The BODY-SNATCHING INDUSTRY.

Patea Mail, 13 March 1882, Page 3

The BODY-SNATCHING INDUSTRY.

The “World” says: Mr Howard Vincent, the Director of the Criminal Investigation Department, is trying to make light of the alleged attempt to steal the bodies of Napoleon 111. and the Prince Imperial from the vault at Chiselhurst, but information from good sources leads to the belief that such attempt was really made, and only defeated by the great strength of the granite sarcophagus, the lid of which weighs three tons. The Empress is much agitated by the reports of this industry of stealing the bodies of distinguished or wealthy persons, and which appears to grow in favor among the criminal classes. With half the ingenuity and less than half the risk involved in a jewel robbery, a thief might reap a rich harvest of rewards. The matter is creating great excitement everywhere. It would be difficult for the most desperate bodysnatchers to rob Westminster Abbey Mausoleum. Frogmore, where the Prince Consort’s body rests, could hardly be entered if dynamite were used, but in almost every church-yard in England the Lord of the Manor has his family vault, which could be entered without any difficulty, and nothing could be easier than to steal the remains of Lord Beaconsfield and other eminent men whose dust is not in the nation’s keeping at Westminster. Nothing has been heard of the body of the Earl of Crawford and Balcarres, although the police profess t* be on the track. The Queen was greatly alarmed when she heard of the attempted outrage at Chiselhurst, and at once ordered special precautions to be taken at Frogmore. The bodies of Napoleon 111, and the Prince Imperial will shortly be removed into Hampshire, where the Empress has built a mortuary chapel. The only way to put a stop to this ghoulish business is to build an impregnable pyramid for one’s ancestors, or cremate them.