Unmarked Graves at Central State

Central State Hospital in Milledgeville, Georgia, opened in 1842 as the Georgia State Lunatic, Idiot, and Epileptic Asylum, and it is surrounded by about 25,000 unmarked graves. Once the largest mental hospital in the world, Central State Hospital shut down during the deinstitutionalization movement in the late 20th century and ceased psychiatric admissions in 2010. The graves are believed to result from decades of overcrowding, high patient death rates, and minimal burial documentation.

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