It seems as though vampires are everywhere you look these days, from the Twilight craze to many other vampire themed books, television shows, and movies. Amidst all of this fascination with vampires and the debate over whether true vampires exist, there is a bit of historical information which adds to the mystery. Folklorist Michael E. Bell believes that those of us with ancestors from New England may have a rather scary skeleton in some of our closets. He has suggested that in some places such as Rhode Island and New Hampshire, people dug up their deceased ancestors in a desperate attempt to rid themselves of tuberculosis.
The story is that when someone in a family became ill with tuberculosis, their family members would begin digging up the graves of deceased relatives. Why were they digging up the graves? They were looking for things that could be the mark of evil spirits residing in the deceased which could be affecting those family members who were still living. The things that they were looking for were unusual things like fresh blood in the heart of the corpse. If such a sign of evil was found, the heart would be removed from the corpse before it was buried, and the heart would be burned. The ashes from the heart would be used to make potions that were intended to heal the person who was suffering from tuberculosis.
Regardless of whether or not the potions actually relieved the symptoms of tuberculosis is uncertain. More likely than not, the people who were affected still died from the disease. The reason that the story is important is that it serves as an illustration of the self help measures that people would concoct when the medical profession was unable to help them cure their dying relatives. The people who were digging up the corpses and hunting for evil spirits were doing it as a way to try to do whatever they could to save their sick relatives. Perhaps it was their way of preparing themselves for the passing of the ill family members. Either way, it makes for an interesting tidbit of history for this time of year.