JACK SLADE’S COFFIN

Background

A 3 dimensional (3D) Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) mapping of the Stranger’s Plat B-4, Salt Lake City Cemetery, Salt Lake City, Utah was conducted for the purpose of locating a buried metal lined coffin that reportedly contains the body of Joseph  “Jack” Slade pickled in whiskey. Joseph “Jack” Slade was a stagecoach and Pony Express superintendent, instrumental in the opening of the American West. His notoriety came about due to being included in Mark Twain’s first book “Roughing It”. During a drunken spree in Virginia City, Montana, he was lynched by local vigilantes on March 10,1864, for disturbing the peace.  In order to keep Slade from burial in “boot hill”, his wife Virginia had a metal lined coffin constructed into which his body was placed along with a barrel of whiskey as a preservative.  In July, 1864, Virginia brought the coffin to Salt Lake and placed it in a temporary grave in “Stranger” Plat B-4 at the Salt Lake City Cemetery with instructions for the coffin “to be removed to (Carlyle) Illinois in the fall”.  Virginia never returned.  A specific location of the buried coffin within the 20×50 m Plat B-4 was not recorded.

Scope of Project

The scope of this project was to locate the coffin and confirm that it was Jack Slade’s.  The project came about because of a Historian’s request to have what’s left of the coffin disinterred and moved to Illinois.  Because the wood coffin shell would’ve completely disintegrated after 150+ years, 3D GPR mapping was employed.  A MALA X3M GPR system was used to collect 224 2D GPR profiles. Total length of profiling was 2,964 meters.  Data was processed in both 2D and 3D using GPR-Slice software (www.GPR-Survey.com).

Project Outcome

Extensive 3D processing and imaging of all 2D GPR data was successful in locating the anomaly of Jack Slade’s disintegrated wood coffin .  Additional detailed analysis of that 3D volume was required to verify the presence of a metal lining.