A portrait of William S. Ladd made in 1857 when he was in the prime of life, 40 years before his body was dug up and stolen by Daniel Magone’s gang.

Editor’s Note: This is the third in a series entitled “Body-snatchers planned to hold ex-mayor’s corpse for ransom.” Read it in its entirety at www.redmondspokesman.com.

In court, the accused body-snatcher Montgomery pleaded guilty and was sentenced to two years in prison.

Rector’s attorney, S.H. Gruber, had a good deal to say, but he had to be somewhat delicate about it. Because body-snatching is illegal, it didn’t really matter, legally, that Rector basically went through with the corpse-napping scheme at gunpoint. Since he knew very well that stealing corpses for medical experiments was against the law — a point he couldn’t very well dispute, being as the operation was undertaken with great stealth in the middle of the night — the fact that he’d thought he was helping steal a less important corpse for a less unpopular purpose was really no defense at all.

Nonetheless, the attorney made that case to the judge. The judge patiently explained that it would not help his client. The attorney thanked him and withdrew it.

Then the real audience for Gruber’s speech went back to the newsroom and wrote the story up. Gruber’s client was going to jail, that was clear and unavoidable. But at least his neighbors, and his wife’s friends, would know it wasn’t entirely his fault.

Although Montgomery and Rector both cooperated with the authorities, and neither Magone nor Long would speak a word, in the end all four men ended up drawing the same sentence: Two years. The charge was illegal disinterment.

“Lucky for them it wasn’t blackmail or ransom or kidnapping yet, or extortion. Because they hadn’t even had time to write a note to the Ladd family,” said Oregon Historical Society Executive Director Kerry Tymchuk, in an interview with KGW’s Ashley Korslein for an episode of the Wicked West podcast. “Their thought was that they were going to hold it for ransom, but they were so awful at what they did, that they left too much evidence. I guess that was the good thing for them, was that they were found out quickly. Otherwise they would have spent a longer time in prison.”

Magone’s trial took a while, because he was so obviously unhinged and the question of insanity had to be doped out: Was he crazy enough to need to go to the asylum rather than the prison? In the end, the answer was no. He ended up finishing up his two years in the regular penitentiary (he’d already served 16 months of it by then, waiting for trial), as did the other three.

As far as I’ve been able to learn, none of them got in any further trouble after they were released.

As for the Ladd family, they purchased a new coffin to replace the one Magone had hacked up, laid their patriarch to rest in it, and re-buried him. But this time, they dug an extra-wide hole, and instead of filling it back in with dirt, they poured in concrete.

It seems a pretty safe bet that no grave robber, resurrection man, body snatcher or ghoul has disturbed old Mr. Ladd’s long-suffering bones since.

“The Graverobbing Ghouls: Episode 4,” an episode of the Wicked West podcast by Ashley Korslien published Nov. 16, 2022, by Vault Studios and KGW TV

Archives of the Portland Morning Oregonian, May and June 1897