Photo: Pavlo Boyko/Creative Commons Atlas Obscura on Slate is a blog about the world’s hidden wonders. Like us on Facebook and Tumblr , or follow us on Twitter . Amid the cracked, moss-covered gravestones of Greyfriars Kirkyard , an Edinburgh church cemetery established in the mid-16th century, sit two large iron cages. Each covers a grave, and each is secured with a chain and padlock. These cages are known as mortsafes, and they were installed in the early 19th century to deter resurrectionists—otherwise known as body snatchers. As the field of anatomy developed in the 1820s, British medical schools needed corpses to dissect. Because most people believed that dissection damned a dead person’s soul, cadavers were in scarce supply. Anatomists used the bodies of executed criminals, but this source also dried up after a parliamentary act reduced mandatory death penalties. Advertisement So scarce were cadavers that a thriving trade in illicit bodies emerged. Grave robbers, or “resurrection men,” would dig up recently buried bodies in the dead of night and sell them to doctors willing to look the other way.

To two Edinburgh men in particular, the grave exhumation seemed a superfluous step. Why dig up a corpse, they wondered, when you could generate your own? William Burke and William Hare began supplying fresh bodies after a man at Hare’s lodging house died of natural causes in 1827. Seeking a way to be reimbursed for the 4-pound rent the man owed, the duo took the corpse to Edinburgh University, where Dr. Robert Knox purchased it for £7.10s. A mortsafe at Greyfriars. Photo: Postdlf/Creative Commons Having scored a princely sum with no questions asked, Burke and Hare were emboldened to step up their efforts. They began to prey on elderly, stray, and desperate people, on the assumption that they wouldn’t be missed. The pair developed a routine: They would invite their victims to the boarding house, ply them with whiskey, suffocate them, and deliver their bodies to Dr. Knox in an old herring barrel or tea chest. As the pace of the murders quickened and the desire for money increased, Burke and Hare became increasingly careless.

After murdering an elderly woman and her deaf grandson in a particularly brutal manner—Hare stretched the young boy over his knee and broke his back as the old woman looked on—the men targeted a well-loved, intellectually disabled 18-year-old named James Wilson. When “Daft Jamie,” as the locals called him, turned up on the autopsy table, several students recognized him. The jig was up. Advertisement The lack of compassion the men showed their victims extended to their treatment of one another. Due to a shortage of evidence, the court offered Hare immunity if he confessed and testified against Burke. He readily agreed, and Burke was sentenced to death, hanged, and, in an appropriate act of revenge, publicly dissected at Edinburgh University. Burke’s death mask, a printed description of his execution from 1829, and a book made from his skin are on display at the Surgeon’s Hall Museum in Edinburgh. Following the passing of the Anatomy Act of 1832, which made it legal for anatomists to obtain unclaimed corpses, body snatching became a much less pressing concern in Scotland.

That said, you can still see remnants of the resurrectionist era: In addition to the mortsafes at Greyfriars, grave cages remain at Logierait kirkyard in Atholl and Cluny kirkyard in Aberdeenshire. The Resurrectionists & Burke and Hare The Resurrectionists & Burke and Hare Introduction Most of us have heard the names of Burke and Hare and other awful grave robbing deeds. Their story is a bit different from the usual 'body snatchers' and is a loathsome tale. But the story we usually get is incorrect and often embellished legend. In this essay on the infamous pair, spurred on by the demand for fresh human corpses for dissection, we shall look at the facts of this sinister case. The Buisness of Grave Robbing: The Resurrectionsts Doctor's all across Europe in the early 19th century were in great need of bodies for medical school examination and dissection. Physiology and anatomy was a relatively new science, and the only way for the medical experts to clearly study the human body, and to show and teach students, was growing. Most started out using bodies of executed criminals or unknown vagrants who'd died of natural causes.

Certain renowned physicians, such as Dr. Cheselden, seeking respectability for this practice, unwittingly set surgery on a darker path. There were an excess of trainee surgeons, but only a small amount of reasonably fresh bodies to study. Public executions provided only one legitimate source of corpses, (the others being transients who died of natural causes). It therefore, was difficult for students of anatomy to get access to others. The family of the condemned man sometimes tried to get the body back as soon as possible, since in some rare cases it was possible to revive a recently hanged man. In the public eye, there remained a strong belief that in order to stand a chance of redemption, a corpse should be left intact, undisturbed by what was seen a desecration of human bodies. Most people believed dissection was equivalent to damnation. There were simply not enough bodies supplied by the hangman's gallows or deceased vagrants to meet demand. In some places in Europe, anatomy schools were allowed to take bodies from poor hospitals. In Britain, surgeons had to take more extreme measures. A paper by medical historian, Ruth Richardson, says: "Body snatching started to happen all over the place.

Anatomists [had] spawned a new profession: resurrection men." These body snatchers became the plague of the bereaved. In many graveyards, watchtowers were built within so that people could keep an eye out for body snatchers. The affluent often buried their loved ones with great iron bands around the coffins, and some people were buried within 'mort-safes': fortress graves complete with walls and gates to keep the grave robbers out. Hordes of gang-like resurrection men competed for business as anatomists and doctors competed to find the best suppliers of fresh corpses. As for bodies demand grew, the some took a new and horrific approach to meet the demand. Grave robbing was not new phenomena and as early as 1737 there are recorded accounts of the recently departed being removed from their tombs to be used as dissection studies on the slabs of the Edinburgh Medical Schools. As the study of anatomy progressed in Edinburgh in the early 1800's, it was becoming clear that the allowed allocation of one executed criminal per year to each Anatomy School was insufficient for the growing numbers of new students. The other sources, consensual donations to the school, and dead vagrants were in short supply.

Dr Robert Knox's school of anatomy near Surgeons Hall drew, perhaps, 500 people to the anatomy classes there. So arose the sinister trade of the Body Snatcher and they so excelled at their gory trade they also earned the nickname of the 'resurrectionists'. The Backstreets of Edinburgh As mentioned, so rife was the Body Snatching in Edinburgh that certain graveyards had large walls, railings and watchtowers erected, such as St. Cuthbert's at the foot of Lothian road and that of the Canon gate Kirk. Some graves had added protection against the exhumation of their occupants by having their own walls and railings, iron locks and bands. The professional credibility that the snatchers, among others, were able to help to establish for surgeons in the 18th century was destroyed in the early 19th century. Grave robbing continued apace. The trade in back street corpses thrived in Edinburgh, then the epicentre of surgical training. The horrified public of Edinburgh condemned the foul trade, but the ambition of certain physicians and Anatomists invariably led to even more hideous methods of obtaining bodies.

After all, a freshly delivered corpse to some unscrupulous Anatomists paid very good money, with few questions asked. Some devised their own sinister methods of supplying the needs of the medical students. Enter Burke and Hare, two of the most infamous of all. The Background of Burke and Hare William Burke (pictured right) and William Hare, two Irish immigrants from Ulster, came to Edinburgh as labourers on the New Union Canal and took up lodgings with Maggie Laird and Nell Macdougal, women of questionable virtue, in the shoddy district of the West Port, near Tollcross. William Burke was 36-years old. He'd spent a lot of time in the army, leaving a wife in Ireland (she refused to come to Scotland) when he came to Scotland to as a 'jack-of-all-trades', before finally settling down into a career crime with Hare. While lodging at Maddiston during his work on the Canal, Burke met Helen MacDougal, a native Scot who was then, after separating from her legal husband, living with a man with whom she had two children.

Burke and MacDougal left Maddiston together after the Canal work was done, apparently leaving the two children behind, and the couple journeyed to Peebles and Leith and then Edinburgh, scraping out a living by working on farms, selling old clothes, and mending shoes. Sketch of William Hare William Hare had also journeyed from Ireland to Scotland to work on the Union Canal, although it is not belieed he ever encountered Burke there. After the completion of the Canal, Hare went to Edinburgh and found cheap lodgings in the area known as West Port at the boarding house of a man named Logue and his wife Margaret, who was also an Irish native. When Logue died in 1826, Hare provided enough comfort to the widowed Margaret that they were soon living as common-law husband and wife and running the lodging house as a married couple. Hare never provided a biography as Burke had, but Hare was described in an 1829 issue of Blackwood�s Magazine as: �the most brutal man ever subjected to my sight, and at first look seemingly an idiot.

(His face) when he laughed � which he did often � collapsed into a hollow, shooting up ghastlily from chin to cheek bone � all steeped in a sullenness and squalor�native to the almost deformed face of the leering miscreant�so utterly loathsome was the whole look of the reptile.� A hideous looking man, with a cruel smile, Hare lived with his common-law wife, Margaret (Maggie, shown right). When Burke and McDougal moved to Edinburgh, they took up residence in West Port and by chance encountered Margaret Hare one day, who invited them back to the boarding house and introduced them to her husband. Soon after, Burke and McDougal became paying lodgers of the Hares. The four of them would quarrel often and might not accurately be described as friends, but they bonded by a shared fondness for whisky and the desire to make easy money � no matter the method. Burke eventually became a permanent boarder. Burke and Hare Ply their Deadly Trade In November of 1827, one of Hare�s lodgers, an old army pensioner named Donald, fell ill and died.

Hare was annoyed, as he owed rent from the deceased. So they concocted a nefarious plan to pinch the man's body and substitute weighted wood in his coffin. After the authorities had been called to fetch the man�s body, Hare came up with a plan to get the money Donald owed him. With Burke�s assistance, they took Donald�s body out of the coffin and replaced it with an equal weight of tree bark and hid the corpse until the coffin had been taken away. The two then went off to find the offices of anatomy instructor Professor Munro, but, in asking directions, were redirected to the classrooms of Professor Robert Knox. Knox�s assistants said that they were interested in the body, and to bring it after nightfall. That night, they covertly contacted the medical school and arranged a meeting, knowing the school's need of a body for students to dissect in school classes. Three of Knox�s assistants examined the body and offered to pay a little over �7 for it. The two men quickly agreed, and left the doctor�s rooms discussing the obvious advantages of this method of making easy amounts of money with so little effort.

Although giving the appearance of two hard workingmen by day, at night they had taken up their more sinister and profitable trade of providing fresh corpses to Anatomists, who were bereft of the need of asking too many questions. The murderers supplied fresh corpses to, among others, Robert Knox, a celebrated anatomist and the most popular lecturer at the city's Medical School, who did, it is said, attracted as many as 500 students per class. Hare and Burke did not spend their money for the body wisely, and soon were looking for new victims. To their luck, or by ill misfortune, another of Hare's boarders became sick days later. In their warped justification, they decided the man must be suffering and they must put him out of his misery. They even felt they were kind to him, giving him whiskey and food. One supposes that they justified this first killing as an act of mercy for a dying man. After consuming the offerings, he was soon drunk and passed out. The two suffocated him, pinning him down and covering his nose and mouth. The poor man was immediately sold off to the medical school, saying he died of illness or of drunkenness.

Soon after he was cashed in, another victim, this time a lady that Hare's wife brought home, became the next corpse for sale. Although no one is quite certain whether or not she knew what was going on, she did fill the woman with whisky and called for her husband. Within hours, the woman was on the medical school's doorstep. No marks were on either to indicate foul play, murder or otherwise. This ritual of Burke and Hares continued many times for 11 months. They Expand Their Nefarious Activities The remaining boarders were all healthy and the duo of death began plotting where else they might go to get bodies? In February of 1828, elderly Abigail Simpson traveled into Edinburgh to collect her pension money. She started back home with a few shillings in her pocket when she met up with William Hare, who invited her to his lodging house to have a dram and rest up before her long journey home. She agreed and soon Burke and Helen joined her and the Hares and they all drank until the evening. Being dark and cold, Abigail was easily persuaded to stay the night and then continue home the following morning.

Burke and Hare had other ideas for her, but they were also so inebriated that they both fell asleep. They supplied her with her ample alcohol, conversation and finally she passed out. They next moring the plied her with more whisky, and when she was too drunk too resist, they smothered her quickly and delivered her to Dr. Knox that evening. They took her body down and received almost double their previous payment, due to the freshness of her body. This is when the first of the suspicious disappearances occurred. [Getting paid for a corpse, right] Burke and Hare were delighted at how easy it was to make good money, and this was the beginning of a roller coaster of murder, inhumanity and greed. Now, their victims were the waifs, strays and prostitutes on the streets of Edinburgh's Old Town, very few people, if any, would miss. They took to hanging out in Inns, such as the White Hart in the Grassmarket, where they would try to spot their potential victims and lure them away. Once done, they would use their own form of strangulation and suffocation. The victims of the gruesome crime were said to have been sold to anatomist Dr.

Knox 'no questions asked' to be dissected on the tables within the school. On the morning of April 9, 1828, 18-year-old West Port prostitutes Mary Paterson and Janet Brown began their day by heading to a local tavern. While drinking their first whiskies of the day, they encountered William Burke, who invited them back to his house for breakfast. Mary readily agreed, but Janet took more convincing. Yet soon all three went off to Burke�s brother�s home, where the drinking continued and they had breakfast. Mary fell asleep at the table, and so Burke asked Janet to accompany him to another tavern, where Janet drank more but did not become inebriated. Burke took her back to his brother�s house and offered her more drink, but was surprised by a sudden appearance of Helen, who screamed at Burke and Janet. A fight ensued as Burke shouted back and eventually threw Helen out -- Mary apparently continued to sleep through the violence. Janet, upset by the incident, prepared to leave, although Burke tried several times to convince her to stay. Janet refused, but said she would return after Helen, who was still screaming and cursing from outside the door, had left.

Instead of going home, Janet stopped by the lodging house of a Mrs. Lawrie, with whom she and Mary had once lodged. Janet told Lawrie of the day�s events, and the landlady became concerned for Mary�s safety and told Janet and one of her servants to return to Hare�s and fetch Mary back immediately. When she returned she was told that her friend went out with Burke and would return later, so she sat and waited. By good fortune her landlady sent a servant to fetch Janet, comcerned for her safety. Eventaully, heeding the advice, Janet gave up and left. She had been spared the fate of her friend. Her friend had been killed and sold to the medical school. Again, they were paid, with little heed payed to these new aquisitions. Weeks later, Burke murdered a woman he knew, and the body was again sold to the university, and he profited once more. Later, in a brazen move, Burke saw the police taking a woman into custody. She was very drunk and Burke insisted he knew her (although it was a lie) and that he would take her home.

She never arrived home but, rather, ended up being another educational experiment for university students. Now the greed was gaining hold on the two and soon they searched again and found an old woman and a young deaf boy with her. Burke took them back to the inn for drinks. They suffocated the old woman but were uncertain what to do with the grandson. With cold and deliberate logic, they wrestled with the young man, Hare holding him over Burke's knee, breaking his back. The terrible duo then handed them both in for cash. When Burke learned that Hare was starting to kill and selling the victims without Burke, arguments broke out and Burke soon moved out. However, this did not stop their horrific alliance. Despite now living apart, they still needed more and more money, and continued nocturnal deliveries to the school to sell the bodies. An old friend came to visit Burke and ended up on the operating slab. Hare and Burke Get Careless Another woman soon followed. Mary Paterson, high-class prostitute (she's been suggested as having serviced the gentry -- even some of the university staff) was lured and murdered, and her daughter, possibly knowing too much about her mother's disappearance, soon followed her mother to the medical schools lab.

This particular lady was rather well known, and people started to talk in open tones about her strange absence. Burke and Hare had become cocky and careless in their zeal for more bodies and money. When they brought the body to Dr. Knox�s, several of his students recognized her, probably from having hired her services previously. Burke and Hare chose not to elaborate on how they came into possession of the body, and Dr. Knox (some say his doorman) stated that her body was so good a specimen that �many of the students took sketches of it, one of which is in my possession. She was a fine specimen of a woman.� There has always been speculation, (possibly well founded) that both Margaret and Helen knew of the killings. Although Hare and Burke would later swear that neither Margaret nor Helen knew anything about the murders, the next "aquisition� brings their assertion into doubt. One day Margaret Hare encountered an old woman out in the streets of Edinburgh and brought her back to her house where she began giving the woman whisky. Margaret told the woman she should lie down, but the old woman declined and kept drinking.

After several attempts, Margaret finally got the woman to rest in the bed, then quickly sent for her husband and Burke, who later appeared at Dr. Knox�s doorstep that evening with a fresh delivery: an old woman. Daft Jamie Unwisely for them, they chose another noted character for their next victim, which got people talking even more. Eighteen year old James Wilson, known as �Daft Jamie� in the West Port neighborhood, was a well-known local character. He entertained local children with riddles and jokes and he lived on the streets or with kind souls who would offer him shelter -- although he frequently visited his widowed mother. Many called him a simpleton, but his heart was great. His only prize possessions were a snuffbox and snuff spoon that had seven holes in it that Jamie used as a calendar to tell the day of the week. Sketch of Daft Jamie In early October of 1828, Hare came across Jamie wandering the streets, looking for his mother (although some versions say Margaret was the one who found him). Hare told him that he knew where his mother was and invited him back to his house to wait for her.

Burke was in a local tavern and watched the two go by and observed Hare �lead poor Jamie in as a dumb lamb to the slaughter and as a sheep to the shearers.� Hare, rashly not seeming to care that Daft Jamie might be missed, picked him up, took him to his home where he was met by Burke. They tried to force Jamie to drink but he resisted. After a stubborn fight, Daft Jamie even pinned Burke to the floor when Burke cried out for Hare to help him. After a surprising tough resistance, the two managed to kill the poor lad. Concerned and having been looking for her son, she soon found his corpse at the medical school. Now the connection was becoming clear. Although though Burke and Hare vehemently denied it was Jamie, other students identified the body and thus verified that they were lying. There was public outrage, as poor Jamie was seen as a defenseless boy. The Final Murder The last murder was committed on Halloween morning. Burke was taking his usual morning whisky in his local tavern when an old woman entered and began talking with the patrons.

Noticing that she had an Irish accent, Burke bought her a dram and she sat down and said that she was Mary Docherty from Innisowen. Burke said that his own mother was a Docherty from Innisowen, and that they must be related. Having established this bond, he easily persuaded the old woman to come to his house. The visitor was warmly received by Helen and by a couple, James and Ann Gray, who were lodging with Burke and Helen. Burke convinced Docherty to stay overnight with them, and arranged for the Grays to spend that night at the Hares� lodging house. The arrangements being settled, everyone drank in celebration of Halloween, and the whisky flowed long past nightfall. The Grays eventually left, but were told to return for breakfast the next morning. The festivities continued and neighbours later claimed to have heard dancing and drinking and arguments coming from Burke and Helen�s rooms. Around midnight, an upstairs neighbor was passing by Burke and Helen�s door and heard two men arguing and a woman�s voice calling out �Murder!� and �Get the police, there is murder here!� The man ran back into the street but could not find a policeman.

Passing by the door again, the man stopped but heard nothing, so he assumed the crisis was over and went up to his own rooms. The following morning, the Grays returned and found Mary Docherty was gone. They asked after her and Helen told them that she threw the old lady out for being �overly friendly� with Burke. Ann Gray later went near the spare bed to get some socks she had left behind, but Burke shouted at her to stay away from the bed. Burke yelled at her a second time when she went near the bed in order to fetch some potatoes. In the early evening, the Grays found themselves momentarily alone in the house, so Ann Gray took a peek and saw the body of an old woman lying beneath the bed. Both Grays bolted from the house, running into the returning Helen, who asked where they were going. James Gray was outraged and asked Helen what she knew about the body. Helen panicked and begged them not to say anything, claiming that their silence would be worth �10 a week. This further incensed the Grays, and James chastised Helen for �bringing disgrace upon her family� and the couple set out to fetch a policeman.

The Law Closes In on the Infamous Duo Sketch of the Trial Helen and Margaret quickly went off to warn their spouses, and were fast enough that when the police arrived at Burke and Helen�s that night, there was nobody in the house. A neighbor told the police that two men had recently left the house carrying a tea chest. Burke and Helen returned home soon after, and innocently asked what the matter was. The police separated the two and asked them individually what had become of the old woman who had been there the previous night. Burke, feeling confident that he and Helen had their alibis in synch, stated that Mrs. Docherty had left their home at seven o�clock that morning. Helen agreed that she had left at seven o�clock, but claimed that the woman had left at 7:00 in the evening. This 12-hour discrepancy was suspicious enough that Burke and Helen were taken in for more questioning. An anonymous tip led the police to Dr. Knox�s classrooms, where Docherty�s body was found and James Gray positively identified it. The police soon moved in and found more evidence against Burke and Hare.

The Hares soon joined Burke and Helen in prison, and the police began to slowly unravel the disappearances of so many people from West Port during the previous eleven months. Each gave conflicting stories and blamed each other. Hare said that William Burke and Helen were the murderers. Burke said that he saw a stranger do the last murder who he named as "William Hare". The masses wanted Dr. Knox put on trial as well. Hare Turns on Burke William Hare The Lord Advocate, however, was in a quandary about how and whom to prosecute. As there had been no eyewitness to any of the actual killings, the entire case depended on circumstantial evidence which, even including the Grays� testimony and Janet�s identification of Mary Paterson�s clothing, was weak at best. He also suspected that Helen and Margaret were secondary players (a huge, and seemingly incorrect assumption) and that neither would testify against her male counterpart. After one month of vacillation, under the assumption that Burke had been the leader of the two men, a deal was made where William Hare would receive immunity if he testified against Burke and Helen.

Hare readily agreed, and soon after Burke and Helen were both charged with the murder of Mary Docherty (Burke was also charged with the killings of Daft Jamie and Mary Paterson), and their trial began on Christmas Eve. Christmas morning the jury deliberated for only fifty minutes and came back with their verdicts: Burke was guilty and Helen was freed by the uniquely Scottish �not proven� verdict. On hearing the news, Burke reportedly cried and embraced Helen, saying, �you are out of the scrape!� (Burke, sketched at right). On being released, Helen went back to the house she had shared with Burke, where an angry mob found her and the police had to be summoned so she could escape. She left Scotland for England, but news of the murders had spread as far south as Newcastle, and police once again had to protect her from vigilantes in that city. After Newcastle, it is not known what became of her, although lore states that she went to Australia and died there in 1868. Margaret Hare also disappeared. After her release, she escaped angry mobs in Glasgow and Greenock, and is believed to have eventually journeyed back to Ireland.

William Hare was released in early February of 1829, but did not meet up with Margaret. The last known sighting of him was south of the English town Carlisle, although a popular later tale tells of his being blinded by a mob who threw him into a lime pit, and of him becoming a beggar on the streets of London. He was never seen or heard from after his release. Was Dr. Knox Involved? Sketch of Dr. Knox Although perceived now as grave robbers or body snatchers, Burke and Hare's corpses had never been buried. Indeed, the victims (sometimes brought in) had never left the guesthouse which the two men ran, and where they were suffocated, strangled or asphyxiated. Experts believe that Dr. Knox must have known that the corpses he was receiving had met a murderous end, but callously he turned a blind eye. Medical historian, Ruth Richardson says: "If Knox was as brilliant an anatomist as everybody said, he should have had some knowledge that these bodies had been killed." For this reason, once the murderers were discovered, and that Dr. Knox went unpunished, without so much as making an apology, caused outrage.

Demonstrations against him in Edinburgh turned to rioting. His effigy was ripped apart as an indication of what the people felt the surgeons did to the dead. Parliament was forced to act, and the Anatomy Act of 1832 put an end to grave robbing and collecting bodies, especially by murder! Unclaimed bodies from the poor house continued to be made available for anatomists to practice on until this day. Burke Executed Deathmask of William Burke William Burke was hanged in 1829 and the public made demands that the doctor that accepted the bodies, and Hare, suffer the same fate. William Hare was released and was never seen again (except for the alleged sighting). The doctor (Knox), was not charged, and continued at the school but was rejected from others he applied for. He eventually moved and worked in a Cancer research institute. It is believed that William Burke and William Hare are responsible for the deaths of between 13-30 (some say 16 as an absolute number, but it is likely more) people, but oddly, Burke was the only one prosecuted -- and then only for the murder of Mrs. Docherty.

William Hare and Maggie Laird turned King's evidence against him and Nell Macdougal. [William Hare's lifemask, made in prison, shown right] The Aftermath and Legacy An expression was coined from these atrocious murders as in 'to burke' or to 'Burke-ing', someone was to kill them by smothering. When Burke was hanged on 28 January 1829 before a large crowd, which was said to be chanting '"Burke him, Burke him". Nell MacDougal escaped prosecution, as the case against her lacked proof despite the fact that she seems to have known about it. No charges were ever brought against the Surgeon Dr. Knox as being the recipient of the bodies for dissection within the school and William Hare is said to have died a penniless pauper in London in 1858, but in many ways, he got away with murder. There is curious mention still of them today and how they were the best, or worst, resurrectionists ever in Europe. Plays, musicals, and movies were made based on their horrific tales. And finally, the West Port murders have entered the timeless culture of children�s folklore.

Threats of visits from Burke and Hare are used by some parents to discipline unruly children, and the pair are even prominently featured in a couple of sing-song rhymes that accompany children�s jump rope and hopscotch games: Up the close and down the stair, In the house with Burke and Hare. Burke�s the butcher, Hare�s the thief, Knox, the boy who buys the beef. Burke and Hare, Project MUSE - The Liverpool Cholera Epidemic of 1832 and Anatomical Dissection--Medical Mistrust and Civil Unrest The eight major riots that occurred in May and June 1832 in Liverpool "Bring Out the Burkers"! This cry of the Liverpool mob gave a clue to the real issue behind the cholera riots—a complex web of anatomical dissection and body snatching. The origin of the term "Burker" relates to the well-known Edinburgh murderers William Burke and William Hare, whose activities only four years earlier had rapidly introduced the term "Burker" into the English language.

They had killed sixteen people between 1827 and 1828, with a motive of pure profit, acquired by selling the bodies of their victims to an anatomy school in Edinburgh [End Page 486] Click for larger view Figure 1 Street map of Liverpool 1829, showing the location of the eight major cholera riots between 29 May and 10 June 1832 (the black numbered circles have been added to the original map and refer to the riots listed in Table 1 ). Thomas Kaye, The Stranger in Liverpool (Liverpool: Thomas Kaye, 1829). Map reproduced with permission from copy in Liverpool Central Library (HF 912), Liverpool, U.K. [End Page 487] for dissection. 30 Their names are often mistakenly identified with the practice of body snatching (or grave robbing), but most of their activities involved murder, followed by sale of the body for dissection. They were finally discovered after a woman's body was found hidden in the straw of Burke's bed.

Hare turned King's evidence to save himself, and Burke was publicly hanged on 28 January 1829 and later dissected for all to see (hence the origin of the expressions "Burking" or "Burkers"). 31 The implication of the Liverpool mob was clear; they believed that the cholera victims were taken to the cholera hospitals, only to be murdered by their medical attendants to supply bodies for the city's dissecting rooms. The issue was certainly topical; in mid-1832, the Anatomy Act (discussed below) became law, attempting to rationalize the unhealthy and illegal trade of bodies to medical schools for dissection. The activities of these body snatchers, or "resurrectionists," were encouraged by the continuing demand for bodies and a "no questions asked" attitude by the medical schools. After the Burke and Hare case, however, body snatchers were regarded as potential murderers for profit, and the rules of the game shifted away from simply digging up bodies at night.

32 This was demonstrated in November 1831 by a high-profile case known as the murder of the "Italian Boy." The Liverpool Journal reported the event as "Another Case Of Burking In London," and described the murder of a poor Italian boy whose body, with noticeable strangulation marks, had been offered for sale to local doctors. 33 Realizing the suspicious nature of the offering, the doctors alerted the police, who detained those responsible. The culprits, Bishop and Williams, were put on trial at the Old Bailey. Williams confessed to having been involved in three other murders with Bishop in order to sell bodies for dissection. Bishop's confession was even more shocking. "He had been, he said, in the habit of supplying the schools of anatomy with subjects for dissection, and had, in the course of twelve years, sold from 500 to 1000 bodies, only three of these, he solemnly declared, had been murdered." 34 [End Page 488] Bishop and Williams described how they had disposed of their murder victims by drowning.

They hung them headfirst in a well, using a piece of rope tied to their feet, having plied them with rum and laudanum. The public hanging of Bishop and Williams caused a frenzy of excitement and made headlines all over the country. An estimated 100,000 people attended the London hanging ("[A]nd the drop fell. Bishop appeared to die instantaneously, but Williams struggled several minutes. The moment the drop fell, the mob, who had continued yelling and shouting, gave several tremendous cheers"). 35 Bishop and Williams can be considered the English Burke and Hare. Their crimes were high-profile, even though they murdered fewer people. In journal and newspaper articles of the time, Burke and Bishop were often written about synonymously. 36 During this time, fears of "Burking" were so prevalent throughout the country that people were sometimes moved to take drastic actions. In one incident, a mob estimated at 20,000 strong destroyed an anatomical theater in Aberdeen, believing it to be a "Burking shop." During the incident, a surgeon and two medical students narrowly escaped with their lives. 37 Another event took place in Carlisle and involved three young children.

It was reported in the press as a case of "Juvenile Burking." The report described how two boys, aged five and eight years, attempted to "Burke" a little boy three years of age. Their unfortunate victim was subjected to a merciless beating but fortunately survived. 38 All these events were widely reported in Britain, including in the Liverpool press. There were, however, specific local events in the town that compounded public concern and fear of body snatching, burking, and dissection. These occurrences predated both Burke and Hare, and Bishop and Williams, and preceded the cholera epidemic by over five years. The Liverpool Body-Snatching Scandals In October 1826, the Liverpool Mercury published a report entitled "Wholesale Resurrectionists," describing in detail the discovery of thirty-three dead bodies. Eleven of these were found in casks labeled "Bitter Salts" on the Liverpool docks awaiting shipment to Scotland, [End Page 489] and enquiries led police to a cellar containing more bodies. 39 Residents nearby had noticed a "disagreeable smell" going back for months.

The cellar contained casks, used to immerse bodies in strong brine to "pickle" them, after which they were packed in other casks with dry salt. The bodies had been obtained by robbing the graves of local cemeteries in order to supply medical students in Edinburgh with corpses for dissection. The paper reported the shocking effect this event had among all classes of the local community, not least because the cellar where the grim discovery was made was underneath a school. Those responsible for the crime were tried at the Liverpool Quarter Sessions. The trial was not a palatable occasion for those selected for jury service: "One of the witnesses stated, that in the cellar . . . there was a tierce . . . containing a quantity of brine, which they poured off, and found the bodies of some babies (an audible shudder ran through the court on the mention of this last circumstance; and the foreman of the jury was taken suddenly ill, and obliged to retire from the court for a short time)." 40 James Donaldson, the ringleader of the operation, was sentenced to twelve months imprisonment and ordered to pay a fine of £50, with a condition that he should remain imprisoned until the fine had been paid.

At least one member of his gang continued in the business. In November, the Liverpool Mercury reported "Another Discovery of Dead Bodies." Again casks were found containing bodies for dispatch to Edinburgh. The accused had keys to the vault door of the parish cemetery in his pocket when arrested, and had been seen nearby during the funeral of one of his "victims." 41 A year later (in 1827), a Liverpool dissection scandal again achieved national notoriety. Described as "another discovery of this inhuman traffic," it concerned grave robbing at Walton churchyard, in the north of the city. 42 A witnessed occurrence in the graveyard led police to a house in Seel Street (in the city center), where the missing body (the daughter of a local Walton publican) was identified by her father. The police found four other bodies in the house, tenanted by a local surgeon, Mr. William Gill, who was taken into custody. A Dr. Collins defended Gill's actions in a letter to the Liverpool Mercury, the same [End Page 490] Dr. Collins involved in exposing the "cover-up" over the first cholera cases in Liverpool.

Collins stated that he "was astonished to see the epithet of a trafficker in dead bodies applied to that gentleman" (referring to Gill). He also wrote about the importance of furthering anatomical knowledge "to the profession and society in general" and said that the paper should not have aided in the prejudice surrounding the dissection issue at the time. 43 William Gill was tried at the Liverpool Quarter Sessions in February 1828 and found guilty of having a body in his possession. In court he read a long paper in defense of his actions. He stated that the attainment of anatomical knowledge was an essential foundation for the practice of medicine and surgery, done for the greater public good. He was sentenced to pay a fine of £30, which he paid immediately and was discharged. 44 In the weeks and months after this event, similar cases were brought to trial in other parts of the country. In response, a group of prominent London doctors launched a fund to help alleviate the costs incurred to members of the profession as a consequence of legal proceedings. The committee even put out a request for subscriptions in the London Medical Gazette of May 1828.

45 The profession was closing ranks to support anatomical and surgical colleagues who needed bodies to dissect, which could not be provided in sufficient numbers by legal means. Riots and Dissection Outside Liverpool The city of Liverpool thus had a marked history of public outcry about dissection and suffered an especially severe outbreak of cholera. The cholera riots in the city during the summer of 1832 brought these two issues together. Against a background fear of burking came a new disease that required hospitalization, often with death as an outcome. Cholera riots occurred widely in Britain in 1832, though Liverpool's eight separate riots (with a number of smaller skirmishes) were the most extensive. Though burking and dissection were sometimes issues outside Liverpool, there were other factors operating. For example, churchyards and burial sites were precipitants in Exeter [End Page 491] (city graveyards frequently filled, and burial in temporary sites outside town was often enforced). 46 In York, rioters believed that doctors were perpetuating the disease to continue their £10 per week "cholera fee" paid by the parishes.

47 The British cholera rioters conspicuously, however, did not blame their rulers—though this was far from the case in mainland Europe, where in many ways much more serious rioting occurred. In Russia, mobs rioted against urban movement restrictions (cordons sanitaires) and killed a number of military officers. In Hungary, castles were sacked and nobles massacred in the belief that they were instigators of cholera. It was believed that noblemen were poisoning the people, and when chlorate of lime was found in their castle cellars, this was taken as evidence of the poisoning theory. Property in Paris was burned in response to the authority's attempts to centralize rubbish collections. 48 The British riots were thus much less politically and class-motivated but were more profoundly anti-medical. A major theme behind this distrust was the dissection problem. In addition to the disreputable actions of various murderers and body snatchers referred to previously, an Anatomy Act traveled through Parliament in early 1832 and became law in June. The timing of this legislation and the cholera riots must have seemed far from coincidental.

Labeled the "Dead Body Bill" by the poor, the Act sought to outlaw burking and body snatching by making the bodies of the destitute more easily available to dissection rooms. 49 Unsurprisingly, the Act, by "providing for the use of dead paupers for anatomical dissection by medical students, also fuelled public sentiment against the doctors." 50 Perhaps also not surprisingly, there were "Anatomy Riots" outside Parliament as the bill was debated. 51 The rioters had good reason to take to the streets—over the following ten years, over 6000 bodies would be taken without consent for dissection, nearly all from workhouses and hospitals. 52 To the poor, the dissection issue was a reminder [End Page 492] of their lowly place in Victorian England's class-ridden society. As Ruth Richardson has observed, "dissection added a penumbra of fear to death on the parish—casting fundamental doubt upon the likelihood that any pauper would reach even the flimsy coffin and the unmarked grave." 53 Such issues of death and dissection were also important outside Britain, including in North America.

There, body snatching was also well documented, and controlling legislation was delayed in comparison with Europe. Public "anatomical museums" were also popular in North America. 54 The End of the Liverpool Riots After 10 June 1832, the crowd violence in Liverpool receded as quickly as it had appeared. The major reason for this was the intervention of the Catholic Church, which became involved after the mayor received a threatening letter, signed "An Irishman," in which the writer claimed he would do "several wicked things" should doctors persist in removing people to the hospital. The Board of Health invited Catholic clergy to attend a meeting of the board, and there asked the priests to address their congregations regarding the escalating problem. 55 The following day, a statement was read from the pulpit of all Roman Catholic churches in Liverpool. Reproduced in the Liverpool Journal, it undoubtedly contributed to the demise of the violence. First, the priests reassured their congregations that cholera was real, and that physicians were doing their best to care for its victims.

We, the Pastors of the Catholic congregations in Liverpool, feel it incumbent on us to offer you a few words of advice on the subject of the melancholy disease which has made its appearance amongst us. . . . We have, for some time past, witnessed with regret the line of conduct which some of you have thought proper to adopt in respect of the disease just mentioned. . . . We understand that some of you disbelieve entirely the existence, in this town, of the disease but too well known by the name of the cholera, and that you suppose it to be the pure invention of interested persons; whilst others among you, who are sensible of the existence of the disease, imagine that the medical men wilfully concur in rendering its ravages more fatal, for some [End Page 493] horrible but unknown purpose. In both of these opinions you are greatly in error. The statement went on to specifically counter fears about dissection.

Though the most positive assurances, from the best authority, had been given, that no anatomical examination of the bodies, after death, should be allowed to take place in the hospital, to satisfy you still further on this head, orders have been issued, that the relations of those who die in the hospital shall be allowed to see the bodies of the deceased before their coffins are closed, and that they may within a limited time take them away to the grave. Permission is also granted to the relations of the sick to see them in the hospital daily, under certain regulations necessary for preventing infections. With this explanation we trust you will be satisfied; and it only remains for us to exhort you, as we earnestly do, to lay aside unfounded prejudices, and to concur with those who are your best friends in arresting the progress of a fatal disease, which, within a few days, has extended its progress amongst us in a most fearful manner. 56 The statement was a masterpiece in defusing an increasingly dangerous situation. Though clearly politically mediated (the initiative originated from the mayor and the Board of Health), it was delivered by the Catholic Church and had far more authority than any local government decree.

It also targeted the poor Irish immigrants, who, as well as being significantly involved in the riots, were also regular churchgoers. Finally, the offer of regular visits of patients in the hospital, and a viewing of those who died prior to burial, finally removed any possible further legitimate reasons to believe "Burking" accusations against the doctors. Though this statement was the major factor in stopping the riots, a lengthy letter written by Dr. James Collins to the Liverpool Journal, published on 16 June (almost a week before the statement), was also helpful. 57 In the letter, entitled "A Few Words To Those Most Exposed To Cholera," he tried to allay fears by writing about the prejudice surrounding the dissection issue, explaining to the local population that there were very few medical students in Liverpool at the time and hence little need for bodies for dissection. He also pointed out the absurdity of using the corpses of cholera victims for dissection because of their contagious nature. [End Page 494] Collins's letter certainly seems to have had some effect. On 23 June, the Liverpool Journal reported that "The address of Dr. Collins, which appeared in our paper on Saturday, has done much good.

It ought to have been printed for distribution." 58 Collins's name appears many times during writings in relation to the Liverpool cholera story. Of Irish extraction himself, he regularly attended church meetings to communicate with the local people. Not fearful of speaking his mind over shortcomings of the authorities, it is possible that he had political aspirations. 59 In any event, it appears that he had the best interests of the people of Liverpool at heart. Conclusions The denial by the Liverpool Board of Health of the existence of cholera in the city for three weeks after its appearance almost certainly reflected the protection of commercial interests. The Central Board in London had stated that "it is of the utmost importance that the very first cases of cholera which may appear, should be made known as early as possible; concealment of the sick would not only endanger the safety of the public, but would likewise deprive the patient of his best chance of recovery." 60 Either the Liverpool Board was unaware of this warning, or it chose to ignore it. The latter seems most likely, because several members of the Board were local merchants and had a vested interest not to declare cholera present.

The fact that Liverpool appeared to be free of cholera, when this was clearly not the case, allowed the port to remain open, and hence it became the largest outlet for the export trade of the country, considering that the port of London had already been closed. 61 The deeper implications of this deception are profound because ships sailed from Liverpool to many parts of the globe, aiding the spread of the disease. Liverpool's riots in response to cholera were portrayed in the press as the actions of the ignorant and destitute. In a city described as "a catchment basin for the poor," the mobs were described by local papers in terms such as "women and boys of the lowest order" and [End Page 495] "low Irish." 62 These were biased and stereotyped descriptions, however, particularly with respect to the Irish. In 1831, Liverpool's population of 230,000 included just over 24,000 Irish (about 10 percent of the total), a significant number of whom were skilled workers. 63 The origins of the cholera riots, however, went beyond issues of class and race.

We have argued in this article that Liverpool's disturbances were related to the coincidental coming together of two occurrences with major social impact—the cholera outbreak itself and the dissection issue. Liverpool's experiences with both these events were more horrific than most of Britain. Faced also with a medical and legislative fraternity who were apparently impotent and powerless (and even initially denied that cholera had reached the city), civil unrest was not surprising. By an unfortunate coincidence, Liverpool had its own major grave-robbing scandals—the 1826 affair of "pickled bodies" exported to Edinburgh, and the celebrated 1827 case of William Gill and the Seel Street dissection room. The result of these interwoven events was a frightened, angry, and frustrated populace that jumped to the conclusion that cholera was an excuse for victims to be burked for dissection. These events occurred amid one of the most turbulent times in English history.

In The Crowd in History, George Rude writes that "England probably stood near to revolution only in 1831, when Irish unrest, rural disturbance, and popular and middle-class excitement over the first Reform Bill combined to bring the country to the brink of civil war." 64 Rude could well have added the issues of dissection, body snatching, and the cholera epidemic. The Liverpool cholera riots clearly had understandable local causes but also should be seen in the context of a time of major national unrest. There are other national factors that may have influenced the rioters in Liverpool. In the early 1830s, a further series of riots had taken place throughout the country—the notorious "Swing" riots. These originated in the rural south of England, largely in response to the invention of new threshing machines that had reduced the need for [End Page 496] farm labor, causing unemployment and discontent. Protests erupted across Kent, Sussex, and Hampshire, but they also spread to the north. 65 In fact, there were several Swing-related incidents in Lancashire in 1830 and 1831, including an arson attack in Liverpool in December 1830.

66 Just as the Swing riots were dying out, further civil unrest was occurring over a separate issue—the Reform Bill. Parliamentary representational reform had been growing as a popular issue for over forty years. The distribution of seats was at best arbitrary and at worst overtly corrupt. A number of northern cities were entirely disenfranchised, with no seats at all, and several boroughs elsewhere had seats that were bought and sold for privilege or cash. One particularly violent "Reform Riot" in Bristol led to many houses being burned and destroyed, with £400,000 worth of damage and 400 people reported killed. 67 The passage of the Reform Bill through Parliament was a stormy one, taking place at approximately the same time as the cholera epidemic. After a third amendment, it was eventually passed into law in June 1832. The reform issue caused much national discontent and was certainly something the people of Liverpool were highly concerned about.

The Liverpool Journal reported, "We do not recollect to have ever witnessed greater anxiety than has been manifested in Liverpool, during the week, respecting the reform bill." 68 Cholera declined and disappeared in late 1832 (though it was to recur in 1849, 1854, and 1866), and the dissection issue faded from public attention. Similar riots did not happen in the later epidemics. England no longer "stood near to revolution," and the body-snatching days were over. Perhaps the medical profession and the authorities had also learned lessons from the 1832 epidemic. 69 A final question concerns whether the 1832 cholera riots in Liverpool and elsewhere played a significant role in stimulating social and/or [End Page 497] public health reform. The epidemic in general appeared to be rapidly forgotten, with the Local Boards of Health disbanded and no apparent significant effect on sanitation and health. 70 However, there were visionaries of the 1832 cholera epidemic—for example, Robert Baker, a district surgeon in Leeds (a town that experienced significant cholera rioting).

Baker meticulously mapped cholera areas in the city and linked them to areas of especially poor sanitation. His report on the epidemic made strong recommendations for sanitary reform and was almost certainly instrumental in leading to the Leeds Improvement Act of 1842. 71 Though the legislative response to cholera in 1832 may have been limited, the next epidemic of 1848–49 certainly did stimulate action (The Times, for example, noted that "the cholera is the best of all sanitary reformers, it overlooks no mistakes and pardons no oversights"). 72 Sanitary change post-1849 was facilitated by the Public Health Act of 1848, whose very passage through Parliament was hastened by the arrival of cholera in continental Europe, and presumably by unhappy memories of the 1832 epidemic. Though the 1832 cholera riots were troublesome, they failed to significantly influence government health policy for two main reasons. First, they were directed mainly against the medical profession, in particular the issue of dissection and body snatching. They were not "anti-government," nor directly concerned with health or sanitation.

Second, although the cholera riots were extensive, on a national scale they were overshadowed by the Reform Riots. Though fewer in number, the latter had a clear political motive, were associated with loss of life and serious property damage, and necessitated the mobilization of troops to restore peace. If the 1832 cholera riots had political effect, it was to add urgency in Parliament for the passage of the Anatomy Act in mid-1832. The disturbances did, however, also undoubtedly contribute to the whole fearful and chaotic milieu of what was arguably the worst disease epidemic to affect Britain since the Great Plague. Sean Burrell is a newly qualified physician currently working at the William Harvey Hospital in Kent. His interest in medical history and in the social response to disease in Victorian England originated from projects undertaken as an undergraduate. He has recently lead-authored a chapter examining the social unrest throughout Britain due to cholera in 1832. More recent work includes the mapping of cholera cases in nineteenth-century England prior to the work of John Snow and research into medical aspects of the battle of Stalingrad. The latter research led to an interview for the television documentary series "Battlefield Detectives," to be shown on the US History Channel.

Correspondence should be sent to him at the William Harvey Hospital, Kennington Road, Willesborough, Ashford, Kent TN24 OLZ; or e-mail: sean.burrell@nhs.net . Geoffrey Gill is Reader at the School of Tropical Medicine, University of Liverpool, as well as Consultant Physician at the University Hospital Aintree. He also has degrees in Victorian history that led to his interest in public disorder and health in nineteenth-century England. His recent papers have focused on the social and political response to the 1832 and 1849 cholera epidemics in England, as well as typhoid in the late nineteenth century and the persistence of miasma theory. His other main research interest concerns an analysis of disease and medical care on the Thai/Burma Railway 1942–45. Correspondence should be sent to him at Department of Tropical Medicine, Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, Pembroke Place, Liverpool L3 5QA; or e-mail: g.gill@liv.ac.uk . Footnotes 1 . G. Gill, S. Burrell, and J.

Brown, "Fear and Frustration—The Liverpool Cholera Riots of 1832," Lancet, 2001, 358, 233–37. 2 . G. S. Rousseau and D. B. Haycock, "Coleridge's Choleras: Cholera Morbus, Asiatic Cholera, and Dysentery in Early Nineteenth-Century England," Bull. Hist. Med., 2003, 77, 298–331. 3 . G. Kearns, "Urban Epidemics and Historical Geography: Cholera in London, 1848," Historical Geography Research Series, 1985, 15. 4 . R. J. Morris, Cholera 1832—The Social Response to an Epidemic (London: Holm & Meier Publishers, 1976), pp. 96–101. 5 . Anonymous, "Cholera Or No Cholera—Tricks of Some Governments," Lancet, 1831, 1, 377. 6 .

An example of this occurred in Glasgow, Scotland, in early 1832 when a mob rioted in response to cholera but also provocatively waved copies of the anti-government publication the Loyal Reformer's Gazette. See Glasgow Courier, 17 March 1832. 7 . See, for example, C. E. Rosenberg, The Cholera Years: The United States in 1832, 1849 and 1866 (London: University of Chicago Press, 1962); M. Durey, The Return of the Plague: British Society and Cholera 1831–32 (Dublin: Gill & MacMillan Humanities Press, 1979); N. Longmate, King Cholera—The Biography of a Disease (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1966); M. Pelling, Cholera, Fever, and English Medicine 1825–65 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978); A.

Briggs, "Cholera and Society in the Nineteenth Century," Past & Present, 1961, 19, 76–79; Morris, Cholera 1832; and R. J. Morris, "Religion and Medicine: The Cholera Pamphlets of Oxford, 1832, 1849, and 1854," Medical History, 1975, 19, 256–70. 8 . See Morris, Cholera 1832, pp. 108–14; Durey, The Return of the Plague, pp. 155–84; and R. J. Evans, "Epidemics and Revolutions: Cholera in Nineteenth-Century Europe," in Epidemics and Ideas: Essays on the Historical Perception of Pestilence, ed. T. Ranger and P. Slack (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), pp. 149–73. 9 . Durey, The Return of the Plague; and R.

Richardson, Death, Dissection, and the Destitute (London: Phoenix Press, 2001). 10 . M. B. Simey, Charitable Efforts in Liverpool in the Nineteenth Century (Liverpool: University Press of Liverpool, 1951). 11 . P. M. Waller, Democracy and Sectarianism: A Political and Social History of Liverpool 1868–1939 (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1981). 12 . J. V. Pickstone, "Dearth, Dirt and Fever Epidemics in the History of British Public Health, 1780–1850," in Epidemics and Ideas: Essays in the Historical Perception of Pestilence, ed. T. Ranger and P. Slack (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), pp. 125–48 (the quotation is from the title, p. 125); Briggs, "Cholera and Society in the Nineteenth Century," p. 79. 13 . Briggs, "Cholera and Society in the Nineteenth Century," p. 79. C.

Creighton, A History of Epidemics in Britain, Vol. 2: 1666–1833 (1894; rpt. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp. 826–27. This source usefully reviews the 1832 epidemic and its effect on various cities, including Liverpool. See also Privy Council papers (1832) at the Public Record Office (PRO), Kew, London (PRO–PC1/108). 14 . Liverpool Journal, 19 November 1831; Anonymous, "Liverpool Board of Health Job," Lancet, 1831, 1, 305–8. 15 . Liverpool Journal, 19 November 1831. 16 . Anonymous, "Liverpool Board of Health Job." 17 . Privy Council Papers, 1832 (PRO–PC1/108). 18 . Liverpool Journal, 5 May 1832.

William Burke synonyms, William Burke antonyms - FreeThesaurus.com William Burke synonyms, William Burke antonyms - FreeThesaurus.com to hold (something requiring an outlet) in check Synonyms British statesman famous for his oratory Synonyms United States frontierswoman and legendary figure of the Wild West noted for her marksmanship (1852-1903) Synonyms murder without leaving a trace on the body Related Words get rid of, silence, or suppress Related Words Want to thank TFD for its existence? Tell a friend about us , add a link to this page, or visit the webmaster's page for free fun content . Link to this page: Write what you mean clearly and correctly. References in periodicals archive ? The letter reads: "This is written in the blood of William Burke, who was hanged at Edinburgh on 28 Jan 1829 for the murder of Mrs Campbell or Docherty. Mass killer's blood letter put on show In Edinburgh in 1827-28 William Burke and William Hare killed sixteen people to supply anatomists with corpses for dissection.

NOW SHOWING Burke And Hare is about the infamous 19th century graverobbers William Burke and William Hare, who not only dug up bodies to service the medical profession but also killed people, after discovering how doctors would pay big money for corpses to practise on. Copyright © 2003-2017 Farlex, Inc Disclaimer All content on this website, including dictionary, thesaurus, literature, geography, and other reference data is for informational purposes only. This information should not be considered complete, up to date, and is not intended to be used in place of a visit, consultation, or advice of a legal, medical, or any other professional.

Question: Who was hanged in Edinburgh in 1829 for multiple murder in supplying doctors with corpses for dissection?
Answer: William Burke