CHARLOTTE, N.C. (FOX 46 CHARLOTTE)- Sunken burial plots and over grown graves are tucked away at a cemetery in South End. Neighbors say the people buried there deserve some dignity and they’ve started a project to clean it up.

A neighbor has taken interest in the upkeep of the cemetery and tomorrow he’s doing some much needed work.

“You can see there’s at least a few pretty well marked graves here and a couple children here,” Will Rice said.

Rice who lives just four minutes away from this small gravesite along Remount Road near Youngblood Street. It’s a residential area not known for this graveyard.

He says he took interest in an Instagram post that said “slaves were buried here.”

The graves are unmarked, so he did research.

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“At first I didn’t believe it because I was familiar with this area and then my second thought was if there’s really people buried in South end, there should be something better than just having it be ignored and not noticeable,” Rice said.

Rice decided to make contact with others who have taken an interest in the cemetery, one being Charlotte Center City Partners. It’s a non-profit that has helped connect neighbors with historical contacts in an effort to clean up the property.

“I started the ball rolling and it kept rolling. It’s been a couple months process to figure out who, what, when and where. We raised a little money, enough to get the project started,” said Rice.

Rice learned that there are at least 16 people buried here from the Shuman family of Charlotte. The property was owned by the family in the early 1800’s but has since been abandoned and doesn’t belong to anyone.

Rice created a GoFundMe and is planning to build a fence around the graves.

“I think it’s a simple step and either way, I think it’s going to improve our ability to remember what happened,” Rice said.

That fencing project will begin tomorrow morning, so far, no word on if actual slaves are buried there, but FOX 46 was able to confirm is that there is a Shuman family from Charlotte resting here.

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