No Evidence of Murder Found

SNYDER

Posted By: Marilyn Holmes (email)
Date: 4/20/2013 at 17:00:19

The Grinnell (IA) Herald
Aug. 27, 1926

NO EVIDENCE OF
MURDER FOUND
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Officials Exhumed Body of William
Snyder as Result of
Rumors.
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HAD DIED SUDDENLY
ON JULY 27, 1923
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Probable That Over Indulgence In
Home Made Whiskey Caused
Death.
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On the 27th day of July, 1923, the body of William Snyder was found in his house by a neighbor who had come to call on him to get some fishing tackle. The door was locked and there was no answer to his reply, but he entered the house and found Snyder lying on the floor dead. The indications were that he had been dead for perhaps a couple of days. Coroner Mellott was called and with the undertaker they made an investigation of the body. There were a couple of gallons of home made whiskey and a still found in the house and they reached the conclusion that the man had come to his death by drinking too much of the poison. The body was prepared for the casket and burial was made without a more careful examination and without calling a coroner's jury as it seemed to be a clear case of poison.

It has been leaked around lately that the man was not poisoned but was murdered and last Tuesday morning, about six o'clock Coroner Evans, Sheriff Gregson, County Attorney Boyd and Mr. Bramer, the undertaker, went to the cemetery, exhumed the body, took it to the Bramer Undertaking Parlors and gave it a complete and careful examination. The body, according to the people who took it up, was not in a bad condition, but had withered away and become somewhat mummified so that there was no odor and the task of examination was not a difficult one.

No evidence, however, was found of murder. It was thought he might have been shot, but the examination showed that he was not shot and the body was re-buried about eight o'clock Tuesday morning.