0:02

In the February 21st, 1885 edition of the New York Times,

0:05

there's the story of a man known as Jenkins,

0:07

who is found turned

0:10

over onto his stomach inside his coffin, with

0:13

scratch marks visible on all

0:16

sides

0:16

of the interior.

0:18

Around that time, there were outbreaks of cholera and malaria in the

0:20

United States, and these diseases can sometimes have,

0:25

let's call it catatonic side effects. They

0:27

leave folks in a coma-like state for

0:29

such a long period of time that others

0:31

might think that they've actually died

0:34

and begin funeral arrangements. Sometimes

0:36

those funeral arrangements

0:39

might even be completed. Just

0:41

the idea of this happening

0:44

caused

0:44

a real stir in American society. This

0:47

was peak taphophobia, the

0:49

fear of being buried alive. But

0:52

this is America,

0:55

so with all the hysteria, the genuine

0:57

fear around being buried alive, came

1:00

enterprising inventors and entrepreneurs who

1:04

saw opportunity. Many different products

1:06

were invented

1:08

to solve this problem, like coffins with air vents

1:10

or coffins with windows that would

1:12

fog up once the person

1:14

inside began to breathe. But

1:16

the most successful was an alarm

1:18

system that the prematurely entombed

1:21

could ring to alert cemetery staff that

1:23

they were not dead, but in fact

1:25

needed to be dug up and rescued

1:28

from their grave. In Bonaventure

1:30

Cemetery

1:33

in Thunderbolt, Georgia, there is one of these devices.

1:36

It's a bell on the grave of a prominent Savannah

1:38

businessman, this lasting relic

1:40

of a slightly horrifying time in

1:44

American history.

1:47

My name is Dylan Thuras, and this is Atlas

1:49

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most important cultural heritage.

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I'm a historian, and I'm a historian. I'm a

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historian. into the

2:00

world's strange, incredible, and wondrous

2:02

places. Today,

2:04

we go to Bonaventure Cemetery, to the

2:06

grave of Charles F. Mills, and

2:09

we learn about cafephobia and

2:12

the hope of being saved

2:13

by the mill. More

2:17

on the trip.

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4:29

Bonaventure Cemetery is like many

4:32

of the cemeteries built in the 1800s. It is

4:34

a Victorian garden cemetery. This

4:37

is Enika Edenfield. She's

4:39

a volunteer at the Bonaventure Historical

4:41

Society and a lover

4:43

of a good walk in a cemetery. During

4:46

the

4:47

pandemic shutdown, I would walk my

4:49

dog out at Bonaventure often because

4:51

it's really close to our house. And

4:54

I would see grapes that I was really interested in.

4:56

So I'd take a picture, look them up online, do

4:59

a little digging. And

5:01

then I started following the Bonaventure Historical

5:03

Society on Instagram and I saw that they were

5:05

looking for more volunteers. And I was like, hey,

5:08

I already know a lot about the cemetery

5:10

and it's something I care about. I will

5:12

absolutely volunteer.

5:14

And it's easy to see why Enika loves

5:17

to spend time there. Because aside from it

5:19

being a cemetery, it is also just a very,

5:22

very picturesque place. It

5:25

is a garden, essentially.

5:27

It is on the bluff of the Wilmington

5:30

River. There are all these

5:32

glorious oak trees out there just dripping

5:35

in Spanish moss. There

5:37

are also a lot of flowering bushes

5:39

out there. In springtime,

5:41

the azalea bushes are in full bloom and

5:43

the entire cemetery is bright pink. And

5:46

then you have some really beautiful historic graves

5:48

out there dating back to the

5:50

mid to late 1800s. And

5:53

it is still an active cemetery. So

5:55

they're a mixture of old and new graves.

5:57

And some of those old graves belong to the Bonaventure

5:59

Historical Society.

5:59

to real local legends. Folks

6:02

like Johnny Mercer, the co-founder of Capitol

6:04

Records, or Mary Telfer, a

6:07

philanthropist who, upon her passing, left

6:09

money to start Savannah's first women and children's

6:12

hospital. But if you're walking around

6:14

Bonaventure, one grave in

6:16

particular stands out, the grave

6:18

of Savannah businessman Charles

6:21

F. Mills.

6:22

It is what is called a safety

6:24

grave. With some of these safety graves,

6:26

you would just have a bell. There would be a bell

6:29

that would run from the ground

6:31

and would be connected to a string or

6:33

a rope that would lead into the grave. His

6:36

does have that, but

6:38

he also has ear vents built

6:41

into his grave.

6:42

He is buried

6:45

in an underground mausoleum. His

6:48

mausoleum marker at the top has these

6:50

little primrose designs. And if

6:52

you take a close look at them, you can

6:54

see that there were holes

6:56

in the original design.

7:01

Okay, here's something to know about Charles

7:03

F. Mills. He was a pretty anxious person

7:06

who, along with taphophobia, also

7:09

had claustrophobia.

7:10

So the very thought of being buried

7:12

alive in this tight

7:15

little space would

7:16

have really

7:17

caused him a lot of anxiety. And

7:20

considering death and burials were not the

7:22

most regulated industries, Fochstia's

7:24

fear of being pronounced dead would mean being thrown

7:27

into an early grave. Even Edgar

7:29

Allan Poe, in his short story, The Premature

7:31

Burial, in 1850, yeah,

7:34

it is all about the horror of being buried

7:36

alive.

7:36

Here is a little excerpt.

7:39

Let me get into a good Edgar

7:41

Allan Poe voice. To

7:44

be buried alive is beyond question

7:47

the most terrific of these extremes,

7:50

which has ever fallen to the lot

7:52

of mere mortality, that it has

7:55

frequently, very frequently,

7:57

so fallen will scarcely. be

8:00

denied by those who think. The

8:03

boundaries which divide life from death are

8:06

at best shadowy and vague. Who

8:09

shall say where the one ends and

8:12

where the other begins? God,

8:18

I love Paul.

8:22

And that is why some

8:24

hospitals would have rooms designated

8:27

so if people died they would go and lay

8:29

those people in that room

8:30

for a week or several

8:32

weeks until it was confirmed that they were

8:35

in fact dead because they were decomposing.

8:37

People who had money put

8:39

in this an A-safety grave,

8:40

these elaborate graves that

8:43

would have bells or you know glass

8:45

windows on them so they

8:47

would alleviate their own fear by

8:50

ensuring that they were not buried alive.

8:52

And as previously mentioned with this fear

8:55

came the inventions.

8:57

The bells, the vents,

8:59

windows.

9:00

So in some cases there were

9:03

graves that were designed to have glass

9:05

fronts on them so

9:08

that way if the person was alive and they started

9:10

breathing then the glass would

9:12

fog up. But also that happens during

9:14

decomposition too so I don't think that

9:16

was very well thought out. But

9:19

there were other graves that

9:21

would start with the casket above

9:23

ground and after a certain amount of time

9:25

the entire grave was

9:27

designed to drop the casket underground

9:30

after it had been long enough that the

9:33

person was definitely not alive.

9:35

As far as we know

9:37

the bell attached to Charles F. Mills

9:39

grave has never been rung. The

9:41

bell mechanism

9:44

is inside rather

9:46

than something external so from the outside

9:48

you can't ring it. I've had a lot of people

9:50

walk by and go I wonder if you can ring that from the outside

9:53

and I'm like you can't. The entire mechanism

9:55

is inside it would have to be rung

9:57

from inside.

10:00

F. Mills's grave.

10:03

We don't have any good

10:05

estimates of how many people were buried

10:07

alive during this period. In all likelihood,

10:10

the number was vanishingly small.

10:12

Truly, truly unlikely. But

10:15

we do know that the fear was very,

10:18

very real. And today, the

10:20

bell at Charles F. Mills's grave stands

10:23

as one of the last mementos of

10:25

this time, this phobia in

10:27

American history. Today,

10:31

Inika still goes for her walks in Bonaventure

10:33

Cemetery and still enjoys telling

10:35

the histories of the place, like this

10:37

one and all of the other graves there. I

10:41

have a deep appreciation

10:43

for the cemetery and

10:45

for the graves and the people who made those graves. Sometimes

10:49

when I'm walking, I'll overhear people

10:51

who you can just go out there and walk anytime you

10:53

want. You don't have to pay anything. It's free to visit.

10:56

There are paid tours you can take out there. But

10:59

people just go out there, they'll grab a free

11:01

map from the Welcome Center

11:03

and walk around. And sometimes I'll overhear

11:05

them having questions about certain

11:07

things. And I will just pop up out

11:09

of nowhere like a cemetery troll

11:11

and be like, do you know this about this grave?

11:22

The Bonaventure Cemetery is just a 15-minute

11:24

drive from Savannah, Georgia. It's

11:27

free to visit and open every day from

11:29

8am to 5pm.

11:33

Our podcast is a co-production of

11:35

Atlas Obscura and Stitcher Studios. This

11:39

episode was produced by Baudelaire.

11:41

The production team includes Doug Baldinger,

11:44

Chris Naka, Camille Stanley, Manolo

11:46

Morales, Gabby Gladney.

11:49

Our technical director is Casey Holford.

11:51

And this episode was sound designed by Baudelaire

11:54

and mixed by Luz Fleming. If you

11:57

want to learn more, be sure to visit atlasobscura.com.

12:00

there is a link in the episode description.

12:03

And our theme in end credit music is by

12:05

Sam Finville. I'm Dylan Searcy wishing

12:08

you all the wonder in the world. I

12:10

will see you next time.

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