Tiny Coffins
by Jesse Glass



Like my hero, Charles Fort, I enjoy reading through back issues of old newspapers. Occasionally, one turns up a Fortean gem; and when what one finds might illuminate a mystery pointed out by Fort himself, why it's all the better! In The Book of The Damned , Charles Fort mentions the finding of a series of tiny coffins below Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh. He writes:


London Times, July 20, 1836:

That, early in July, 1836, some boys were searching for rabbit's burrows in the rocky formation, near Edinburgh, known as Arthur's Seat. In the side of a cliff, they came upon some thin sheets of slate, which they pulled out.

Little cave.

Seventeen tiny coffins.

Three or four inches long.

In the coffins were miniature wooden figures. They were dressed differently both in style and material. There were two tiers of eight coffins each, and a third tier begun, with one coffin.

The extraordinary datum, which has especially made mystery here:

That the coffins had been deposited singly, in the little cave, and at intervals of many years. In the first tier, the coffins were quite decayed, and the wrappings had moldered away. In the second tier, the effects of age had not advanced so far. And the top coffin was quite recent-looking. (Pp. 198-199, Ace Edition.)

* * *

Upon perusing the American Sentinel , a newspaper published in Westminster, Carroll County, Maryland, I found the following curiosity, dated November 7, 1856:


Buried but Still Alive.

We discovered, says the Baltimore American Democrat, two [African-American] women yesterday, near the Grand Jury room, in the Court House, of whom we inquired their business—the following novel story was elicited: That they came there for the purpose of presenting to the Grand Jury Harriet Holliday and Mary Jane Brooks, on the charge (to use their own language) of laying a spell upon them, saying that these parties had buried them in miniature, in the Catholic burying ground, since which they had suffered all the pangs of death, and did now really feel as if dead. Since the burial the witches came to them and offered to relieve them of their sufferings, provided they would give them a dollar each. Accordingly one paid the required ransom, the corpse was disinterred and the sufferer restored to life. The remaining two not being so credulous, refused to pay for their lives, and are now suffering all the penalties of the departed. We understand that great excitement exists in Biddle alley, among the [African-American] population, and that they are leaving that locality in numbers, in consequence of the arts practiced by Misses Brooks and Holliday.

In this enlightened age of the nineteenth century

Can such things be,
And overcome us like a summer's cloud
Without our special wonder.