. Well, Grandison began to
get a a reputation around the African American community. He
was starting to be suspected of doing this. They kind
(27:13):
of feared him. Plus the rumors that you know, he
this guy's a slave, but he doesn't do hard work.
We never see him doing that. He's just over at
the college with these seven white guys, and you know
they were they were kind of jealous. Jealousy played a
(27:34):
role because they were like, you know, he's got freedom
to kind of go around town in that wagon, and yeah,
we really don't see him doing backbreaking labor, and nobody's
ever admonishing him, you know, what's the deal with this
huge guy. Well, also the students at the medical college
at Georgia, they called on to what Harris was doing
(27:57):
as well. And I don't want to say this is funny,
it's kind of some macabre levity here, but one night
after Grandison, Grandison was out Robin Graves, he was able
to steal a cadaver and when he finished his job
(28:17):
for the night, he already had the corpse. He had
put it in a bag, and he had a habit
of stopping by local taverns. He liked to enjoy a
like anybody after a hard day's work, he wanted to
have him a cold drink, so he would go in
and have a drink or two. Never any notes about
(28:38):
him getting intoxicated, but he enjoyed a drink, and he
would usually go to one of the local taverns that
allowed African Americans in now one night, he was doing
just that and some of the students they decided to
play a prank on him. While Grandison was inside the tavern,
the students went out to his wagon, removed the corpse
(29:01):
from the bag that it was in, and then one
of the students climbed in the bag himself. Oh my,
So when Grandison returned to the wagon, the students started
moving around and started moaning and wailing help, I'm cold,
and so a spook Grandison. He bolted off the wagon,
(29:24):
leaving everything there, only to return the next morning to
retrieve the body. So he ran off. Uhhh, he wouldn't
have any part of that.
Speaker 3 (29:32):
So they put the body back on the wagon.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
Yes, the body was somewhere in there, but I think
it was covered up in cloth or something. You can't
really ride around with a bag full of dead bodies.
But yeah, this student climbed inside and started moaning and
wailing help. So Grandison he bolted off, but came back
(29:55):
to get that the next morning, and his activity continued.
He I don't want to say worked, but he was
enslaved and his duties continued from eighteen fifty two to
eighteen sixty five, the end of the Civil War.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
Now, the Emancipation Proclamation was signed in January of eighteen
sixty three by the Thirteenth Amendment, officially abolishing slavery, wasn't
ratified until eighteen sixty five, and this finally gave Grandison
Harris his freedom. So he was finally deemed a freeman.
(30:39):
And this story is gonna keep going. It's not over yet,
far from over. We'll get to that when we get
on the other side of this break and this quick
word from our sponsors, folks will be right back and
(31:17):
welcome back to Carolina Crimes, Episode two twenty one. This
is Matt Hyres here along with my mom from Mother's Day.
Speaker 3 (31:24):
Alamier.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
Yes, but thank you for being here in this wild,
remarkable story from back in the eighteen fifties. I warned
y'all all up front this was going to be a
wild one, and it truly is. So when we left off,
the Civil War had ended, and after thirteen years being
(31:49):
property of the faculty of the Medical College of Georgia,
Grandison Harris was finally free. So after being freed from
slavery and his life of being forced to rob graves
sounds wild. Grandison Harris, he started to create quite the
(32:10):
remarkable life. Now, when he was freed, he was armed
with the one thing that nobody can ever take away
from that was an education, which the vast majority of
freedmen and African Americans at this point in time did
not have. So Grandison moved back across the Savannah River
(32:33):
to South Carolina, where he was actually reunited with his
wife and his son George. Wonderful, yes, now the Harrises.
They settled in a small town of Hamburg, South Carolina.
It was in Aiken County, which was originally part of
the Edgefield District over there.
Speaker 3 (32:54):
Now I knew Edgefield was coming in well.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Not too prominently, but now Hamburg initially prior to the
Civil War was a thriving town, but it had suffered
economically when the South Carolina Canal and Railroad Company extended
its line onto Augusta. So instead of Hamburg being a
primary stop there along the railroad where there were banks
(33:21):
that were built, a lot of commerce, you know, they
were just a stop now, just to blip on the map,
and everything ended up coming through Augusta, and in one
article that said Augusta siphoned commerce away from Hamburg, which
it really did, and a lot of people moved out.
So after the end of the Civil War, Hamburg was
(33:44):
repopulated with freedmen. Well. Once in Hamburg, Grandison Harris was
a well respected member of the community, alongside the likes
of Prince Rivers and Samuel Lee, who was the first
African American who was Speaker of the South Carolina House Representatives. Now,
(34:05):
this was of course much due to Grandison's education that
he received from his former owners at the medical College
at Georgia. Grandson Harris was so well thought of that
he was actually appointed the judge in Hamburg. It wasn't
(34:26):
clear that if he was a municipal judge or a magistrate,
but nevertheless, he became a judge there in Hamburg, and
he served in that position for almost ten years. And
he served in that capacity well until eighteen seventy six.
It was in July of eighteen seventy six that the
(34:49):
Hamburg massacre occurred, and we'll probably cover that in a
later episode, but give you a snapshot of what the
world was like in eighteen seventy six. The Reconstruction era
was coming to an end. And by that the re
instruction era was where the federal government and the United
(35:14):
States the Union. It set forth rules and procedures for
Southern states that they had to use and abide bye
to be re emitted back into the Union. Some of
these were that freedmen had the right to vote, and
that was something that the former Confederate soldiers of former
(35:37):
Friends of the Confederate Calls in South Carolina. They did
not like at all that freedmen would have the same
equal rights as they did and they couldn't stomach that.
So what they did was they started to use intimidation
tactics across the South. This is when you saw the
(35:58):
inception and the I guess the tarnished golden age of
the ku Klux Klan. They would force these people and
scare them to not vote. They began to exercise loopholes
in the laws for voting where they would require poll
(36:21):
taxes where you had to pay a certain amount to
be able to vote. They had poll tests where you
had to prove that you could read or write before
you were able to exercise your right to vote. And
basically this was the establishment of Jim Crow laws around
the South. Now, the Hamburg massacre that we mentioned it
(36:44):
was a series of bloody altercations carried out in the
summer of eighteen seventy six by Red Shirts. The Red Shirts,
we've mentioned them before in Carolina crimes. There were a
group of white men looking to regain control of the
state government and eradicate civil rights. So they wanted to
(37:07):
be able to control who voted. They wanted to take
a certain segment out of that voting population, and they
wanted to do that to kind of steer who ran
the state, and one of the candidates they liked the
most was Wade Hampton third. So in eighteen seventy six
(37:29):
there was a very contentious state campaign for governor, also
small house races around the state, and to suppress African
American voting, one hundred Red Shirts attacked the Hamburg National
Guard armory, which was guarded by thirty freed African Americans,
(37:49):
and they killed two black men. The next night they
went back and tortured and killed four more, with several
other men being wounded. Now this was around the time
Grandison Harris and his family they said, okay, we're going
to have enough of this, I know a place we
could probably go and we'd probably be welcomed back, and
(38:13):
I'd probably almost immediately have a job again. And that
was back in Augusta, Georgia. So Grandison and his family
returned and he went to work. Actually was on the
payroll of the Medical College of Georgia.
Speaker 1 (38:31):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (38:33):
His his pay was eight dollars a month to work there,
which in today's money was two hundred and forty six dollars.
Speaker 3 (38:46):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
But if you're not going to be a farmer a sharecropper,
have to answer to anybody. That's what Grandison had to do.
And so Grandison and his son George even went back
to robbing Graves for the school. They were labeled in
(39:08):
acquisitions was their job title. And a little footnote was
that George was not near as good as his dad
at Robin Graves.
Speaker 3 (39:20):
So he wasn't as big as his dad.
Speaker 2 (39:23):
Probably, yeah, Grandison, he was the man when it came
to Robin Graves, as odd as that sounds. So Grandison
not only was he going out at night and retrieving
these bodies for the college to use for free, but
he also became a teaching assistant. He had been around
(39:45):
long enough that he knew exactly what was going on
with these bodies. They're an anatomy. And the students actually
started referring to him, calling him judge. They had found
out about his profession in south care and they were
half serious, half ribbon him. They were backhandedly respectful. I
(40:07):
guess it would be the best way to put it. Well. Eventually, Grandison,
he retired from the Medical College in nineteen oh eight,
and he died in nineteen eleven at the age of
ninety five. Oh my goodness, So you're retired. Now, imagine
if you had to work what twenty two more years
(40:29):
and retire at the age of ninety two.
Speaker 3 (40:31):
I don't think so.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
Yeah, But for those three years he was retiring, I mean,
I'm kind of I'm looking at this, but uh, he
received a pension from the state of Georgia. So, I mean,
not many African Americans around that time I would be
willing to say had a pension, right. But he did
(40:54):
live to the age of ninety five, and all in all,
it speculated that Anderson Harris robbed over one thousand graves
in his life, making him the most prolific grave robber
in history.
Speaker 3 (41:10):
Going back to the start. How many bodies did they
say that they unearthed.
Speaker 2 (41:18):
They at the very minimum, I think it was forty eight,
and they said it was closer to four hundred and
fifty that.
Speaker 3 (41:24):
Out, okay, and he had on earthed a thousand.
Speaker 2 (41:29):
It was speculated. I mean, there was no real record.
They didn't keep a smoking gun, they didn't keep a
record of those.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
And ironically Grandison Harris was buried in the Cedar Grove
cemetery where he used to rob graves.
Speaker 3 (41:45):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 2 (41:47):
And there were great floods both in nineteen twenty six
and nineteen twenty nine that destroyed all the records of
Cedar Grove, So his final resting place is actually unknown,
so they don't know where he's at in there. And
even more ironically, after those bones were unearthed in nineteen
(42:08):
eighty nine, they were all buried back in Cedar Grove
as well, possibly with or next to the man that
had pulled them from the ground and displaced them for
over one hundred years. Wow. So that's the story of
the most prolific grave robber in the history of.
Speaker 3 (42:29):
South Carolina, of the world of the world.
Speaker 1 (42:32):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (42:33):
Yeah, So that's that's a macabre one for Mother's Day.
I have you on here, man. I didn't want to
do a gruesome one, nothing that would upset you or
anything like that, but that was a wild, remarkable tale
that needed to be told. Well, folks, we appreciate you
for joining us this week. Mom, thank you so much
(42:54):
for being here.
Speaker 3 (42:55):
Well, thank you for having me. This has been fun.
Speaker 2 (42:57):
Yes, and before we get just a quick word. If
you're not already following us on Facebook, you can check
us out at Carolina Crimes Podcast. Also over on Twitter
at sc crimes pod. Also, if you're looking to support
the show listening on Spotify, Apple iTunes, Apple Podcast, throw
us a five star review, mash that purple subscribe button,
and tell us a little something about yourself, about your animals,
(43:21):
your dogs. We'll have a lot of shout outs and
thank yous next week when Daniel returns. And also, if
you're looking, Mom wore her uniform today, she wore her
Carolina Crimes Podcast shirt, So if you're looking for some
sweet Carolina Crimes paraphernalia, head on over to Carolina Crimestore
dot com. We would greatly appreciate that as well. So
(43:42):
until next time, have a happy Mother's Day. We love
you all, Mom's special ladies, everybody out there that's cared
for us throughout our lives. Mom, I love you, Thank you.
Speaker 3 (43:53):
For being here, enjoyed it, thank you for having me.
Speaker 2 (43:56):
And until next time, We'll see you on Carolina Rhymes. Yeah,
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