GRAVE ENTRY INVESTIGATED


Rumored Valuables Thought to Be Cause

    County Detective H. J. (Jim) Laub is investigating reports that the grave of an elderly man who was buried on private property in the vicinity of Moccassin Bend some 60 years ago was robbed recently.
     A smashed grave marker was found at the sight indicated the grave was for Jerome Simmerman, who died in 1893 at the age of 72 and was buried alongside the bodies of his deceased wife and baby.
    Simmerman's grave was found opened recently by Sam Norman of Norman Lane, Signal Hills. He told Laub he and his mother revisited the grave site several days ago and at that time saw the outline of what was presumably was a casket.
  The casket was not in the grave when Laub visited the scene yesterday afternoon. Two casket handles several pieces of glass and bits of bone were found, however, indicting a grave had been violated, Laub reported.
                                          YOUTHS PROBED
    The officer said it was legend that Simmerman was a relatively wealthy man at the time of his death and that there were rumors he might have had valuables buried with him. He said he was investigating a theory that the grave was entered by curious youths who might have a accidentally discovered the burial ground.
  Thus far, Laub reported, no relatives of Simmerman have been located. Norman told the detective an automobile with Mexico or New Mexico licenses and two unidentified men and a woman were in the vicinity last fall or last summer asking questions about the grave.
THE CHATTANOOGA TIMES  Jan. 28, 1953

Submitter: Ivelyn Kay Skelton Blanton. Jerome is a g.
Uncle by his marriage to Jemima Ann Bolton. k_blanton@yahoo.com

Submitted by Ivelyn Kay Skelton Blanton
mailto:k_blanton@yahoo.com