the practice, by forbidding students to steal
bodies under penalty of dismissal. However,
heedless of the order the students continued
to obtain bodies by whatever means possible.
In fact, a burial ground close to Surgeon’s
Square in Edinburgh (adjacent to the old
Infirmary) was considered a choice source
of material and young medicos would keep
the spot under observation. At the first
sign of a new grave they would go into
action. Sometimes different factions came
to blows over the spoils.

DRUNKEN SAILOR’S SURPRISE

There are a number of stories told con-
cerning students and their zeal to keep the
dissecting table supplied. In one case, two
of them—hearing of an unexplained death
in Fife, decided to steal the body and bring
It across to their school for examination.
They rowed across the Firth of Forth dis-
guised as sailors and, by night, lifted the
body from its grave. After having secreted
the body, they went to a local inn for rest
and refreshment. While engaged in con-
versation with the barmaid, a drunken
sailor came in carrying a large bundle
wrapped in sackcloth. It appeared that the
sailor had been taking a nap under a hedge
when the two students happened to select
the same place to leave their grisly burden.
The sailor, thinking that they had stolen
something worth while, brought it to the
inn, where his sister was barmaid. Before
the two students could stop him he had

ripped open the sack and the head of the

corpse fell out of the bag. With a yell, both
sailor and barmaid fled from the inn leaving
the two students to hurriedly retrieve their
prize and hasten to the boat awaiting their
return to Edinburgh.

On another occasion a sailor was drowned,
and interred at Rosyth. A group of students
made a stealthy night-time visit to the grave-
yard to secure the body. At the graveyard
they were surprised to see a young girl
strewing flowers over the grave, lamenting
the lad who had been her sweetheart. The
students waited until the grief-stricken girl
left and then removed the body. Callously
one of the students took a flower from the
grave and stuck it in his button hole before
he departed. As the students left by boat,
the girl returned and the last they saw of
her was a tragic figure wailing her grief by
the-seashore, bereft twice, once in life and
once in death.

Such was the ghastly business of body-
snatching, practised in the interests of sur-
gery in early 19th century Scotland. Those
who engaged in it had a complete disregard
for the common principles of humanity and
the law.

In such an atmosphere the infamous
Burke and Hare embarked on their foul
careers.

Bopy-SNATCHING As A BUSINESS

Burke was an Irishman, born in 1792 at
Orrey, County Tyrone. He had served in
the army as an officer's servant. Later he
married but deserted his family and went
to Scotland in 1818. He worked on the
Union Canal between Edinburgh and Glas-
gow. He met and lived with Helen Mc-
Dougal, a woman with a chequered marital

Page Four

history. In 1827 the couple were living in
Edinburgh, Burke ekeing out an existence
by repairing shoes which he purchased
cheaply, and then hawked around Edin-
burgh’s slum area. In the fall of 1827
Burke and his woman secured lodgings in a
cheap “flop house” run by Mr. and Mrs.
Hare in Tanner’s Close in the West Port.
Hare had been a lodger in this evil ruin of
a building when it was operated by a man
named Log. Log died and Mrs. Log and
Hare entered into some form of common
law marriage and henceforth she was known
as Mrs. Hare. Hare was an Irishman, about
the same age as Burke, and noted for his
extremely ugly appearance. The lodging
house consisted of a mere three rooms, two
of them fairly large, the windows opening
on the “close.” The third room was a small
one in the rear with a solitary window
Opening on to a pig stye and a blank wall.
The “lodging house” catered to the dregs
of Edinburgh’s population and consisted of
eight beds ranged around the walls of the
two larger rooms, each bed accommodating

three lodgers for the equivalent of six cents
a night.

The smaller inner room, remote from the
street, was to figure in many of the dark
deeds of this unlovely quartette.

Dissolute and bestial, without the slightest
trace of morals, these dangerous degenerates
were to be leading figures in a series of
crimes which shocked the world.

Their criminal partnership commenced as
the result of circumstances which neither
Burke nor Hare could have foreseen. While
Burke was living with his -consort Me-
Dougal at Hare’s, leading a hand-to-mouth
existence peddling his mended shoes, a
lodger named Donald passed away after a
lengthy illness. Hare was upset about this,
but not because of any sentiment. The old
man had died just before his small quarterly
pension was due and he was in arrears to
Hare to the tune of £4. Feeling that he
must recoup himself for this loss, Hare
figured on disposing of the body to the
medical profession. Thus Donald would
pay in death what he couldn't pay in life.

As he needed an assistant in this enterprise,
Hare spoke to Burke about the matter.
Atter some discussion the pair formed q
s.mple plan to possess themselves of the poor
remains. When the parish undertaker had
placed the body in its rude coffin and
departed, to call the following day, Burke
and Hare opened the coffin, took out the
body and substituted a bag of tan bark.
Then the coffin lid was renailed. |

On November 29th, 1827, the two men
went to the Old College and were directed
by a student to Dr. Knox’s anatomical
school at No. 10 Surgeon’s Square. After
some discussion, the two criminals offered to
sell a body. They were told to bring it later
that night. When darkness fell they re-
turned with the body in a sack and they
received the sum of £7 10s from Dr. Knox,

Surprised to learn that they could get as
much as £10 for a body delivered to the
medical school the partnership of Burke &
Hare was sealed.

“NATURAL CAUSES” Not ENOUGH

As there were not likely to be many nor-
mal deaths in the lodging house, Burke and
Hare thought that nature should be encour
aged to deliver them “merchandise” for their
nefarious trade. A miller named Joseph,
lodging at the Hare’s, was taken ill. He
seemed to have a high fever which ordinarily
would be bad for the lodging house business.
So Burke and Hare hit upon the idea of
ridding the establishment of the ailing guest
and at the same time making some money
out of his demise. No sooner did they decide
upon this course than they secured a pillow
which was placed over the patient’s face.
In his condition he was unable to offer much
resistance and soon died of suffocation.
The body was delivered to Dr. Knox and
the two scoundrels received £10.

From that time on there was a steady flow
of “subjects” supplied by Burke and Hare
to the dissecting rooms of the good Dr.
Knox. In all there were 16 cases adm‘tted
by Burke in his confession. It is quite
possible there were others which he e'ther
could not recall or thought best to omit.
There was the case of an Engl’shman, whose
name is not known. This man had jaundice
and while in bed at the lodging house, Burke
and Hare held their hands over his nose and
mouth until he suffocated. Then in Febru:
ary, 1828, an old woman named Simpson
came to Edinburgh to collect a tiny pension
of 1/6d and “a can of kitchen fee.” The
old woman, after collecting her pittance,
met the Hares and was enticed to their
lodging house by promise of liguor. They
all drank so much that night that although
the old woman survived, the following morn
ing Burke and Hare were relatively sober.
The unfortunate woman was given more
whiskey and when she was very drunk, Hare
“clapped his hand over her mouth while
Burke threw his weight across her chest.”
In a very short time she was a subject for
Dr. Knox, to whom she was delivered. It
is said that the only comment the doctor
made was that the body was very fresh, but
he didn’t ask any questions as to where she
had been found.

There were then two other murders of
women who were enticed into the hovel by

THE SHOULDER STRAP