Living Legends

Burke and Hare

For over 150 years a flourishing trade in bodysnatching went on in Britain, supplying corpses for medical dissection. In 1834 this traffic was brought to an end, thanks largely to two Irish navvies in Edinburgh, William Burke and William Hare. In their eagerness to supply their customer, Dr Knox, with fresh subjects, Burke and Hare had taken cunning steps to speed up the turnover of human bodies.