Lilly E. Gray-- Victim of the Beast 666

In the Salt Lake City cemetery is a mystery. On the headstone of Lilly E. Gray is engraved "Victim of the Beast 666". What motive a person or people would have to put something like that on someone's grave is the mystery that many have tried to unravel.







Many people have tried to research this woman's life to try and learn the basic question of why, but so far, no answers have emerged.

Richelle Hawkins article

The above link is the best article I could find on it. I took the two pictures above on a recent trip to Utah. The lady in the cemetery office had to help me find the headstone, and she told me that she, too, had tried to discover the meaning of this last message.

Some have speculated that it is what Lilly wanted on her grave. Some say it was a final F you to her, and some think it might have been due to Lilly's death; perhaps the message is referring to a disease.

Lilly is buried far from her husband and they had no children, so we may never know.

Oh- and you can see that someone put a penny on her stone before I got there, but it may not have been a friend or family member. She is rather popular.

what an odd thing to put on a headstone. especially for 1958. hopefully someone knows more about this...

she lived to a ripe ole 77 years of age, so she was old when she died.

why a woman that old would request such a stone, or why someone else would do that to an old lady is beyond me. considering it is in Utah, it is probably some crazy Mormon family, and God knows who what and why ..

It seems cruel to me-- that was my first reaction at least. Someone paid good money for that headstone, and to pay for that....I'm assuming they had a good reason, or a lot of bad feelings.

reply to post by Alora


Perhaps she was ritually sacrificed by Mormons.

Maybe she fell victim to what they believed was the mark at the time. Could of been the fact they thought it was money:

Example. If they thought the mark was money, and she gave it up, she could've starved to death, or suffered from being ill, with no money to pay doctors...

Could of just been the crazy ideals at the time of what the mark could be.

Maybe she was one of the first advocates of preaching about the mark, and in her death, people did not want her to die in vain. So they marked her headstone accordingly.

Maybe she was possessed or something at some point?

Perhaps she was just trying to be funny? If so, she accomplished this quite well. I wonder if there is a book with funny tombstone markings?

Maybe her husband was abusive . She considered him the beast and that is why she is not buried beside him.

Could she have been very hateful woman that the rest of the family wanted her no where near her husband?

My second husband killed himself. He was buried in our family plot.

One day I went to the cemetery and saw that he had been moved all the way across to the other side of the cemetery.

My grandmother bought a single lot and had him moved. I was very happy.

I think I will desecrate his grave and spray paint 666 all over it. I despise what he did when he blew his brains out. He made wounds in his family's, friends and my heart that will never heal.

That was 38 years ago.

[edit on 5-11-2009 by dizziedame]

According to this article her Husband was a bit of a paranoid nutter and it was likely that it was him that put the message on her grave...

www.associatedcontent.com...

Worth having a read and actually sounds believable

Maybe she was a practitioner of Thelema.
Crowley was known as "The Beast 666"

Update

Richelle Hawks continued to dig into the mystery of Lilly E. Gray and the odd phrase forever etched into her gravestone and here is what she found:

Mystery Solved:

Once Richelle's original article began to build steam she received a lot of feedback

I also received testimonials of dubious scenarios by "psychics" and remote viewers, along with some nasty and unlikely warnings and admonishments from religious fanatics. I actually still receive such emails at the rate of about 3 per month, a full two and a half years after the picture was posted at Coast to Coast, and my articles were published in various forums and sites. Ultimately, though, I received some helpful information from others who'd viewed a government document-Elmer Gray's Criminal Pardons Application-of which I had only seen a reference--at a Utah government site

Behold: Elmer L. Gray's Criminal Pardons Application is now available online via the Utah State Archives. What a character. Reading his answers in the form questionnaire, a definite sense of his personality can be detected, which includes sarcasm ("Woodrowe Lamb, a bum,") irony, and exaggeration. He seems quite eccentric, and probably more than a bit cantankerous.

In the document, he has typed a line that has an affinity with and shares a spirit with the one on Lilly's stone. On the line that asks for "Address of parents," Mr. Gray has written, "Booth dead. Died of grief when kidnapers murdered my Wife." Later, he refers to his arresting officers and prison officials as "Democrat officials," and "kidnapers." So, whatever the real circumstances concerning these family deaths, it can be concluded that Elmer Gray blamed the law for the death of his previous wife and clearly considered her a victim. (Remember, Lilly was a subsequent wife-they married in 1950, three years after this document was filed.)

Elmer Gray's view of the government and law is clear-a criminal, evil organization hell-bent on kidnapping, imprisoning and murdering innocent citizens without cause or provocation. With all the conspiracy, anti-government, sentiments of victimization within, it is difficult and perhaps foolish not to come to one conclusion-that Elmer L. Gray was responsible for placing the outrageous phrase, "Victim of the Beast 666" on his second wife Lilly's gravestone, and that it refers simply to the government, law enforcement and officials, with whom he likely tangled with his entire adult life*, and the dynamics and beliefs based on his experiences.

So, after reading the Criminal Pardons Application, and considering his references to victimhood and murder at the hands of the law; also that he was Lilly's only known survivor, who likely made all her funeral arrangements, including ordering her stone-what are the chances that the inscription has nothing to do with his extreme belief system?

Obviously, we will never get a full "Why I did it" statement from Elmer, but Ms. Hawks has done an extraordinary job of finding answers and reasonable (or as reasonable as someone like Elmer can provide) conclusions from the dead.

Elmer's 1947 Prison Papers


An interesting read, from Elmer himself. I don't want to make Lilly's husband the spotlight of this story and would prefer to keep the attention on her. But it seems that this story is going to go in the direction it wants, regardless.

Enjoy