Seventy-five years ago, Grace Fifield took two of her children to the circus in Hartford. She was never seen again.
On Thursday, Connecticut’s Chief Medical Examiner testified to a judge, saying that Fifield could be one of the five unidentified victims of the fire buried at the Northwood Cemetery in Windsor.
“There are five still unidentified remains, two of them are adult women,” said Dr. James Gill, who has been the state’s Chief Medical Examiner for over six years. In total, 168 people died in the infamous fire.
“We’re doing it for the family,” said Dr. Gill. “We believe the best opportunity to make the identification would be to examine both of those adult women.”
Earlier this year, a woman named Sandy Sumrow contacted Dr. Gill Saying she believed her grandmother could be one of the unidentified victims buried in Windsor.
“With DNA testing, which was not available back in 1944, there’s a reasonable possibility that we could get DNA to do testing and make a comparison and make a positive identification,” Gill explained to NBC Connecticut after testifying at the state’s superior court on Thursday.
NBC Connecticut talked to Sumrow back in June. Her mother told her of grandmother’s disappearance when she was just a little girl.
“My mother didn’t have closure, her sister didn’t have closure, her brother didn’t have closure.”
At the request of Sumrow and Gill, Hartford State’s Attorney Gail Hardy filed the motion to exhume the two unidentified female bodies, and on Thursday presented the evidence in their favor to a judge.
“I offered all the evidence that I thought was necessary,” said Hardy.
The state says that initially the victims races and ages were identified in the 1944 death certificates, but Gill believes their third- and fourth-degree burns would have made it nearly impossible to determine those characteristics back then.
“When you have thermal injury, heat injury of the body, it can cause changes, tightening of the skin and so forth that can make determination of race, or age difficult,” Gill said.
Artifacts From the 1944 Hartford Circus Fire
The civil case is against Northwood Cemetery where the bodies are buried. The City of Hartford owns the land. Mayor Luke Bronin wrote a letter to the state’s attorney this week saying the city has no objections to the exhumation and is ready to assist if the judge grants the motion.
“This is a scar that remains for many in our city and in our state and I think that if by identifying these bodies we can bring closure to anyone, it’s an important thing to do,” said the mayor.
Even if Sumrow’s grandmother isn’t found, Gill says labs across the country are interested in doing testing on the samples collected to find a match pro bono.
“We want to make sure that all decedents in Connecticut are properly identified and have a proper death certificate,” Gill explained.
The court says they expect to have a ruling within the next few weeks.
To take a look at our interactive coverage on the 1944 Hartford Circus fire, click here.
