James Murphy, nicknamed ‘Stoneman Willie’ because of hard skin from experimental embalming, has been ‘gawked at long enough’
The mummified remains of a petty thief nicknamed Stoneman Willie have been laid to rest in Pennsylvania, concluding a fascinating and somewhat macabre episode stretching back 128 years.
Willie, whose real name was revealed to be James Murphy at his burial in Reading, 60 miles north-west of Philadelphia, on Saturday. He was embalmed shortly after his death in 1895 by a mortician experimenting with new preservation techniques.
