What it means: When you are removed from a situation or a place that you didn't want to be in in the first place. Where it comes from: Even today, it's not unheard of that people are alive when they have been pronounced dead. In fact, people have woken up at their own funerals and wakes, much to their surprise and the shock of their guests. So, to make sure that people weren't being buried alive, grave diggers would attach a bell to the gravestone and some string to the wrist of the 'deceased.' So if they did happen to wake up and discover themselves in a coffin underground, they would ring the bell and would therefore be saved by it. This also leads us to the phrase....
