Daily Davenport gazette. [volume] (Davenport, Iowa) 1854-1855, 1855-08-13
From tho Alton Courier.
DROWNED VEN.

For several months past the papers of st.
Louis have daily recorded one or more in
quests on the bodies OF unknown men found
drowned. A large number of inquests have
been held at this point and every CITY on
the river, over the bodies Of unknown men.
found drowned. The question naturally
arises, why is it that so many men come to
their death in this way Most of them are
clothed, aud yet nothing eau be found by
which reasonable number of them can be
ntenlihed. Why is it that the time, placo
and circumstances oftheir drowning are SO
seldom recorded! A ST. Louis paper est-
mates the number Of bodies found at that
point alone at 30 to 40 each month. Say
it is IS, and that will make the number of
one year 400. n these men are for the
most part drowned at points above, then
there is no good reason why the number
found at st. Louis should be very much
greater than at other single points. True,
the large number Of people crossing the river
at st. Louis. and the large number of boats
always in port would furnish reason why
bodies floating in the river at that point
should be more frequently discovered, and
the eddy near the city is more likely to
throw them ashore; but if one third Of the
number drowned in the Mississippi from st.
Louis to the head Of navigation on that river,
and on the Missouri, are picked up at ST.
Louis, then the aggregate number found
yearly willequal 2G0-a much larger num-
Der than are killed or drowned by steam
boat disasters.
There is a fearful mystery involved in
this subject-a mystery that requires n scru-
tnizing public investigation We have been
informed by passengers on the river boats
that 1t is SO common a thing to observe hu-
man bodies floating in the river, that such
discoveries are rarely subjects of remarks,
and they are almost universally left to float
or.
The st. Louis 1nielgcncer publishes the
following incident in this connection which
will doubtless serve ms an index to point out
the causes of much Of this destruction of
human life.
"a circumstance which occurred few
nights since, rnder our own observation
suggested to us q solution Of this mystery:
but solution too horrid almost for belief
The night was dark, we were walking in
retired part Of the levee, aud whose neigh.
borhood does not bear the best reputation
in the world, when we saw two men come
out of n low sailor boarding house, bearing
something heavy upon their shoulders They
walked stealthly and cautiously, and as they
passed by us, and between us and gaslnmp
OF little distance, we could see without
being seen, and from the appearance of the
object they Were carrying, we took it to be
drunken man. Our suppostion at first
was, that they were couple of boatmcn
taking TO their craft drunken man.
From motives Of curiosity alone, ms we
saw they were taking a direction where no
boats were lying, we followed them. What
ever their burden was, they drew il into Il
river. We thought then, and think still,
that il was drunken man. TIE fact that
tn neighborhood whence these men came,
is filled by low sailor boarding houses, kept
by the most depraved and viciou specimens
OF humanity, and that the bodies found in
the river are nost exclusively those Of tn,
boatmen, md that these only stop at such
places when they had been paid off by tn,
boats, and are consequently flush of money,
the conclusion is almost irresistible forced
upon u, that these unfori gnate men are first
made drunk, and while in that state rob
bel, and then thrown into the river and
drowned.
The idea is horrd one, but one which
we 'lieve is often realized in the locality
to which we allude, and where we believe
that, at any dav, fifty men could be found
who would take human life for ten cents.
This place has been canker spot upon our
city for years, il is the resort and safe abode
of the most corrupt and during rognes, and
no outside citizen dare walk its precincts
unguarded after niqhtfall.
There is reason to believe that in connec-
ton with very many Of these bodies found
as above described, there is an unwritten
tale Of drunkenness, robbery and murder,
which will never be disclosed"