100 years ago in Spokane: Cultists still hoped to bring Flora Watson back from the dead, but they didn’t object to the undertaker getting involved in the meantime

The macabre story of Miss Flora Watson – dead 10 days – was not quite over.

The religious cult of faith healers who had been praying for her revival asked for Watson’s body to be held at a funeral home for three more days “to await the fulfillment of a prophecy made by her that she would live after she was reported dead.”

At least four of the faith healers claimed to have “received communications from the Lord since the woman died that she would again live.” They had been gathered around her body for nine days in a revival tent on North Monroe and reported that “her body did not become offensive as would be expected.” They even said that “indications of a return of circulation” had become manifest on day three.

A city health officer said the cult made a technical violation of the law by not reporting the death within 24 hours, but that prosecution might not be requested since the faith healers did not believe she was dead.

When he went to the revival grounds and asked to see the dead woman, they replied that, “if he considered it death,” she was over in a tent.

“We found the woman was in reality dead, and instructed that the body be taken to an undertaker,” the health officer said. “There was no objection.”

The coroner later reported that the body was, in fact, badly decomposed. She had died of tuberculosis.

The health officer said he had no objection to holding the body for three more days, as her cousin requested. Relatives agreed that if there were no signs of life in three days, they would make funeral arrangements.