Catherine and Richard Dotson were never supposed to leave this land, and their family made sure of it. When the U.S. War Department seized the fields for a World War II airfield, almost every grave was dug up and moved. Almost. The Dotsons’ descendants fought to keep them here, rooted in the soil they once farmed, even as concrete and steel swallowed everything around them.
Today, their headstones lie flush with runway 10, the only known graves embedded in an active commercial runway. Two more relatives rest quietly in nearby brush, half-hidden from passengers rushing past. Pilots glance at the markers on final approach, trading ghost stories in the cockpit. In a city famous for restless spirits and tragic histories, Savannah’s first greeting to many travelers is a chilling one: a reminder that beneath the roar of modern flight, the dead still hold their ground.
