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Tales of London

Tales of London

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The Resurrectionists: London's Body Snatchers

31 January 2021

'The Reward of Cruelty' by William Hogarth
'The Reward of Cruelty' by William Hogarth. For most people in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, dissection after death was something to be feared.

To whom does your body belong once you have shuffled off this mortal coil? There are of course many religious and philosophical answers to that question. But legally speaking, at least in the UK, the answer is: nobody. And that answer led to the establishment of an underworld profession detested and feared throughout eighteenth and nineteenth century London: the resurrectionists.

Although quite commonplace today, the idea of human dissection for medical study was anathema to the medieval church, who believed that the body must remain whole in order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. It wasn’t until 1540 that Henry VIII allowed the Company of Barber-Surgeons to dissect up to four felons a year, but as medicine began to take a firm footing in the realms of science this number was nowhere near enough to meet the growing demand.

The Murder Act of 1751 aimed to plug this gap. It read that:

“for better preventing the horrid crime of murder…that some further terror and peculiar mark of infamy be added to the punishment of death…that in no case whatsoever the body of any murderer shall be suffered to be buried… [but instead after execution is] to be anatomized, or to be hung in chains.”

Hogarth's 'The Idle 'Prentice Executed at Tyburn'
Hogarth's 'The Idle 'Prentice Executed at Tyburn'. Often the hangings would turn into riots, as the observers attempted to prevent the corpses falling into the hands of the barber-surgeons.

For most of the population anatomisation was a fate worse than death, as their immortal souls would be in peril, and the Barber-Surgeons were resented for their part in the desecration. Riots often took place at execution sites, as the viewing public – who were often sympathetic to the criminals due to the despotic justice system – would try and prevent the corpses being put under the knife. In the 18th century the Sheriff of London ignored the rights of the surgeons and handed the executed bodies back to their families in order to prevent public disorder.

But even in those bloody times the supply of murderers’ corpses was not enough to meet the demand of the surgeons, and so they turned to the resurrectionists to plug the gap. The reason they were known as such was because they would 'resurrect' the freshly buried bodies from the local graveyards. Gangs of sextons, gravediggers, undertakers and local officials would conspire in this pursuit, and bodies quickly became a commodity just like any other good. By the 1820s doctors would pay up to twenty guineas (£21) for a fresh corpse, when the weekly wage for an East End weaver was just ten shillings (50p). It was a highly lucrative trade, and one with relatively minor punishment should you be caught: desecration of a grave was treated as a misdemeanour rather than a felony. Bodysnatching became an open and accepted secret within London, and was often ignored by the authorities.

Resurrectionists
Resurrectionists would 'resurrect' the freshly buried bodies from their graves, being careful to avoid taking the corpse's clothes and jewellery.

The usual modus operandi for resurrectionists would be to enter the graveyard under cover of darkness and begin digging at the head of the grave with a shovel made of wood to reduce the noise. Once they had reached the coffin they would break through and hoist the corpse out with a piece of rope tied underneath the armpits. The grave would then be refilled and returfed, leaving any mourners none the wiser that they were standing over an empty grave. The resurrectionists would be careful to leave behind any of the corpse's clothing and jewellery, however, as otherwise they could be charged with the felony of theft - ironically they could be hanged for taking the clothes, but not the body itself.

The families of the recently deceased went to great lengths to try and prevent the desecration of the grave. They would often stand guard in the churchyard for several nights until the body had sufficiently decayed, something that led in at least one instance to a shootout between a family and a gang of resurrectionists. Increasingly intricate coffins were marketed that were supposed to be tamper proof, offering – as one advertisement put it – “safety for the dead”.

Coffin in St Bride's Church crypt
"Safety for the dead": a fortress of a coffin that can be seen in the crypt of St Bride's Church on Fleet Street

But the audacity of some resurrectionists knew no bounds. They would often pay women to pretend to be a grieving relative of a deceased pauper at a local workhouse so that she could take the body away. At a wake for an elderly woman on Bow Lane, a gang burst into the house in broad daylight and “acted with the most revolting indecency, dragging the corpse in its death clothes after them through the mud in the street”. The London Borough Gang, who operated in the early nineteenth century, desecrated graveyards to drive rivals out of business. At one time they gate-crashed a lecture at St Thomas Hospital School where they threatened students and attacked corpses in a row over pay rates.

Burke & Hare
Burke & Hare, the two Edinburgh resurrectionists who arguably went a bit too far in their pursuit of the perfect corpse

The situation came to a head in 1828. Two Edinburgh resurrectionists named William Burke and William Hare had taken to murdering rather than just bodysnatching, and a gang called the London Burkers was doing the same. By this time there were around two-hundred resurrectionists operating in London, and Parliament realised that the demand for corpses was not going to disappear. In 1832 the Anatomy Act was passed. Bodysnatching and the sale of corpses was still not a crime, but the Act ended the dissection of felons and instead allowed anatomisation in cases where the bodies of the deceased were left unclaimed.

Slowly the trade of the resurrectionists disappeared, and by 1844 it had pretty much vanished. But it was the poorest of London who came off worst through this Act. Many did not have any loved ones to claim their bodies after death, and even if they had objected to being dissected it was in the best interest of the parish to ignore their wishes, as it would mean saving on funeral costs. As the MP and journalist William Cobbett said in objection to the Act:

“They tell us it was necessary for science. Science? Why, who is science for? Not for poor people. Then if it is necessary for science, let them have the bodies of the rich, for whose benefit science is cultivated.”

I doubt many took Cobbett up on his suggestion.

For more stories about the bizarre and quirky history of the capital, check out my other articles, or click here to subscribe to future updates! 

Fortune of War plaque
Opposite Bart's Hospital, on the corner of Cock Lane, can be found this reminder of the resurrectionists' work

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