The History of Burke and Hare Part 17

The following appeared in the _Caledonian Mercury_ early in the month of January, 1829:--

"The information from which the following article is drawn up we have received from a most respectable quarter, and its perfect correctness in all respects may be confidently relied on. In truth, it is as nearly as possible a strict report, rather than the substance, of what pa.s.sed at an interview with Burke, in the course of which the unhappy man appears to have opened his mind without reserve, and to have given a distinct and explicit answer to every question which was put to him relative to his connection with the late murders.

"After some conversation of a religious nature, in the course of which Burke stated that, while in Ireland, his mind was under the influence of religious impressions, and that he was accustomed to read his Catechism and Prayer-book, and to attend to his duties. He was asked, 'How comes it then that you, who, by your own account, were once under the influence of religious impressions, ever formed the idea of such dreadful atrocities, of such cold-blooded, systematic murders as you admit you have been engaged in--how came such a conception to enter your mind?' To this Burke replied, 'that he did not exactly know; but that becoming addicted to drink, living in open adultery, and a.s.sociating continually with the most abandoned characters, he gradually became hardened and desperate; gave up attending chapel or any place of religious worship, shunned the face of the priest, and being constantly familiar with every species of wickedness, he at length grew indifferent as to what he did, and was ready to commit any crime.'

"He was then asked how long he had been engaged in this murderous traffic, to which he answered, 'From Christmas, 1827, till the murder of the woman Docherty in October last.' 'How many persons have you murdered, or been concerned in murdering, during the time? Were they 30 in all?' 'Not so many; not so many, I a.s.sure you.' 'How many?' He answered the question, but the answer was, for a reason perfectly satisfactory, not communicated to us, and reserved for a different quarter.

"'Had you any accomplices?' 'None but Hare. We always took care when we were going to commit a murder that no one else should be present; that no one could swear he saw the deed done. The women might suspect what we were about, but we always put them out of the way when we were going to do it.

They never saw us commit any of the murders. One of the murders was done in Broggan's house while he was out, but before he returned the thing was finished and the body put into a box. Broggan evidently suspected something, for he appeared much agitated, and entreated us to take away the box, which we accordingly did. But he was not in any way concerned in it.'

"'You have already told me that you were engaged in these atrocities from Christmas, 1827, till the end of October, 1828. Were you a.s.sociated with Hare during all that time?' 'Yes, we began with selling to Dr. ---- the body of a woman who had died a natural death in Hare's house. We got ten pounds for it. After this we began the murders, and all the rest of the bodies that we sold to him were murdered.'

"'In what place were these murders generally committed?' 'They were mostly committed in Hare's house, which was very convenient for the purpose, as it consisted of a room and kitchen. Daft Jamie was murdered there. The story told of this murder is incorrect. Hare began the struggle with him, and they fell and rolled together on the floor; then I went to Hare's a.s.sistance, and we at length finished him, though with much difficulty. I committed one murder in the country by myself. It was in last harvest. All the rest were done in conjunction with Hare.'

"'By what means were these fearful atrocities perpetrated?' 'By suffocation. We made the persons drunk, and then suffocated them by holding the nostrils and mouth and getting on the body. Sometimes I held the mouth and nose, while Hare went upon the body; and sometimes Hare held the mouth and nose, while I placed myself on the body. Hare has perjured himself by what he said at the trial about the murder of Docherty. He did not sit by while I did it, as he says. He was on the body a.s.sisting me with all his might, while I held the nostrils and mouth with one hand, choked her under the throat with the other. We sometimes used a pillow, but did not in this case.'

"'Now, Burke, answer me this question:--Were you tutored and instructed, or did you receive hints from any one as to the mode of committing murder?' 'No, except from Hare. We often spoke about it, and we agreed that suffocation was the best way. Hare said so, and I agreed with him. We generally did it by suffocation.'

"'Did you receive any encouragement to commit or persevere in committing these atrocities?' 'Yes; we were frequently told by Paterson that he would take as many bodies as we could get for him. When we got one he always told us to get more. There was commonly another person with him of the name of ----. They generally pressed us to get more bodies for them.'

"'To whom were the bodies so murdered sold?' 'To Dr. ----. We took the bodies to his rooms in ---- ----, and then went to his house to receive the money for them. Sometimes he paid us himself; sometimes we were paid by his a.s.sistants. No questions were ever asked as to the mode in which we had come by the bodies. We had nothing to do but to leave a body at the rooms, and go and get money.'

"'Did you ever, upon any occasion, sell a body or bodies to any other lecturer in this place?' 'Never. We knew no other.'

"'You have been a resurrectionist (as it is called) I understand?' 'No.

Neither Hare nor myself ever got a body from a churchyard. All we sold were murdered, save the first one, which was that of the woman who died a natural death in Hare's house. We began with that: our crimes then commenced. The victims we selected were generally elderly persons; they could be more easily disposed of than persons in the vigour of health.'

"Such are the disclosures which this wretched man has made, under circ.u.mstances which can scarcely fail to give them weight with the public.

Before a question were put to him concerning the crimes he had been engaged in, he was solemnly reminded of the duty inc.u.mbent upon him, situated as he is, to banish from his mind every feeling of animosity towards Hare, on account of the evidence which the latter gave at the trial; he was told that a dying man, covered with guilt, and without hope except in the infinite mercy of Almighty G.o.d, through our blessed Redeemer the Lord Jesus Christ, he, who stood so much in need of forgiveness, must prepare himself to seek it by forgiving from his heart all who had done him wrong; and he was emphatically adjured to speak the truth, and nothing but the truth, without any attempt either to palliate his own iniquities, or to implicate Hare more deeply than the facts warranted. Thus admonished, and thus warned, he answered the several interrogations in the terms above stated; declaring at the same time, upon the word of a dying man, that everything he had said was true, and that he had in no respect exaggerated or extenuated anything, either from a desire to inculpate Hare, or to spare anyone else."

THE CONFESSIONS OF BISHOP AND WILLIAMS, THE LONDON "BURKERS."

The following are the confessions of Bishop and Williams, the London "Burkers," an account of whose case is given in chapter XLI. They were emitted in presence of the Under-Sheriff on the 4th of December, 1831, the day before their execution:--

"I, John Bishop, do hereby declare and confess, that the boy supposed to be the Italian boy was a Lincolnshire boy. I and Williams took him to my house about half-past ten o'clock on the Thursday night, the 3rd of November, from the Bell, in Smithfield. He walked home with us. Williams promised to give him some work. Williams went with him from the Bell to the Old Bailey watering-house, whilst I went to the Fortune of War.

Williams came from the Old Bailey watering-house to the Fortune of War for me, leaving the boy standing at the corner of the court by the watering-house at the Old Bailey. I went directly with Williams to the boy, and we walked then all three to Nova Scotia Gardens, taking a pint of stout at a public-house near Holloway Lane, Sh.o.r.editch, on our way, of which we gave the boy a part. We only stayed just to drink it, and walked on to my house, where we arrived about eleven o'clock. My wife and children and Mrs. Williams were not gone to bed, so we put him in the privy, and told him to wait there for us. Williams went in and told them to go to bed, and I stayed in the garden. Williams came out directly, and we both walked out of the garden a little way, to give time for the family getting to bed: we returned in about ten minutes or a quarter of an hour, and listened outside the window to ascertain whether the family were gone to bed. All was quiet, and we then went to the boy in the privy, and took him into the house; we lighted a candle, and gave the boy some bread and cheese, and, after he had eaten, we gave him a cup full of rum, with about half a small phial of laudanum in it. (I had bought the rum the same evening at the Three Tuns, in Smithfield, and the laudanum also in small quant.i.ties at different shops). There was no water or other liquid put in the cup with the rum and laudanum. The boy drank the contents of the cup directly in two draughts, and afterwards a little beer. In about ten minutes he fell asleep on the chair on which he sat, and I removed him from the chair to the floor, and laid him on his side. We then went out and left him there. We had a quartern of gin and a pint of beer at the Feathers, near Sh.o.r.editch Church, and then went home again, having been away from the boy about twenty minutes. We found him asleep as we had left him. We took him directly, asleep and insensible, into the garden, and tied a cord to his feet to enable us to put him up by, and I then took him in my arms, and let him slide from them headlong into the well in the garden, whilst Williams held the cord to prevent the body going altogether too low in the well. He was nearly wholly in the water in the well, his feet just above the surface. Williams fastened the other end of the cord round the paling, to prevent the body getting beyond our reach. The boy struggled a little with his arms and his legs in the water; the water bubbled for a minute. We waited till these symptoms were past, and then went in, and afterwards I think we went out, and walked down Sh.o.r.editch to occupy the time, and in about three-quarters of an hour we returned and took him out of the well, by pulling him by the cord attached to his feet.

We undressed him in the paved yard, rolled his clothes up, and buried them where they were found by the witness who produced them. We carried the boy into the wash-house, laid him on the floor, and covered him over with a bag. We left him there, and went and had some coffee in Old Street Road, and then (a little before two on the morning of Friday) went back to my house. We immediately doubled the body up, and put it into a box, which we corded so that n.o.body might open it to see what was in it; and then went again and had some more coffee in the same place in Old Street Road, where we stayed a little while, and then went home to bed--both in the same house, and to our own beds as usual; we slept till about ten o'clock on Friday morning, when we got up, took breakfast together with the family, and then went both of us to Smithfield, to the Fortune of War--we had something to eat and drink there. In about half-an-hour May came in--I knew May--but had not seen him for about a fortnight before,--he had some rum with me at the bar, Williams remaining in the tap-room. [The condemned man then described the movements of himself and Williams, and May during that day, in course of which they were princ.i.p.ally occupied in visiting public houses, though they called upon two lecturers on anatomy and offered them the body, but were refused.] At the Fortune of War we drank something again, and then (about six o'clock) we all three went in the chariot to Nova Scotia Gardens; we went into the wash-house, where I uncorded the trunk, and shewed May the body. He asked, "how are the teeth?" I said I had not looked at them. Williams went and fetched a brad-awl from the house, and May took it and forced the teeth out; it is the constant practice to take the teeth out first, because, if the body be lost, the teeth are saved; after the teeth were taken out, we put the body in a bag, and took it to the chariot; May and I carried the body, and Williams got first into the coach, and then a.s.sisted in pulling the body in...." [The rest of this part of the confession is simply a record of "having something to drink," and visiting lecturers, who refused to purchase the body. It concludes with an account of the apprehension of the men at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, with the body in their possession.]

In an addition to this confession of the murder of the boy, Bishop made this further statement:--

"I declare that this statement is all true, and that it contains all the facts so far as I can recollect. May knew nothing of the murder, and I do not believe he suspected that I had got the body except in the usual way, and after the death of it. I always told him I got it from the ground, and he never knew to the contrary until I confessed to Mr. Williams [a clergyman] since the trial. I have known May as a body-s.n.a.t.c.her for four or five years, but I do not believe he ever obtained a body except in the common course of men in the calling--by stealing from the graves. I also confess that I and Williams were concerned in the murder of a female--whom I believe to have been since discovered as f.a.n.n.y Pigburn--on or about the 9th of October last. I and Williams saw her sitting about eleven or twelve o'clock at night on the step of a door in Sh.o.r.editch, near the church. She had a child four or five years old on her lap. I asked her why she was sitting there. She said she had no home to go to, for her landlord had turned her out into the street. I told her that she might go home with us, and sit by the fire all night. She said she would go with us, and she walked with us to my house, in Nova Scotia Gardens, carrying her child with her. When we got there we found the family abed, and we took the woman in and lighted a fire, by which we all sat down together. I went out for beer, and we all took beer and rum (I had brought the rum from Smithfield in my pocket); the woman and her child laid down on some dirty linen on the floor, and I and Williams went to bed. About six o'clock next morning I and Williams told her to go away, and to meet us at the London Apprentice in Old-Street Road, at one o'clock. This was before our families were up. She met us again at one o'clock at the London Apprentice, without her child. We gave her some half-pence and beer, and desired her to meet us again at ten o'clock at night at the same place.

After this we bought rum and laudanum at different places, and at ten o'clock we met the woman again at the London Apprentice, she had no child with her. We drank three pints of beer between us there, and stayed there about an hour. We would have stayed there longer, but an old man came in whom the woman said she knew, and she said she did not like him to see her there with any body; we therefore all went out; it rained hard, and we took shelter under a door-way in the Hackney Road for about an hour. We then walked to Nova Scotia Gardens, and Williams and I led her into No. 2, an empty house adjoining my house. We had no light. Williams stepped into the garden with the rum and laudanum, which I had handed to him; he there mixed them together in a half-pint bottle, and came into the house to me and the woman, and gave her the bottle to drink; she drank the whole at two or three draughts; there was a quartern of rum, and about half a phial of laudanum; she sat down the step between two rooms in the house, and went off to sleep in about ten minutes. She was falling back; I caught her to save her fall, and she laid back on the floor. Then Williams and I went to a public-house, got something to drink, and in about half-an-hour came back to the woman; we took her cloak off, tied a cord to her feet, carried her to a well in the garden and thrust her into it headlong; she struggled very little afterwards, and the water bubbled a little at the top. We fastened the end to the pailings to prevent her going down beyond our reach, and left her and took a walk to Sh.o.r.editch and back, in about half-an-hour; we left the woman in the well for this length of time, that the rum and laudanum might run out of the body at the mouth. On our return, we took her out of the well, cut her clothes off, put them down the privy of the empty house, carried the body into the wash-house of my own house, where we doubled it up and put it into a hair-box, which we corded and left there. We did not go to bed, but went to Shields' [a street porter] house in Eagle Street, Red Lion Square, and called him up; this was between four and five o'clock in the morning. We went with Shields to a public-house near the Sessions-house, Clerkenwell, and had some gin, and from thence to my house, where we went in and stayed a little while, to wait the change of the police. I told Shields he was to carry that trunk to St. Thomas's Hospital. He asked if there was a woman in the house who could walk alongside of him, so that people might not take any notice. Williams called his wife up, and asked her to walk with Shields, and to carry the hat-box which he gave her to carry. There was nothing in it, but it was tied up as if there were. We then put the box with the body on Shields' head, and went to the hospital, Shields and Mrs.

Williams walking on one side of the street, and I and Williams on the other. At St. Thomas's Hospital I saw Mr. South's footman, and sent him up stairs to Mr. South to ask if he wanted a subject. The footman brought me word that his master wanted one, but could not give an answer till the next day, as he had not time to look at it. During this interview, Shields, Williams, and his wife, were waiting at a public-house. I then went alone to Mr. Appleton, at Mr. Grainger's [Anatomical Theatre], and agreed to sell it to him for eight guineas, and afterwards I fetched it from St. Thomas's Hospital, and took it to Mr. Appleton, who paid me 5 then, and the rest on the following Monday. After receiving the 5, I went to Shields and Williams and his wife, at the public-house, when I paid Shields 10s. for his trouble, and we then all went to the Flower Pot in Bishopsgate, where we had something to drink, and then went home. I never saw the woman's child after the first time before mentioned. She said she had left the child with a person she had taken some of her things to, before her landlord took her goods. The woman murdered did not tell us her name; she said her age was thirty-five, I think, and that her husband, before he died, was a cabinetmaker. She was thin, rather tall, and very much marked with the small-pox. I also confess the murder of a boy who told us his name was Cunningham. It was a fortnight after the murder of the woman. I and Williams found him sleeping about eleven or twelve o'clock at night, on Friday, the 21st of October, as I think, under the pig-boards in the pig market in Smithfield. Williams woke him, and asked him to come along with him (Williams), and the boy walked with Williams and me to my house in Nova Scotia Gardens. We took him into my house, and gave him some warm beer, sweetened with sugar, with rum and laudanum in it. He drank two or three cups full, and then fell asleep in a little chair belonging to one of my children. We laid him on the floor and went out for a little while, and got something to drink and then returned, carried the boy to the well, and threw him into it, in the same way as we served the other boy and the woman. He died instantly in the well, and we left him there a little while, to give time for the mixture we had given him to run out of the body. We then took the body from the well, took off the clothes in the garden, and buried them there. The body we carried into the wash-house, and put it into the same box, and left it there till the next evening, when we got a porter to carry it with us to St.

Bartholomew's Hospital, where I sold it to Mr. Smith for eight guineas.

This boy was about ten or eleven years old, said his mother lived in Kent Street, and that he had not been home for a twelvemonth and better. I solemnly declare that these were all the murders in which I have been concerned, or that I know anything of; that I and Williams were alone concerned in these, and that no other person whatever knew anything about either of them, and that I do not know whether there are others who practise the same mode of obtaining bodies for sale. I know nothing of any Italian boy, and was never concerned in or knew of the murder of such a boy.... Until the transactions before set forth, I never was concerned in obtaining a subject by the destruction of the living. I have followed the course of obtaining a livelihood as a body-s.n.a.t.c.her for twelve years, and have obtained and sold, I think, from 500 to 1000 bodies; but I declare, before G.o.d, that they were all obtained after death, and that, with the above exceptions, I am ignorant of any murder for that or any other purpose."

Williams, whose proper name was Thomas Head, confirmed the confession given above as altogether true.

SONGS AND BALLADS.

_The following songs and ballads were published at the time the news of the West Port tragedies was agitating the people of Scotland. They are rude and unpoetical for the most part, but they are fairly representative of a very extensive cla.s.s, in which the feelings of the common people are not unfaithfully mirrored._

RHYMES

_On reading the Trial of William Burke and Helen M'Dougal, for Murder, 24th December, 1828._

AN EXPOSTULATION.

"_Thou can'st not say I did it!!!_"

Ah!--can'st thou, with cold indifference see The hand of execration point to thee?

Can'st thou, unmov'd, bear a whole nation's cry, To cleanse thyself from the polluted sty Of Burke, and Hare, and all that fiendish crew, Who, for mere gain, their fellow-mortals slew, And sold to thee, as thou hast not denied, Such bodies as by students were descried Ne'er to have been interred, nay, bore, some say, Strong marks of life, by violence reft away?

And thou didst not attempt the truth to find, Though oft it must have flash'd across thy mind; But with a reckless carelessness, receiv'd Whate'er was brought,[1] and any lie believ'd, Told by the gang, whose very forms do show They would not tell thee aught thou did'st not know, Or should'st have known, if true thy Science says, That marks of death by _Murder_ any ways May well be seen, when the dissecting knife Opens all the sure and secret seats of life.[2]

Art thou a Scotsman ----? then haste to prove That patriotic feelings can thy bosom move; Haste to wipe out the stain thy country shares, While such a stigma fair Edina bears.

Art thou a son of Science? quickly, then, Show she does not make brutes of _lect'ring_ men.

Art thou a Father? then thy child may plead, To cleanse thyself from this unholy deed.

Art thou a husband? ask thine honest wife, If 'twere not better to descend in life, Than traffic with the basest, vilest band, And thus for ---- soon's the deed is plann'd; A ready market keep--and hide away An _old tea-box_; that's all which you can say.

Art thou a Christian? think'st thou this avails With Him on high, who, with unerring scales, Weighs all the thoughts, and words, and deeds of men, And searches through, ev'n the soul's inmost _ken_?

If this dread argument will not prevail, Nought can thy cold obdurate heart a.s.sail.

Yes, time mispent, and surely worse than vain, 'Tis to attempt to rouse, by my poor strain, The proud rich man, hedg'd round by many a friend, Whose voice th' applause of hundred youths attend.

If his own conscience will not wake and cry, a.s.sert thine innocence, REPLY, REPLY, To all the accusations lately rais'd 'Gainst thy fair fame, till ev'n ---- has gaz'd, And gaz'd in vain to see thee ---- come forth, Arm'd with thy ---- thy ---- and thy ---- * * * * _Cetera desunt._

[1] _Vide_ the evidence produced on the trial of Burke, &c. It has been told as a fact, that this gang carried off to ---- one of their slaughtered victims in such a hurry, that the body actually _groaned_ in the box on the porter's back. No doubt the half-strangled being would be dead enough after a night in the ---- cellar.--_Original Note._

[2] The ---- is understood to be profoundly skilled in Anatomy; consequently, it is one of the bitterest satires that can be uttered against the utility of the Science, to say that he was _ignorant_ that the bodies supplied by Burke and his gang had come to their death by violence.--_Original Note._

WILLIAM BURKE.

O Burke, cruel man, how detested thy name is!

Thy dark deeds of blood are a stain on our times.

O savage, relentless, forever infamous, Long, long will the world remember thy crimes.

Thrice ten human beings, weep all you who hear it, Were caught in his snares and caught in his den, The shades of thy victims may elude thy vile spirit, O Burke, cruel monster, thou basest of men.

The weary, the old, and the way-faring stranger, Were woo'd by his kindness and led to his door, But little knew they that the path led to danger, O little knew they that their wanderings were o'er.

Little knew they that the beams of the morning, To wake them to brightness, would shine all in vain, And little their friend knew, who watched their returning, That they were ne'er more to return back again.

O gather the bones of the murdered together, And give them a grave in some home of the dead, That their poor weeping friends with sad hearts may go thither, And shed tears of sorrow above their cold bed.

Ye great men of learning, ye friends of dissection, Who travell'd through blood to the temple of gain, And bright human life for your hateful inspection, O give the poor friends the white bones of the slain.

But woe to the riches and skill thus obtained, Woe to the wretch that would injure the dead, And woe to his portion whose fingers are stained With the red drops of life that he cruelly shed.

Tho' Burke has been doom'd to expire on the gallows, The vilest that ever dishonoured the tree, Yet some may survive him whose hearts are as callous, O, who wall be safe if the tigers be free.