Dead Men of Duffy's Cut

Janet M. Monge, Acting Curator-in-Charge and Keeper of Collections in the Physical Anthropology Section speaks about "The Dead Men of Duffy's Cut."

In the spring of 2009, parts of the mass grave of 57 Irish Railway workers who died while building the 59th mile of the Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad, was uncovered. Historic accounts indicate that these railway workers died of cholera; the bones tell a different tale constructed around violence and tainted with prejudice against these early industrial age immigrant workers. Duffy's Cut is located in Malvern PA along Route 30. You can see the mass grave from both SEPTA and AMTRAK trains as they course over this ancient landscape.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• forensics
• physical anthropology
• burial
• cholera
• railroad
• workers
• railway
• irish
• immigrants