The Snake Hill region of Secaucus, New Jersey was the location of the Old Bergen County Poor Farm in the late 1700s. In 1845, Bergen County split into what became Passaic County, New Jersey and Bergen County, New Jersey . Hudson County purchased the land and placed their Insane Asylum and Alms House there.
The Berger Group which performed the removals wrote:
A total of 113,532 artifacts or non-skeletal objects were recovered of which over 50 percent were coffin nails. Other personal effects or "grave goods" included dentures, glass eyes, coins, clay smoking pipes, embalming bottles, whiskey/wine bottles, combs, over 4,500 buttons, over 500 ceramic fragments, clothing remnants, shoes, hats, jewelry, military medals, religious items, and medical devices or prosthetics. ... Using historic maps, original hand-written burial ledgers, osteological examination, background research, and artifact analysis, Berger's team was able to determine possible identities for approximately 900 of the disinterred remains. Of particular note, positive identifications were established for two interments who have living linear descendents. The remains of a woman who died in 1928 and a man who was buried in 1949 were returned to their respective families for private ceremonies and reburial - ending the search for their long-lost grandparents.
In 2003, the remains of 4,569 of these individuals were removed from the Potter’s Field in and brought to [Maple Grove Park Cemetery, Hackensack to be honored and remembered. May this site serve in perpetuity as their final resting place and a sanctuary of peace.
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