The Hidden Hoard of Seattle's Recluse
When two elderly men were found dead in a filthy, squalid room, a subsequent search revealed a small fortune stashed in bedposts and rags.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
A search of the house where two old men, Joseph Perry and Hicoerd Prise, were found lying dead yesterday, brought to light a large amount of hidden treasure. Perry was the one who owned all the riches. He retired from a firm of auctioneers several years ago with independent means, and took Prise, who was his cousin and a companion. He was a close miser, and scarcely allowed himself the necessaries of life. In an undertaking establishment, the bodies lay today, ghastly in death. Their appearance was revolting, and showed a frightful condition of personal neglect.
This afternoon the coroner, together with the distant relatives of Perry and a lawyer, began a search of the filthy old house. They began in the second-story front room. Moving a filthy coverlet from a bed, an old dirty piece of paper was found containing bank notes to the amount of $127. A small parcel next was found containing $40 in gold, and an old dirty canvas bag had $400 in gold coins, and $110 in bright new gold certificates were wrapped in pieces of cloth. In another bedroom, $300 in $50 gold certificates wrapped in old rags and paper was found under a corner of the mattress. An old rag tied around a bedpost was found to contain $45 in gold pieces. In addition to the packages containing money, great piles of papers were brought out of old money boxes. They contained deeds to property, mortgages, bank books, insurance policies, ground rents, and other valuable documents.
“He was a close miser, and scarcely allowed himself the necessaries of life.”
This 1887 discovery echoes the modern anxieties surrounding Seattle's hidden wealth and the extreme isolation of elders in an rapidly urbanizing city. It serves as a reminder that behind the facades of progress, the city has long grappled with the private, tragic contradictions of extreme poverty amidst accumulated property.
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