A Burglar Caught by a Skeleton & Other Singular Tales from the Victorian Press (26 page)

Preface

Railwayman John Wilkinson died an ironic death. Shortly after clambering into his locomotive, he collapsed, slumping suddenly to the footplate. His workmates dashed to help, but by the time they’d carried him to the waiting room, he’d stopped breathing.

So the train, much like its unfortunate driver, was late that May morning in 1876. But there were few grumbles from the passengers; most of them were dead too.

This minor-key scene played out on the Necropolis Railway, which was built to convey corpses and the bereaved from a dedicated station by Waterloo Bridge to a vast new cemetery in Surrey. It was the largest burial ground in the world at the time, and the most beautiful too, according to an 1888 advert in
The Times
that urged all to visit before making the doleful error of depositing loved ones in ‘the seething London cemeteries’.

Therein lies the tale. Crowded beyond compare, the disease-infested boroughs of London had faced a chronic shortage of skeleton space in the first half of the nineteenth century. The canny solution was found in a swathe of land by the village of Brookwood, near Woking, and in the train tracks of the London and South Western Railway.

The first railway funeral was held in November 1854; a truly morose affair for stillborn twin boys from south London. More than 200,000 coffins later, the final passenger to make the one-way trip along the line was a Chelsea pensioner buried in April 1941, shortly before Luftwaffe bombs fell around Waterloo and closed down the operation. In between, there’s a good chance poor Mr Wilkinson ended up in the hearse carriages at the back of his own train. Perhaps he knew that day would come, wondering only as to the timing and the cause.

And when it came to causes, there were plenty of contenders for the average Briton: consumption, cholera, smallpox, convulsions, dysentery, dropsy … With the singles charts a full century away, the
Leicestershire Mercury
began printing a regular countdown of the various ways the townsfolk had died. In the early 1840s, the mortality figures appeared four times a year. By the end of the decade, the table was in each month. By the early 1850s, it was a weekly rundown. Maybe the statistics were being compiled ever faster. Or maybe they proved so popular they just needed to be.

Death fascinated the Victorians, with their grandiose funerals, cult of mourning and keepsake photographs of lifeless loved ones propped up in their Sunday best. And the newspapers of the day indulged them, with reports of calamities and murders that dripped with unpleasant, unnecessary detail.

By contrast, in a topsy-turvy twist to the norm, we are the ones who seem prudish.

A Tragic Story

The tragic circumstances surrounding the death of a well-known Brooklyn doctor named Park are exciting much sympathy. Mrs Park died, as it was supposed and the husband was completely prostrated. As the undertakers were putting Mrs Park into her coffin she revived; the shock to Dr Park, aided by other physical complications, caused his death two hours afterwards.

The Nottingham Evening Post
, January 18, 1890

Laughed Himself to Death

Wesley Parsons, an aged and well-known farmer, died at Laurel, Ind. under peculiar circumstances. While joking with friends he was seized with a spell of laughing, being unable to stop. He laughed for nearly an hour, when he began hiccoughing, and two hours later he died from exhaustion.

The Star
, Guernsey, December 14, 1893

Buried Alive

A rich manufacturer, named Oppelt died about 15 years ago at Reichenberg, in Austria, and a vault was built by his widow and children in the cemetery for the reception of the body.

The widow died about a month ago, and was taken to the same tomb; but when it was opened for that purpose, the coffin of her husband was found open and empty, and the skeleton of the deceased discovered in a corner of the vault in a sitting posture.

It is supposed that M. Oppelt was only in a trance when buried, and that on coming to life he had forced open the coffin.

The Worcestershire Chronicle
, May 19, 1858

Novel and Fatal Balloon Duel

A deadly encounter between balloonists is reported from Guayana. It appears that M. Molica, a Portuguese gentleman, sent a challenge to a Dutchman, who, according to the rules that are adopted in all cases of this sort, had the choice of weapons and manner of meeting.

The Dutchman, who is an aeronaut, elected to ascend in his balloon; his adversary to adopt a similar course in a balloon borrowed for the occasion. The terms were agreed to, and each belligerent, accompanied by his second, ascended simultaneously.

At a given time the combatants discharged their weapons. M. Molica was wounded slightly, while his antagonist received a mortal wound, from the effects of which he expired in less than two hours. The affair has caused quite a sensation in the locality in which it took place.

The Illustrated Police News
, March 16, 1878

Fall Into a Grave.