Hart Island

Even among lifelong New Yorkers, Hart Island is frequently unknown. Located in Long Island Sound, the island is the city's burial place of last resort, a final resting place of more than one million New Yorkers. Among those interred at Hart Island are the indigent, the unknown, stillborn babies, and those who died during epidemics. It's a forlorn stretch of land where most of the graves are unmarked and many of those buried there are identified only by numbers.

The island, which was once used for the training of Union soldiers during the Civil War, began to be used as a cemetery in 1869, when a woman who died of tuberculosis and was unclaimed was interred there. A smallpox epidemic the following year led to hundreds of New Yorkers being buried on the island, a safe distance away from the city. Established cemeteries in the city were becoming overcrowded and were often poorly maintained, leading to public health concerns. The city had other potter's fields, but they, too, eventually became overcrowded and were no longer used.

Over the years, Hart Island became the final resting place of hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers, most of whom were buried in long trenches with dozens of coffins. The AIDS epidemic of the 1980s and early 1990s also contributed to Hart Island's population; at the time, AIDS patients were often stigmatized and families were often reluctant to claim the bodies of relatives who died of the illness. Consequently, many of those who died in the horrific early years of the epidemic were buried on Hart Island. But even there, there was little in the way of dignity or compassion; the first AIDS victims buried on the island were buried alone at the end of the island, separately, and in graves that were 14 feet deep.

More recently, Hart Island has also become the final resting place of many of New York's coronavirus dead. In the early months of the pandemic, when New York City was an epicenter of the disease, mass graves were once again in use to accommodate the overwhelming numbers of dead. In 2020, more than 2,000 New Yorkers were buried on the island, a figure more than twice the number of burials there in 2019. Inmates from Rikers Island are paid to bury the dead in stacks of three coffins.

Because Hart Island is maintained by the Department of Corrections, it has been difficult for family members to identify and visit graves of their relatives. Many people have had friends or relatives buried on Hart Island and had no idea of their final resting place. There have been efforts in recent years to help people identify the graves of their loved ones and to get the opportunity to visit the island and pay their respects. In 2019, Mayor DeBlasio signed a bill that would transfer ownership of the island from the Department of Corrections to the Parks Department, which would allow people more opportunities to visit the island. Since 2018, the Hart Island Project has worked to map the island, identify those buried there (where possible) and to advocate for those whose loved ones are buried there.

Meier , Allison. Pandemic Victims are Filling NYC's Hart Island. It Isn't the First Time, National Geographic . April 13th 2020. Accessed January 19th 2021. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/2020/04/unclaimed-coronavirus-victims-being-buried-on-hart-island-long-history-as-potters-field/#close

Hennigan , W.J. . Lost Inside the Pandemic: Inside New York City's Mass Graveyard on Hart Island , Time. November 18th 2020. Accessed January 19th 2021. https://time.com/5913151/hart-island-covid/.

Spivack , Caroline . Hart Island Will Become Publicly Accessible Parkland , Curbed NYC . November 14th 2019. Accessed January 19th 2021. https://ny.curbed.com/2019/11/14/20963508/hart-island-new-york-public-parkland.

Could Hart Island be Transformed Into a Public Park?, June 1st 2019. Accessed January 19th 2021. https://secretnyc.co/hart-island-park-nyc/.

About , The Hart Island Project . Accessed January 19th 2021. https://www.hartisland.net/about.