Located in Columbia County Pa, it's possible these are the only remaining examples of mortsafes, built to keep grave robbers out, in the United States. As the practice of bodysnatching waned, most cages were reused or repurposed. These, at the Old Mount Zion Cemetery in Catawissa, still stand.
Frequently referred to as "Vampire Cages", Mortsafes were structures placed over a burial site to prevent the body being stolen for use by anatomy instructors or medical students. There was no legal source of cadavers in the 18th and 19th centuries. Thieves were frequently paid to supply them.
"It is now more than sixty years since the Anatomy Act was passed, and there are probably few who remember, except as a tradition, the horrors of the preceding time, when the medical schools were supplied with subjects for dissection chiefly by men who stole corpses from the grave. These men were called body-snatchers, or, in a slang phrase, "resurrection men." Respect for the dead made the idea of this violation of the grave horrible to the survivors, and various means were devised to secure that the bodies of the beloved dead should remain undisturbed. The iron coffin, instead of the usual wooden one, was so intended. A heavy iron cage, called a "mortsafe," was another. Mortsafes were of various kinds. Some formed almost a house of iron bars, with a locked gate to it. Others lay flat on the grave, and consisted sometimes entirely of iron, and sometimes of a border of strong masonry with iron bars on the top."
There were originally three hooded graves at the cemetery in Catawissa, but today only two remain. The third cage was reportedly removed in the 1930s, due to its state of disrepair. The graves covered belonged to three women: Rebecca (Thomas) Clayton and Sarah Ann (Thomas) Boone were cousins. Asenath (Campbell) Thomas married John Thomas.
SARAH ANN,
CONSORT OF
RANSLOE BOONE
DAUGHTER OF
LLOYD & FRANCES THOMAS
ENTERED INTO REST
JUNE 18, 1852
AGED 22 YEARS 6 M. 9 D.
It's believed that the women died in childbirth, or from complications related to childbirth. Sarah's daughter had been born on June 2 1852.
Asenath B.
Consort of
John F. Thomas.
Daughter of Joseph B. & Anna G. Campbell
Entered Into Rest
June 26th 1852
Aged 20y
Aeseneth's daughter lived 4 months. Born June 26 1852, she died Nov 5th of that same year.
Rebecca S. Thomas
Born 6/14/1826
Daughter of Abel & Ann Thomas
Married Nelson Clayton
Died May 12 1852
Several members of the Thomas family were ironmasters, and they all were of Scottish descent. Mortsafes were once very popular in Scotland. It's likely that the Thomas family erected them purely as decoration, or out of tradition from their homeland, and not out of any real fear of the bodies being stolen. That does not however, explain why the cages were made to be locked.
It's accepted that there were grave robbers here in the Susquehanna Valley, as we did have doctors. It was not uncommon for doctors to obtain a cadaver to practice a surgery on, before performing it on his living patient. It appears that Dr McKelvy, a surgeon in Bloomsburg, for one, worked with illegally obtained cadavers.
Sarah Ann Thomas married Ransloe Boone, a cousin of James Boyd McKelvy.
When the Lutheran and Reformed Cemetery in Bloomsburg was moved to Espy in 1925, more than 100 bodies were missing.
On November 13 1999, the cages were rededicated. After being restored, the wrought iron cages were returned to the grounds by horse and wagon.
In 2009, the Old Mount Zion Methodist Church Cemetery received a new sign, "Hooded Grave Cemetery".
In 2013, Dianne Salerni published a young adult novel, "The Caged Graves", inspired by the graves at Catawissa.
William Hummel, convicted of brutally murdering his wife and her three children, went to great lengths to assure that after his hanging his body would not be "given to the doctors",
James Boyd McKelvy graduated from Pennsylvania Medical College and returned to Columbia County to establish his practice. In 1914, workmen digging in the alley next to McKelvy's home at the corner of Main street and Jefferson in Bloomsburg, discovered human bones buried there. The bones found were dismissed as "left over from some demonstration."
Sarah Ann married Ransloe Boone, a cousin of James Boyd McKelvy.
In the 1850s, the Lutheran and Reformed congregations split and built their own church buildings. The original building they shared was raised, but the congregations continued to use the burial grounds. In 1925, all of the bodies at that Lutheran And Reformed Cemetery in Bloomsburg, located on First Street at Center, were to be moved to Espy. A new high school was to be constructed on the location. The contract to remove the bodies was carried out under the supervision of Dr. S. Arment of the PA Department of Health. It was estimated that approximately 500 had been buried on the grounds, with more than one body in some of the graves. Only 369 bodes were officially removed. The Morning Press reported that Dr Arment was confident more bodies had been buried than were found, but no traces of them remained.
The cages were erected over the graves of three women who died in a 6 week period in
The wrought iron cages are 7 feet long, 3 feet wide, and 3 feet tall.
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