Cofer Cemetery (A Grave of Unknown Children, Prisoners, and Lunatics)

Nestled on the top of a hill which was once known as Potter's Field located in Chattanooga, TN is this small
 cemetery with an unusual past. The cemetery was officially opened in the year 1933 as Hamilton County Memorial Park later to be dedicated to Ruth Cofer in 1974 and renamed Cofer Cemetery. At first glance, it seems like most older cemeteries from the last two centuries, with old and weather worn gravestones. One thing sets them apart tho, and that is that the graves located nearer to the entrance of the cemetery have no names inscribed on the stone. Chiseled into the cement stone, is a single numerical digit. The area out there with the very small, numbered-only stones are the children victims of an early 1900's plague that swept the city.  Some of these stones have become removed (presumably due to vandalism) over the years, and someone has lined all the loose ones on the ground into the shape of a cross (as shown in one of the photos below). It really disturbs me that the children who suffered from the outbreak of tuberculosis were put into a mass grave without the dignity of a name they deserved. As a cemetery for the indigent, 212 recorded burials include past prisoners of Silver Dale. Others buried here from the early 1900's were patients of Pine Breeze Sanitarium, who were found of unsound mind, and were labeled in the day as lunatics. One of the most bizarre histories of this cemetery dates back to May 5, 1911 when a grand jury visited as then known Potters Field only to discover exposed graves and bones lying around on ground  surface. This is indeed a place of buried mysteries, secrets, and an eerie history.