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DEAD IN THE DITCH
UNKNOWN TRAMP DIES BY WAYSIDE
[Welland Tribune, 30 April 1897]
Early on Tuesday morning as August Thomas was going along the road running east and west past William Hixon’s farm on Thorold township. He was startled to discover the body lying in the ditch by the roadside. There was only about 18 inches of water in the ditch, and the man’s body lay on his back in it, his head being a few inches under water. The man was dead. The body was recognized as that of a tramp who had been about Port Robinson the day before. In fact he had passed through Port during the past two summers, but no one knew his name. His tracks had led from Mr. Hixon’s barn, and it is supposed after passing the night there he had come out on the road very early in the morning and had been seized with a fit or paralysis and had fallen into the water, either dying from the effects of the fit or being drowned whilst insensitive under the stroke. The case was referred to Coroner Cumines who did not consider an inquest necessary.
The body was that of a man of about 70 years of age, apparently well nourished, but poorly dressed. Rather a heavy built man; with sandy complexion. He had two sticks with him, one of which had belonged to a piece of machinery in Mr. Hixon’s barn. The sticks he used to assist in walking, being slightly lame. There was no money found upon his person, nor anything by which the man might be identified, and the body was sent to the Toronto school of anatomy.
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