Cemetery for former slaves goes unnoticed among Buckhead homes
Audrey Collins looks down at her grandmother’s headstone on Sunday, June 14, 2015, in Atlanta. It wasn’t on her ancestor’s grave. Rather, it was leaning against a tree. Collins could not find a headstone for her brother who died in infancy, or for her grandfather. And when she spotted a pile of broken headstones in the woods, she became upset and ran. BRANDEN CAMP/SPECIAL
In June 2015, one family — retired Atlanta police officer Richard Thomas and his cousins Audrey Collins and Earl Dillard — ventured out to Piney Grove Cemetery to find their relatives for the first time in years.
Collins spotted her grandmother's headstone leaning against a tree, instead of fastened to the ground like the others.
“It was heart-wrenching to see your loved ones like that,” Collins said. “You don’t know where they are. You can’t find the markers, and the ones you are able to locate are not attached, so we don’t even know if that is where our grandmother is. And we have no idea where our grandfather is.”
Ernie Suggs is an enterprise reporter covering race and culture for the AJC since 1997. A 1990 graduate of N.C. Central University and a 2009 Harvard University Nieman Fellow, he is also the former vice president of the National Association of Black Journalists. His obsession with Prince, Spike Lee movies, Hamilton and the New York Yankees is odd.
Ernie Suggs is an enterprise reporter covering race and culture for the AJC since 1997. A 1990 graduate of N.C. Central University and a 2009 Harvard University Nieman Fellow, he is also the former vice president of the National Association of Black Journalists. His obsession with Prince, Spike Lee movies, Hamilton and the New York Yankees is odd.
