NamUs #UP85529 - Stony Creek Jane Doe Found in September 1948

By: Shane Lambert

NamUs #UP85529 is a Jane Doe that was found near Stony Creek, Virginia in 1948. Her case was uploaded in October 2021, making for a 73-year interval. It's quite likely that, if she was a murder victim, then there is no justice to be had in this case due to how long ago it was. However, here are all the details that I could find on this Jane Doe.

Age: NamUs estimates an age of 15 to 25 years.

Sex: Female

Race: Black

Height: 5'2" to 5'3" (estimated)

Weight: 130 to 135 pounds (estimated)

Date body found: September 16th, 1948 (a Thursday) according to NamUs. According to the news source I found, the date of discovery was September 17th, 1948 (the source says the body was found on the nearest Friday to the date of publication). When two sources contradict one another, it's not clear which one to go by. It does create potential that the news source is covering a different Jane Doe, however, nearly all the other information lines up. I think the news source and the NamUs profile are covering the same case.

Date of death: NamUs estimates that she had been dead for six weeks. The original journalism in 1948 stated 2-3 weeks. It would be likely that she died sometime between late July and early September of 1948. If you are cross-referencing this case to missing people, then that's the target area for "last seen" dates (but be open to earlier times).

Location of Body: She was buried in what NamUs called a "makeshift" grave. That sounded clandestine in nature. A news report said she was found near Stony Creek, which makes it sound like the outskirts of town. It was near the Sussex-Prince George County Line according to the news source I found.

Who Found the Body: A crew of highway workers.

The date of discovery being either September 16th or 17th is one contradiction. However, it's not too uncommon for a date to be wrong on these matters. Another matter struck me as more substantial.

In the newspaper source, which is below, it is stated that highway workers noticed the Jane Doe when they noticed some disturbed Earth near a picnic table. This disturbed area was her shallow grave, which was described as two feet wide and two feet deep. It is stated in the article that the workers noticed her hand sticking out of the clandestine grave.

Regarding hands, this Jane Doe's NamUs profile states that one or both of her hands were missing from the body. Evidently, only one hand was missing and the other was sticking out of the grave.

The picture I am getting from all this is that someone buried this woman, who was nude, on the side of the highway. Perhaps this person did it near the picnic table so that it would provide a measure of seclusion. 

But why one hand was removed from the corpse is puzzling. Usually, when criminals remove a Doe's hands they are doing it to eliminate the chance of the Doe being identified due to fingerprinting. However, removing one hand and not the other doesn't seem to jive with that. I am thinking that the buried Doe might have been scavenged by an animal and one of her hands was removed that way while the other perhaps was pulled up, allowing for the highway workers to spot her.

NamUs #UP85529 19 Sep 1948, Sun The Times Dispatch (Richmond, Virginia) Newspapers.com