Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 34, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 August 1895 — THE SEVERED HAND. [ARTICLE]

THE SEVERED HAND.

Its Owner Could Not Rost UntK It M/as Made Comfortable. Peter King, a lumberman of Grass Valley, recently met with a terrible accident, whereby lie lost one of his arms in a planing machine. The severed limb was buried in such a manner that when subsequently disinterred it was found that the hand andVsist were twisted. The strange feature of the affair is the fact that King suffered considerable pain until the buried member was dug up and straightened, when the cramped and strained feeling entirely vanished. The accident occurred nearly a week ago. Yesterday morning one of his associates in the yard called upon him to make inquiries as to his progress toward strength and recovery. Mr. King was progressing favorably, but in the conversation that ensued he stated to his friend that he imagined he felt a cramped and constrained feeling in the hand which he had lost. He said he felt as though it were twisted, and he could not resist the feeling of trying to turn it to a natural and easy position. This sensation had so annoyed him that he had slept scarcely any the night before. This part of the conversation was then dropped. Soon Mr. King’s business associate departed. Without saying a word to Mr. King of his intention, he enlisted the services of another attache of the yard, and the two proceeded to the cemetery where Mr. King’s dismembered arm lay buried. They disinterred the shattered member. And here comes the marvelous part of tjiis story. In the first place, they found the hand in a twisted position, similar to that described by Mr. King. They took hold of it carefully and placed it in an easy and natural position. At the moment they were manipulating the hand in this manner the distant patient, not knowing that any person was contemplating an act of tlie kind, remarked to his nurse: “Some one is fooling with my hand.” From that time he lost tho twisted and cramped sensation. The nurse, also being unaware of the intention of the lumbermen, soon after stepped over to the yard to learn if any one had gone to the cemetery to fix Mr. King’s hand. The employes had not yet returned. When they did return a comparison of watches showed that when Mr. King made the exclamation above quoted they were then placing the dismembered hand in an easy and natural position, Mrs, King asserts that from the time of this act, as related and vouched for by the gentlemen, named, her husband has rested easily and has not since complained of the imaginary constrained feeling which before had kept him awake.