Gruesome things have happened along, inside, and over the Delaware River. Plenty of bodies were fishes out of the waters and it was a common river for people to end their lives. It was also a disposal site for the victims of murder.
His Ashes Blown Back
Henry Van Zuitan made one last request back in 1907 in a letter he left to his friends, “Scatter my ashes to the four winds.” The German man took his own life and his remains were cremated. Showing their friendship, his friends brought his ashes onto a ferryboat that was crossing the Delaware River. When they reached the middle of the river, his friends gathered around to pour out the ashes.
As fate would have it, as the ashes left the bronze box, a wind swooped up and brought the ashes up and into the faces of the crowd of mourners. Incidentally, a photographer was present and took a photo of the event as the ashes flew back. [1]
Found Frozen in Ice
While it was rather common for bodies to be found floating in the Delaware River in the early 20th century, this particular body case from 1926 was far more sinister than a mere floater.
It was a cold February day and young John Koekler, along with two friends, was walking along the river. The boys spotted something embedded in the ice and ran to get the police.
The police returned with axes and chopped away at the ice until the body of a young woman was freed. She was clad in a union suit and had on only a single stocking.
The coroner examined her body and found a gash across her forehead. Her skull had been fractured and the evidence showed that she was deceased before being dumped into the river.
No further information could be found as to whether or not the body was ever identified. [2]
Chopped
In 1869, a Philadelphian picture frame maker did the unthinkable. He took an ax and chopped his wife and two small children to pieces. When he was finished, he wrote a letter claiming that he had been robbed and was now a ruined man. He then threw himself into the Delaware River and drowned. [3]
Dead Must Pay Tolls
Under a Pennsylvania law in 1914, funerals were no longer allowed to cross over the Delaware River bridges for free. Instead, each person had to pay a fee to cross the river, including the deceased body in the hearse. [4]
Inside a Burlap Bag
Burlap bags were rather common in the early 1900s and there were a number of cases involving bodies stuffed inside of them. For instance, in 1908 a body was found stuffed inside a burlap bag in the Delaware River. The body was so terribly decomposed that the coroner could not establish the identify or even the gender of the body.
Other things found inside the bag included a leather coat, a clothesline that was wrapped around the body, and forty pounds of railroad spikes to weigh the bag down. [5]
The Mutilated Dead
In 1907, a report came out of Philadelphia that a body of a man had just been taken from the Delaware River. The body’s head and chest were mutilated and both of the body’s legs were missing.
There was a second body, that of a woman, whose throat appeared to be slit and, again, both legs were missing.
At the time of the report, the police were having problems removing the woman’s body and there were no clues as to who might have committed the double murder. [6]
