McCook weekly tribune. (McCook, Neb.) 188?-1886, 1884-08-28
THE NEW TOWN SLEEPER.
Strange life and Death of Connecticut
Farmers Boy.

Strange Life and Death of a Connecticut
Farmers Boy.
A Newtown (Ct.) dispatch: One OF
the straDgest of the many strange char
acters which this Gland of steady hab-
its" has given to the world was q resi-
dent of this delightful little town, in
Fairfield county. His name was Sher-
man w. Plat, and he was known
throughout the state as ''the Newtown
Sleeper" He was a somnambulist OF
somnambulists, and the peculiar form
which his malady took made him an
object of general curiosity, as well as
one of special interest to the medical
experts of the county. Young Plat
lived with his father, well-to-dO far
mer, in the little hamlet of Dodgin-
town, in the southwestern part of this
town. He was never particularly
brilliant child, but he was by no means
dullard, averaging in intelligence
about with the ordinary farmers boy.
The strange somnOlent states which
brought to him so unenviable notoriety
were first noticeable soon after he pass
ed into his ''tcens," and they contin-
ued nearly up to the time of his sudden
and as yet unexplained death. When
the disease-for it is generally consid-
cred among physicians that he was the
victim of some strange and hitherto
unknown intermittent malady-attack-
ed Platt, he would 60 to bed and be at
once wrapped in the soundest of slum-
bers. Efforts to thoroughly arouse him
by shaking, dousirg with baths of cold
water, the application of electricity,
and treatment of a similar nature, were
always unavailing. He would remain
in his trancelike condition sometimes
for only few days, but oftener the
sleep would lengthen out into weeks,
and sometimes even into months, his
''best record in any one of these
TIA ices, according to a generally &C
cepted report here, being within a few
days of five months. During this long
period he seemed to have lost all power
of intellectual effort, and when he re-
covered from such an attack the
period of his sleep was all blank
to him. Instinctively, it seemed to
those who watched him, he would rise
from his couch at irregular intervals
and partake of the food or drink shat
was constantly kept in his room TO
supply his wants. When hunger and
thirst were abated he would at once
return to his bed and continue his
slumbers. When he arose at such
times he would speak to no one, would
answer no questions, pay no attention
to any interference, and was seemingly
o5livious of the fact that anyone was
near him. A singular fact in connec-
ton with the case was that he did not
seem to lose either health or strength
during these prolonged slumbers,
which it was naturally expected would
wear out his vitality. Physicians who
were called in from Bridgeport first,
then from New Haven, and finally
from New York, could give no expla-
nation of the strange disease, nor
could they suggest any remedy that
was sufficient to effect a cure, though
many tried their skill.
About a year ago, Platt having be-
gun to frighten his parents by taking
short walks out of doors while in his
somnambulisoic state, his father ap-
piled to the prooate court of this dis
trict, and Plat was sent to the asylum
for the insane at Middletown. Appli-
cation and commitment were on the
theory that his peculiar malady was
some form Of insanity. He remained
in that institution, where there were
few but Short occurrences of his somno-
lency, until the Goth of last month,
when he was discharged and returned
to his home here. He seemed much
depressed in spirits, and his mind
seemed to wander at times. On the
Monday following his return he wan
dered away from his fathers house,
and no trace of him could be had I'M
til the succeeding Saturday. On that
day his body was found by one of
party of searchers in Sandford's pond.
1t was perfectly nude, and this added
to the misery of his death. The theory
was advanced that he had been
drowned while bathing, and this was
very generally accepted at first as the
solution to the way in which he met
his death, as there were no marks of
violence on his person. Search was
made all along the banks of the pond
for his clothing, but it could not be
found, as it was argued it certainly
would have been had he been bathing
in the pond. 1t is possible that the
clothes had been found and appropria-
ted by tramps, who sometimes fire.
quent the shores of the pond. 1t is
thought now that he committed sui
eide, becoming respondent because of
the incurable malady with which he
was afflicted. This theory is borne
out by the fact that some of the people
living near the pond remember having
seen man acting somewhat strangely
near there the day after his disap-
pearance.