Tombstone Unearthed in Washington Square Park

clipped from gothamist.com Tombstone Unearthed in Washington Square Park Washington Square Park in 1930 This past Friday, as construction on Washington Square Park’s redesign entered Phase II, a tombstone was unearthed. Dun dun dun. An eagle-eyed reader of the WSP Blog wrote in to that website Friday after “he noticed that there was a large hole dug about 6 feet below the surface in the fenced-off construction area” where two people were seen dusting off the tombstone. Creepy! Washington Square Park was a potter’s field from 1797 to 1826, and in early 2008, during a soil testing, four bodies were discovered (and left buried) there. In fact, there are still 20,000 (known) bodies down there. The tipster for the recent tombstone find, however, wondered if this tombstone could have been from the original land owner, and perhaps part of a “family cemetery from 200 years ago or more.”

Could this be a new African Burial Ground? The land that Wash. Sq. Park is on was owned by a Freed African Slave and was given to him by the Dutch. Could the headstone unearthed belong to a Freed African Slave?