The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1888-01-06
OPENING OF AN OLD CASKET
Doctors Make an Examination of a
Corpse That Has Excited Curiosity.
The Body of Mrs. MjJless Proves To Be Mummi-
fed Instead of in an Adipocerous or Pet-
rified State, as Was Supposed.

A crowd of half hundred morbidly curious
people with a fair representation OF doctors,
gathered in Kregelos morgue yesterday after
noon, about the casket containing the rem aims
of Mary Ann Milless. The supposed discovery
fifteen months ago of a case of petrifcation IN
the body Of this woman, who died April g. 1856,
led to a widespread interest The body had
never been buried, outlay in the vault at Green
lawn Cemetery until chance directed the sections
attention TO its casket lie was cleaning out the
vault, and in shifting the collins and caskets
noticed that this particular one was much
heavier than the rest Under the impulse of
excited curiosity he examined the face through
the small glass panel, and jumping at the con-
clusion that he had a petrifed body in his care,
turned the event to profit by making known the
discovery and charging trifiing fee to see it.
AS the spread the crowds became greater
and his income larger, until on Sunday he was
enriched by the fees of five thousand people.
Kregeo, in whose vault the remains lay,
made of the thrifty sections
doings, and to save it from the hands of some
enterprisng curiosity seeker and to hold it for
burial pending investigation to who the rela-
tives or friends Of the deceased were, had the
body removed to his morgue. Following this
came bids from museum proprietors all over
the country, and in time information that the
womans husband, L. o. Milless, job printer,
lived in Baltimore. At the time of her death
he WAS q compositor on the Journal But leav-
ing this city shortly afterwards he let her body
remain in the vault with the intention of having
it buried in the near future. He told his friends
Aere that if they did not hear from him to see to
The burial, and this he thought had been done
until the discovery, as related, showed that the
body had lain as it was found all these long
years. Mrs. Milless died of quick consumption,
contracted while attending ball In her i'll
ness attended by Dr. Z. II. Jameson,
and her remains were prepared for burial by
Elijah Hedges.
That is the story in brief, except that the idea
of petrifacton gave way to the supposition that
the body adpocerous formation. Fear
Of having it stolen has been one reason for it's
retention in the morgue until this late day. Az
other was that the undertaken wanted to satisfy
himself the riehtfulness of Millesss claim
of having been the woman's husband He did
this about TWO months ago, visit to Balti-
more for that purpose Milless then told kreg-
clio to have the casket opened. the body exam
ined by physicians, and then 20 bury il secretly.
1t was this examination that attracted the crowd
yesterday, and in face Of it that the body
is petrifaction adipocerous is swept
away. IL required twenty minutes for the
dertaker's assistants to remove the lid of the
casket, but through the glass panels it could
be that the face had undergone con-
removed from the vault 1t pre-
sented yelowish appearance, with the skin
tightly covering the eye sockets. That is all
that could be noticed until the lid off,
which il did after cutting out the screws. A
screw-driver was first tried on them ard then a
bit. but a chisel had to be used. and all the time
the crowd got closer and closer around the
casket When the body was exposed the nox-
ious odor that came from it scattered tine sight
seers somewhat, but directly they closed their
ranks again, leaving the doctors and others less
curious on the outside edge, or wandering about
the room and stable waiting for their time to
gee. 1t was CHASTITY sight, that head with the
r1x-aa 10 ofytr oh
head the skull and face the mouth open
and the hair thin, long and straggly. The black
silk dress looking as if it had been drsnched in
water the soiled Lace, and shoes appearing if |
they had stepped through stream appeared no
better, but all were in good preservation lin |
parts the silk was as soft and glossy
as on the day the body laid in the
casket, and the shoes showed no apparent signs
Of decay. but they suggested the old style of
thirty years ago. The hands were covered with
black silk mits. fashion at the time when Mrs.
Milless no doubt appeared an attractive woman
among her acquaintance. but the hands them |
selves, turned down by twisted wrists, were like
those of a skeleton, the fingers long, knotty and
drawn apart from the position in which they |
were laid across her breast.
1t did not take the doctors long, after a hasty |
examination, to give their opinions. Drs. Combs, |
Davis, Stilson, Lockridge and Wishard all said |
it was naturalization. Nature had done her |
own embalming. and as the BODY lay in her |
medically sealed casket in which a particle |
of air went the process has continued these
thirty-two years. In perhaps thirty more. at |
says the body would have been |
completely mummifed. An unscientifc gentle
man gave il as his theory that the body was
forming soap through ammoniacal elements
produced by the nitrogen of the body coming |
int contact with fatty matter but the doctors
held stoutly to the belief that it nothing |
more than a mummy. and that specimens like it
could be found in any medical college in the
country. The condition produced by a
wasting away of the watery tissues and the es-
Gaping of gas from the body, which, having no
outlet to the air, again became condep sed and
contributed TO the process of preservation. 1t is
said by DIR. Combs that the body now will rap
idly decay, and that there are no calcareons,
waxy fatty formations about it. 1t is the
mere she'll which nature herself has preserved
Mr. Kregeo will bury the body, but when or
where he win keep to himself