Heirloom Tragedies. Chapter I

On July 23, 1927, a tragic event would take place in the town of Herencia.

The events took place around five-thirty in the afternoon at the cellar of Don Marcelino Rodríguez on Toledillo Street. Two teenagers, José Fernández – Baíllo y Díaz-Pacheco and José Jiménez-Ortiz y López-Escribano, aged 17 and 15 respectively, died at that place.

In the past, it was almost impossible for less affluent people to access education. Therefore, if parents saw that their child was not doing well in school or if they themselves said they didn’t like studying, they would automatically take them out of school and send them to work.

These two teenagers worked as laborers at Don Marcelino Rodríguez’s cellar, taking care of maintenance. There is no data on when the two young men started working at this place, but certainly that July 23 did not go as planned.

That day, they were apparently in the area of the wine cones or jars where the wine was stored, probably doing cleaning tasks or even filling one of these jars. Bad luck invaded that place, as one of them would slip or trip and fall into one of them. His companion would go to rescue him, but unfortunately would also fall into the jar.

There were probably more laborers working in the cellar and when they saw that the boys did not return or were taking too long, they went to see if anything unexpected had happened, and to their surprise, the worst of thoughts had occurred. The two teenagers were found drowned inside a jar. The scene I have described is only a speculation of what might have happened, as there is not enough specific data to know what triggered the accident.

These events took place on July 23, but the deaths were not reported in the Civil Registry of Herencia until the 26th of the same month. At ten past two in the afternoon, the death of José Jiménez-Ortiz was reported, and at twenty past two, that of José Fernández-Baíllo. By reading the two death certificates, we can be sure that death occurred due to “immersion and asphyxiation by gases,” with carbon monoxide predominating, commonly known in the world of oenology as “carbonic acid”. However, death by immersion only appears in one of the two certificates, specifically in José Jiménez-Ortiz’s, why does it not also appear in José Fernández-Baíllo’s?

This may be due to a writing error, having forgotten to include the complete cause or perhaps José Fernández-Baíllo only died from inhaling carbonic acid. Dying from inhaling this gas does not cause pain or agony, it is a sweet death, as whoever breathes it becomes unconscious as the gas expels the oxygen from the body, being denser than oxygen, taking over the body until the heart stops beating due to lack of oxygen. It is possible that the entire room was filled with this gas and that one of them was next to the mouth of the jar and fainted into it to drown, while the other might not have been so close and simply collapsed on the ground. Another conjecture.

In the past, there were many deaths due to inhalation of carbon monoxide, and although the death was described more technically in the civil registry certificate, people would speak of a death due to this cause as “dying from the stench”. After all, the people always end up giving their own adjective to the most common diseases or deaths about which little was known due to the lack of education.

Braulio Sepúlveda Álvarez and Indalecio López Fuensalida, two men from Herencia, were the ones who found the lifeless bodies of the young men and raised the alarm in the cellar.

Another remarkable aspect of this case is that both boys were buried in the ground, as was customary at that time due to the high poverty rate and the inability to afford the high cost of a coffin to hold their mortal remains and not even a tombstone. However, only one of them, José Fernández-Baíllo, has a tombstone with an inscription. The boy was lucky to have a connection with music, as the tombstone is engraved with the following text:

“JOSÉ BAÍLLO DÍAZ, ON JULY 23, 1927, AGED 17, THE MUNICIPAL BAND, LED BY MR. LUÍS GONZÁLEZ, DEDICATES THIS MODEST MEMORY TO THE STUDENT AND COMPANION. RIP.”

Unfortunately, there is no document that indicates the instrument the young man played, but at least it is evident that he was beloved in the band, which is why they decided to pay for the tombstone and dedicate that inscription. The tombstone, despite being almost 100 years old, is in acceptable condition, although currently, due to different circumstances, the bottom right corner is broken, and the tombstone is covered in lichen and mold.

In the burial and concession registry of the Municipal Cemetery, we can find the owners of the two graves of the deceased young men: Crisóstomo Fernández-Baíllo, father of José Fernández-Baíllo, and Lorenzo Jiménez-Ortiz, father of José Jiménez-Ortiz, who are listed as the owners of both graves. It is also unknown how much money the purchase of the grave cost, but at that time, as mentioned before, the cost was higher than what families could afford.

Moreover, we can also find the inscription of the deaths, which includes the burial number, date, the deceased’s name, and their location.

To conclude, an interesting fact to add a more painful layer to the tragic event previously detailed: Lorenzo Jiménez-Ortiz, father of the late José Jiménez-Ortiz, passed away 33 days after his son. The causes are unknown.