Premature burial and how it may be prevented : with special reference to trance, catalepsy, and other forms of suspended animation / by William Tebb and Edward Perry Vollum.

  • William Tebb
Date:
1896
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Premature burial and how it may be prevented : with special reference to trance, catalepsy, and other forms of suspended animation / by William Tebb and Edward Perry Vollum. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    although she continued to do so. The internal anguish of her mind was, however, at its utmost height when the funeral hymns began to be sung, and when the lid of the coffin was about to be nailed on. The thought that she was to be buried alive was the first one which gave activity to her :Soul, and caused it to operate on her corporeal frame. Related by Dr. Herz in the Psychological Magazine, and transcribed by Sir Alexander Crichton in the introduction to his essay on Mental Derangement. [2 vols., Lond., 1798.] One of the most frightful cases extant is that of Dr. Walker, of Dublin, who had so strong a presentiment on this subject, that he had actually written a treatise against the Irish custom of hasty burial. He, himself, subsequently died, as was believed, of a fever. His decease took place in the night, and on the following day he was interred. At this time, Mrs. Bellamy, the once-celebrated actress, was in Ireland; and^ as she had promised him, in the course of conversation, that she would take care he .should not be laid in the earth till unequivocal signs of dissolution had appeared, she no sooner heard of what had happened than she took measures to have the grave reopened ; but it was, unfortunately, too late. Dr. Walker had evidently revived, and had turned upon his side ; but life was quite extinct. Mr. Horace Welby, in a chapter on Premature Interment, says that the Rev. Owen Manning, the historian ot Surrey, during his residence at Cambridge University, caught small-pox, and was reduced by the disorder to a state of insensibility and apparent death. The body was laid out and preparations were made for the funeral, when Mr. Manning's father, going into the chamber to take a last look at his son, raised the imagined corpse from its recumbent position, saying, ' I will give my poor boy another chance,' upon which signs of vitality were apparent. He was therefore removed by his friend and fellow-student. Dr. Heberden, and ultimately restored to health.—The Mysteries of Life and Death, pp. 11J-116. A most conspicuous and interesting monument in St. Giles's Church, Cripplegate, London (where Cromwell was married and John Milton buried), is associated with a remarkable case of trance or catalepsy. In the chancel is a striking sculptured figure in memory of Constance Whitney, a lady of remarkable gifts, whose rare excellences are fully described in the tablet. She is represented as rising from her coffin.