Dear Professor Death

Dear Professor Death,

Your letter about being buried gave me shivers. Do you know of any true cases where this happened?

Best,

Still Shivering

Dear Shivering,

The Dear Professor letter about people’s fear of being buried alive generated a lot of feedback. Recently I came across a purported case and thought I’d share it with you.

When an Irishwoman named Marjorie McCall in County Armagh took ill with a fever and died, pronounced dead by her husband––a doctor. Fearing a contagion, her family immediately buried her in the Shankill Graveyard along with her valuable wedding ring that they couldn’t remove because of swelling. I’ve seen different dates for her burial, 1695 or 1705, but have no way to verify the correct one.

That night, grave robbers dug up the grave to get the ring, but when they cut her finger, she began to bleed and woke up, scaring the crap out of the robbers, who fled.

At this point the story diverges into a couple different versions. One has her finding her way home, having several more children, and living to a ripe old age. In the other, more macabre version, when the husband opened the door and saw his dead wife standing there dripping blood, he had a heart attack and died.He was then buried in his wife’s vacated grave and Marjorie remarried and had several more children. Yet another version has the husband fainting and his hair turning white overnight.

When she died for real, she was buried in Shankill Cemetery. Her headstone reads, “Lived Once. Buried Twice.”

The story has been researched and reported as a true tale, although the particulars differ somewhat.