Year: 1876

I have made brief mention of the
strange circumstances which transpired
during tie funeral services of Miss Belle
I,oucks, a number of people present
claiming that they saw the corpse move.
From Rev. Mr.. Gillespie, the officiating
clergyman, the following additional in
formation relative to this extraordinary
occurrence is learned: As the close of the
services was approaching his attention
was directed to restless, uneasy moving
about of quite number of young ladies
in the immediate vicinity of the coffin,
which he at first supposed was occasioned
by strong sunlight shedding its rays
directly upon the corpse through a
transom of the door. This, however,
was not the real cause of the agitation,
which increased momentarily, the ladies
gesticulating in the direction of the
corpse and watching it with intense
emotion. The services by this time had
been concluded and the friends were di-
rected to pass in front of the corpse and
take last look at the remains. Instead
of making any move, however,. they
stood spell-bound as it were, the rum0r
having become quite general that indi-
cations of life had been observed in sew
eral movements of the body. Upon
hasty consultation with Undertaken
Kregelo, and with consent of the father,
the funeral was postponed that it might
be determined whether life was yet ex-
tinct.


The company of friends very reluct-
antly entered the room, thinking every
moment the corpse would come to life
and assume its natural state. So strong
ly did this belief impress the audience
that it was only after repeated requests,
and closing the view of the corpse, the
room was cleared. Even then numbers
fingered about the premises during the
afternoon in the expectancy that life
would return to the inanimate body of
the deceased. The rumor which gave
rise to this unusual excitement originated
from a number of young ladies standing
in close proximity to the coffin, one of
whom positively declared that the head
of the corpse was seen to move percep-
tibly others that her eyes were opened
once or twice, and still others that the
cotton which had been inserted into her
nostrils had been displaced by her own
breath.


To satisfy himself as to whether life
still existed, Mr.. Gillespie viewed the
remains very closely, and the popularity
noticeable was an absence of that CLASSY
look of the eve which is incident to
death, and the rim of her left ear being
tinged with high coloring. Her hands
and body, although deadly cold, were
remarkably supple, which, however, is
not an infrequent occurrence. The rev.
erend gentleman was satisfied the young
lady was dead, but under the circum
stances approved the course which was
taken. The fancied imagination, with
perhaps little superstition, he thought,
had much to do in forming the cOnclu-
sions arrived at by those so positive in
their declarations as to seeing signs of
returning life in the cold corpse before
them. When reporter viewed the re-
mains later in the afternoon the peculi-
arities noted above were not observable,
and even the most skeptical were salts
fed by this time that life had ceased to
exist in the person of the young lady.


The attendant physician, DIR. L. N.
Bryan, with DIR. q. E. Wright, of the
Board of Health, and others called at
the residence, and, after viewing the
body, pronounced it positively dead.
Rumors of the most exaggerated kind
soon gained credence on the street and
spread in every direction, occasioning
much comment and excitement. The
circumstances surrounding the case and
the wild rumors it occasiOned were of
course very annoying to Mr.. Loucks,
who, although satisfied as to the death
of his child, willingly acquiesced in the
suggestion of friends in the matter of
postponing the burial. A brief service
was held after which the remains were
placed in a vault in Crown Hill
cemetery. ..'''.''. -.