Unknown Male Native American - New Salem Cemetery - NW of Rosebud, MO - Graves of the Unknown on Waymarking.com

County of church: Gasconade County
Location of church: CR-503 (Piezuch Rd), 3 miles W of US-50, NW of Rosebud, S. of Drake
Phone: (573) 437-5455
Pastor: Paul Kurrelmeyer

I met with Pastor Paul, as I was coming out of the cemetery. He showed me inside the lobby and the newspaper story of the church burning and re-build.
The church building shown in the Historic Survey below is the one that burnt down.

A local rancher was doing fence repair about a ¼ mile away from the church, and Pastor Paul called him over, and the three of us had a great time talking the history of the church, cemetery, and the Indian of unknown name buried in this cemetery.

The story goes like this. In the 1940s, a local man and his sons found a site where they found and dug up native artifacts. Arrow heads, and other tools. The old man was very protective of this site and kept it a secret even from his family.
Once while digging the found a skull and a couple of other bones. The man kept them as part of his treasure. When the old man died, the family found these bones in his closet. They felt they belonged with the Indian tribes somewhere, and began trying to find a proper home for them. They sent the bones to Oklahoma, South Dakota, Arizona and New Mexico Indian Affairs and museums over the years.

All Indian and Native American historical organizations rejected them for the same reason. They were not properly documented, they were not properly located for site acquired, and cannot therefore be positive they were Indian.

The family were members of the New Salem Baptist Church in Gasconade County, and brought their problem there. They, the family, still wished a proper treatment of the remains.

The men of the church took it upon them selves to have a proper funeral service, and full religious honors, and complete with procession and pallbearers, to the grave site, and buried the remains with religious dignity.