A 50-year-old German native was discovered dead inside his hut in 1895 after his neighbors started to smell him. The state of his remains and the smell of his hut was so terrible that the body was quickly buried and the hut was burned.
Death of a Miser
A sickening and ghastly discovery was brought to the notice of the authorities last Sunday morning. It was the decomposed and vermin covered body of an old man in a hovel near the round house.
The stench was so terrible that it was almost impossible to approach the door of the hut. The discovery was made the night before by a Mexican and his wife who were passing the hut at a distance of thirty feet. They were attracted by the stench and traced it to the hut, but at the door the investigation was discontinued.
The Mexican reported it to a neighbor the next morning, and by him to Officer Roach. Justice Meyers was notified, and a coroner’s jury impaneled.
The door of the hut was broken, disclosing the rotting corpse half concealed by a dry goods box in front of the door. The body lay on a cot in a posture of repose, and there had been no disturbance of the arrangement of the furniture to create a suspicion of foul play.
The body was taken out with great difficulty and buried.
A trunk, a couple of boxes and valises comprising everything of any apparent value were taken out and everything else including such scanty provisions as were found, was burned with the hut.
After the fire had died away, that awful smell lingered in the vicinity.
The dead man was Valentin Hermes, 50 years old, and a native of Germany. He had lived in Tucson a little more than eleven years, and had gained the reputation of a miser.
As nearly as can be ascertained he had when he died $1,800. Whether it is at interest, or whether it is locked up in his trunk, which will not be opened until an administrator is appointed, is not known.
His other effects consisted of an assortment of patent medicines, papers and a half dozen books, among which were a couple of German grammars and a Spanish-German grammar.
His collection of savings, destroyed by fire, included nearly everything worthless and portable, empty lard buckets, tin tops of beer bottles, old newspapers, rags of every description, and small bits of wood.
The hut contained a single room ten feet square. The cot was in the center. On one side was a cooking stove and on the other, or suspended from the rafters, was his miscellaneous collection.
His death occurred not earlier than last Tuesday, though the body looked as if it might have lain for a month. But he was seen alive on Tuesday morning, and so far as is known, no one has seen him since.
It was remembered that for three or four days past crows and buzzards were seen hovering over the house or resting on its roof.
Very little is known of Hermes, except that he was a genuine recluse. He was a most devout Catholic, faithful in his attendance upon all services from the early mass.
Source: Arizona republican. (Phoenix, Ariz.), 06 Sept. 1895.
