DNA testing has solved a decades-old mystery surrounding a human skull discovered in 1978 within a wall of a house in Batavia, Illinois. Officials from Kane County confirmed that the skull belonged to 18-year-old Esther Granger, an Indiana woman who passed away in 1866 shortly after childbirth, not long after the American Civil War.
In a press conference on Thursday, October 24, officials explained that modern DNA techniques allowed them to reconstruct a family tree and locate a living relative—Granger’s great-great-grandson—who provided a DNA sample, confirming the match. Investigators also generated a facial impression to approximate her appearance.
Authorities believe Granger’s body may have been stolen by grave robbers, who were active in that era, leading to the eventual separation of her skull from her grave. Though the skull was initially thought to be from before 1900, it spent nearly 50 years in storage at the Batavia Depot Museum, where it remained unidentified.
The mystery resurfaced in 2021 when museum staff found the skull while organizing storage. Local police and the coroner’s office then began the formal identification process, using state-of-the-art DNA testing to finally close this historical case.
source ; Linde Ikeji
