Los Angeles herald., 1890-09-29
An Officer Who Must Have
Plenty of Nerve
To Face the CHASTITY Sights He
Has to See.
How a Couple of Ariz0nans Held
Inquests.
The Finding of a Mummy at Anaheim-
Old Longenecker's Punishment--A Cor
oner Sleeps in Coffin AL Night.

Der OF candidates LOT Jne ONCE OF cOrO-
ner. So far there is goodly list of Re-
lican candidates, with the Democrats yet
to be heard of. The reason why such
ghastly job is in demand is because it is
fee Office, which pays the incumbent
considerably. But: how any one but a
doctor or undertaken, or one used and
nerved up to horrible scenes, can banker
after position in which all the senses
must in turn revolt, can only be account
ed for on the proposition that the candi-
date only sees before him his prospect
i've fat monthly demands on the county,
and never recollects the undesirable
work he has to perform before he can
present his bill. A gentleman who was
for long time connected with coroners'
offices in different parts of the country
yesterday told HERALD reporter few
of his "reminiscences, some of which par
took of the ludicrous and others very
much of the lugubrious.
''Several years ago." said the loqua-
cious eX iuez de muertos, as the Next
cans call the coroner, 'there were two
coroners in the county of Pima, Arizona,
and as it was a fee office, and jobs very
on each occasion who should get first to
the locality where a suspicious stiff
had been discovered. The greatest rival
~, not to say enmity, existed between the
two, and they never lost an opportunity
to quarrel and ventilate their differences
before the public. One was an under
taker and the other had some connection
with the coalbunkers of the railroad
company, but as far as holding judicial
investigation into the cause of any ones
death was concerned neither was any
more fit for it than to catch an Apache
by putting salt on his gee-string." III
had to hold most inquests for the under
taxer, he, of course, presiding maiesti-
cally and keeping his mouth shut as
tight as he could throughout the entire
proceedings. He came in very handy,
Guided. He then invariably told the
but that unfortunately the county did
not provide jury fees and so their time
could not be remunerated But, gen.
tlemen.' he would say, lets 60 over to
Billy Donsing over the way, and I'll
set 'em up. All hands come along
This always ended the proceedings
IL,
30 that in the dry climate of Arizona,
where drinking several times a day is
quite the fad, we never found any great
trouble in securing as many jurors as
we wanted. Some fellows, who found
the coroner always as dumb as an oyster
at inquests, though he was as voluble as
a magpie when trying to sell a coffin or
when 'jawing' his wife, got to making
fun of him about it, He concluded that
he must assert his dignity and hold the
next inquest himself: You do the
writin', boy he said and let me DO the
talkin'; l call ate that kin show these
yere fellows l know my business So
when the next inquest cane along, the
coroner was ready for all emergencies.
After the preliminary questions to the
first witness, he stopped short as if
stuck, and STOPPING over the
table he anxiously inquired of
me: 'What'll 1 say? What'll I
ask?, replied quite unconcernedly
ASK him what you d please. You
are doing this, not l.. That settled the
old man, who, pretexting that he had
swallowed fly and felt sick, got me to
go on and finish up the inquest. When
it was over he had so far recovered as to
ask all hands up to Billy Donsings bar,
as usual"
''In Globe there was once constable,
who, in the absence of the justice of the
peace, believed himself justified in hold
ing an inquest. A man was lying in q
corral, and as he had not moved all day,
he was believed to be dead. The con-
stable, without bothering himself to in
yestigate, lost no time in making the
rounds of the saloons and soon had a
jury empaneled. Under his guidance
they marched to the corral and reached
the supposed corpse. To their surprise
it turned over a little and in faint
voice gasped for water. Yet it was evil
dent that the man could not live
The constable was quite up to the
occasion, for without losing his calmness
he just adjourned the inquest until the
following morning. There was no further
disappointment at that time, as the man
had given up the ghost"
but some sights are truly horrible
One time had to actually shovel the re-
mains OF young tramp, who had fallen
OH a brakebeam, near Sepulveda station,
into a coffin, because nothing large
enough to handle otherwise remained.
/ had to do the work myself, for the
reason that not one of the railroad en-
piOyctS WHO were IIlere COulU De luuuCeO
to undertake it."
Son another occasion man com.
mitted suicide by shooting himself in the
breast up in the cemetery on the hill.
His clothes caught fire and his breast
was completely roasted when the body
was found. There is popularity about
the smell of burning human flesh. 1t is
more pungent than that OF any other
burning flesh that 1 know Of was so
disagreeably affected by this odor that for
more than week could not overcome
the idea that 1 smelled it yet.
"On another occasion we had to dig
up a man who had been killed by the
kick OF horse, because there were ru-
mors of foul play respecting him. Well,
as he had been buried nearly eight DAYS
you can imagine what the sight would
be. Some of the jurors were so nervous
that they could hardly stand. 1t is a
real cruelty of the law to subject men to
some of these abominable spectacles
which haunt them in their dreams for
nights to come. know that one or two
OF the jurors became sick and had tenn
porarily TO withdraw.
''Then take the ghastly looks of sui
cides who have hanged themselves, the
unsavory appearance of ancient float
ers, or of the persons who have accident
ally been killed or murdered, and you
may rest assured that green coroner
doesn't believe he has struck such big