Re: Family Bible of Michael S. Vandercook
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In reply to:
Re: Family Bible of Michael S. Vandercook
nancy elliott 2/05/10
Interesting article from St. Lawrence Republican ,Nov. 19, 1913:
BONES OF MAN IN BARNYARD AT NORTHRUPS CORNERS - GRUESOME FIND IS MADE BY DITCH DIGGERS - While digging a ditch for a water pipe in the barnyard on the old Northrup farm at Northrup's corners, four miles from this city, on the Canton road, J.B. Armstrong, the present owner, unearthed part of a human skeleton.His spade first turned up the two hip bones, and after that portions of the ribs, part of the backbone, small bones believed to have been the fingers, and the skull, were brought to light. Some of the teeth were still in the jawbones and in a good state of preservation.
Mr. Armstrong and his hired men were excavating about twenty-five feet back of the farmhouse, when they made their gruesome find.The skeleton was barely two feet below the surface.The bones were carefully collected and later taken by the hired men to Lisbon village, where they were shown to Dr. W. J. L. Millar, who expressed the opinion that the skull was that of an old man, who had been dead, perhaps seventy-five years. How the man came to be buried there, is, of course, a deep mystery, and there is little chance of it ever being cleared up.
For several generations the farm was owned by the Northrup family, and no one could be found today, who knew Lewis Henry Northrup, who died thirty years ago, at the age of 90, and bought the land when it was mostly virgin forest and cleared it up.
There was a country tavern at Northrup's Corners for many years, and in the old days it was one of the best known country inns in this part of the state.There is a graveyard a short distance away from the Corners, on a cross road that leads to Heuvelton.