New Orleans - New Orleans celebrates the return and burial of 19 African-American bodies in 19th-century Germany.

Saturday, including jazz funerals, including one of the city’s most distinctive traditions, pay tribute to the humanity of people who are tribute to people.

"Ironically, we know these 19 are blasphemous because of the horrible things that happened after their death, blasphemy their bodies," said Monique Guillory, president of Dillard University. "It's actually an opportunity for us to know and commemorate the human nature of all these people, you know, it's such a respected send-out and the final funeral."

These 19 people are believed to have been separated from natural causes in charity hospitals from 1871 to 1872, serving all races and classes in New Orleans during the peak of white supremacist oppression in the 1800s. The hospital was closed after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

On Saturday's service Saturday, the remains sat in 19 wooden boxes at the University Church, which also included music from Kumbuka African Drum and Dance Collective.

A New Orleans physician provided a German researcher with 19 skulls, engaged in fake research – the debunked belief that a person’s skull can determine innate racial traits.

"All kinds of experiments are conducted on bold bodies of life and death," said historian Eva Baham. "People without agencies."

Gillori said that in 2023, the University of Leipzig and the City of New Orleans reached out to find a way to return the body. The University of Leipzig did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

"This is our moral demonstration in New Orleans and Leipzig," Baham said.

Researchers at Dillard University say there is more digging to do, including trying to track down possible offspring. They believe that some people may have escaped slavery recently.

"In the late 19th century, these people were really poor, poor people, but … they had names, addresses, and walked on the streets of the city we liked," Gilory said. "We all should recognize our humanity and the value of our lives."