Two Native American human skulls dug up and given to Bristol Museum nearly a century ago by a Victorian adventurer and archaeologist from the city have been handed back to their US tribe.
The prehistoric remains, along with other grave goods, were excavated on the tiny Pacific island of Santa Catalina, off the California coast, by Alfred Hutchins.
He donated them to the museum in 1920 after returning home to retire after several decades in America at the end of the 19th century.
Now the pair of skulls are being repatriated and reburied after they were given back at a ceremony at City Hall to descendants of the Tongva people, who once occupied Santa Catalina and other islands in the California Channel chain.
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They will be flown 5,500 miles back to their homeland, which has a population of just 4,000 — the first time remains of any of the tribe’s ancient ancestors have been returned from abroad.
Former Bristol University visiting researcher, filmmaker and anthropologist Dr Teri Brewer started researching the remains in 2011, which led to an international collaboration between curators, archaeologists and descendants to piece together their story.
They discovered that Hutchins left Bristol for the western US in the 1860s seeking his fortune.
He became a keen amataur archaologist and photographer, taking part in what would now be illegal pillaging of graves for skeletal remains in former Native American villages, between 1890 and 1905.
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After amassing a collection of artefacts, he returned to Bristol but lost his son, Lt Avalon Hutchins, named after Santa Catalina’s main settlement, in the First World War before giving his finds from the island, where his son was born, to the museum, most likely as a tribute to him.
A 'constant state of mourning' for Native Americans
Tongva descendant and archaeologist Desiree Martinez said: “This is the first international repatriation of Tongva ancestors that we have achieved.
“As Native Americans, we are in a constant state of mourning knowing that our ancestors’ graves have been disturbed and their remains and burial goods removed to sit on museum shelves, all over the world, to be ‘studied’.
“Today we are joyful that we can bring our ancestors back to the US and rebury them in their homelands.
“We are grateful that the Bristol City Museum and Gallery has been gracious enough to work with us to make this possible.”
A 'typical Victorian and an avid collector'
After the two skulls were formally handed back to the tribe on March 28, Hutchins’s granddaughter Avalon Eastman said: “I am quite sure that my grandfather would not have made his excavations or brought the skulls to England if he had realised there were living descendants who would have been distressed.
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“On his behalf, I will say he was a typical Victorian and an avid collector of all sorts of specimens, geology and artefacts, as well as these human remains, and he did what others of his ilk were also doing, possibly thinking he was ‘saving items for posterity’.
“I am sure Bristol Museum has looked after them well. I am delighted they are going home, and will pray for their souls.”
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