The Air Force was sent some hours after reports of Congressman Leo Ryan's assassination was received by the State Department. They arrived at Port Kaituma night of 18 November, and transported the wounded for treatment in Puerto Rico. Some members of the US Military stayed behind with Guyanese officials, to secure the bodies of the deceased on the tarmac and to find out what happened in Jonestown.
The bodies in Jonestown were found on evening of 19 November 1978 by the Guyanese Defense Force, about a day after the deaths have occurred. Jonestown was not too far from Port Kaituma, but the Guyanese Defense Force moved slowly through the jungle, fearing that they would be shot at by Jonestown residents. (Plus, you know, would you take it very well if an armed military force barged into your home?) Because Guyana is in the tropics, the bodies of the victims have already begun to bloat and decay in the hot humid air. The decomposition situation would only get worse as time went on.
Medics from the US Army arrived with cyanide antidotes for any survivors, under the belief that 400 people had died and that there might still be hundreds survivors in the area. This belief was quickly found to be false; although over 80 people survived the tragedy, most of the people who survived happened to be out of Jonestown that day, whether because they were in Georgetown, because they were sent out on an errand, because they were on a supplies mission, or for other reasons. Any survivors near the Jonestown/Port Kaituma area were quickly found, and most were sent to Georgetown. This left 909 bodies lying in the jungle.
A brief examination was preformed on the bodies.
Dr. Leslie Mootoo, Guyana’s chief pathologist, along with an American forensic pathologist sent by the Defense Department, performed brief examinations on Congressman Ryan and the others who died at the airstrip. Mootoo also visually examined over 200 bodies in Jonestown. He later told a Guyana coroner’s jury that he saw needle marks on at least 70. With the help of American pathologist Dr. Lynn Crook, Mootoo concluded that cyanide was present in some of the bodies. An analysis of the contents of the vat revealed several tranquilizers as well as two strong poisons: potassium cyanide and potassium chloride.
The exact number of bodies with needle marks is uncertain, having been reported as either less than 20 bodies, 70 to 80 bodies, around 120 bodies, or even up to 400 bodies. Tim Carter, who returned to Jonestown to visually identify the bodies, correlates Mootoo's account of injection marks, and said this about the injections:
The location of these injections was haphazard and varied, despite the testimony of Guyana’s chief pathologist Dr. Leslie Mootoo at the inquest in Matthews Ridge that all injections were found located between the shoulder blades. I personally saw abscesses on a left temple, neck, back of hand, upper arm, lower leg, cheek, and back of shoulder. I believe Dr. Mootoo was describing the bodies found in the “dorm” where Hyacinth Thrash and other older seniors lived.
The numbers of people forcibly injected with poison will never be fully known. During the first days following November 18, Dr. Mootoo gave a range in his count, from 70-80 to over 180, and this was on the limited number of bodies – perhaps no more than 200 – that he says he was able to inspect before the U.S. State Department took over the “recovery” operation on November 22. What is most disturbing is that when Dr. Mootoo testified at the inquest, he said the number was fewer than 20. Why? What would account for such a drastic reduction to a number below what I personally saw in a very small area inside the pavilion.
As noted, some survivors, such as Tim Carter and Stephan Jones, had returned to give identification to the bodies. This was stopped after several days, due to the decomposition problem. Anyways, the priority was to get these bodies out of the area, as soon as possible, and this was what the US military did.
The Guyanese authorities waived the requirement for autopsies and death certificates for unnatural deaths. This helped to expedite the removal of the remains. The bodies were transported, first by helicopter to Georgetown in leaking body bags, then to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware in transfer cases. Because of the large number of bodies, orders for transfer cases (and even some coffins) were sent as far away as West Germany, and many transfer cases were reused. Also due to the large number of bodies, the transport cases were stacked like crates, in order to facilitate their removal.
Once the bodies were sent to Dover, some attempt was made to identify the bodies. Fingerprints were collected, and dental and fingerprint records had been sent from Guyana to the US. Shortly after, all of the bodies were embalmed. By this point, no full autopsy had been done on any of these bodies.
The Justice Department would eventually preform an autopsy of seven bodies in December: those of Jim Jones, Annie Moore, Carolyn Layton, Larry Schacht, Maria Katsaris, Richard Castillo and Violet Dillard. The bodies of Annie Moore, Carolyn Layton, Larry Schacht, and Maria Katsaris were done at the request of their families. Jim Jones's body was selected by the government. The last two were selected at random. Because the bodies had been embalmed, and because of the state of decay, the pathologist's reports on their cause of death were uncertain, and not much information could be gleaned from their bodies.
Some of the bodies were released to family members. Most family members, however, could not afford to bring the bodies back or otherwise claim them (as most Peoples Temple members were poor and lived in California). In addition, many of the bodies had been left unidentified; these mostly comprised of children who had died in Jonestown. Delaware did not want the bodies, and at one point had halted cementation of the Jonestown dead. Religious workers in San Francisco raised money to bring the bodies back to California, and Evergreen Cemetery was willing to accept and bury the bodies. In April 1979, the bodies were finally transported to California. In May of that same year, the bodies that had been unidentified and/or unclaimed by their families were finally laid to rest.
A memorial is held every year on 18 November at Evergreen Cemetery to commemorate the dead.
Roughly in order of appearance:
(I'm sorry that the articles are from the same website. It's the largest repositories of articles and public source documents accessible to the public that I can find. The articles themselves were originally published in the jonestown report and are rehosted there for the public.)