Exhibited:

Milton and Cheadle’s Great Adventure, Jonny’s Antiques, Shakespeare (with label, #8)

Note:

The Headless Indian (Dessert Plate 8)
“The Corpse was in a sitting posture, with the legs crossed, and the arms clasped over the knees, bending forward over the ashes of a miserable fire of small sticks. The ghastly figure was headless, and the cervical vertebrae projected dry and bare; the skin, brown and shrivelled, stretched like parchment tightly over the bony framework”
Milton & Cheadle page 296
“Assinibone suggested he had met with foul play; probably from some Americans, who of course having such a bad name are accused at once if any crime is suspected. But this seems improbable from the quiet crouching posture of the body, & the natural position of the axe, bag &c.”
Saturday August 8th 1863, Cheadle’s Journal, page 202
The grim discovery of the body occurred just as starvation loomed for the travellers. They decided to kill their packhorse, ‘Blackie’. The horse, shot by the Assinibone, tasted ‘very sweet and good although lean & a little hard’ and, when dried, supplied them nourishment for several days. A bizarre subject for a formal dessert plate but certainly one to stimulate after-dinner conversation! A later expedition through the area found the head of the decapitated Indian. Mercifully, no plate exists.