Outlasted

no bullet or landmine would send him home. In nineteen eighteen, No, that would be blamed on something far more strange. He was on patrol in the area of Belgium known as Flanders Fields when a bolt of lightning flashed out of the sky and struck him off his horse. When his fellow soldiers found him, he was laying in the mud beside his dead horse, and half his body had been paralyzed. As a result. He was put on the next ship

back to Canada to begin his recovery process. It would take Major Walter Somerford many years to become self sufficient, eventually learning to walk with the help of a cane. But he was still young, still drawn to adventure and still full of life. So when a group of his friends decided in nineteen twenty four to hike into the mountains to fish in a nearby lake, Walter happily joined them. I imagine the steep hike was grueling for him, but

he kept up. Walter was a fighter, after all, But when they arrived at the lake, he decided to take a seat while his friends unloaded their gear and set up camp. Right near the water's edge was a tall tree, so he sat himself down against it under the shade of the branches, But the sun quickly faded away as a storm rolled in. When Walter his friends found him, he was laying on his side at the base of the tree, trembling and in pain. The tree itself told

them everything they needed to know. A dark, smoldering streak ran down the bark from high above all the way to the ground. It had been a lightning strike, and Walter, against all odds, had been struck again, just like the first time. Walter seemed to have been paralyzed by it, and as a result spent a long while in the hospital doing his best to recover. It took him two years before he could walk again. But he did it. Like I said, he was a fighter and giving up

wasn't an option, so he pressed onward in life. As the story goes, Walter took a trip to a park in Vancouver in the summer of nineteen thirty. He was probably there with family or maybe those same fishing buddies. We don't really know, but I have a feeling you could guess what happened next. Right against all the laws of probability, Walter Somerford was struck by lightning for the

third time in his life. They say this one was the worst, or perhaps it was just so devastating because it was the third time in twelve years that it had happened. Whatever the reason, Walter never walked again and spent the last two years of his life in a wheelchair. When he passed away in nineteen thirty two, still very much a young man, he went to the grave as a member of a very special club. Lightning rarely strikes twice, but for Walter Somerford, it did that and more. You

would expect the story to end there, wouldn't you No more? Walter? No more lightning? Right? Well, not exactly, because in nineteen thirty four, Just two years after he passed away, lightning did strike again in his hometown. Now, I know what you're thinking, without Walter, where could it possibly strike? The answer, though, might be more obvious than you were expecting. It struck his gravestone naturally. When the trap door of the gallows

was opened, the entire crowd held their breath. They were about to watch an innocent man die, and there was nothing they could do to stop it. It was February of The person on the platform was a young man named will Purvis, who had been sentenced to death by hanging for the murder of a local farmer named William Buckley. The trouble was Purvos claimed he was innocent. He swore to it thanks to a bit of circumstantial evidence, though

the jury ruled unanimously against him. Purvis was stunned. He hadn't committed the crime, and yet no one believed him. Angry and bitter, he lashed out in the courtroom. I'll live longer than a lot of you, he shouted, regardless. On a cold February day in mississip Be, Will Purvis was escorted to the gallows for his execution. He was led up the stairs where a noose was lowered over his neck and then tightened, and then a black sack was slipped over his face. Finally, the trap door was

triggered and will Purvis dropped to his death. Well sort of. He actually fell a few feet and landed on the soft grass below the platform. The crowd glanced back up at the rope and immediately spotted the reason why the noose had come untied. Sure, Purvis had a bit of rope burn around his throat, but he was alive and breathing, so the crowd went wild. The executioners tried to rebound

from their failed attempt. They rushed down and scooped Purvis up, and then hauled him back up to the platform, where they reset the trap door. After a moment, though, they gave up. Maybe it was the nervousness of retying a noose in front of thousands of angry onlookers. Perhaps it was a desire to do things on their own terms, at their own pace. Maybe they could hear his words to the jury echoing in the back of their minds. Somehow, despite the odds, he had survived. So they tossed Will

Purvis back in jail. He had already spent two years in prison waiting for his trial, and now he was back. He made an appeal for a new trial, but they denied him. He made another appeal and received yet another denial. This went on for two long years. All Walpurvis had to endure hard labor alongside the other prisoners. But finally, in January of eight something changed. Actually it was someone.

Mississippi had elected a new governor, and when the new man and slum McLaurin took office, he changed Purvis's sentence. The executioner's noose no longer loomed in his future. Two years after that, enough evidence and public outcry had flowed in that he was actually pardoned. Roughly six years after his life fell apart, Will pervos Us was a freeman. Two decades later, the true killer of William Buckley came forward and confessed, closing the case for good. Purvis went

on to live in another four decades. He never found himself back inside the courthouse or at the center of another murder trial. He eventually received a large payment from the state as restitution for his time in prison, and lived a full normal life. Will Purvis passed away in nineteen forty four years after his failed execution and just three days after the death of the final member of his jury, Will Purvis It turns out was a man of his word. I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour

of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created by me Aaron Mankey in partnership with how Stuff Works. I make another award winning show called Lore, which is a podcast, book series, and television show, and you can learn all about it over at the World of Lore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.