PREMATURE BURIAL.

Evening Star, Issue 14053, 7 May 1909, Page 3

PREMATURE BURIAL.

One of the most curious of the many little gatherings of societies who meet in London rooms to advance neglected causes is the Association for the Prevention of Premature Burial. Most of the members are very old, and one of them is a woman who is said to possess heb own death certificate. Mr William Tebb, who presided at the last meeting, ,is really the mainstay of the Association;’ Accompanied by his daughter, he has spent years travelling over Europe, visiting libraries and seeing persons interested in his subject, and one result of his inquiries is the thirty-page bibliography of works, published in all languages, on premature burial. The other chief support is Dr W. R. Hadwen, of Gloucester, who has compiled the standard book on the subject, in which he noted 150 cases of persons who have been buried alive and 200 cases of persons who have just been saved frqm the fate, all certified by medical testimony. Dr Hadwen told the little audience that he had had the unpleasant task of carrying out the will of Mies Frances Power Cobbe, who had commanded that her -veins should be opened and her head nearly severed from her body. Such instructions were daily becoming ipore common, showing how prevalent was the fear of being buried alive. Sir William Thomson had once suggested a stiletto being used before interment. The only certain evidence of the presence of death was decomposition. He argued that there should be mortuaries— 1 respectable and pleasant places—where bodies should be kept until this happened. This was done in Germany, and Munich had eleven large mortuaries. An American member, Mr A. P. Jenkins, told a terrible story of a shriek coming from a body just as it was carried into a, cremation furnace, but to my inquiry he could give no particulars as to the town and place except that it happened in America. A motion was passed urging the Government to support the Death Registration and Burials Bill, which provides for the compulsory examination by qualified medical men before death is certified. —'Manchester Guardian.’