Hurricane Camille swept through the commonwealth on Aug. 19 and 20, 1969, dropping more than 25 inches of rain in Nelson County, and leaving more than 120 dead from flooding and mudslides in the rural county.
Almost 60 years later, The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner is attempting to identify the remains of eight people from the storm.
Lara Newell, the longterm unidentified coordinator at OCME, said seven of the bodies were found in Nelson, while another was found nearby, over the Albemarle County line.
The individuals — four children possibly between 6 and 19, a woman about 70, two women around 35 to 40, and a 50-year old man — were potentially a family or families on vacation, Newell said, traveling through Virginia.
“This one has definitely been where we've had public engagement,” Newell said about the Camille case. “I think because it was a hurricane and it was a huge event for Virginia, it shaped a lot of our mass disaster policies and working with other agencies. I mean, most of the case file is dealing with putting … procedures into place to work in an event of this magnitude.”
Autopsies were conducted on the eight unknown people the year of the storm. And in addition to showing that they drowned, the procedure included creating dental charting — documentation Newell said details missing teeth, fillings and whether a person had an overbite or underbite.
Investigations regularly involve seeking the public’s assistance, but two issues complicate the Camille case: its age and the individuals being cremated decades ago, making DNA testing impossible — until technological advances potentially make the process available on cremains.
Newell said the office, established in 1946, has unidentified cases dating back to its inception — 329 in total.
“The thing is that it has been 56 years, so now we're losing the historical knowledge. The people who know, ‘Well, my aunt or my grandmother went missing in 1969,’ we're losing the people who have that access to that information,” said Newell, who previously worked as a death investigator before moving into her current position. “That's why we're trying to get some of these older cases out, so that we can connect with the people who know who’s missing in their family.”
To contact the medical examiner’s office with questions or information about Hurricane Camille, email Newell at lara.newell@vdh.virginia.gov.