Residents who live near cemeteries with bodies buried from the Civil War era may want to test their drinking water for arsenic and other contaminants, as toxins used for embalming corpses during that time can leach into the soil.
The Civil War may have ended about 150 years ago, but some towns are dealing with an unusual consequence of that era today.
During that time, embalming became a popular method of preserving corpses for burial, and most solutions contained the poisonous element arsenic.
Arsenic was considered helpful in stopping the bacteria involved in the decomposition process; however, it is a substance that does not break down and remains highly toxic.
It proved to be so harmful to the embalm
