My goal is not to cause unease in Russell or to suggest that residents should commence to scour cluttered sheds and dark basement recesses for mummified human remains. Not at all.
Only to report that as of 1903 the headless corpse of an unfortunate man had been reposing in a shed in or near the business district for about five years after a dispute involving the city, Lucas County and the undertaker developed over who should foot the bill for burying him.
The remains had been discovered during the late 1890s by William E. Gittinger on property he owned along the Chariton River some miles southeast of Russell. I've marked the location of the Gittinger family woodlot along the river, the most likely site, on this 1896 plat map of Washington Township.
The situation came to light outside Russell during early 1903 when The Burlington Hawk-Eye published the following story in its edition of January 20:
THIS CORPSE HOMELESS
No One Will Claim It and No Grave Open to it
In a Lime House for Years --- Strange Story of a Dead Body at Russell, Iowa, Which No one Will Pay for Burying
A story comes from Russell, Iowa, which if true, is one of the most remarkable recitals ever told of a community outside the realm of fiction. It was first related by a traveling man on one of the Burlington accommodation trains going west over the main line in Iowa. The story was discredited by the relator's auditors, but one person concluded to investigate it. And that is how it came to The Hawk-Eye.
The gentleman happened to stop off in Russell on business, and while there said to one of the principal storekeepers: "Is it true that there has been a dead man in a lime house in this place five years?"
"Yes," replied the merchant, unconcerned. "It is right over in that house yonder," pointing out of a nearby window. "He has been there for five years, and I guess he will stay there, unless the county takes a notion to bury him."
This extraordinary statement so aroused the curiosity of the visitor that he pressed the merchant for the facts in the case. the gentleman was nothing loath, and being perfectly familiar with the case, as the visitor afterwards found every resident of Russell to be, he told him the following story:
Story of the Dead Man
Some five years ago a man somewhat resembling a tramp came to Russell and after loafing around a while left, going in the direction of a strip of timber near the town. About eight months after that, the decaying body of the tramp was found in the timber. The head was gone and even the skull had disappeared. Wild animals had feasted from the flesh and little more than the bones and clothing were left.
The body was brought to Russell and a coroner's jury investigated the case. It was proven to the satisfaction of all that the remains were those of the tramp who had disappeared eight months before. From papers in the pockets the man was found to have relatives in Appanoose county. Notice was sent to them and they came, viewed the remains and identified them. Then they went away, refusing to take the body or to pay the expense of its burial.
Refuse to bury the Dead
The county was appealed to, but was obdurate. It also refused to foot the expense of burial. The corpse was on the hands of the coroner, who had no use for it and did not know what to do with it. So he boxed it up and put it temporarily in a house in which lime is kept. The house is moisture tight to prevent the lime slaking, and the air within is dry and limy. This has acted as a preservative and as all decay seems to have been arrested, the body was allowed to remain in the room day after day till it gradually became mummified and is now kept there like some old piece of worn out furniture.
That is the story which so interested the traveling man and which the people of Russell tell in a matter of fact way, as they would the account of the hard winter of 1864.
+++
The story of the "Russell corpse" was interesting enough to be picked up and republished widely during the days that followed in other Iowa newspapers.
Henry Gittinger, who would acquire The Chariton Leader within a few years and edit it for many, was at the time editor of The News in Pleasantville. He also was William E. Gittinger's brother. A month later, he published his take on the case in The News, republished as follows in The Chariton Herald of Feb. 26:
THE RUSSELL CORPSE
Editor Gittinger Tells What He Knows of the Mysterious Lime House Occupant
The editor of the (Pleasantville) News has frequently of late been asked about a corpse, at Russell, that has reposed in a lime house for the past five years. A traveling man stopped at Russell, learned of the story and told a reporter for the Hawk-Eye about it and it has been clipped by the papers all over the state.
The facts are about this way. Some six years ago next spring, W.E. Gittinger, who is a brother of the writer, and who then owned a farm on the Chariton river about eight miles southeast of Russell, happened to go to an obscure part of the place along a creek making up from the river, and there found the remains of a human being, in an advanced state of decay --- all but the head and one foot. He immediately notified the coroner and an inquest was held, but all the "verdict" that it could bring in was that "these are the bones of an unknown man who must have perished where found in some way not revealed to the jury."
The bones were taken to Russell and turned over to an undertaker, who placed them in a box and stored them in his lime house, out of his way. Afterward it was learned that an old man had been missing from Corydon for several months and a grandson was notified of the "find." He came over to Russell, said his grandfather was somewhat demented when he wandered away and these were his bones (there being some fragments of clothing left as an identification) but he was too poor to bury him. Lucas county didn't and Wayne county wouldn't, so "he" has reposed in the lime house all these years and the people have thought but little about it, not even so much as using the knowledge with which to scare unruly children --- "Be good now or the old booger man in the lime house will get you!"
It does look as though some one might have at least taken a post auger and dug a hole sufficiently deep, in some obscure nook, to contain the remains of a former human being.
+++
Lucas County death records do contain a reference, unfortunately undated, to the mysterious corpse. The record notes the location it was found, the W.E. Gittinger farm; that the remains were "supposed to be" those of J.H. Cook of Moravia; that there was no indication of how or when the man had died; and, under "disposition," that the remains had been turned over to the Russell undertaker.
The Russell undertaker at the time (and for many years thereafter) was Alfred J. Woodman, who also operated a hardware store on the north side of Shaw (Main) Street. That hardware store would have sold lime and that lime would have been stored in a "lime house," also a convenient place for an undertaker to stash a corpse.
I've not been able to find any report of what happened next --- how the remains of the unfortunate Mr. Cook eventually were dealt with. No issues of Russell newspapers from this time survive. Most likely the body was buried in the Russell Cemetery not long after Russell's secret came to light. But who can say for sure?
No comments:
Post a Comment