American citizen., 1876-09-09
A CHASTITY HUNT.
Ncman's Desperate Search for the
BODY of her Dead IIusband-She Finds
II In Dissecting Room, Fresh from
the Pickling Tub.

the PickIing Tub.
[From the Philadelphia Times.l
When the steamship Illinois, of the
American Line, arrived in this port in
the early part of March last, Mrs. Jane
Potter, chief cock aboard the vessel,
visited her boarding-house, expecting
to be greeted by her husband, but was
then informed for the first time that
Mr.. Potter had died about ten days
previously. Mr.. Potter was an elec-
trician, employed in an electrical in
strument mandatory at Second and
Chestnut Streets. His death was sud-
den ono. Coroner Goddard was noti-
fled, viewed the body, post-mortem
examination was made, an inquest held
and verdict rendered of death from
congestion of the brain. His wife be-
ing absent, and the dead man having
no relatives in the city, his body was
inferred in the city burial ground, the
coffin, by direction of Coroner God
dard, being marked, so that in case
Mrs. Potter should desire to exhume
the body there would be no trouble in
identifying it.
Mrs. Potter learning these facts upon
her arrival in Philadelphia, at once de-
termined to remove the body of her
husband to N1achpelah Cemetery, as
the idea of his remains mouldering
away in the dreary waste of unsodded
hillocks called Potter's Field was dis
tasteful, to her. Besides, her husband S
life was insured for 81, 900 in the Metro
politan Life Insurance Company, and
in order to furnish authentic proof of
his death it was necessary thatthe body
should be disinterred. Mrs. Potter en-
ployed an undertaken, Robt. p. Morton,
of 10 South Second Street, to under
take the exhumation and reinterment
of her husbands remains. Mr.. Nor
ton visited the City Burial Ground and
saw William M. Taylor, the Superin-
tendent, who professed to-know the ex-
act whereabouts of the body. Men
were set to work and coffin was soon
brought to the surface, but the pallid
face that stared upward from the plain
box of unplaned pine was not that of
Mr.. Potter. Several more cot1ins were
brought to the surface.
PoTTER's FIELD.
Taylor was finally forced to admit
that he could not find the body. Mrs.
Potter was about giving up the search
when man employed in Potter's Field
came to her in an intoxicated condition
and volunteered to find her husbands
remains provided she would pay him
two dollars. She readily acquiesced,
and fearing lest when the liquor that
had unhinged his tongue had lost its
effect his returned sense would close his
mouth, she accompanied him, though
wild and repulsive looking, to the
Homeopathic Hospital, Filbert Street,
above Eleventh, Mr.. Morton, the un-
dertaker, being one of the party. Down
a narrow stairway, into the darkness of
a cellar, past rooms from which came
odors of the grave, to the vat in which
the subjects are prepared for the dis
secting room, but MIR. Potter's body
was not among its CHASTITY contents. In
the room opposite were two collins of
plain board, side by side, barren
of one word that would tell
who rested within. "Here he is,'' said
the man, as he wrenched the lid from
the foremost coffin. 1t was not Mr..
Potter. The next one was opened, and
he lay exposed to his wife's gaze. The
body had already been injected, and in
all probability was fresh from the pic
kling-tub. The coffins were without a
stain, and had evidently never been be-
meath the ground. Who rested in the
other was not known, as Mr.. Taylor,
though he has trafficked in bodies for
years, and does a business so extensive
that the human consignments to the
city burial ground barely suffice to sup
ply his many customers, keeps no rec
ord of the former names of the corpses
he sends TO the picking watts of the col
leges and the boiling-tub of the skele-
Mrs. Potter removed her
husbands body to Machpelah Cemete-
ry, and is still engaged in attempting to
convince the Metropolitan Life Insu-
rance Company that he is really dead.
Whether she will have to indulge in the
luxury of a lawsuit to obtain the 81, 900
due her is still an undecided question.
THE TRAFFIC IN BODIES.
A little more than year since Cor
oner Goddard, suspecting that Superin-
,endent Taylor was selling the bodies
from the Potter's Field, instituted an in
vestigation and found three of the
Morgue collins in the Woman's 8 Medical
College, and upon this and other testi-
nony Taylor was held by Magistrate
Kerr in $4,000 bail, but the Coroner's
being excited in favor of the
mans wife and six children, the prose-
,ution was not pressed. Notwithstand-
ng this, he has still continued the prac-
ice, obtaining from S. to $40 for each
body. Indeed, did he but retire from
he business, the Potter's Field, which
s now almost barren of inhabitants,
would soon be overtiowing, there hav-
ng been 80 bodies sent there during
me week of the late heated term. No
blame is placed upon the college au-
horities. The number of students there
S very large, and it would be impossi-
,le to discover the history of every SUBJ
ect for anatomical study brought in.
Taylor has undoubtedly reached the
md of his tether, and it is probable that
Coroner Goddard will again cause his
Lrrest.