There's an interesting cemetery at Bodie, a ghost town in the Sierras that was once a gold/silver mining town. Lots of kids, especially babies in the cemetery because all the food had to be brought in - very few fruit/veggies. (Cool pix here: ghosttowns.com
The main cemetery has a fence around it and then there's Boot Hill, which is outside the main cemetery, where criminals and prostitutes are buried. But there's also a marker that states: Here lies the entire Chinese population of Bodie.
A priest, Fr. Jim Kelley, who serviced Mono Country in the Sierras many years ago told me the story. Here's the short version:
Three miners got drunk and decided to get even with 3 Chinamen, who they imagined had committed some Mortal Sin. They found the 3, murdered them, cut them up, put them in barrels and delivered them to their respective homes. The Chinese were so outraged that they found the 3 responsible miners and did the same things to them. Then the whole town got involved, killed every man, woman and child in Chinatown and set it on fire, which of course, just happened to burn down a good portion of the rest of the town. There wasn't any water - drinking water had to be imported. |
