Tribal organization warns about Native American graves on prison land
By Brett Rains
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FRANKLIN COUNTY, Arkansas (KHBS, KHOG) — A local tribal organization is warning the state that a new prison could be built on land containing Native American graves.
“This would be a stone box, grave lid. It’s the right size. It’s cut, so you know that this is a stone box grave lid. It came off this property. There is no question,” Jimmie Kersh said. “They’re often called stone box sarcophagus, stone box. That is traditional in our burial. It’s our religious practice. We have been working with an archeologist for about the last 10 months who’s already come down and identified them.”
Kersh told 40/29 News that he is the national medal chief of the West Region Chickamauga Nation.
“We’re first cousins with the Choctaw, the Chickasaw, the Creek, the Natchez and the Seminole,” Kersh said.
Currently, the state is seeking proposals to design and build a new 3,000-bed prison on more than 800 acres of land in the Vesta Community of Franklin County, approximately six miles outside of Charleston, Arkansas.
Kersh posted signs outside the property Wednesday, that said it was a Chickamauga archaeological site. The signs had been removed by the next day.
“We need to do due diligence if we’re going to be putting a prison on top of graves that have been here since the late 17 to early 1800s. Maybe we should know a little bit more about the history,” Kersh said.
An email sent to 40/29 News by Arkansas Department of Corrections communications director Rand Champion said that preliminary assessments have been completed and that no evidence of a burial site has been found to date.
Sam Dubke, spokesperson for Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, said the tribal organization is not recognized by the state or federal government. In an email sent to 40/29 News, he called the claims “absurd” and said it was an attempt to derail the prison.
“We were here decades before the state was ever founded,” Kersh said. “The United States has us under jurisdiction, but we are not on the list. That’s as true as it can be. To say that we are not a federally recognized tribe would be a violation of at least two Supreme Court rulings.”
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