Immortals

A religious sect which has attained a certain respectability and a good-sized following in England is the British-Israel Movement, whose members believe that Anglo-Saxons descend from eleven non-Jewish Israelitish tribes (the twelfth, Jewish, is Judah). In Detroit last week a U. S. adherent of the movement, Mrs. Sophia Holtz, 82, made news by declining to make a will.

Last year her Israelite Husband Henry Holtz (no Jew) died, left Mrs. Holtz $66,000. For years before, the two had barricaded themselves in their Detroit house, Mr. Holtz emerging only to buy groceries. They kept no mirrors in the house, prayed from sundown every Friday to sunup every Sunday, and believed themselves immortal. Unshaken at the death of her husband, Widow Holtz saw no point in making a will. Last week relations of Henry Holtz went to court to force her to. Said she: "I've spent 35 years in Heaven already. When I joined the Israelite Church in England, I was assured of eternal life. I am not a widow, because my husband is only resting. He'll come back and see me. I'll never die." Henry Holtz's relations won the first step in their suit, by getting court permission to contest his will.

In Manhattan last week, police broke into the tenement room of Mrs. Emily Cudas, 65, found on her bed, beneath an old quilt, a skeleton to which clung rotting chunks of flesh. It was the remains of Frank Cudas, 79, who died eleven months ago. Neighbors had complained of the stench, an old-age pension investigator had wondered why Mrs. Cudas had always said her husband was ill, but the widow, weighing 200 lb., had kept visitors out. To police she said that she had climbed over the corpse, slept alongside it every night "since Frank went away." Brandishing Bibles and religious tracts, she cackled, "Frank will come back again," was taken to Bellevue Hospital for observation.

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