In the early 1800s, British medical schools used cadavers to teach anatomy to their students. There was a perpetual shortage because the only corpses that could legally be used for this purpose were those of executed criminals. The situation led some to accept corpses from less reputable sources, including body-snatchers. Body-snatching became so commonplace that families of the recently deceased would guard the body even after the burial. Two men, William Burke and William Hare, however, developed a more creative way to bring fresh bodies to the medical school.
Early Life of Burke and Hare
William Burke was born in 1792 in Urney, Ireland. In 1817 to emigrate to Maddiston Scotland. He later met Helen McDougal and the two moved to Edinburgh.
William Hare was born in 1792 in Ireland. He also emigrated to Scotland and moved to Edinburgh. He lived in the boarding house of a man named Logue and his wife, Margaret. The boarding house was located in Tanner’s Close in the West Port area of Edinburgh. In 1826, Logue died and Hare took Margaret as his common-law wife. The two ran the lodging house together. In 1827, Burke and Helen moved into Hare’s lodgings.
Burke and Hare's Victims
In November 1827, one of Hare’s lodgers, an army pensioner named Donald, died. Donald owed Hare £4 in rent. Hare was outraged and came up with a plan to get the money owed to him. After Donald’s body was taken away, Hare, with Burke’s assistance, went to the mortuary and stole Donald’s body. They took the body to Professor Robert Knox at the Edinburgh Medical College and were paid £7.
The men’s next victim was known as Joseph the Miller, who was very ill. They gave him whisky and then suffocated him. This became the group’s modus operandi. When there were no other sick tenants, the group became luring victims from the street. In February 1828, Abigail Simpson was invited to spend the night and was killed.
In April of 1828, Burke invited two prostitutes, Mary Patterson and Janet Brown, to the lodging house. Janet left when Helen and Burke began arguing, but Mary stayed. When Janet returned a couple of hours later, she was told that Mary had left. The next morning, some of the medical students recognized the body of Mary Patterson.
After the close call with the prostitutes, Burke and Hare targeted less well-known people as their victims. They made a mistake, however, in October 1828, with the murder of a young man named James “Daft Jamie” Wilson. Daft Jamie was 18 years old and mentally retarded. He was well-known throughout the neighborhood. In early October 1828, Hare invited Jamie to him house and he and Burke murdered the boy. Those in the neighborhood became suspicious when Jamie’s mother began looking for him. Also, several of Dr. Knox’s students recognized the boy. Dr. Knox denied that the body was Jamie’s corpse and began the dissection quickly.
Burke and Hare’s last victim was Marjory Campbell Docherty. Burke met Marjory and convinced her to stay the night at the lodging house. Another couple, James and Ann Gray, was also staying at the house. The couples drank and celebrated Halloween into the night. Eventually the Grays left.
The following morning, the Grays returned and found that Marjory was gone. The couple became suspicious when Burke would not let Ann near a spare bed. Later that evening, the Grays, alone in the house, went back to the bed and found Marjory’s body. The couple fled and found a policeman.
Police arrived at the home of Burke and Helen and questioned the couple. A discrepancy in their alibi led to their arrest. The Hares soon joined them. An anonymous tip led the police to Dr. Knox.
The End
A month after their arrest, police made a deal with William Hare: immunity in exchange for his testimony. Burke and Helen’s trial began on Christmas Eve. The next morning, the jury, after a fifty minute deliberation, found Burke guilty. Helen was freed on a not proven verdict.
William Burke was hanged on January 28, 1829. Helen returned home and was almost lynched by an angry mob. She is believed to have fled to Australia and died in 1868. Margaret disappeared, perhaps to Ireland, but nothing more is known. William Hare was released in February 1829. He was last seen in Carlisle, England. Dr. Knox tried to remain in Edinburgh, but suspicion followed him. He eventually moved to London and died in 1862.
Burke and Hare’s actions led to the passage of the Anatomy Act of 1832, which expanded the types of cadavers used for dissection. The story of Burke and Hare lives on in fiction and movies.
Sources:
MacGowan, Douglas. “William Burke and William Hare.” Trutv Crime Library (accessed August 7, 2009)
Edwards, Owen Dudley. Burke & Hare. Edinburgh: Polygon Books, 1981.
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