Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1886-11-26
VICTIMS OF THE PLAGUE.
Three Hundred Bodies Dug Out of
City Churchyard.
Fron tha Man York ,Tournal.

From the Nes0 York Journal.
A crowd of ladies and old gentlemen
stood gazing solemnly through the iron
churchyard at it's Nineteenth street en-
trance yesterday afternoon. Workmen,
under the direction of Sexton William FL.
Nicholl, were engaged in opening some
fourteen vaults, whose entrances had not
been disturbed in thirty years. Upward
OF 800 bodies have been buried in the
Eighteenth Street Methodist church yard,
which is divided into two portions, con-
tanning respectively the public and pri-
vaue vaults.
Rev. DIR. George E. Strobridge, pastor
Of the church, is very indignant at a re-
port that has been circulated that the
church had wantonly disturbed these
eternal sleepers for the sake OF making
money out of the land wherein they
mouldered.
"The suggestion originally came" said
he, IRON the owners of vaults or their
descendants, who perceived the impro
prety Of such site for cemetary and
desired to transfer their loved ones to
family plots in mere quiet graveyards.
SO many suggestions of this sort were
made that at last the church folks took
to talking about it in earnest. Some at
first opposed 1t, but at a meeting OF the
pew-holders it was voted upon without
dissenting voice. Only q small proper
ton OF those buried here are Methodists.
this having been the principal burying
ground OF the village of Chelsea fifty
years ago."
| A reporter entered one of the open
vaults. They are built TO last, not a
crack or seam being visible anywhere.
| The three hardwood collins had crumbled
away, leaving three bowi-like skulls upon
the brick floor with the outlines, in
Wondering black dust, of the skeletons
| OF the dead, In some cases thigh bones
and shoulder blades being not yet turned
| to original earth.
An old resident of the neighb0rhood
was very much disturbed lest the exhum-
| ing of the dead bodies should lead to
| repetition OF the great cholera scourge
| which decimated the village of Chelsea
In 1882 and again some ten years later.
II remember" said the old man,
'when people were dying every day from
| the dreadful plague, and it was no
unusual thing Tor two or three cholera
! patients to be buried in single alter
| noon. 1t was during that dreadful
| epidemic that the Methodist graveyard
was filled up. Now, scientists say that
| cholera germs are practically indestFUct-
| IDLE. we were safe enough when the
bodies were enclosed in those Theoretically
sealed vaults, but am worried for fear
the opening of them and transferring of
the dead peoples remains in the outer air
| may start the disease once more among
us. This neighbOrhood Is much more
| densely populated now than in the olden
| days, and if the plague started here it
might sweep the entire city, as we'll as
| Brooklyn and Jersey City. Better to
have left them in their charnel house
| far better" ..t
Mr.. Edward Berrian, one of the oldest
and most respected members of the
| church, did not, however, participate ia
the fears of his neighbor, he claiming
that 1t was only AsiatIc cholera that was
so DANGEROUS. Besides, the bodies to be
| removed were, Tor the most part, from
| private vaults which did not contain so
many bodies of those who had died OF
| cholera.
The vaults are marked by prone gran
tie slab, most of them having no mark
save number, but others bearing the
name of the owner. The numbers were
| all preserved in an old register, which
was lost some thirty years ago by one Of
| the sections OF the church, SO that now
| the task is doubly difficult to identify the
| dead.