Jerome, Legless Mystery Man From The Sea

[MrRING]

I hadn't heard of this story before!
https://www.canadianmysteries.ca/sites/jerome/accueil/indexen.html

In the Catholic cemetery of Meteghan, in the Municipality of Clare along St. Mary’s Bay in Nova Scotia, there lies a grave marked by a stone bearing the simple inscription, “Jerome.” Who was this Jerome? Where did he come from? For half a century the Acadians of St. Mary’s Bay asked exactly those two questions. On September 8, 1863, a stranger whose legs had been amputated above the knee was found on the beach of Sandy Cove, on the coast of the Bay of Fundy. Taken in by the local Acadians, he spent the rest of his life in almost total silence. People named him Jerome because in the midst of his grunting he is said to have uttered this name. The families that took him in received an allocation from the Nova Scotia government to provide for his needs. People came from everywhere to see the mystery man, who was put on show. By the time he died in April 1912, the legend of Jerome had only begun.

Over the decades, many people claimed to know the truth about Jerome. Most believed he was an Italian, a nobleman who had been mutilated for revenge and had shut himself away in near total silence for protection from his political enemies. Or that he was an Italian naval officer who had been injured on ship and was abandoned because he had become useless. It was often mentioned that he had apparently uttered the words “Colombo” and “Trieste,” proving that he was from Italy. But others believed that he was Jeremiah Mahony, an Irishman who had emigrated to the United States and run away from his family. Still others believed he was a poor lumberjack who had been injured in a logging accident and left to die. Jerome himself never revealed his own story.

 

[EnolaGaia]

The Jerome case has its own Wikipedia entry:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerome_of_Sandy_Cove

As mentioned in the Wikipedia article and this Canadian (Globe and Mail) webpage:

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/new...-year-mystery-of-legless-man/article18171402/

... a local New Brunswick historian floated a theory that Jerome was the same mystery foreigner who'd lost his legs to gangrene a few years earlier in New Brunswick, could not speak, and was eventually shipped off to anywhere else. If this were true Jerome's stay in Nova Scotia actually represented his second "tour of duty" as a local enigma.

 

[MrRING]

Double the mystery, double the fun!

 

[EnolaGaia]

There's another possible angle that doesn't seem to be mentioned in the few online accounts I've seen so far ...

Jerome was discovered on the Nova Scotian shore in 1863. The American Civll War was raging (arguably at its peak ... ) that year.

 

[EnolaGaia]

Jerome was mentioned back in 2001 in this thread:

Mysterious Appearances (Of People Who Can't Be Identified)
https://forums.forteana.org/index.p...rances-of-people-who-cant-be-identified.1658/

A link was provided to a 2000 Angelfire webpage, which provided a more detailed account of Jerome's discovery. Here's the full text from that (un-copyrighted) webpage ...

Stone marker erected for Meteghan mystery man

Meteghan - Some claim he was Canada's first welfare recipient. Others prefer to recall the legless man, known only as Jerome, as an aristocrat who was mutilated, perhaps by pirates, and marooned on a rocky Digby Neck beach.

A large stone marker bearing the name Jerome was unveiled Tuesday in the Meteghan parish cemetery where this mystery man was buried in 1912 after living most of his life among Acadians.

In those days most grave markers were wood and didn't last long, says Jean Doucet, president of La Societe Historique Acadienne de la Baie Ste. Marie. The group sponsored the memorial, which includes a plaque with the only known photo of Jerome and a brief history of his life in French and English.

On Sept. 8, 1863 a fair-skinned stranger believed to be in his 20s was found by two fishermen at Sandy Cove, Digby County. Both of the man's legs had been freshly amputated. A jug of water and some bread had been placed nearby.

The man was unable or unwilling to speak and is said to have uttered no more than two or three words after being found. One of the words was thought to have been Jerome, and he was soon given that name.

A strange sailing vessel had been seen in St. Marys Bay the day and evening before Jerome was discovered. Some say it was a Spanish warship.

Jerome's hands weren't calloused and his clothes were cut from fine cloth. Speculation up and down the bay soon led many to believe he had attempted a mutiny and was punished by amputation. Others suggested he was tossed from a pirate ship. Most thought, however, that he was heir to a fortune and had been crippled and cast away to make way for someone else seeking his inheritance.

None of the stories has ever been proven.

"What I think is the most likely scenario is not the most romantic one," says Germaine Comeau, an award-winning playwright, whose 1976 play The Return of Jerome was adapted for radio and won a Radio-Canada prize in 1987.

Two years prior to the discovery of Jerome, a man was found pinned under a fallen tree in New Brunswick. Both of his legs were frozen and had to be amputated by a doctor in Gagetown on the St. John River. The unidentified man, thought to be European, was taken to Saint John and placed aboard a ship. A few people think he was marooned on Digby Neck.

"For me it would have been the most likely (scenario)," said Ms. Comeau.

"But why they would put him in Sandy Cove, though, I have no idea."

And the ship which is thought to have landed Jerome was indeed a mysterious vessel, swore local fishermen.

"It was a different ship than they were used to seeing at those times," said Ms. Comeau.

Soon after he was found at Digby Neck, Jerome was taken to the home of Jean Nicholas, a Corsican, and his wife, Julitte, in Meteghan, across the bay.

Mr. Nicholas, fluent in five languages, was never able to converse with Jerome.

"When I did my research all articles said that he said three . . . words," said Ms. Comeau.

"One that sounded like Jerome. . . . And they asked him where he came from and he apparently said Trieste. That's in Italy. And there's Columbo. He apparently said Columbo. That might have been the name of the ship he came on."

In 1870 the provincial government placed Jerome in the care of Didier and Elisabeth Comeau of St. Alphonse, where he lived out the remaining 42 years of his life. The government provided $104 a year for his upkeep.

"Apparently he was filled with rage when certain words were spoken," said Ms. Comeau. Pirate was one of them.

"Everybody thought he was carrying some kind of a secret. There was something he knew and that he was not allowed to say."

Jerome died April 19, 1912, four days after the sinking of the Titanic.

SOURCE: http://www.angelfire.com/ns/cyamateur/jerome.html

 

[MrRING]

Crikey! I guess there is a merge a-coming...

 

[EnolaGaia]

Crikey! I guess there is a merge a-coming...

I don't think so ... IMHO the Jerome story has enough "mass / momentum" to warrant a dedicated thread.

 

[MrRING]

Jerome wins one!

 

[EnolaGaia]

This is something new ... The Canadian Mysteries website provides a full set of documentation for researching the Jerome story and its possible relation to the very similar story of an amputee known as "Gamby" in New Brunswick.

It's done in the motif of an exercise ...

Introduction

On September 8, 1863, a man whose legs had been cut off at the knees was found on the beach of Sandy Cove, Nova Scotia. He had no identity papers, money, or belongings, and didn’t speak. Unable to look after himself, Jerome was cared for by local Acadians. He spent the rest of his life almost in silence. Many rumours developed about this mystery man and his origins. These theories — ranging from the believable to the unbelievable — were transformed into a widely-told Maritime legend.

Because of notable similarities between Jerome’s circumstances and those of an individual named Gamby, one theory is that these men are one and the same person. Gamby, thought to be an Italian, was found on a logging trail in the winter of 1859. His legs were frozen and eventually amputated at the knees. The people of Chipman, New Brunswick looked after him for several years before paying to have him removed from the area because it was too costly to care for him. Jerome showed up in Nova Scotia around this time. Many believe that Jerome and Gamby were different people; others think they were the same person. You’ll have an opportunity to decide what you think.

SOURCE: http://www.mysteryquests.ca/quests/25/indexen.html

Go to the URL above, then scroll down to the "Evidence in the Case" section. Following the links therein will lead you to documents concerning the Gamby case and illustrate the curious coincidence between the timeframe when the good folks of New Brunswick paid to have him transported elsewhere and the timeframe when he was discovered on the shore in Nova Scotia.