Now back in the late 1700's there were quite a few people who were called ressurectionists, ressurection men, grave robbers or body snatchers as I would like to call it.
This was needed because many professors needed cadavers to use during their lectures to teach and mold up and coming doctors. How can you come up with new medical techniques or learn body parts without the body? Some of these people were so good they would search the obituaries or hear about people who have died. Then they would wait and watch to see when they were buried and in the middle of the night dig up the grave and remove the body. Some were so good that they would only dig up a portion of the grave, put a rope around the underarms of the deceased and pull them out of the casket. They were so good that they could do all of this less than an hour....but the only problem was some of the bodies were damaged by the time they got to medical schools that they did not last the entire semester.
Well this brings us to the best "body snatcher" of all. And he goes by the name of John Collins Warren, Jr. who was the son of James Collins Warren who was the founder of Harvard Medical School. At first James Sr had no idea that his son was a "body snatcher" as he thought that he was getting the cadavers legally. Even though he was the best and could produce a body in perfect condition that would last the entire semester he was very sloppy about it. He was so sloppy he was lucky he didn't get caught.
John Collins Warren, Jr. wrote this statement: "Having understood that a man without relations was to be buried in the North Burying Ground, I formed a party...When my father came up in the morning to lecture, and found that I had been engaged in this scrape he was very much alarmed."
I wonder how proud James Collins Warren Sr was after he found out his son was a body snatcher???
Well.....until next time!
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