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The
British authorities turned a blind eye to grave-rifling because surgeons and students were working to advance medical knowledge. They kept publicity to a minimum to prevent people from realising what was happening. The cases of grave-robbing that came to light caused riots, damage to property and
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had supplied schools of anatomy since the early 18th century. This was due to the necessity for medical students to learn anatomy by attending dissections of human subjects, which was frustrated by the very limited allowance of dead bodies – for example the corpses of executed criminals – granted by
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Likely all communities near the
Scottish schools of medicine in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Aberdeen employed some means of protecting the dead. Some used both mortsafes and watching. There are watch-houses in the remoter Scottish areas, in the Borders, and two have been found in the English county of
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together. Examples have been found close to all
Scottish medical schools. A plate was placed over the coffin, and rods with heads were pushed through holes in it. These rods were kept in place by locking a second plate over the first, to form extremely heavy protection. It would be removed by two
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and iron cages around graves. The poor began to place flowers and pebbles on graves to detect disturbances. They dug heather and branches into the soil to make disinterment more difficult. Large stones, often coffin-shaped, sometimes the gift of a wealthy man to the parish, were placed over new
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is a circular building with a thick studded wooden door and an inner iron door. Inside there is a turntable to accommodate seven coffins. A coffin would be moved round as further ones were added. By the time it reappeared, the body would be of no use to the dissectionists.
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Men were employed to steal bodies and transport them from place to place, even across the sea, for sale to medical schools. Revelations led to public outrage, particularly in
Scotland, where there was great reverence for the dead and a literal belief in
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Antiquary
Society. There are one or two in museums, but those on display rarely have any indication of what they are, or how they were used. Some documents relating to mortsafes and other protection devices are in libraries and record offices.
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even fatal attacks. In the early 19th century, with the great increase in numbers of schools and students, there was continual rifling of secluded graveyards, fights in city burial grounds and other disturbances.
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Surviving mortsafes are generally found in churchyards and burial grounds. Some are very broken and rusting away. One has been restored and hung in a church porch, with an explanatory note, by the
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There are two mortsafes in reasonable condition outside the old
Aberfoyle church in Stirling, which was 30 miles from the nearest School of Anatomy in Glasgow. One is outside the front door of
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The mortsafe was invented around 1816. These were iron or iron-and-stone devices of great weight, in many different designs. Often they were complex heavy iron contraptions of rods and plates,
219:– repositories for dead bodies – were built by public subscription in Scotland, with their use governed by rules and regulations. Some of these were above ground. Others – mainly in
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They were placed over the coffins for about six weeks, then removed for further use when the body inside was sufficiently decayed. There is a model of a mortsafe of this type in
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Friends and relatives took turns or hired men to watch graves through the hours of darkness. Watch-houses were sometimes erected to shelter the watchers. One watch-house in
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People were determined to protect the graves of newly deceased friends and relatives. The rich could afford heavy table tombstones,
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279:, Aberdeenshire, in a slightly rusted state. Another in reasonable condition is in the kirkyard at the remote hamlet of
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W Roughead, ed., Burke And Hare, Notable
British Trials Series, William Hodge and Company Limited 1948, p.3:
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W Roughead, ed., Burke And Hare, Notable
British Trials Series, William Hodge and Company Limited 1948, p.3:
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is a three-storey castellated building with windows. Watching societies were often formed in towns, one in
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was a construction designed to protect graves from disturbance and used in the United
Kingdom.
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heightened the fear felt by many people. It was about this time that
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YouTube video and commentary on a mortsafe in
Prestwick, Ayrshire.
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were used by watchers, but graves were still violated.
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Northern notes and queries or the Scottish antiquary
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Northern notes and queries or the Scottish antiquary
410:. Vol. 3. Edinburgh: David Douglas. p. 20
385:. Vol. 3. Edinburgh: David Douglas. p. 20
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303:A mortsafe in Greyfriars Kirkyard, Edinburgh
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69:Learn how and when to remove this message
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438:Echoes of the Scottish Resurrection Men
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344:. Stroud : The History Press.
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404:Hallen, A. W. Cornelius (1889).
379:Hallen, A. W. Cornelius (1889).
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195:Vaults and watch-houses
53:more precise citations.
342:Scottish Bodysnatchers
340:Holder, Geoff (2010).
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131:Precautions
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51:introducing
447:Categories
328:References
283:, west of
228:Udny Green
149:mausoleums
91:Perthshire
34:references
289:Tullibody
177:padlocked
157:Edinburgh
152:graves.
87:Logierait
257:Colinton
205:Dalkeith
189:Aberdeen
171:Mortsafe
103:mortcage
99:mortsafe
161:Glasgow
47:improve
414:8 July
389:8 July
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285:Alford
217:vaults
145:vaults
36:, but
281:Towie
416:2017
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346:ISBN
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