The Evening statesman. [volume] (Walla Walla, Wash.) 1903-1910, 1904-05-18
pREAD-oF BEING PUT INTO COZ
FIN ALIVE IS BECOMING
VERY GENERAL.
Large Number Of Live Persons Who
Have Been Put Under the
Ground.

mature burial which haunted the lat
ter days of Miss Frances Power Cobbe
the famous authoress, and caused her
to leave instructions for her doctor to
sever the arteries of her neck before
her interment is more general than is
popularity supposed.
A we'll known physician said today
than many of his patients had the
greatest horror of the possibility of
being buried alive, but the gruesome-
ness Of the subject prevented their
discussing it except with their medical
advisers.
The peril Of premature burial in this
country is not, it is true, SO great as
In warmer climates, whence interment
tons in England are so rare that there
is no absolute proof that some people
are not consigned to the grave while
still alive.
There are several well authenticated
instances in which the death certificate
has been signed and the patient pre-
pared for the grave. and in rarer cases,
actually buried while still living.
Woman Twice In Coffin.
There is a lady living in Kensington
who has twice been put in her coffin.
An even more remarkable case is
that of q Liverpool man, who was act
ually lowered into the grave. At that
moment the coffin was seen to move,
and one of the mourners insisted that
it should be reopened.
Drug takers and victims of alcohol
ism are peculiarly liable to this terri
BILE fate. The late Sir Benjamin Ward
Richardson recorded a case in which
a physician, who had taken 100 grains
of choral, was resuscitated after he
had apparently died.
The records of the Paris morgue
show that Identification occurs in
about one case in every 800.
So real is the risk of premature bur-
ty requires two Independent certifi-
Gates Of death, and recognizes that the
only sure test of death is decomposi-
ton.
DR.. Hartmann, the eminent Austrian
physician, has declared that no doctor
has any right to say a person is dead
0rb ha iv1o Of hoc
to manifest it's activity in a human
body. He cannot, with truth, say more
than that such person appears to
be dead.
How deep the feeling of the public
son the subject may be imagined from
the existence of society the examining
physicians of which will, in the event
of the death of member, put the body
to certain tests before pronouncing
life to be extinct, and, if necessary
delay the burial until the possibility
OF life lingering be quite removed.
Extreme Caution Necessary.
~What are the special precautions
which you advocate?' was asked OF
Or. Stenson Hooker secretary of the
London Association for the Prevention
Of Premature Burial.
Our great object" said DR.. Hooker
us to prevent the possibility of any
one being buried alive. know some
people declare that such a contingent
cy is impossible. But how can they
or any one else possibly tell that? In
England there is only one case of ex-
humation in every $4,000 burials.
Another fact we found out only with
great difficulty, and that is that 10000
people are buried each year without
any death certificate.
I'VE want, too, to alter the law with
regard to the giving Of death certifi.
Gates without seeing the body. AS the
law stands doctor who has attended
a patient can give the death certificate
on the mere information Of a neighbo1
or any ignorant person who may come
to him with the news that life has de.
parted from his patient.
Doctors Deceived by catalepsy.
Trance and death from sufrocatfor
and drowning should also. believe
be scientifically Investigated. Doctor.
can be deceived by catalepsy. There
was quite recently the case Of a Nor.
witch match vender. The certificate O,
death was given. but when the under.
taker arrived. the corpse, was sit.
ting up IN bed"
DR.. Stenson Hooker complains tina,
although there are certain tests b,
which the fact Of death may be A.
sured. no stress Is laid upon the cues.
ton in the curriculum Of the medica,
seudent. The subject was to a grea,