The ashes of nine people who were killed in the 1978 Jonestown massacre in Guyana have been discovered in Delaware.
They were among 38 containers discovered at premises which once housed the Minus Funeral Home.
In all 918 people died in the mass suicide in Guyana in November 1978, after devotees of the 'Rev Jim Jones' drank cyanide-laced punch.
Forensic investigators were called into the building by the new owner, a bank, whose officials discovered the containers.
Documents found on the site, including death certificates, enabled investigators to link nine of the containers to the Jonestown massacre.
A spokewosman for the Department of Safety and Homeland Security said further investigations would be carried out on the remains.
A view of the inside of the former Minus Funeral Home (AP)
'We don't know why they were unclaimed. What we intend to do is identify family members, reach out to them and make them aware that the cremains are available to them.'
The discovery of the ashes led to further excavations outside the building, but no further discoveries were made.
How the remains were left at the home remains unclear, although there is no suggestion of impropriety.
Jones was the leader of a cult known as the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project in California before he headed a a mass migration to Guyana in the mid 1970s.
About a third of those who died in what Jones described as 'revolutionary suicide' were children.
Entities 0 Name: Guyana Count: 3 1 Name: Jonestown Count: 2 2 Name: Jones Count: 2 3 Name: Department of Safety and Homeland Security Count: 1 4 Name: Delaware Count: 1 5 Name: Peoples Temple Agricultural Project Count: 1 6 Name: AP Count: 1 7 Name: California Count: 1 Related Keywords 0 Name: guyana Score: 28 1 Name: jonestown Score: 20 2 Name: jones Score: 13 3 Name: discovered Score: 13 4 Name: 1978 Score: 12 5 Name: minus Score: 12 6 Name: funeral Score: 11 7 Name: massacre Score: 11 8 Name: containers Score: 11 9 Name: investigations Score: 10 authors 0 Name: David Millward Url: http://ift.tt/1oOOAKQ Media Images 0