Pieces of an old pine casket have surfaced on the Alum Creek Lake shoreline at the site of the former Cheshire Cemetery, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced Tuesday.

The cemetery was relocated during construction of Alum Creek Dam in the 1970s.

Corps archeologists on Monday investigated the site, but found no evidence of human remains, said Peggy Noel, corps spokesperson. Personnel from the Devore-Snyder Funeral Home were at the scene in case remains were found.

A private citizen walking in the area found the pieces and notified officials, Noel said.

"We just started drawing the lake down to go to winter pool so that area has just become exposed again," Noel said.

Last April, shore erosion in that area exposed parts of old caskets and a vault. Human bones were found. They were put in individual small vault casket containers and placed in the Berlin Cheshire Cemetery.

TAB Construction out of Canton is conduction a $110,929 project to stabilize the shore in that area, to prevent further erosion.

The company completed the summer-pool shoreline protection in September and will begin securing the winter-pool shoreline in December, Noel said.

"We're putting the stone slope protection to stabilize the bank to help prevent this from happening in the future," Noel said. "We're glad we were able to do so with the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act dollars, and I'm glad that an Ohio company was able to perform the work.

In April, Lawrence Buell, superintendent of the Berlin Cheshire Cemetery, said Cheshire Cemetery records were lost in a 1940s fire. Any graves without headstones could have been overlooked in the 1970s, when about 1,400 bodies were moved to Berlin Cheshire Cemetery.

Buell said the original cemetery dates to the 1800s. In 1991, a grave vault was uncovered on the east bank of the reservoir, which also was placed in the Berlin Cheshire Cemetery.