Exeter, Rhode Island. The year...1892. This was not a peaceful time for these people. Consumption was, well..."consuming" a lot of people. In modern times, consumption is called Tuberculosis. It's not that hard to treat Tuberculosis today but back then...not so much. People performed rituals such as digging up bodies to "banish the undead manifestation".
Mercy Brown was a farmer's daughter. Her mother, Mary, was the first in the family to die of consumption. Her older sister, Mary Olive, followed suit not long after. Her brother, Edwin, was very sick and was taken to an arrid area so he could get better. But instead, his conditions grew worse and he was taken home to basically die. Mercy was, in a way, luckier because her battle with consumption didn't last as long as Edwin's.
The grieving Mr. Brown tried everything he could possibly think of to cure his son. After losing his wife and two daughters, he certainly didn't want to lose his son. Like everybody else, he finally turned to folklorism for an answer. He thought that his family was being cursed so he decided to dug up his family's graves. The bodies of Mary and Mary Olive's started to decompose except for Mercy's. Her body looked to "well preserved". Everybody isntantly thought that Mercy was a vampire and that she was attacking Edwin. Desperate, Mr. Brown decided to take out Mercy's heart, burn it, mix the ashes with water and drink it to his son. Sadly, despite his efforts, Edwin died two months later.
I feel sorry for Mercy. She became a scapegoat of her family and society. People back then believed that they could "break the spell of the vampires and cure the sick" by burning the "vampires' hearts". As much as I feel sorry for Mercy, I can't really blame them for what they did. They didn't have any real scientific knowledge and they tried desperately to figure out what's really plaguing them. Dr. Michael Bell, a folklorist and author of the book Food for the Dead believes that "attacking vampires was a way for people to embody and physically fight whatver's plaguing them...in Mercy's case that evil was consumption". Do you believe that Mercy was a real vampire? Well...better have your crucifix and garlic. If not...run and pray to God your feet don't fail you this time...
2 comments:
Even with all of that I don't know if I could believe in a vampire. I guess i would have to see it to believe it
no,no mercy was not a vampire. i have never heard any of this story and it is pretty compelling .... wow - wouldn't it be interesting if their was the science to know why she hadn't decomposed as much ? yuck !! i hate to even think of all that i'm for creamation but anyways, i can not imagine digging people up then cutting out the heart then drinking the ashes geez some kind of horror story for real but i do not believe in vampires at all period hmm.....interesting post.
Post a Comment