Group of criminal body snatchers in early 1800s London
The London Burkers were a group of body snatchers operating in London, England, who apparently modeled their activities on the notorious Burke and Hare murders. They came to prominence in 1831 for murdering victims to sell to anatomists, by luring and drugging them at their dwelling in the northern end of Bethnal Green, near St Leonard's, Shoreditch in London. They were also known as the Bethnal Green Gang.[1]
Nova Scotia Gardens was the area of a brick field, north-east of St Leonard's, Shoreditch. The brick clay had been exhausted and the area begun to be filled in with waste ("leystall", literally excrement). Cottages (probably evolving from sheds serving the gardens) came to be built here, but were undesirable as they remained below ground level, and so were prone to flooding.[2]
During the early 19th century, the demand for legally obtained cadavers for the study and teaching of anatomy in British medical schools greatly exceeded the supply.[3] In the 18th century, hundreds had been executed each year, often for quite trivial crimes, but by the 19th century only 55 people were being hanged each year, while as many as 500 were needed.[4] As medical science began to flourish, demand rose sharply and attracted criminal elements willing to obtain specimens by any means. The activities of body-snatchers, or resurrectionists, gave rise to a particular public fear and revulsion. Relatives, or people paid by them, often guarded new graves for a period after burial.
Murders
Gang of Burkers
Engraving of the London Burkers, from left: John Bishop, Thomas Williams, James May.
John Bishop, together with Thomas Williams, Michael Shields, a Covent Garden porter, and James May, an unemployed butcher, also known as Jack Stirabout and Black Eyed Jack, formed a notorious gang of resurrection men, stealing freshly buried bodies for sale to anatomists. In his subsequent confession, Bishop admitted to stealing (and selling) between 500 and 1,000 bodies,[5] over a period of twelve years. The corpses were sold to anatomists, including surgeons from St Bartholomew's Hospital, St Thomas' Hospital and King's College. The Fortune of War Public House, in Smithfield, was identified as a popular resort for resurrectionists.[6]
"Italian Boy" Murder
In July 1830, John Bishop rented No. 3 Nova Scotia Garden, from Sarah Trueby. On 5 November 1831 the suspiciously fresh corpse of a 14-year-old boy was delivered, by Bishop and May, to the King's College School of Anatomy, in the Strand. They had previously tried to sell the body at Guy's Hospital, but it was refused.[7] They demanded twelve guineas for the body, but were offered nine. On inspection by Richard Partridge, demonstrator of anatomy, it was suspected that the body had not been buried, and police were summoned by Herbert Mayo, the professor of anatomy, from the station at Covent Garden. The resurrection men were arrested, and remanded in custody, by the magistrate. On 8 November, a coroners' jury was held, and found a verdict of "willful murder against some person or persons unknown", but expressed their strong belief that the prisoners, Bishop, Williams and May, had been concerned in the transaction.
Joseph Sadler Thomas in superintendent's uniform
On 19 November 1831, Joseph Sadler Thomas, a Metropolitan Police superintendent of F (Covent Garden) Division,[8] searched the cottages at Nova Scotia Gardens, and found items of clothing in a well in one of the gardens, and also in one of the privies, suggesting multiple murders. The prisoners appeared at trial, before Chief Justice Tindal, Justice Joseph Littledale and Baron Vaughan, at the Old Bailey between 2 and 3 December. Bishop (aged 33), Williams (aged 26) and May (aged 30) were all found guilty of the crime.[6] The windows were opened to allow the public to hear the Recorder pronounce sentence of death.
By an extraordinary arrangement, the police opened the premises at Nova Scotia Gardens for viewing, charging 5 shillings. The public carried away the dwellings, piece by piece, as souvenirs. The police had tentatively identified the body as that of Carlo Ferrari, an Italian boy, from Piedmont, but after their trial Bishop and Williams said that the body belonged to a Lincolnshire cattle drover, on his way to Smithfield.
Confession
Bishop and Williams attended the prison chapel on Sunday, 4 December. Afterwards, they were placed in the same cell and the ordinary and under-sheriffs of London took their written confessions.
John Bishop admitted that the Lincolnshire boy was taken on 3 November, from The Bell in Smithfield, with the excuse of lodging at Nova Scotia Gardens. On arrival, he was drugged with rum and laudanum. Bishop and Williams then went to drink at the Feathers, near Shoreditch church. They returned when the boy had lost consciousness and then pitched him head first into the well, attaching a cord to the feet. After a brief struggle the boy was dead; again they went out, and on their return removed and undressed the boy, placing him in a bag.[5]
They also admitted to the murder, on 9 October, of an indigent, Frances Pigburn, sleeping rough in Shoreditch. They lured her into the adjacent empty cottage, No. 2. The method was the same, but this time they had bided their time in the London Apprentice in Old Street. The bodies were taken to St Thomas's, for a surgeon Mr South. Due to a delay in acceptance, they were then taken to a Mr Grainger and sold for eight guineas.[5]
A further victim, a boy named Cunningham, was found sleeping in the pig-market at Smithfield on Friday, 21 October; again lodging was promised. He was drugged with a mixture of warm beer, sugar, rum and laudanum, and murdered in the well. He was undressed, bagged, then sold for eight guineas to a Mr Smith at St Bartholomew's Hospital.[5]
The confessions exonerated the other members of the gang, who would often help with delivery, of involvement in the murders.
Sentencing
Bishop and Williams were hanged at Newgate on 5 December 1831 for the murder,[5] before a crowd of thirty thousand. May was respited during his Majesty's pleasure, as it was accepted that he had no knowledge of the murders. The bodies were removed the same night, Bishop to King's College and Williams to the Theatre of Anatomy in Windmill Street, The Haymarket, for dissection. On the Tuesday and Wednesday, large crowds viewed their remains. James May was sentenced to penal transportation to Van Diemen's Land on 1 December 1831.[9] He received a two-year sentence to Port Arthur for insubordination on board the penal transport vessel and died at the settlement in 1834, buried in an unmarked grave on the Isle of the Dead.[9]
In the same year, Catherine Walsh of Whitechapel, who made her living by selling laces and cotton, was murdered by Elizabeth Ross, who sold the body to surgeons. She was hanged for the murder.[10] These murders and the West Port murders led to the passage of the Anatomy Act 1832 that finally provided for an adequate and legitimate supply of corpses for the medical schools.
By 1840, the area of Nova Scotia Gardens had degenerated into a notorious slum. It is for this reason that the philanthropist, Angela Burdett-Coutts purchased the land, and, after the leases expired, established Columbia Market in 1869.
Harding, William, stenographer. The trial of Bishop, Williams, and May, at the Old Bailey, 2 Dec. 1831, for the murder of the Italian boy, Carlo Ferrier: exact copies of the original confessions of the prisoners Bishop and Williams, and full particulars of their conduct in Newgate, and the execution of Bishop and Williams / corrected and revised by W. Harding, short-hand writer. London: W. Harding, [1831?] 31 pages; 22cm (Available on Internet Archive)
Further reading
Helen MacDonald Legal Bodies: Dissecting Murderers at the Royal College of Surgeons, London 1800-1832 - in Traffic: An Interdisciplinary Postgraduate Journal, No.2, 2003 pp.9–32 ISSN1447-2538
Sarah Wise The Italian Boy: A Tale of Murder and Body Snatching in 1830s London (Metropolitan Books, 2004) ISBN0-8050-7537-2
Lisa Rosner The Anatomy Murders (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2010) ISBN0-8122-4191-6
In the collection of the Wellcome Library: Thomas Williams, John Bishop and James May, murderers: miscellaneous papers relating to murder of persons in Smithfield area and sale of corpses for dissection. 1831. (MS.7058).
Giovanni Aldini was an Italian physician and physicist born in Bologna. He was a brother of the statesman Count Antonio Aldini (1756–1826). He graduated in physics at University of Bologna in 1782.
The history of anatomy extends from the earliest examinations of sacrificial victims to the sophisticated analyses of the body performed by modern anatomists and scientists. Written descriptions of human organs and parts can be traced back thousands of years to ancient Egyptian papyri, where attention to the body was necessitated by their highly elaborate burial practices.
The history of anatomy in the 19th century saw anatomists largely finalise and systematise the descriptive human anatomy of the previous century. The discipline also progressed to establish growing sources of knowledge in histology and developmental biology, not only of humans but also of animals.
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The Burke and Hare murders were a series of sixteen killings committed over a period of about ten months in 1828 in Edinburgh, Scotland. They were undertaken by William Burke and William Hare, who sold the corpses to Robert Knox for dissection at his anatomy lectures.
Body snatching is the illicit removal of corpses from graves, morgues, and other burial sites. Body snatching is distinct from the act of grave robbery as grave robbing does not explicitly involve the removal of the corpse, but rather theft from the burial site itself. The term 'body snatching' most commonly refers to the removal and sale of corpses primarily for the purpose of dissection or anatomy lectures in medical schools. The term was coined primarily in regard to cases in the United Kingdom and United States throughout the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. However, there have been cases of body snatching in many countries, with the first recorded case dating back to 1319 in Bologna, Italy.
Robert Knox was a Scottish anatomist and ethnologist best known for his involvement in the Burke and Hare murders. Born in Edinburgh, Scotland, Knox eventually partnered with anatomist and former teacher John Barclay and became a lecturer on anatomy in the city, where he introduced the theory of transcendental anatomy. However, Knox's incautious methods of obtaining cadavers for dissection before the passage of the Anatomy Act 1832 and disagreements with professional colleagues ruined his career in Scotland. Following these developments, he moved to London, though this did not revive his career.
The Golden Boy of Pye Corner is a small late-17th-century monument located on the corner of Giltspur Street and Cock Lane in Smithfield, central London. It marks the spot where the 1666 Great Fire of London was stopped, whereas the Monument indicates the place where it started. The statue of a naked boy is made of wood and is covered with gold; the figure was formerly winged. The late 19th-century building that incorporates it is a Grade II listed building but listed only for the figure.
The Anatomy Act 1832 is an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom that gave free licence to doctors, teachers of anatomy and bona fide medical students to dissect donated bodies. It was enacted in response to public revulsion at the illegal trade in corpses.
William Smith Forbes was an American physician who served as demonstrator of anatomy at Jefferson Medical College. He is known as the "Father of the Anatomical Act" in Pennsylvania.
Richard Partridge FRS, FRCS was a British surgeon. Although he became President of both the Royal College of Surgeons and the Royal Medical and Chirurgical Society, he is best known for his part in apprehending the London Burkers gang and for failing to spot a bullet lodged in Giuseppe Garibaldi's leg.
A cadaver or corpse is a dead human body. Cadavers are used by medical students, physicians and other scientists to study anatomy, identify disease sites, determine causes of death, and provide tissue to repair a defect in a living human being. Students in medical school study and dissect cadavers as a part of their education. Others who study cadavers include archaeologists and arts students. In addition, a cadaver may be used in the development and evaluation of surgical instruments.
The Fortune of War was an ancient public house in Smithfield, London. It was located on a corner originally known as 'Pie Corner', today at the junction of Giltspur Street and Cock Lane where the Golden Boy of Pye Corner resides, the name deriving from the magpie represented on the sign of an adjoining tavern. It is allegedly the place where the Great Fire of London stopped, after destroying a large part of the City of London in 1666. The statue of a cherub, the Golden Boy of Pye Corner, initially built in the front of the pub, commemorates the end of the fire.
The East End of London, often referred to within the London area simply as the East End, is the historic core of wider East London, east of the Roman and medieval walls of the City of London and north of the River Thames. It does not have universally accepted boundaries to the north and east, though the River Lea is sometimes seen as the eastern boundary. Parts of it may be regarded as lying within Central London. The term "East of Aldgate Pump" is sometimes used as a synonym for the area.
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An anatomy murder is a murder committed in order to use all or part of the cadaver for medical research or teaching. It is not a medicine murder because the body parts are not believed to have any medicinal use in themselves. The motive for the murder is created by the demand for cadavers for dissection, and the opportunity to learn anatomy and physiology as a result of the dissection. Rumors concerning the prevalence of anatomy murders are associated with the rise in demand for cadavers in research and teaching produced by the Scientific Revolution. During the 19th century, the sensational serial murders associated with Burke and Hare and the London Burkers led to legislation which provided scientists and medical schools with legal ways of obtaining cadavers. Rumors persist that anatomy murders are carried out wherever there is a high demand for cadavers. These rumors, like those concerning organ theft, are hard to substantiate, and may reflect continued, deep-held fears of the use of cadavers as commodities.
Resurrectionists were body snatchers who were commonly employed by anatomists in the United Kingdom during the 18th and 19th centuries to exhume the bodies of the recently dead. Between 1506 and 1752 only a very few cadavers were available each year for anatomical research. The supply was increased when, in an attempt to intensify the deterrent effect of the death penalty, Parliament passed the Murder Act 1752. By allowing judges to substitute the public display of executed criminals with dissection, the new law significantly increased the number of bodies anatomists could legally access. This proved insufficient to meet the needs of the hospitals and teaching centres that opened during the 18th century. Corpses and their component parts became a commodity, but although the practice of disinterment was hated by the general public, bodies were not legally anyone's property. The resurrectionists therefore operated in a legal grey area.
Andrew Moir (1806–1844) was a 19th-century Scottish anatomist linked to the body-snatching scandal which swept Scotland in the late 18th and early 19th century.
William Cunningham was a body snatcher who lived in Cincinnati, Ohio. A "professional resurrectionist", Cunningham provided corpses for area physicians from 1855 to 1871. Popularly known as Old Cunny, other names attributed to Cunningham include "Old Man Dead" and "The Ghoul".
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