HANOVER COUNTY, Va. -- Brenda Courtney placed the only picture she had of her nephew's grave on the ground where she thought he was buried. Kenneth Hott was just six months old when he died in 1963.
"I want him to know we love him and will never forget him," Courtney said. "We learned that Bliley’s did his funeral and he’s buried here at Enon Methodist Church."
Brenda showed us his death certificate and pointed out a glass marker in the picture.
The marker with Kenneth’s name on it is one that her father made for her nephew’s grave.
That marker is long gone now. Years ago Brenda and her sister Betty, Kenneth’s mom, found out that Enon Methodist Church cemetery had no record of the infant being buried there.
That is when their search began. Sadly, the two never found Kenneth‘s grave before Betty died.
“Nobody seems to have any record of anything. It’s like he just disappeared. This is very important to me. I lost a child, so it’s very important that I find this grave and mark it, so he can be remembered,” Brenda explained.
Standing in the middle of the cemetery, Brenda is sure she is in the right vicinity.
She called her memory of Kenneth’s funeral still vivid. She even said she remembered her nephew’s casket was just a few feet away from a headstone bearing the name of one of Brenda’s school mates.
“I stood and read that monument so many times. That is what I remember. It was here in this area,” Brenda said.
CBS 6 Problem Solvers contacted Bliley‘s Funeral Home to see if they could help. Within hours Brenda got a phone call from them.
“He knows the exact size of the casket. I told him it was three feet. He said it was 31 inches. He said if I know the area, then he will come out and probe the ground until he finds it. See, someone already came and helped. God is good,” Brenda exclaimed.
Next week Brenda will meet up with someone from Bliley’s funeral home at this graveyard. He will help her pinpoint her nephew’s grave.
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