Richland beacon. [volume] (Rayville, La.) 1869-1890, 1888-08-18
HE WAS BURIED ALIVE.
The Horrible Discovery Two Sisters
Made.

In the whole category of horrors it i,
difficult to imagine an ending so dread
full or an experience more terrible to an
ticipate than that of being buried alive
1t is something from which the mind
shrinks with instructive terror and be
fore which the stoutest heart is forced Il
quail.
The awful railway accidents at Ashta-
bula and Chatsworth, and the death.
dealing cyclones of Marshfeld, st.
Cloud and Mount Vernon, each cast a
pail of gloom over the whole country,
although it was not so much the manner
in which the victims met their doom as
it was the wholesale loss Of life which
was involved; but even more sickening
to contemplate than this is the bringing
forth from the grave of the remains of
one who was supposed to have under.
gone the natural process of dissolution,
and make the appalling discovery, when
too late, that a human being had been
entombed alive, and upon lifting the lid
of the coffin, expecting to see the same
placid countenance that was seen before
the remains were consigned to the
earth, gaze upon the bruised and LAGER.
ated features Of relative or friend.
Such is the story which has been de-
veloped by the exhuming of the remains
of George Stuff, who conducted saloon
in Lowell, says the st Louis Globe DEM
ocrat. He was aged twenty five years,
and was supposed to have died of pneu-
mOnia in the forenoon of January g,
1888. January 10 was the day first set
for the burial of the remains, but, act
ing upon the advice of Dr.. W. G. Green,
the attending physician, it was decided
TO have the body inferred on the 9th, the
day following the supposed death, and
accordingly the burial took place in
Bethlehem Cemetery on the afternoon
Of Monday, January 9.
Nothing further was thought of the
matter, nor was the impossibility of the
young man not being dead preached I'M
til the remains were taken up on Tues
day last to be transferred to the family
lot, which had been secured in Calvary
Cemetery. Only the two sisters of the
deceased, accompanied 10y several init
mate friends, were present when the
coffin was taken from the grave for re-
moyal, and they expressed q desire to
once more gaze upon the face of their
brother and riend before it should be
lowered to its last resting place.
The request was granted, and when the
lid OF the coffin was raised, those who |
had gathered around for the purpose of |
the remains witnessed a sight |
which they will remember with a cold !
shudder to the last day of their lives.
~ frla in no ,ck
lid, had been smashed to atoms, and tile
splinters were in the bottom of the cof-
bin and laying around the dead mans
head, while the body was turned COM
pletely over in tho coffin, face down.
ward, with the hands drawn up tightly
against the breast. The face was con
'lderably cut with the broken glass and
presented not very pleasing object to
gaze upon.
The sisters of the deceased then claim
I'd that the boy had been buried alive,
put William Laudvogt, the undertaken
Who hal charge of and had embalmed
he remains on the night of the death,
aid that it could not be SO, but that the
'ody had been turned over and the glass
'roken by the careless lowering of the
'onh AutO tHc STuNS, anu also tiluC Oh
he night of January 8, he had, in en-
'alming the body, injected into the
ems and calves OF the legs, four ounces
# arsenic in solution, and that the
windows in the room :. aiiiioh the body
ny had been left open on that night
nd had there been any life in the body
t that time the intense cold would have
4 itself caused death.
The coffin was again closed, however,
nj the remains inferred in Calvary
cemetery, but the sisters OF the deceas-
4 were not alone in their opinion that
ieorge Stuff had been buried alive, for
hey reasoned that it would be al impos-
Utility for the remains to be turned
Yer in the coffin from the simple fitting
it either on end or on the side, with
&c lid OF the coffin screwed down, as it
well.knOwn fact that it is q rather
ifficu!t matter to even turn a body in
he coffin when the lid is of. And then,
10, the evidence of struggle or COM
lotion was made quite plain from the
ct that the face was cut with the
glass, and then the body {
lrned completely over, with the face I
lrecily downward and the hands and
ms drawn up in the position previous
stated. These are circumstances
hich are hard to explain, and whether
he that tho man really was buried
i've or not it is certainly q very remark.