The Strange Story Of Essie Dunbar, The Woman Who Was Allegedly Buried Alive In 1915

The 1955 Newspaper Article and Its Context

The primary documentary source for the Essie Dunbar story is worth examining in its specific historical context, because the circumstances of its publication are revealing.

The Augusta Chronicle article of August 25, 1955, was triggered by the death of Dr.

D.

K.

Briggs, the physician who had allegedly pronounced Essie Dunbar dead in 1915.

The article’s hook — the occasion for returning to a forty-year-old story — was that the doctor who had made the famous mistake had now himself died.

The article’s news value derived from the irony of this juxtaposition: the doctor who had said someone was dead when she wasn’t was now actually dead, while the woman he had pronounced dead was still alive.