The Jeffersonian. [volume] (Stroudsburg, Pa.) 1853-1911, 1853-08-11
The Pauper Dead Of Naples.


A writer in the Cincinnati Gazette
gives the following account of a visit to a
place where the pauper dead of naples
are buried
About two miles from the city, in a
large square place, enclosed by high
wall, there are 365 cistern Snapped vaults
or pits, with an aperture on top about
three feet square. These cisterns are
some 20 or 25 feet deep by IL or Is in
diameter, with the opening covered by a
heavy stone, and tightly cemented. One
of these is removed by portable lever
every day in the year, to receive the dead
of that day, and then closed again for a
year. They begin to deposit the bodies
about o'clock in the evening, and end
at 10. When got there about ten or
twelve people had already been thrown
in, and were lying promiscuously as they
chanced to fall, with head, body and
limbs in every possible attitude across, O.
yer and under each other An old priest,
or three attendants, and few idle speo-
tators of the common sort, were lettering
about.
Shotly after my arrival box was
brought containing the body of a child
some 4 or 5 years; its hand held bunch
of flowers, and rose was in its mouth.
The priest mumbled short prayer, sprin-
kled it with holy water, and turned away,
man then took the little fellow by the
neck and heels and pitched him in as he
would stick of wood; his head struck
the curb as it went in, and he fell whirl
ing to the bottom; seeing the flowers that
fell from his hand, he took them up and
threw them in after it. In few minutes
more a man was brought to the mouth of
the pit the priest again prayed and sprin-
kled, the attendants took him up by the
head and legs and down he went also.
Then followed another child like the
first, and was about leaving the ground
when fourth subject entered. The lid of
the box was thrown back, and it was the
body of young and rather handsome fe-
male. She was apparently about twenty
and died evidently from some short i'll
ness. Her arms and face were round and
full, and she appeared more asleep than
dead. The prayers and holy water again
in requisition: the attendants took her
roughly up, and tossed her in. l imme-
diately stepped to the mouth of the vault
and looked down her limbs, and those
of the dead below she had disturbed by
her fall, were still in motion. Her head
was slowly turning, and her hair, which
was long, black and luxuriant, was set
tling in thick clusters across a very white
and naked body lying near her. For a
moment the whole herrid mass seemed
instinct with life, and crawling on the bot
tom of its loathsomo charnel house. l
had seen enough; sick and disgusted l
turned away, and moralizing on the diff
erence between such an interment and a
peaceful one in our own beautiful cement
cry at SpringGrove, l mounted my vo-
lante and returned to Naples, meeting on
Il
and small, containing more victims for that
Unsuitable nav that opens its mouth but
once year to be gorged with its dread
full banquet
The bodies thus entered are generally
from the Hospital, and the sight can be
witnessed by any one 365 times year
Before the pit is closed, quick lime is
thrown in, and nothing but bones left
when it is again opened.