EVER WALK ALONG A BEACH AND LOOK FOR SHELLS??? WELL WHAT IF YOU COULD WALK ALONG A BEACH AND LOOK FOR GRAVES????

Have you ever heard about bodies being buried on a beach???? I know!!!!!  Me neither!!!!  But guess what Key West have one.  We were on this little trolley that was taking us out to the Museum where Robert the Doll was and along the way we pasted this beautiful beach and the tour guide kinda said in a nonchalant way... and over there on that beach underneath the sand is several graves!!!!  WAIT!!!!!!!!! WAIT WHAT????????????? I'm like STOP this trolley!!!!!!!!!!   I have to check this out!!!!!!!!!  But as you can see from the pictures all we did was drive by.

Anyway, here is what I found out about this beach.  Also, here is a link that gives much more detail of  the cemetery and how it came to be and how it is today.

 http://www.academia.edu/4349925/Cemeteries_at_South_Beach_Key_West_Florida

There's nothing but sand there today, but 140 years ago, nearly 300 Africans were buried on what is now Higgs Beach, victims of slavery, the "cruel trade in human misery."

It was 1858, and U.S. warships had been ordered to enforce the anti-slave trade laws.

Five ships patrolled the Florida Straits, where slave merchants for the tobacco and sugar fields of Cuba and Puerto Rico maintained a vigorous commerce for human cargo with several African coastal states and principalities, including the king of the African state of Dahomey.

At least 3,119 African men, women and children headed for Cuban ports were intercepted by Navy ships in 1860 alone. Most were eventually returned to Liberia, a country peopled largely by recaptured Africans, said Tom Hambright, historian at the Monroe County Library.

But not all were returned to Africa.

In 1860, three slavers, as the ships were called, were captured with 1,400 Africans, who sang, cheered and clapped their hands when the Navy freed them and brought them to Key West.

While most would sail back to Africa 80 days later, 294 of them would not, never realizing that Key West, their new land of liberation, would be the last place they would ever see.

They all would die of typhoid fever and dysentery and lie buried, unnamed, in an unnamed cemetery that became a public beach.

The few historical references to the old burial ground have been gleaned by Gail Swanson, a 20-year resident of Grassy Key.

She gave a brief talk on the buried slaves Saturday as part of the Mel Fisher Maritime Museum and Key West Maritime Historical Society's first Florida Keys Maritime History Conference.

Her research as a writer of historical wrecks is what first sparked her interest into the wreck and capture of slave ships off the Keys.

She plans to ask the county, which owns Higgs Beach, to remember the sacrifice of the 294 buried Africans with an eight-foot polished black stone in the shape of Africa, shaded by a garden of African flowering trees.

The Wildfire was one of the clippers running slaves that ended up in Key West waters. Built in Philadelphia in 1855, it sailed from New York on Dec. 16, 1859, with an American crew, made a run to St. Thomas, then sailed for the Congo River, said a Boston Post article on May 15, 1860.

The captain of the USS Mohawk wrote a letter June 8, 1860, after capturing the Wildfire, and described what he saw:

"The Negroes are packed below in as dense a mass as it is possible for human beings to be crowded; the space allotted them being in general about four feet high between decks with little ventilation.

"These unfortunate people...pass their days, nights amidst the most horribly offensive odors of which the mind can conceive under the scorching heat of the tropical sun, without room enough for sleep; with scarcely space to die in. The passage to the West Indies varies from 40 to 60 day...and their sufferings are incredible."

As to what the people faced when they arrived in the Key West of 1860, a town of 3,000, Swanson provided a quote from the Congressional Globe:

"Both on account of a deficiency of water and provisions, and its exposure to the yellow fever, Key West is one of the worst spots for an African Negro depot, which could be found on the coast of the U.S."

A more stark realization of the ultimate ending for the 294 was discovered by Swanson at the Islamorada library.

A copy of a receipt dated Key West, Sept. 11, 1860 bears mute testimony.

The receipt was "for making coffins and burying 294 deceased African Negroes from the cargoes of the barques, Wildfire, William and Name Unknown by order of F.J. Moreno, U.S. marshal, at $5.50 each, for a total of $1,617 and signed by Daniel Davis."

George Born, archeological historian for the Historic Florida Keys Foundation, confirmed that the Higgs Beach site was also the original Key West Cemetery.

But after the 1846 hurricane washed it away (some bodies were found in trees), what did not get destroyed was moved to the present city cemetery.

Further confirmation of the location came from writer John Viele, of Cudjoe Key, who found a map of Key West, dated 1861, which shows a site labeled "African Cemetery" near where Higgs Beach is now.

NATIVE AMERICANS-DO THEY HAVE A CONNECTION WITH THE AFTERLIFE THAT WE DON'T???

Native Americans: Ghosts & Spirits

Native American spiritual beliefs hold rich accounts of ghosts and spirits - that the dead live on and even visit us. Death is typically viewed as a door into the next life, or world, and not something to be feared but embraced.
"We believe that the spirit pervades all creation and that every creature possesses a soul in some degree, though not necessarily a soul conscious to itself. The tree, the waterfall, the grizzly bear, each is an embodied force, and as such an object of reverence." - Ohiyesa, Sioux 1902 (aka Charles Eastman)
The Native American belief in spirit (and ghost) visitation can be found in an amazing speech made in 1854, by Chief Seattle:
"And when the last red man shall have perished from the earth and his memory among white men shall have become a myth, these shores shall swarm with the invisible dead of my tribe, and when your children's children shall think themselves alone in the field, the store, the shop, upon the highway or in the silence of the woods, they will not be alone." - Chief Seattle, 1854

This incredible Native American idea of spirit interaction with the living, what we call spirits or ghosts, could be understood as meaning that Chief Seattle's people (Suquamish) will be with us, for we are all connected as one, great humanity - brothers. However, his address from 1854 is also haunting as we continue to read his words for he seemed to give a warning that, in the afterlife, ghosts and spirits affect the living:
"The white man will never be alone. Let him be just and lindly deal with my people, for the dead are not powerless. Dead - I say? There is no death. Only a change of worlds."
We might say that Native American beliefs in the afterlife reveal a hidden, spirit world that interacts with this earthly plane - a greater, underlying connection that exists before our eyes - many remaining unaware of its existence. Black Elk, a Lakota Sioux medicine man, had much to say about the unseen world of Spirit co-existing with the physical world we know:
“The first peace, which is the most important, is that which comes within the souls of people when they realize their relationship, their oneness with the universe and all its powers, and when theyrealize at the center of the universe dwells the Great Spirit, and that its center is really everywhere, it is within each of us.”
"The Great Spirit is everywhere; he hears whatever is in our minds and our hearts, and it is not necessary to speak to him in a loud voice."
This idea of a Great Spirit being everywhere and within everything is the meaning behind Black Elk's words. Here are two more quotes from this great Native American:
“Peace will come to the hearts of men when they realize their oneness with the universe. It is everywhere.”
“The Holy Land is everywhere.”

Another example of this idea is reflected in the story of how the great warrior, Crazy Horse, was said to have found his courage and strength. According to the book, Black Elk Speaks, Crazy Horse shared with Black Elk his vision that occurred in the spirit world:
“Crazy Horse dreamed and went into the world where there is nothing but the spirits of all things. That is the real world that is behind this one, and everything we see here is something like a shadow from that one.”
Crazy Horse also described his horse floating and moving differently above the field (thus, "Crazy Horse") in his powerful vision. It's been said that he was able to move in and out between the spirit realm and the physical world, able to see both, and so his courage and power was greater than most men.
Let's consider the concept that people can make a choice to move beyond this plane after death of the body but still interact with the living (at times, as loving, guiding spirits often seen in dreams and visions), or consistently remain behind, earthbound and troubled (what we would call ghosts). We can find this choice upon death of the body reflected in Native American beliefs by reading A Speech to the Dead by Native American (Luiseno) Chief Fox:
"Now this day you have ceased to see daylight.
Think only of what is good.
Do not think of anything uselessly.
You must think all the time of what is good.
You will go and live with our nephew.
And do not think evil towards these your relatives.
When you start to leave them this day you must not think backwards of them with regret.
And do not think of looking back at them.
And do not feel badly because you have lost sight of this daylight.
This does not happen today to you alone, so that you thus be alone when you die.
Bless the people so that they may not be sick.
This is what you will do.
You must merely bless them so that they may live as mortals here.
You must always think kindly.
Today is the last time I shall speak to you.
Now I shall cease speaking to you, my relative."

Another example of this idea is reflected in the story of how the great warrior, Crazy Horse, was said to have found his courage and strength. According to the book, Black Elk Speaks, Crazy Horse shared with Black Elk his vision that occurred in the spirit world:
“Crazy Horse dreamed and went into the world where there is nothing but the spirits of all things. That is the real world that is behind this one, and everything we see here is something like a shadow from that one.”
Crazy Horse also described his horse floating and moving differently above the field (thus, "Crazy Horse") in his powerful vision. It's been said that he was able to move in and out between the spirit realm and the physical world, able to see both, and so his courage and power was greater than most men.
Let's consider the concept that people can make a choice to move beyond this plane after death of the body but still interact with the living (at times, as loving, guiding spirits often seen in dreams and visions), or consistently remain behind, earthbound and troubled (what we would call ghosts). We can find this choice upon death of the body reflected in Native American beliefs by reading A Speech to the Dead by Native American (Luiseno) Chief Fox:
"Now this day you have ceased to see daylight.
Think only of what is good.
Do not think of anything uselessly.
You must think all the time of what is good.
You will go and live with our nephew.
And do not think evil towards these your relatives.
When you start to leave them this day you must not think backwards of them with regret.
And do not think of looking back at them.
And do not feel badly because you have lost sight of this daylight.
This does not happen today to you alone, so that you thus be alone when you die.
Bless the people so that they may not be sick.
This is what you will do.
You must merely bless them so that they may live as mortals here.
You must always think kindly.
Today is the last time I shall speak to you.
Now I shall cease speaking to you, my relative."

The above was an article taken off the Angels and Ghosts website.  But I thought it was really good.  I love reading about Spirits and the Native American Indian.  There is SUCH an emotional connection between the Native American Indian and Spirits that just seems to be at a level higher than non-American people.

Below is a cemetery that I visited years ago up in Seattle.  I'm sorry I don't remember the name of it but I can tell you that it is a cemetery JUST FOR Native American Indians.  As we walked around the cemetery I remember constantly thinking I could hear drums beating!!!  My senses seemed to be on overload.....I felt completely different and not scared..... just different.....more spiritual.  I can't explain it  but I LOVED THIS PLACE!!!!!