A Dead American and A Riot in County Cork December 12, 2014
Author: Beach Combing | in : Modern , trackback
This one’s a gem and reminded Beach of that great Limerick custom of beating up families who dare to bury their dead on the same day. Here we are a bit further to the south, near the normally more sensible Cork, but the problem is still a death. The year is 1867.
A riot, originating an extraordinary superstition, occurred at Myross, the west of Cork a short time since. A body supposed to be that of the captain of an American ship lost on the western coast, was washed ashore near Myross some time since, and, after an inquest had been held, was interred in Myross churchyard. Friends of the drowned sailor came recently to Myross to claim the remains, and to carry them back to the United States for interment in the burial ground where others of the deceased’s family rested.
So far we have a tragedy. Now the tragi-comedy begins. Just imagine how the American visitors to Ireland took this: all kitted out in mourning clothes, talking about how exceptionally nice the locals had been…
When it became known that the body was to be removed, there was great perturbation amongst the country people, who have superstitious belief that the exhumation of corpse which has been buried for some time causes unusually great mortality during the ensuing twelve months one of those extraordinary notions deep-rooted in the popular mind which defy human ingenuity to analyse or explain.
Is it possible that this was a misunderstood version of the Irish belief that the last buried in a graveyard brings water to all those buried there in purgatory? See the Limerick link above.
To prevent the threatened calamity, the country people resolved to oppose the removal by force. On the morning on which the exhumation was to take place, the population of the district, armed with the miscellaneous weapons that the farmyard affords, arose en masse against the strangers and drove them and their assistants out of the graveyard. The parish priest was appealed to, and strove to reason the people out ot their absurd apprehensions; but his influence, all powerful in everything else, failed to make an impression on their superstitious fears. The people still refuse to permit the body to be removed, and mount guard day and night over the grave. The friends of the deceased are determined not to allow their pious mission to be frustrated a popular snperstition, and it is stated that the aid of the military will called in if other influences cannot induce the people to desist from their cruel and insensate opposition to the removal of the body.
No news as to what happened in the end. One of those stories that died its death out of the glare of publicity? drbeachcombing AT yahoo DOT com
