Page 74 - Encyclopedia of the Unusual and Unexplained Vol. 3

54 Ghosts and Phantoms

that the only signs of fire in the house were the ety of fires fed by such combustibles as hickory
ashes left from Walker’s clothes, which had and oak, gasoline, oil, coal, and acetylene.
been burned from her body by the flames from Krogman learned that it takes a terrific
her flesh. There were no burners lighted on the amount of heat to completely consume a
stove and not a single match was to be found in human body, both flesh and skeleton. Cadav-
Walker’s house. Friends and relatives said that ers that were burned in a crematorium burn at
the woman did not smoke and never carried 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit for more than eight
matches on her person. hours, burning under the best possible condi-
tions of both heat and combustion, with
everything controlled, are still not reduced to
ash or powder. Only at temperatures in excess
SPONTANEOUS human combustion of 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit did he observe
bone fuse so that it ran and became volatile.
seems to strike without warning and without
How, then, can a human being burn
leaving a clue.
beyond recognition—in a number of cases in
less than an hour—yet not cause the fire to
spread beyond the chair in which the victim
The strange phenomenon of ball lightning was sitting or the small area of the floor on
has been used by many scientists in an which he or she might have sprawled? Accord-
attempt to explain the even stranger mystery ing to Krogman, the temperatures required to
of spontaneous human combustion, but it is as bring about such immolation should ignite and
difficult to isolate in laboratories for study as consume anything capable of burning within a
SHC. In 1960, Louise Matthews of South considerable radius of the blaze.
Philadelphia survived an eerie experience that
might substantiate the theory of ball lightning In what has become one of the classic
as a factor in at least some of the mysterious cases of SHC, Mary H. Reeser of St. Peters-
cremations that have taken place throughout burg, Florida, was last seen relaxing comfort-
the world and throughout all recorded time. ably in an armchair in her apartment at 9:00
Matthews claimed that she was lying on her P.M. on Sunday evening, July 2, 1951. When a
living room sofa when she glanced up to see a telegram was delivered to her 11 hours later,
large red ball of fire come through both the nothing remained of the 170-pound woman
closed window and the venetian blinds with- but a skull that had shrunk to the size of a
out harming either. At first Matthews thought baseball, one vertebra, and a left foot wearing
that an atomic bomb had fallen, and she the charred remains of a black slipper.
buried her face in the sofa. But the ball of fire St. Petersburg Fire Chief Nesbit said that he
passed through the living room, into the din- had never seen anything like it in all his years of
ing room, and drifted out through a closed investigating fires. Police Chief J. R. Reichart
dining room window. Matthews said that it received an FBI report stating that there was no
made a sizzling noise as it floated through her evidence that any kind of inflammable fluids,
house. And she was able to exhibit visible volatile liquids, chemicals, or other accelerants
proof of her experience: As the ball of fire had had been used to set the widow’s body ablaze. A
passed over her, she had felt a tingling sensa- spokesman for a St. Petersburg mattress compa-
tion in the back of her head. Her scalp was left ny pointed out that there is not enough material
as smooth and clean as her face. in any overstuffed chair to cremate a human
In his experiments regarding the effects of body. Cotton, he said, comprises the basic stuff-
fire on flesh and bone, Dr. Wilton Krogman, ing of such a chair, and this material is often
professor of physical anthropology at the Uni- combined with felt and hair or foam-rubber
versity of Pennsylvania, tested bones still cushions. None of these materials is capable of
encased in human flesh, bones devoid of flesh bursting suddenly into violent flames, although
but not yet allowed to dry out, and bones that they do possess properties that enable them to
have dried. He burned cadavers in a wide vari- smolder for long periods of time.

The Gale Enc y clopedia of the Unusu al and Unexplained