Morbid: Episode 447: Burke & Hare Part 1

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Hey weirdos, I'm Elena and I'm Ash and this is Morbid

It's Morbid

Hey guys. Hey, what's up? What's up fellas? What's up fellas and fellers? Flora's faunas and boxes

Oh, okay getting getting cute with the spring equinox. I see the spring of it all. Um, what is it? Ostara?

I just learned something like that. Yeah, it's something like that. It's witchy. Yeah, it's kind of like welcoming spring

Yeah, and I feel like we're all kind of feeling this way. Usually I'm I never want to hang on to winter, but I'm never

Super eager to get out of it. I'm usually just like okay spring is coming like cool. That's how I feel

But this year I was like get me the fuck out of winter. This has been a fucking terrible winter

It's well, we had a lot of family stuff going on. We had which sicknesses

Sicknesses. Yeah, like it's just been a shit winter too much going on. Yeah, I'm lost

Lots of loss up in the air miss. Yeah, just it's it's been shit a lot of stress so much stress

Like you guys were all feeling it in our voices. I think because we got so many which like we can't say it enough like

We really appreciate that you guys give a shit because the amount of messages we've gotten that are like you guys, okay

Well, it's crazy like clearly we've been going at this for a while with you guys because like you you know

You can hear the change in our voice. I know even when we don't think we're showing it

We think we're putting on the show like right show must go on. Yep. Get rid of whatever's going on behind the scenes

I feel that sentiment so hard. The show must go on. It's true because it has to and you never want to like

We never want to let you down when shit happens like we we are here to entertain you

You know, I mean to yeah to inform you of things, you know

So it's like we're very much in that mindset of the show must go on but to know that like you said you guys

Always know. Yeah, even when we think we're hiding it like that tells us like how close we are to this community

And it's and we just appreciate you. This is like it's like really nice. It's nice

But I also it was like a slap because I was like, oh shit, so it's leaking out a little bit

I know I know the good news is like where spring is here. Yeah, we're feeling a lot more

We feel like we are in a good place like schedule wise like, you know how we went we kind of changed it to the og way of things

It's feeling good. Well and astrologically things are changing a bit right now and like planets are moving into different

Signs and houses that like things are a little more stable. That's what we need

Except I think Aquarius is moving into Pluto next week and that's gonna bring like some kind of major transformation

The last time that Aquarius was I think it's Aquarius entering Pluto is what it is and the last time it happened was in the 1700s

Oh damn, isn't that nuts and it's a time of like

Um, what's the word the war that have a revolution of the war. It's the time of like revolution. Oh, wow

Yeah, crazy. So that could be like great or really bad. Well, I think like revolution like revolution or it can be really bad

It's gonna probably coincide with like all the alien shit happening right now. I'm not even joking your butt

I mean, I'm not even joking your butt. I'm not even I'm not even shitting you dick. No way. You're not I can tell

Yeah, but you know what? We're in a good place. It's spring. Aliens aside. Happy spring. I'm feeling good

I got some good cases coming up that I'm feeling excited to tell you guys about just because like, you know, I love an old-timey

Like his weird history case. You do?

I got it. I got a good one here that I'm really excited about and it just perped a little. I'm sorry

That's okay happened, you know, sometimes you just you can't you can't make a stop. It's just a rough can't stop

We'll stop, you know

But I'm gonna be doing Birkin hair today and it's gonna be a two-parter

So it's gonna be this week. I'm gonna be doing Birkin hair damn girl. You're on a two-parter like yeah, you know

I love a multi-part. Yeah, I'm gonna know I like when you do that

I love some really really intense long cases when it gives me a little more time to wrap my

There you go, so it works out and I just think it's good, you know, you get a whole week of one really intense long case

I like it. I'm excited about it. This one's a wild one and it also

takes place in Edinburgh for at least part of it. Oh

and

This is a wild one because we're gonna do I'm gonna do this case and then we're gonna talk about

Maybe next week or whenever we're gonna talk about those these little mini coffins that were found. Okay

Way later, and we're gonna get into detail. Don't worry, but they there's a theory that it's connected to this case

Oh, which is a nice like continuation. Okay, so you have to look forward to a lot of Birkin hair in the recent in the coming days

Okey-dokey, so

Throughout the first three decades of the 19th century doctors and med schools all across Europe

They really struggled to find enough bodies that they could use because this is the time when they were using

Bodies like corpses for anatomical teaching in medical surprising that they were having a hard time finding bodies

Back in that time because they didn't want to get like plague bodies or anything like that, you know

Like you didn't you wanted like fresh. Yeah fresh bodies that were not sick

Presumably, you know, if you could get them where it's and there's no trauma and stuff

It would be helpful because you're really trying to do like I mean those would be good too for certain things, but yeah

now

They basically this demand for fresh bodies and how it was becoming so hard to find them this led to the rise of what was called

Resurrection men. Oh, which that doesn't sound good cool band name

This is kind of a tongue-in-cheek name that was given to grave robbers

Yeah, who medical students turn to a lot for fresh corpses

Isn't that crazy thinking of like just like like hoity-toity people in the medical field like ma-ha-ha

Yeah, well, it is because they're looking they're basically overlooking the crime of great brahman and the ethics surrounding that right for the

Pursuit of medical advancement. That's like really I guess but you kind of have to you know

Well, you don't you don't have to put the time. That's what was going on

It was very frequent resurrection men were a real thing. Oh, it wasn't like a weird thing and in Edinburgh, Scotland

Dr. Robert Knox was a very highly respected surgeon and he found what he believed to be a

Very reliable pipeline of fresh bodies. Okay, and he found cuz it was really hard to find that you'd find this resurrection

Man, maybe you could get a couple out of them, but you were gonna have to look around for it. It was not easy

This guy, however, was like I found a good

Steady stream of bodies to use see that makes me feel like he's working alongside a serial killer

Well, he was working alongside William Burke and William Hare the two Williams Burke and here. Oh, it's like Tom and Tom

Yeah, exactly. That's not good. Did anyone see that midseason trailer the midseason trailer though in case you don't know what we're talking

Oh my god, the end of it. I when he says what can I do for you? What is it?

Can I get you anything? I think or no, she says do you want anything do you want anything and she says?

I want you to die. She says for you to die like whoa. Yeah, but that's that's for another day

But once we get to the just wait once we get to those reunions and those episodes come and we'll talk more about it for real

But yeah, so this Dr. Robert Knox

He was absolutely comfortable with the fact that William Burke and William Hare were providing him a steady stream of bodies to use in

His medical teachings and throughout 1828 Burke and Hare supplied Knox with nearly 20

Corpses, uh-huh

They got a very decent profit out of that. I bet they did but

We're we're Burke and Hare just resurrection men. No, I don't think so. They just really good at their jobs

No, always finding fresh bodies. Nothing is like ever like if it's too good to be true. It's not true

exactly

So during the late 18th and early 19th centuries the Western world kind of strayed away from

The original thinking that you know a dead body was the most

It's hard to explain like you know how in the beginning in Victorian times and whatnot

Death and bodies were treated a certain way. There was a lot of respect

It was a big to-do. It was a big to-do like a lot of ethics surrounding a dead body a lot of

Rituals importance placed on the body a lot. The body itself was a real like beacon of ethics and all that kind of stuff sure

This you know in the late 18th early 19th century

That's when they began to stray away from that a bit and it was more like a body's a body

It kind of did it was like a more enlightened era where

Advances in medical science were kind of reshaping this thought process a lot because people didn't think that anybody was still lurking around in their body

Right, it became more of a clinical situation. You know like medical theaters became more of a thing people were watching these dissections

It was just it really flipped the whole thing on its ear and in the early 19th century England

Trainee doctors so medical students and those hoping to become surgeons were required

To dissect at least three corpses before moving forward in their training. That's which now that's a similar thing

You're required to do gross anatomy. You're required to do that. So it stuck around

And as these trainees needed more and more hands-on experience the availability of bodies for dissection

kind of became

Entangled a bit with the with the medical school's student fees, okay

So to put it simply the more bodies a school had access to the more hands-on training

They could offer and the more hands-on training they could offer the more they could charge in student fees make sense

So this what once was like we need to do this training. That's important. So they can become good doctors

Suddenly became entangled with money and then it becomes something totally different money is the root of all

So of course for the purposes of training exercises

Like we were saying only recently deceased bodies would really suffice here. Mm-hmm. That's where that issue came from that we were just talking about

So this created a demand that was far outweighing the supply at the time

And the only legal supply of bodies for the purpose of dissection were those who had actually been executed at the gallows

Oh, okay. Yeah, which that makes sense which at the time was only about 50 people per year

Okay, well, so that's good. That's good. It's not for this. It's not giving you a great supply of people

but like the

Like at the time executions themselves were heavily attended by spectators the dissections were also heavily attended social events

They often took on kind of like a like a carnival

Atmosphere. Yeah, there was a lot of showmanship involved a lot of theater. It's like the I think you did a whole episode on that

Way early on in the podcast. It's like we were talking about how like the

Uh, how executions executions. Yeah. Yeah, and that's definitely what happened with like dissections in medical theaters

When it was like a new

A new carnival to go to is probably how they saw it a new macabre thing

That was happening before you were very eyes

And at the royal college of surgeons in london, for example, um early 19th century instructor professor professor

Giovanni Aldini

He was known to perform tricks in the form of like

Basically macabre experiments on corpses don't love. Uh, he would make disembodied heads open their eyes

With like electrical shock. Oh, no. Uh, he would have like a a dead hand clutch

Things he's having a little too much fun with it. Yeah, he would use galvanic experimentation

And this involves using electrical sparks like static electricity

To demonstrate that it could cause different muscles to twitch and even move a dissected specimen

Wow, it's yeah, it's interesting and it's fascinating that you can do that. It's just a matter of should you do that

Exactly, that's the thing you can do that. Yes, which should you also you saying galvanic took me to a place of failing every science course

I've ever taken there you go

Well, and this made me look into galvanism a little bit because I was like I'd never heard of that

So I I'd heard like a little bit about making things move with electricity

Yeah, but a little side note about galvanism. It's really fascinating in

1751 England passed the murder act

And this act allowed the bodies of recently executed murderers to be used for medical experimentation

So that's how they were able to get the bodies from the gallows

This way the demand for corpses for medical colleges would be aided and also the murderer

In their eyes was suggested to also

Subjected excuse me to having his body dissected which at that time was still considered a desecration

And just another form of posthumous punishment. Oh, whatever they had done. Okay, so this is important in a second

So just remember that putting it in my pocket

But in 1780 and that Italian professor

Luigi Galvani was the one who suddenly found or excuse me. It wasn't that professor. It was a relation to that other sure

Um, he was the one who suddenly found that he could use jolts of electricity to make the muscles of deceased

And dissected frogs at the time

Twitch around and look like they were alive

I love frogs once he discovered this others quickly started using this method of experimentation on other animals as well dead animals

Yes, um Galvani's nephew a physicist named

Giovanni Aldini who we just talked about

Actually used the body of an ox to do this

Wow, he cut the ox's head off and used electricity to make its tongue move around

I just like don't think you have to I just like don't want to I don't want to go to that show

Yeah, I'm I'm also a little weird

But yeah, it's a little weird and once word got out about this though people began to attend the

Demonstrations where people where they would like electrify cows pigs other animal heads as like a show the human species

Species human species

Um, so in november 1818 a scottish chemist andrew yuri, I believe it is took shit to another level

Oh, no, he had not only conducted these experiments, but he did so on recently executed murders because of the murder act

Um, and he did it for the reason of believing he could use electricity not just to reanimate particular muscles in a corpse

He believed that he could bring an entire corpse back to life. Well, dr. Frankenstein here we go

On this november evening in 1818 yuri did a truly theatrical demonstration in front of a theater of onlookers

On a 35 year old murderer named Matthew Clydesdale

He had murdered his fellow coal miner who was an 80 year old man. Jesus christ. Yeah that guy and he had used a pickaxe

Oh my god monster. So you're gonna try to bring this man back to life

That's the thing

So he was in an anatomical theater full of people watching and he managed for over an hour to use electrical current

Directed through rods at different nerve points to make it look like the dead murderer was breathing

Like his chest went up and down and they made his hand point at people in the crowd. Wow

They needed a hobby a different topic. Yeah, I was gonna say this was their hobby unfortunately bravo. They needed bravo

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Uh, so he actually wrote about these experiments and the demonstration and some of the entries that were found in his like journals

And on atlas obscura

I found some of those entries and one of them says every muscle in his countenance was

Simultaneously thrown into fearful action rage horror despair anguish and ghastly smiles

United their hideous expression in the murderer's face

surpassing far the wildest representations of a fucelli or a keen an actor and a painter

At this period several of the spectators were forced to leave the apartment from terror or sickness

And one gentleman fainted same and he said he thought the experiment was important

But not really fruitful because even if he had managed to revive this man from the dead

He was bringing back a murderer exactly and that's not awesome

So either way interesting and since this was something happening at the time and in medical colleges

It seemed like an interesting side quest for me to take. I just had to so

So back to the resurrection man of this time in the early 19th century skilled trades people could kind of they could expect to

Make in their trades like regular trades

They could make between five and ten shillings for 72 hour grueling work week. Yay

By contrast

Selling a fresh cadaver could net you as many as 20 guinea guineas, which is around

420 shillings. Oh, shit. That's from the medical training schools

Under the circumstances the imbalance between supply and demand

created an economic opportunity that

While it's pretty

ghoulish

And a little hideous

It would be hard for a lot of people of the time to pass up. Yeah, because remember like this is these are people

Hard up. Mm-hmm in really bad situations. They're a little desperate at this point makes sense

So that's at least what you have to think of when you think of the perspective at the time. I'm not saying I would do it

I'm just saying I'm not in those dire straits that they were in right now

Also in England the penalty for unlawful disinterment

Was a small fine or up to six months in jail. Wow

so

Certainly horrified the public grave robbing

But grave robbing in general wasn't really taken that seriously by the authorities either because that's not that big of a

Penalty penalty at all. Yeah, so in fact while procuring fresh bodies was typically left to

grave robbers and resurrection men

In sometimes to a lesser extent students would actually go out and find them themselves

It was like a like a hazing ritual. Yeah, literally

It was not entirely unheard of for a professor

To help in the process getting desperate especially if they hope to obtain a special prize

So

There's that now. It was the promise of good money that caused normal people to head out to cemeteries and collect these bodies

They would use grappling hooks and wood spades

Um, because these were less noisy than like metal tools that would get them caught in the act and these resurrection men

Um, they would also be called ex ex ex zoomators. I believe it's how you say that makes or lifters

That's also what they're called

They could put in like very little effort with the right tools and they earned

You know more than they would earn in a weeks time in one night. Damn. Yeah

Now in Edinburgh several safeguards were actually installed in cemeteries across the city to make sure this wasn't happening because it was such a big problem

Yeah, these included watchtowers. They had mort safes, which were large. You can look them up online. They're large iron cages

That sat over a grave site to prevent body snatch. Oh, I might have seen photos of at the obituary show

They yes, they showed a mort safe

So if you haven't gotten your tickets to the obituary, uh, us tour you should do that because it's fucking hilarious and you learn a lot

Yeah, uh, but these protective measures

They definitely limited more the procurement of cadavers, which was making things harder and making

medical the medical colleges in Edinburgh

Get cadavers from london, liverpool or ireland

And they were costing more money in that situation and probably the reward went up because it was a harder thing to do

Exactly. So the more the harder it is to procure something

People find nefarious ways to get it. I love the way that you just said nefarious

I know, I don't know why I said it like that. You were in scotland in that moment

But I don't know why I was like nefarious nefarious. Um, oh, what was I gonna say?

I don't know and that's where the problem lies. It's like if something's harder to get people are gonna find nefarious ways to get it

Oh, that's what I was gonna say. Yeah, it's it's not the catch. It's the chase. Exactly

so with the dissection of dead human bodies serving both a scientific and

entertainment

function at the time and the value of the recently dead now

Shooting up there at a premium. It was only a matter of time before the criminal and pretty unscrupulous

people turned to not only

Digging these bodies up. Oh god, but turned to other ways

Murder to get bodies. That's exactly we're gonna turn to murder to meet demand. Oh, no, and at the time none

We're going to be as prolific or

Dare I say efficient at doing this than Edinburgh's Burke and Hare. Oh, no

So let's talk about Burke and Hare. Both Burke and Hare had a tendency to um

Um, exaggerate their lives. Okay, both of them their origin stories their achievements

It's giving Henry Lee Lucas and

An oddest tool. Yeah

so at this point, it's difficult to really discern back from fiction and

You know, there's some things frustrating. I know because they're just liars. They lie out of their face into your face

So it's just not good

But there are definitely some facts that we know are true. Okay

So William Burke was born in Liam de Berca in 1792 in County Tyrone Ireland

He was the son of Neil Burke who was a laborer

And while many in late 18th century Ireland were very poor and made a meager living performing manual labor

William Burke's upbringing seems to be a little more fortunate than those around him. Huh?

He received a fair education. It's described as okay. He can read and write, you know

And he found work as a servant to a Presbyterian minister

But it didn't take long for him to get a little tired of that work and he moved on

So from there, he tried his hand at being a weaver, a baker, a shoemaker, a candlestick maker

I was waiting for that and then he turned to the Donagull militia in 1809

Where he served as a personal attendant to one of the senior officers

I was gonna say that sounds intense

It is and it was during this time that the militia with the militia that William Burke married Margaret Coleman

Who was a young woman from the town of Bolina? Well, that's a pretty town name. Right? Bolina

He that's actually uh, it's like the chicken's name in return to Oz

Bolina, I believe it's Bolina. Look at you. Yeah. Look at you quoting horror films. Go watch return to us

I love that. That's a horror film. I love it. It is it really is

Uh, but he went to live with Margaret Coleman after um, after the militia was disbanded in 1816

And he found employment with a quote country gentleman

And continued living with his wife and her family. Okay

Uh, that was an until that they lived together with the family until an ongoing argument with her father

Made it a little unlivable. That'll do it. The main point of their contention was Burke's

Obsession with leasing his father-in-law's land

But his father-in-law refused to transfer the lease of his land into Burke's name

So Burke was just pissed and just straight up abandoned the family in 1817

Because he couldn't have leased land from his land. That wasn't even his yeah

He was like fuck you guys and he just went to scotland

He never returned to ireland and he never saw his wife again. Holy. I was gonna say they were married, right?

Oh my god, I'm out. What did well that goes to show you exactly who this man is exactly

We're working with his father-in-law wouldn't transfer the lease of his land into his name and he was like well

I'm out. He's like, I don't know her. I don't know her no way rolls up the window

So while there are some surviving documents to verify William Burke's origins

We can't say the same for William Harris

Uh-oh his life before and after this whole story is a little mysterious, but

Some of it's questionable. We can find bits and pieces of it

But by most accounts he was born in ireland in the early 1790s

According to George McGregor who is the author of a history surrounding this case and the resurrectionist times and movement

Okay, hair was quote brought up without any education or proper moral training and rapidly slipped into a vagabonding kind of life

His temper was brutal and ferocious and when he was in liquor. He was perfectly unbearable. Oh, no

Like his later pal Burke William Hare left ireland for scotland in late 1817 or maybe early 1818

And he found work as a lumper at the docks in hopetown. What's that?

Uh, basically lumpers unloaded the shipments. They were just called lumpers, which is hilarious

But in the it was 1818 during his early days of working at the canal that William Burke met Helen McDougal

She was a widower at a very young age

And McDougal had two children to support

So she took up with Burke in madison and the couple lived for all intents and purposes as a married couple

I was going to say they just couldn't get married because he already had a wife back home

Married although they would remain together for the decade leading up to Burke's eventual death

It seems they never really had a uh loving or nice relationship

They both were heavy drinkers. They fought constantly

Their arrangement seemed like it was

Tolerable and acceptable to both of them, but it wasn't like a lovely situation out of convenience. Yeah

Which is unfortunate for everybody, especially the kids. Yeah, and due to economic instability Burke and McDougal

Dougal moved around a lot and eventually made their way to Edinburgh in 1827

There they took up residence in a boarding house in Portsburgh

Portsburgh, excuse me where Burke had planned to set up a cobbler shop

The home was actually owned by

Ding ding ding

William Hare I knew it and Margaret Laird

So I wish it was Lair Laird Laird and Hare Laird and Hare

Burke had actually William Burke had met Margaret Laird a few months before actually

So he knew her that's how they got the room at the boarding house

And Laird had convinced Burke and McDougal to move into the boarding house

She had inherited from her previous husband who had died. I think two years earlier everybody dying

It's that time, you know, yeah

Like many accommodations in Edinburgh's west port at the time

The boarding house was not great. Yeah, it was known as Tanner's Close

Um, it catered to poor immigrants who'd come to the city looking for work

So they didn't they were not treated well, you know, so this house was not well maintained

It was what historians have since described as dirty low and wretched awesome

The rooms of these boarding houses were filled with a ton of beds as many beds as you could get

But windows were at street level so they looked directly in so there was no privacy

Um, but there was one smaller room at the back of this boarding house that had only one window

Looking out over a pigsty

Nice, so you know an actual moving on up

And this is actually the particular setting where a lot of the crimes of Burke and Hare would eventually unfold

Okay, looking out over a pigsty. Oh god, that's awful. Yeah, it's giving Willie picked in. Yeah, it's not great

so it would be easy and

Probably reasonable to assume that body snatching for profit was the work of lazy men

Hoping to get rich on a very short night of work. Yeah

But like we said before that's not necessarily true

In the case of Burke and Hare both were very hard workers

Like that is one thing you can say about them

That's what it sounds like. They actually continued to work their respective trades

Burke was a cobbler and Hare was a boatman or a salesman and to keep up with the parents

Even after they were selling bodies

And in fact looking at the year where their spree began

Author of Burke and Hare uh Burke and Hare the book. Oh and Dudley Edwards describes them as quote excellent examples of immigrant enterprise

Whose ultimate business diligently answered the needs of the host culture

Basically despite the horrific acts and very ghoulish

Nature of the business that they were entering Burke and Hare saw a need for cadavers and were able to meet the need through hard work

and ingenuity making them a good

representation of

work ethic at first

Key words at first at first

But then because remember we are talking about a time where people are desperate

We're talking about a time where people are living in fucking terrible conditions, especially immigrants

We are talking about people just desperate to get enough food on the table for their family or feed their you know

Feed their kids keep a roof over the kids house

Those are the people that would turn to this for quick money. Yeah

Burke and Hare in the beginning were doing just that. Yeah

But then they turned to murder and that's not okay

I'm not saying the grave robbing is okay. I'm saying that desperation

Is a part of this story totally in the beginning right in the this is where it ends. This is where the

Desperation meager working, you know living conditions all this stuff. That's where we there's always a line

We're drawing a line right here

So nobody say that i'm saying that it's fine that you murder people for medical schools. I'm saying that right now

No, don't say that this is where it ends not okay

Okay, so

Again, this is before shit got really real

So Burke Hare and their women lared in mcdougal were all trying to make at least a slightly honest living

Again, they were working at Burke was a cobbler. Hare was a boatman

Lared was a landlady and mcdougal was selling Burke shoes. Okay, so they were all working together

They were all working in honest living, but around november 29th 1827 things turned nefarious

And then imagine saying that you had a pair of Burke shoes

Yeah, I bet sales went down that'd be wild

Now this evening one of lared's tenants who was an aged pensioner. That's how he's described named donald

He died in the house. Sure and he died of natural causes. Oh, okay. He actually did. Okay. This is one where he actually did

Um, some sources say he died of dropsy, which is edema

Um, and that was honestly so this was often the case for pensioners and transients at the time

Donald was live was on living credit

Which means he had an arrangement with lared that he would pay for his

Living the roof over his head when his pension came. Okay, he would receive that quarterly

but unfortunately donald had died before receiving his next pension so

Lared and hare had also loaned him money at one point

So they're like the the runners of this boarding house, obviously

They'd loaned him money. They were letting him live on this like you pay me when your pension comes

So now he's gone. They're not getting the pension. They're not getting their money back

So he actually owed them a fairly large sum of money, which is not like a bad thing. They they loaned him the money

Everything was fine. It was on the app

They were now expected to forfeit that but in his confession later given after his arrest

Burke explained that hare had informed the authorities of the man's death as you should

And he was hoping that if nothing else they would just take the body out and the parish parish would pay for the burial

Because he was like not only am I not getting

Paid for the living expenses. I'm not getting the money back that we loaned him and now I'm expected to bury this guy

Oh, like he would have been expected to pay for the burial

So he was like, I'm not doing that. So he called the authorities being like you just got to take him out of here

Yeah, and again the parish would hopefully pay for it. Okay

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So they waited because they were like sure we'll come pick them up

And they waited for the coffin to come and hair continued to be really pissed and bummed about the lost income

And expenses that he wasn't going to get back. And this is when Burke suggested

Why don't we just sell the body to the surgeon for the purposes of dissection?

Because he's got no one around. He's got no family. Well, that's really we can't pay for him. He owes us money anyways

Again, I'm not saying this me. I'm saying this is what they were thinking. Right. Right. So they're thinking, you know

And although the practice was illegal and very seriously discouraged from social speaking a lot of people were doing it

Burke had extensive experience with medical practitioners from his days in the militia

And he knew that they were often willing to pay a pretty good sum for recently deceased body that didn't have signs of trauma

So he's looking to get his money back

So they talked a little bit about it and it was decided that they were going to sell Donald's body and recoup hair's losses

But they are how he saw it. Didn't they already call the people to come pick him up?

Well, so this is what ended up happening because when I read that too, I was like, what did you tell those people that came?

Yeah, exactly. They were just coming to drop off the coffin

They hadn't even arranged yet for the parish to bury him. Okay, these authorities were coming to bring the coffin

Gotcha. Gotcha. So they figured they could recoup hair's losses

Get this whole thing taken care of get them out of the house

Get a new person in there

There you go

And they said Burke was the one that was going to do the negotiating for the price and two days later when the coffin was delivered

Burke and Hare stood by they watched as the deliveryman loaded the body into the coffin nailed it shut

Then they left and it was going to be picked up by whoever was going to transfer it to the cemetery

But as soon as those people were out of sight

Burke and Hare pried open the lid removed Donald's body. They hid it in a nearby bed

and

They stuffed things in the casket

That would make it heavier mimic the weight of a human being. Oh my god

Exactly. I think they used Tanner's bark that they collected from the backyard

Then they resealed it and then they had it picked up to be interred at the west church yard

Shit. So it was a filled casket of something else that was interred. Oh my god

So with the first part of the plan

Success in their eyes Burke and Hare next set about finding a buyer for Donald's body

So they first stopped at the surgical college and they asked a student where they could find Dr. Monroe

Who they assumed they would want to see for selling a body. He was like the head guy, right?

Right. So the student gave them directions to Monroe's home

But through a series of like weird really weird mistakes and coincidences

They instead found themselves at another doctor's home. It was an intentional. Okay. This doctor was Dr. Robert Knox

Who was I don't know if you remember him from the beginning. Yeah, we talked about right

I thought you said his name. He was from the top of the episode

He was a private anatomy teacher who had the most students and they used the most bodies in the city

Okay, so they just happened to come across this guy when they were looking for another doctor

Right, and they've come across the doctor who needs the most bodies that they can get. I see so whether or not

Things would have been different if they had come to Monroe's door

Or some other teacher that had some more

squirrels

We don't know right maybe honestly

I think most doctors at the time would have taken this body. They were desperate just because of the way shit was

But who knows things could have been different

We'll never know if they were turned away and they couldn't find anything. They didn't get paid for it

I think they would have ended up murdering people

For some other reason right later down the line because I don't think these are good men

So I think it would have gone down that road differently, but I think it could have been a different story. Okay, but

Whatever Knox was desperate for bodies. So he was thrilled by this offer. Yeah, so he gave the men 10 shillings for Donald's corpse

This one transaction was the thing that's set into motion

The awful chain of events that was going to happen after this the deaths of at least 16 people

16 in one of the worst crime sprees in Scottish history

Wow

So until this point Birkenhair's only crime and this is what I was talking about before if they committed one at all

In the eyes of the time was unlawful

Disinterment

Okay, because they had they hadn't killed him right they hadn't done any that's all they had died. Yeah

However, they hadn't actually exhumed the man's body. They only sold his corpse

So it's unclear whether there was even a crime here at all

Because they didn't just technically nobody had really done this. He was never buried. Yeah

Unlawful disinterment was digging up a body grave robbing

Right man was never about buried because nobody thought they would have to make another law of like hey if you know

Yeah, like so there's like a loopy hole here that I think they were banking on

But technically I wonder if they could have been charged with disinterment because he was in the coffin

And they took him out of his coffin. That's what I wondered. Yeah, I wondered if maybe who knows I couldn't I didn't find

What the specific language of the um crime would be sure

But I wonder if that's a that's a very good point because I wonder if them prying open that coffin would have counted

Even though he was only in there for a moment

You're disintering him and you are yeah, you know like technically so I I guess that would be like how a jury would see it

Yeah, so it's like you can't you can look at this as like

All right, they haven't murdered anyone yet, but then you also look at it and go well, maybe you did commit a crime here

Yeah, you disturbed about definitely committed an ethical crime, but like a technical crime like a crime perhaps. Yeah, but either way

the

What would be looked at at the time

As a pretty petty crime that they had just committed like somebody died naturally in their home

They owed these people a debt that they didn't pay

They were put in a coffin these people just took them out of the coffin and sold them for that debt

Yeah at the time that would be like wow that was fucked up, but like that's really all that would happen

So that being such in the in the eyes of the time a petty crime

Makes it really surprising how brutal and quick they escalated from that

So they probably like you were just saying like you were like oh, I think they would have done it anyway

I think you're right because it's like

You don't just go from that to this what they end up doing. Oh, no

It's just it's one thing to sell the body of a man who dies by natural causes again

Fucked up with the death and saddling you with getting rid of the body at the time

It's quite another thing to

Systematically seek out a particular type of victim and murder them purely to be paid, right?

That is a very different series of crime

Yeah, that's your so it's a little bit like a hitman and I think that point

Yeah, and I think that's why it's so shocking the crimes of brick and hair because it is such a

a

Like they went so quickly and just really brutality

um

And to sell a body outside of proper channels well in poor taste is

Again entirely understandable given the impoverished circumstances of scotland's immigrant working class at the time

but

That next step would never be murder for most of these people like most of these people that would be the end of it

It would be tough

You're gonna have trouble sleeping at night with what you did, but you didn't murder anybody

Yeah, but that's why that's why this also doesn't make sense

I'm like there's got to be more in here that we don't know about

And people do think there are more murders that we don't know about from them

Really that maybe aren't even tied to this medical industry that like because it really there's not a lot of sense here for this jump

Well, and I wonder too if there's murders that they couldn't have used the bodies because they had to be more pristine

Exactly, I wonder there's got to be more in right now when it comes to identifying the first victim of berkin hair

There is a little bit of a discrepancy with their confessions

But you just work with what you have because this was a long time ago

According to berk the first victim of their scheme was abigail simpson. She was a minor hawker

Which is like a like they would hawk things, you know what I mean like selling. Oh, oh, oh, I see

Like did you say throw? Yeah, like hawk a loogie. Just hawk and things

Um, but she was a minor hawker from the nearby village of gilmerton who stopped at the boarding house for an evening

In hair's confession. He identifies the first victim as a man named joseph

So joseph was a miller who was also staying at the boarding house at the time and was very ill with a fever

It's

So they both died

So it's like whether they were first or not. Well, they probably killed so many people that that that's why there's a discrepancy

And we kind of go with hair's confession here because hair's confession was the most consistent and unchanging

Berks would kind of jump around a little bit

It's generally generally believed that hair's version of events is probably the most accurate

It also makes more sense that they went from the first

crime of somebody dying naturally and them just selling the body

To maybe killing someone who was ill already and dying. Yeah, it does make more sense

If we want to make any sense out of it, but either way it's fucked

But i'm just trying to make some sense of the escalation here. Yeah

Now it was in late january or early february 1828 just a month or two after having sold the

body of pensioner donald's

That joseph the miller became very ill with a fever that i think made him stay in bed. He couldn't get out of bed

He was unable to speak. He was like delusional

Oh god

And fearful of having a man so very close to death in their home

Laird, so um the the other owner of the boarding house

She was eager to get rid of this man as soon as possible

Yeah, and she had no idea how to go about doing it. She she wasn't saying and like let's kill him

She was just like we gotta get him out of here because I don't want him to die in my boarding house

Which is god. That is the like mentality and brutality and callousness of the time. No, it's true. It's get it

I keep saying it's giving it reminds me a lot of the jack the ripper when you hear like you can't die in my boarding house

You know like it wasn't even it's foreign to us

But at the time that was it was desperation. There was such a lack of empathy

There was and it was it was a lack of empathy that was beaten into people

Like this it wasn't a lack of empathy that there was a bunch of you know, like yeah, exactly

It was like no, this was like

beaten into people who just were treated like

Bucking scum twas as harry would say a sign of the times. It truly was a sign of the times, but

Sensing so this so this was happening. Laird is a little like what do we do here?

Yeah, sensing another opportunity to make a quick buck

Buck burkin hair began discussing the best ways to get rid of this man. Woof

Ultimately, they decided they should suffocate him. Oh

Yes, scottish historians or walter scott suggested that

rather than

a giant like

Crazy olympic leap from opportunistic body snatcher to cold's blooded killer

This killing

Might be that like I said that like line in between. Yep the gray area sent them into that

whole thing like the really dark area

Because they would frame it as a mercy killing right and an act to protect the

The reputation of hare and lairds boarding house because you know on people dying in your boarding house

Right people are gonna hear about it, right?

That's how they framed it and that's how they were kind of taking it as that like little transition period between

Being a totally just shitty grave robber and being a fucking blooded killer

cold-blooded killer

So whatever the case it was here that berks preferred method of killing was established

He placed his hand over joseph's mouth and nose and he instructed hare to lay across

The man's chest to prevent flailing and to make it harder for him to breathe wow and that's how they would do it

Like hand over mouth and nose the other one would lay on the chest

So it was a very brutal way of killing someone very scary and terrifying and awful for the person that was being killed

Yeah

Now before the evolution of modern forensics

This murder method which would become known later as birking. Oh, I don't like that at all

Yeah, it was very ideal for what they needed to do because it wasn't leaving anything right and there was an again without the

Modern forensics we have that somebody could tell when somebody is suffocated right right you couldn't tell back then

One hand over the nose and mouth or sometimes they would force the jaw shut

It was very difficult if not impossible for the victim to draw any breath that way

And then the weight of the second man on the victim's chest

Prevented the diagram of diaphragm and lungs from expanding

Um, so it was very fast

It was effective for what they were trying to do and there were no visible signs of trauma

That would affect the price that nox was going to offer

Is there particular hemorrhaging when you get suffocated? Yeah, but they just didn't know what that was

They didn't know what that was that was not a very common thing that they would be like. Oh, you suffocated this person

Um, this technique was used in the murder of Abigail Simpson very shortly after this or what we believe was shortly after this

According to Burke's confession Abigail Simpson had arrived at the boarding house on February 11th and

Quote was decoyed in by hair and his wife

The three spent the evening drinking and after several drinks

Um, uh, Simpson began talking about how difficult it had been to support her daughter as a single mother. Oh god

That's what makes this even worse to me is like she literally brought that force to you

Well in like you spent hours drinking with her and got to know her

Yeah, like then did whatever you did and got to know that she was talking about how hard her life was how she had a child

That's she was raising that child by herself. Like you're an asshole. No, you're just gonna like orphan a baby

Yeah, so at some point hair told Abigail that he was a single man

And suggested that he would marry her and provide financial support. Yeah, right

Which convinced her to stay the night at least

The next day Abigail was violently ill and was vomiting from drinking the night before

So hair gave her quote some porter and whiskey

Which caused her to become so intoxicated that she passed out in the bed in the back room

Do you think that they were doing anything to her drinks beforehand? I could see that for sure

But there's no indication of it. Like no likes, you know

Official indication, but I could see that happening for sure. Yeah

Um, but she passed out on that bed in the back room the one that overlooks the pigs die

And once she'd passed out Burke entered the room and then he laid across her legs and feet

While hair covered her nose and mouth with his hand until she suffocated

It was so scary when the sun had gone down and it was darker outside

They carried her body to Nox's dissecting room where he paid them 10 ceilings for the body

And remember Nox isn't asking where they're getting these bodies from see that's the problem because it's you're turning a blind eye

Yeah, like sure are the blindest of us and there's a point which I believe we're probably gonna get to in part two

Where there's one that you're like you turned a real blind eye on that one. Oh, yeah

Yeah, so the pair's third victim, uh, which Burke mentioned in his confession

He called him simply an Englishman, a nadir of Cheshire

Uh, he so not even a name

Just an Englishman. Yeah, he was killed under circumstances that were pretty similar to Joseph the Miller

So the man was described as being 40 years old

Um, and he used to sell spunks in Edinburgh. He's got spunk

What we could see is that spunks are like some kind of like a woody tinder. Okay

I don't know why it's called spunks, but at the time that he met Burke and Hare. He was unemployed

And he'd come to the boarding house

And when he had come to the boarding house, he appeared to be ill. He was suffering from jaundice. They believe

Um, just like the others the man was taken to the private back room near the pig's die

He was smothered and then the body was removed once it got dark that night taken to Nox

He paid him out 10 shillings. It didn't ask any questions

Now if there was any kind of emotional conflict over the murders of these three

The first three victims neither Burke nor Hare seems to have

indicated any kind of like

You know emotional turmoil, guilt

Any kind of remorse so they probably would have murdered even if it weren't for the money

They seemed like they were totally they just went about their lives. So nothing was affecting them

They didn't seem off to people around them. Like, you know, how you'll hear that sometimes like, I don't know. We seemed off

Yeah, you know, he didn't none of them seemed off and the people that were around these schemes meaning the two women in the boarding house

specifically layered

They didn't seem like they were really

Asking questions either. Oh, I don't like that at all. Yeah

And what would happen was Burke would explain to Dr. Knox that the men had come across these bodies

either through a relative or some kind of close, you know

Relative a personal friend or some kind of acquaintance. There's always

Close to them, but not close to them far enough away where it wasn't weird

Yeah, it was always like that arms length like I know this person who knows this person

And but and obviously that's a very flimsy explanation. Like he like Knox is like, oh, yeah, you got another one and they're like, oh, yeah

Like my cousin's brother's friend, you know, he died and then why not? He said it was fine

And Knox is just like, okay

Like I don't need to ask anything else. That's like maybe ask like two questions at least and then wildly

In at least one of the murders Abigail Simpson

Margaret Laird is implicated in that crime. She was drinking with them. She knew what was going on

She was in the house when it happened like

She was at the very least to an active participant in luring Abigail into the house

That's what I was going to ask. I had a feeling at some point. She was going to be involved in this all

and

um author of the anatomy murders the book another book about this case, which will like um, we'll put them in the sources

Lisa Rosner, she said the earnings for each body were split three ways

Um with hair getting six Burke getting four and Laird getting one

So she was an active participant

weird

and and active in the sense like she got one

shilling because

She was luring or getting them drunk and turning a blind eye not actively like physically murdering someone

But she was an accessory. Yeah

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So Burke and mcdougal who is Burke's lady yep, she's the other piece of this four person puzzle

Mm-hmm Burke maintained until his death that mcdougal knew nothing of these murders

Well, you don't really hear much about her other than nope

He married her and that's why she was never really

And she wasn't included in the split either

Like that was split three ways. It wasn't split four and she would have been in it if she was part of it

And she wasn't so interesting. That's interesting or

Did hair get more because and like

Like like she she was cut into his like his six he got the most were part of her earnings earnings

It absolutely could have been the case because it's like how because hair is coming home with all this money

And you're not wondering where it's coming from. Well, that's the thing. I don't think she had a physical part in it

I don't even think she had really the physical part that laird did

But she had to know something was a rye like he's getting money somewhere like you said exactly

She's got to be asking where's this coming from right and who knows maybe he again these people are good liars

Like he could have said anything. Oh, I did so extra work at the boarding house

These guys are shit bags. So it's like, you know, you're with a shit bag. You know, he's not getting money

via

Wholesome means like come on like you gotta know I'm sure you don't know that this is what's going on

But then at the same time you're in the boarding house

True. You're not seeing anything. I don't know. Yeah, maybe she just kept quiet

But he maintained Burke was very clear till his death said she knew nothing about it

Did not participate in it had nothing to do with it jam or hair, right?

Yeah, sorry. Yeah

But for the most part Burke and hair chose their victims

Like most serial killers choose their victims. They were typically transients

So it was like one of those things and and honestly marginalized people they would pick

So it was like the less dead

Fewer social connect connections people that weren't going to be in their opinion missed, right?

Um, there are however a few exceptions to this

method that they went with

Their fourth victim Mary Patterson

Was definitely going to be missed. She was known by a lot of people in town by face and name

According to her landlady Mary quote much

Was quote much given to drink and had even been jailed

For at least 10 days the previous year for being drunk disorderly and creating a crowd

Oh, which meant she was also known to police which is another reason to not

Pick this person see it now

This is where I wonder if they were escalating and they wanted some more excitement out of it

That's the thing like this wasn't just financially profitable, but they wanted a little more right now on the evening of April 8th

So Mary went out to a public house with her friend and roommate Janet Brown

The two of them ran into William Burke

So he was apparently liking the two ladies and he ordered a bottle of whiskey and invited them to join him at his table

Because he's really good guys. Yeah, totally during the trial Janet Brown the friend said that Burke's advances made her uncomfortable

And she was actually very reluctant to join him

But Mary was quote always a forward fearless disposition and had no reservations

So they stayed there. They drank with him all night. The following morning Burke took both women to the nearby home of his brother

Constantine. Mm-hmm. There they had a big breakfast. They drank two more bottles of whiskey

Shit

And after that Mary passed out and she was moved to a small bed while Burke and hair went out to get more food and more alcohol

Okay

Several hours later the scene was discovered by Helen McDougal

Mm-hmm. She was

Pissed to find Burke hanging out with two women who he was clearly like

Wooing. Yeah, and so they began arguing the couple. Okay

And during this it got violent and during this whole thing Burke hit her hard enough to open a huge gash on her forehead

Oh my god

Yeah, like pieces of absolute shit

And Janet Brown the friend of Mary would later tell the court that she was quote much alarmed by their proceedings

And tried to wake her friend Mary so they could get the hell out of there. Yeah

But Burke ushered her out the door before she could wake up her friend. What the fuck?

So even though he wouldn't let her go wake her friend

She was like, okay. Well, I'm gonna come back and I'm gonna get her later. Yeah

I'm gonna get her and he said returned within a half an hour to get her

Now brown is gone. Janet Brown. She's out of the house and McDougal is sitting in the adjacent room

Um, remember McDougal supposedly

Doesn't know anything about this. She's turning a blind eye. Okay, and Burke and Herr decided to employ their usual method of suffocation

And they killed Mary Patterson

So when Janet Brown came back a half an hour later to remember this isn't even the boarding house. This is Constantine's house

This is the brother

They she comes back a little while later and she's told that Mary had gone out to town with Burke and it was unknown when they would return

Okay, so she was like, um, I don't know about that. So she came back to the house again several hours later

But this time she was told that Mary and Burke had never returned

What okay

So Janet Brown was like, um, I'm gonna come back again

So she returned back later and even reported Mary's disappearance to the police

But because of their low social status and having a reputation of being heavy drinkers and you know other

unsavory in the time behaviors

The report wasn't taken seriously at all and it was never investigated

Good, so they just didn't investigate it. We're like, well, that's probably fun

That's really shitty. Now four or five hours after killing Mary Patterson

The two men loaded her body into a large tea crate and they carried it over to Knox's dissection room

When they got there with the body one of Knox's assistants

recognized Mary from town

And asked about how they'd come into possession of her body, right?

To which Burke replied that he'd purchased it from an old woman at the back of cannon gate

So the student at Dr. Knox's school were like

What the fuck but they were also so taken with Mary's beauty

They said that she was quote so handsome a figure and well-shaped in body and limbs

That the professor called in a local painter to create a portrait of her

Instead of inquiring further

As to how this man

These two men are saying they bought

This woman's body from a woman behind somewhere. They're like

Yeah, yeah, that probably checks out. She's so hot though

We should get a painter in here and we should get a fucking portrait taken of her like wow

Uh, what oh and what's crazy is before he painted her the painter asked Burke to cut off the woman's hair

To like cut off some of the hair gave him a pair of scissors to do it

And before leaving Knox gave Burke eight shillings and allowed him to keep the two and a half

shillings that were found

Clutched in Mary's hand when she arrived. I have to go at this point in time. Yep. I actually have to leave. Yep

So the murder of Mary Patterson was definitely a large departure from Burke and Hare's pattern. Yeah

Not only was the woman known to tons of people in town and they actually she was recognized immediately

But other unlike other victims he'd been seen socializing with her at a public house for hours

Yeah, like even gone so far as to seduce her and go back to his brother's house with her

Like that's a lot of like brazen. Yeah, a lot of a lot of eyes on you and the surprisingly

Limited details of the murder that basically were only provided by Burke's confession

Um, they it suggests that Burke kind of felt

differently about this killing than he did to others because the way he described this one was different

The amount of time he spent with the victim was different people are like what the fuck happened there like it's a that's a weird departure

And the you know the weird intimacy that were shared was shared between Burke and Patterson

put the scheme and

Both of their freedom at risk to be honest like Burke really put them

In big time really bad position here one might call it a pickle a very big pickle

They again, they had been seen multiple places by multiple people countless people

And the last well known she was well known people know her by name and face and the last place she was seen alive

Is at Constantine Burke's home?

right

Like Burke's own brother that how that doesn't

The fact that they weren't arrested

really can only be explained by really bad policing and

A complete disinterest in the safety and welfare of the lower social classes here

Totally because even her friend knows the last two people she was seen with them. They're like, yes, and we're telling the authorities

Sorry, yes, they were just like, yeah, I don't know. She's gone like that sucks to suck. I guess like what the fuck

So given the inconsistencies in their confessions and the namelessness of most of their victims

It's pretty impossible to create like a really accurate chronology chronological chronological order

Of the murders committed between april and october 1828

Instead you can you can like group them together to kind of form a an approximate picture

I would say of when the really big things happened

Burke's friendliness with mary paterson had caused a number of

Minor problems for the pair who whether they knew it or not made the decision to return to the more

Convenient and less familiar victims. I don't know if that was a conscious effort

Like they were like, we can't do that again or they just did it because they were like, well, that was a headache

Right and just like didn't think about it

But either way they went back to the beginning where it was like people they didn't think we're gonna be missed very well

Now the first of these victims, unfortunately was elizabeth haldane

Who showed up at hair's boarding house sometime in early spring of 1828?

Uh, he knew nothing more about her than her name, but he described her as quote a stout old woman

She had but one tooth in her mouth and that was a very large one in the front. Oh, that's how he described her

That's fucked now berk found the woman sleeping off drink in a pile of straw in the stable

That's so sad and retrieved more alcohol to give to her

Once she was sufficiently drunk and very unstable and able to take care of herself

They suffocated her with the usual manner and left her in the barn until the following day

And that's when they took her body to nox

A few months later elizabeth haldane's daughter

Margaret was also murdered by berk

What and was murdered by berk alone and did they did he know that there was a connection there?

So that's the thing. We're not really sure so she was

Briefly staying at the boarding house

And this murder is one that you can read a lot about and it gets distorted a lot through a lot of fictional accounts for the murder

um

A lot of them portray her as like this daughter searching for her mother

And then the woman's killers get the jump on her before she can find them out like this really like

Intensified, you know detective noir kind of thing. Yes

In reality berk described marbet as someone quote of idle habits and much given to drinking

And it's really likely that they met at a public house or just somewhere else. Okay

He enticed her back to the boarding house with drink. So just a terrible one. She passed out laid

berk laid her face down on the bed and pressed her face until the bed until she suffocated

Jesus

And it really does seem like purely coincidence that she had been killed by the same killers who killed her mother. That is

So beyond bizarre. It really is and tragic

It's so sad

Now around the same time of margaret haldane's murder berk had gone into town looking for another victim

And that's there that he made friends with a frail elderly man who he believed was the perfect fit for the next victim

But just as berk was about to invite the man back to the boarding house

He spotted what he would describe to police as quote an old woman and a dumb boy her grandson from glasgow

Oh

Through conversation he learned that the woman and child were irish and had walked from glasgow to ademberra

They were looking for shelter along the road like um during the night

Yeah, and the woman was not from or this area and was completely unfamiliar with edinburgh. She's lost

And so this made them ideal victims to him because no one edinburgh doesn't know her either

Exactly

So the elderly man with who berk was talking

He just kind of abandoned that whole thing. He was like well, you were gonna be next which i can't imagine. Wow that man

Someone was with him. Yeah, but he invited the woman and boy back to the lodging house

Oh

Now by most accounts the woman had been traveling to edinburgh to visit friends

And was told by berk that her friends resided at the boarding house of his friend william berk

Um, or excuse me. Uh, william here once they'd reached the boarding house and they settled in berk brought out the bottle of liquor

which

Immediately they got drunk the woman retired to bed for the evening and according to george mcgregor the author the two killers

Snuck into the room quote at the dead hour of the night and she was murdered by the human ghouls

While berk and hair were murdering the old woman

Her grandson was in an adjoining room with laird and mcdougal who were attempting to soothe his agitation

over his grandmother's absence

mcdougal was there uh-huh

Unsure of what to do the men decided they needed to get rid of him as well

So they suffocated him as well and loaded both bodies into an old herring barrel and then berk was quick to note

That the bar that the barrel was quote perfectly dry. There was no brine in it

Oh, just in case you were worried about that

So that was a briny barrel. I would have been pissed. I mean i'm pissed either way like hollow

but

So that implicates mcdougal now too

So goodbye. Goodbye. He later is sitting there going she has nothing to do with it. She didn't know anything

So what did she never she never said like hey, what happened to that little boy that I was fucking calming down while you murdered his grandma in the next room?

Exactly, like this is just her. Yep. That's how I feel

Now later that morning the two men tried to transport the barrel to noxus dissection room by horse and cart

But after a few miles the horse refused to go any further because the horse was like you guys are assholes and i'm not doing this

Yeah, the horse was like i'm not being implicated in this

So I guess they got a porter's cart from a nearby shop and pushed it the rest of the way

They got to noxus berk carried the barrel the remaining distance to the dissection room

The students struggled to get the bodies out of the barrel because they were so stiff and cold

And as a result nox paid them a slightly reduced rate. Nice of 16 shillings

Now according to berk the pair shot the horse on their return to the boarding house because it wouldn't walk any further

I did not need to know that so they're

Like the worst kind of people soulless women children elderly

They don't give a fuck. There's no there's no line with them

And shortly after the murder of this woman and her grandson berk and hare murdered a cindergatherer that berk thought

Maybe went by the name effie. Maybe possibly who knows

During the spring and summer months most laborers left the city to work

In the farms and fields that surround the city and this kind of limited berk and hares victim pool during that time because laborers are gone

So according to lisa rosner the author effie was a hawker who would occasionally sell odds and ends door to door

And she was actually known to berk

Like berk knew her

And because she had sold like bits of leather to him

I think for you says like um in his cobbling business

That's crazy and despite being known to both the killers and many people in town as well

The pair enticed effie into the barn with alcohol

And they said you can rest in the barn as well

And once she had fallen asleep they quote laid a cloth over her

And suffocated her as they did the others and then they transported her to noxus dissection room where they were paid 10 shillings for the body

Oh my god, and that is where we're going to end for part one of berk and hare

uh

Good when we return

We are going to talk about the final

Murders things are going to go awry for the two of them

We're going to talk about how they were caught and we're going to talk about what happened to them

I'm excited

Yeah, it's I'm excited to talk about what happens to them like and when they get caught in sentenced to prison

Because I'm like you need to be caught at this point and again like thinking about like, um at the very least two

people but most likely a group of people that are

willing to do this kind of shit and to the most vulnerable people to the most vulnerable

people and like two

Just yucky scary terrible couples. Oh, it always freaks me out when couples. Yeah, I don't like it. Yeah, so this is

This is quite a tale. Oh, yoy yoy and a real sign of the times for real

But that is part one of berk and hare

Well, thanks for listening to that guys. Yeah, hope you keep listening and we hope you keep it

Weird but not this weird because that's too weird. No, it's not that time anymore guys. Don't go gray robin. It's not that time

You

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Machine-generated transcript that may contain inaccuracies.