Latest / Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities / A Leg Up

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A Leg Up · Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities

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  Speaker 1: Welcomed. Aaron Mankey's Cabinet of Curiosity is a production of
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  Speaker 1: iHeart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world is full
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  Speaker 1: of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book,
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  Speaker 1: all of these amazing tales are right there on display,
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  Speaker 1: just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet
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  Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Born and raised in Norfolk, England, in nine six,
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  Speaker 1: Arthur started getting visions early on. He was only twelve
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  Speaker 1: years old when he began dreaming of a city made
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  Speaker 1: of stone. It had been carved into the side of
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  Speaker 1: a mountain in the desert, somewhere far from England, a
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  Speaker 1: place he had never seen before with his own eyes.
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  Speaker 1: The visions only grew more intense as Arthur got older,
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  Speaker 1: with the image of the city becoming clearer in his mind.
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  Speaker 1: As time by. They left him upset, but he couldn't
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  Speaker 1: figure out the reason why. It was during a visit
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  Speaker 1: to his local beach when the clearest vision presented itself.
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  Speaker 1: Arthur had been playing among the orange and pink colored
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  Speaker 1: pebbles along the shore when he was whisked away to
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  Speaker 1: the city in the mountain. There was as though he
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  Speaker 1: had been teleported there. The beach faded away around him,
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  Speaker 1: and he was suddenly standing within the walls of the
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  Speaker 1: city itself. What he didn't realize was that the colors
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  Speaker 1: of the pebbles had triggered his strongest vision yet due
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  Speaker 1: to their resemblance to the son of the city. What
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  Speaker 1: confounded him was that he had never seen such a
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  Speaker 1: structure before in his life. He didn't read books about
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  Speaker 1: traveling to exotic locations, nor had he left Norfolk, but
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  Speaker 1: the place felt so real and familiar. He hadn't invented it.
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  Speaker 1: It was like he was living someone else's memories. After
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  Speaker 1: that day at the beach, Arthur received more bits and
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  Speaker 1: pieces of information. They were being beamed straight into his
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  Speaker 1: brain from some far off satellite. He returned to the beach,
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  Speaker 1: to the pink and the orange pebbles under his feet,
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  Speaker 1: and just as before, they transported him back to the
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  Speaker 1: city in the mountain, but he saw more on each
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  Speaker 1: mental trip. There were streets and passageways. A military barracks
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  Speaker 1: had been built nearby, and he got the sense that
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  Speaker 1: he was a soldier, one who had been killed by
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  Speaker 1: a spear in battle. Arthur stopped going to the beach
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  Speaker 1: after that. He kept his dreams to himself, although he
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  Speaker 1: continued to have them well into his old age. It
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  Speaker 1: wasn't until he was watching a BBC documentary about ancient
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  Speaker 1: Jordan when he finally saw the city he had been
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  Speaker 1: dreaming about for real. It was Petra, also known as
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  Speaker 1: the resting place of the Holy Grail for fellow Indiana
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  Speaker 1: Jones fans. Arthur was a static at the realization and
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  Speaker 1: reached out to the BBC about the documentary. He told
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  Speaker 1: them about his lifelong visions, and rather than hang up
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  Speaker 1: on him, they believed him. He became the subject of
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  Speaker 1: a segment on another BBC program and was subsequently interviewed
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  Speaker 1: by an archaeologist with a deep knowledge of Petra. The
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  Speaker 1: archaeologist was floored by how much Arthur knew about the city,
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  Speaker 1: considering he had never laid eyes on it before the documentary.
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  Speaker 1: He knew details that no average person would know without
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  Speaker 1: having been there themselves. The Jordanian government got wind of
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  Speaker 1: Arthur's miraculous story and invited him to Petra to demonstrate
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  Speaker 1: his innate knowledge. Set loose on his own, he walked
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  Speaker 1: through it as though he had grown up there. He
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  Speaker 1: knew every street and landmark. He was even able to
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  Speaker 1: explain parts of the city that had been yet to
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  Speaker 1: be excavated. When presented with artifacts and buildings that the
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  Speaker 1: so called experts could not understand, Arthur calmly told them
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  Speaker 1: about their true purposes, which happened to be correct. All
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  Speaker 1: attempts to stump him or prove him to be a
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  Speaker 1: sham failed. Arthur knew more about Petra than archaeologists and
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  Speaker 1: the people of Jordan's but how it was believed that
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  Speaker 1: he had been glimpsing the past life of a Jordanian soldier,
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  Speaker 1: one who had died centuries ago. Arthur was seen by
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  Speaker 1: many spiritual leaders as proof that reincard nation was a
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  Speaker 1: real phenomenon. True or not, it was certainly curious. Arthur
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  Speaker 1: flower Do didn't see much more excitement during his time
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  Speaker 1: on Earth, but he and his past life did prove
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  Speaker 1: one thing. Life's a beach and then you die. When
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  Speaker 1: someone loses a limb, such as an arm or a leg,
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  Speaker 1: the road to recovery can be rough. They may have
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  Speaker 1: to fight off infection or learn how to do things
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  Speaker 1: with only one appendage that they used to do with two.
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  Speaker 1: Tying their shoes, walking, and buttoning up their shirt are
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  Speaker 1: all made more difficult. But the story doesn't end with
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  Speaker 1: that loss. It goes on as the person at its
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  Speaker 1: center continues to grow and adapt. They may get a
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  Speaker 1: prosthetic device, which brings its own set of challenges. But
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  Speaker 1: no matter what, the tail of a lost limb is
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  Speaker 1: always about the person it once belonged too well. Usually.
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  Speaker 1: Henry Paget, the Earl of Uxbridge and the first Marquess
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  Speaker 1: of Anglesey, was born in seventeen sixty eight to a
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  Speaker 1: wealthy English family. He was well educated and entered Parliament
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  Speaker 1: when he was only twenty two years old. Paget continued
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  Speaker 1: to climb the political ladder into the eighteen hundreds, while
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  Speaker 1: also joining the military to fight the French in seventeen
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  Speaker 1: ninety three. As major general and later lieutenant general, Paget
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  Speaker 1: commanded formidable cavalries against France, and his men regularly defeated
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  Speaker 1: them in battle. However, it was at the Battle of
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  Speaker 1: Waterloo where Paget had his uh Waterloo moment. On June
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  Speaker 1: eighteenth of eighteen fifteen, he was in charge of thirteen
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  Speaker 1: thousand cavalry and forty four members of the horse artillery,
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  Speaker 1: which he led into the fray after taking on thousands
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  Speaker 1: of French infantry. The charge of two thousand British heavy
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  Speaker 1: cavaltry led by Paget had successfully managed to drive them back. However,
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  Speaker 1: Paget's men continued to chase after them and were eventually
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  Speaker 1: met with force by additional French cavalry. Paget did his
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  Speaker 1: best to counter their attacks with roughly nine lightly armed
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  Speaker 1: cavalry charges, but he kept running into the same problem.
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  Speaker 1: His horses continued to get blown out from under him
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  Speaker 1: by cannon fire. Every time he went down, Paget got
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  Speaker 1: back up on a new horse. By the end of
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  Speaker 1: the fight, it seemed as though he had made it
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  Speaker 1: out okay, though the same couldn't be said of the horses. Unfortunately,
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  Speaker 1: the French weren't done yet, though. They fired their cannons
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  Speaker 1: a few more times, and as Paget was trotting away
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  Speaker 1: beside the Duke of Wellington's one of their cannon balls
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  Speaker 1: collided with his knee. It was shattered into a thousand pieces.
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  Speaker 1: Although Paget's stiff upper lip refused to buckle, he allegedly
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  Speaker 1: said to the Duke, by God, Sir, I've lost my leg,
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  Speaker 1: and the Duke of Wellington was believed to have replied
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  Speaker 1: by God, sir, so you have. Paget was brought to
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  Speaker 1: a surgeon who took one look at his leg and
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  Speaker 1: knew immediately that it couldn't be saved. The limb was
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  Speaker 1: amputated shortly thereafter at the Belgian home of a man
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  Speaker 1: named Hyacinthe Joseph Marie Kari, but since Paget was in
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  Speaker 1: the midst of war with no access to proper health
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  Speaker 1: care facilities, the surgery was completed without anesthetic, but that
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  Speaker 1: didn't phase the general. He said that the knives felt
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  Speaker 1: kind of blunt as the doctor cut the limb away,
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  Speaker 1: and when it was all over, Henry Paget was down
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  Speaker 1: one leg, and Monsieur Peris had increased his number of
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  Speaker 1: appendages by one. That's right. The owner of the house
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  Speaker 1: where the amputation had taken place had also taken possession
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  Speaker 1: of Paget's discarded leg. He buried it in his garden
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  Speaker 1: outside and turned it into a kind of shrine or altar,
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  Speaker 1: complete with a tombstone. Others heard about the strange leg
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  Speaker 1: grave at Pari's home and began showing up at his
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  Speaker 1: doorstep to see it, and Paris, seeing a lucrative business
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  Speaker 1: opportunity before him started charging a fee for visitors. Sixty
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  Speaker 1: odd years later, Paget's son made a pilgrimage to the
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  Speaker 1: house to see the shrine for himself. What he found
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  Speaker 1: flabbergast at him. The leg had been removed from its
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  Speaker 1: grave and placed on display for all to see. The
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  Speaker 1: change in ven you had been made after a big
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  Speaker 1: storm had disturbed the ground where it had been interred.
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  Speaker 1: The British government stepped in and requested the bones be
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  Speaker 1: returned to the Paget's family. Peri's Air said that he
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  Speaker 1: would happily hand it over for a price. The Belgian
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  Speaker 1: Minister of Justice then told him to put the leg
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  Speaker 1: back in the ground so as to avoid an international incident.
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  Speaker 1: Paris Airs obliged taking down the public display, but he
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  Speaker 1: didn't rebury the bones as ordered. Instead, he tucked them
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  Speaker 1: away in his study, only to have them discovered by
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  Speaker 1: his widow following his death in nineteen thirty five. She
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  Speaker 1: was so upset by the presence that she tossed them
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  Speaker 1: in the homes furnace and cremated them. But Henry Paget,
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  Speaker 1: the Earl of Uxbridge, had moved on from his injury
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  Speaker 1: long before. After a year long recovery, he was fitted
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  Speaker 1: with one of the first ever prosthetic limbs that could
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  Speaker 1: bend at the knee. It had been built from wood
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  Speaker 1: and leather with springs inside. With it strapped onto his thigh,
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  Speaker 1: he was able to ride horses again until his death
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  Speaker 1: in eighteen fifty four at the age of eighty five.
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  Speaker 1: Paget never got to see his lost limb again. His
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  Speaker 1: son did have the chance to bring it home later
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  Speaker 1: in life, but unfortunately, thanks to Monsieur Perry's own air,
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  Speaker 1: it would have cost him an arm and a leg.
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  Speaker 1: I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet
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  Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn
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  Speaker 1: more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com.
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  Speaker 1: The show was created by me Aaron Manky in partnership
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  Speaker 1: with how Stuff Works. I make another award winning show
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  Speaker 1: called Lore, which is a podcast, book series, and television show,
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  Speaker 1: and you can learn all about it over at the
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  Speaker 1: World of Lore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.