Why Does This Grave Have a Cage On It?

today's video is sponsored by light racer the sci-fi game made by sci-fi fans hey 42 here picture the scene mourners are gathered around a coffin in a church yard they pay their respects and wander off to the local pub for the wake the grave is covered with earth and all appears well as the body is laid safely to rest but just hours later under cover of darkness and perhaps whilst the last few mourners are reminiscing over one last pint several men emerged from the shadows and dig the body out of its grave they work quickly to rebury the empty coffin and cover it back up with earth over the coming weeks months and years relatives who come to lay flowers and pay their respects never realize that person is no longer there sounds pretty horrific but once upon a time that happened on a daily basis light racer is a sci-fi game that gives you the power to determine the fate of entire civilizations based around the big rip hypothesis in which the universe is slowly being torn apart due to its own expansion you play as the navigator of a high-tech arc together with your best companion an ai bot the game tells the story of various planets and civilizations struggling to survive at the twilight of the universe and you are required to decide whether to help them rise or fall however choose carefully as every decision you make within the game has an impact on the ending also make sure you look out for the star childs every planet gives you the opportunity to collect one each star child you collect will unlock more of the story light racer is created by a dev team of only four people who have a real passion for science fiction and that really comes across because the game is full of subtle references to sci-fi classics such as hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy the matrix and the movie arrival this serious dedication to sci-fi is my favorite thing about light racer and it's just a fantastically fun game to play light racer is available worldwide and you can download it for free and start playing today by clicking the link in the description below find out where your choices will take you share your version of the story in the comments below and let me know if you successfully collect all the star children check it out in early 19th century britain freshly buried bodies were regularly dug up and transported away to a mysterious location why was victorian britain rife with necrophiliacs probably but that wasn't their intended purpose for these particular stolen corpses no these specimens were sold on to medical students who needed a constant supply of cadavers for dissection and without modern embalming methods the specimens needed to be very fresh previously this hadn't been much of an issue as the bodies of executed criminals were sent straight to medical schools dissection was simply another part of the punishment in 1751 the government passed a murder act which dictated that the bodies of executed murderers must be made available to medical science remember this was a society that still crowded in town squares to watch the occasional hanging nobody is going to be bothered about the body of a killer being chopped up a little bit criminals sentenced to death would sometimes be more frightened of the idea of being dissected than being executed records from newgate prison london's largest and most notorious reveal the fear felt by one very young assailant john amy bird bell convicted of murder and sentenced to death in 1831 at the age of just 14 was said to have shown no fear of death at all when he was sentenced but when he was told that he would be dissected after death he broke down in court at the turn of the 19th century medical science was advancing fast with a flurry of medical schools being built along with anatomical theatres where students would pack into viewing galleries to watch a dissection you can still visit one of these the old operating theatre in southwark founded in 1822 though it's now a museum damn it i miss my chance in its dissection days the floor was covered in sawdust to prevent bodily fluids seeping through the floorboards into the church below at least that would have given the passion of jesus sermon that real 4d experience anatomical theatres lined with rows of eager medical students relied on a regular supply of bodies the problem was the number of people being executed was falling around 60 a year were executed in england between 1800 and 1835 half the number seen in the 18th century then in 1823 the medical schools hit yet another supply chain issue there had been 220 crimes that carried a death sentence in england and wales including stealing anything worth more than 12 pence this meant that death sentences were handed out for stealing a loaf of bread or picking a pocket the 1823 judgement of death act changed all this allowing judges to choose a lesser sentence often transportation to a penal colony instead this was good news for britain's numerous poor who frequently had to resort to stealing in order to eat but it was terrible news for anatomists and medical students there just weren't enough people being executed enter the body snatchers to meet the ever-growing demand a roaring cadaver trade emerged mostly operating in gangs body snatchers would hang around graveyards wait until dark and then dig up a grave some would even target houses where they knew there had been a recent death in the family and break in to steal the body pretty grim i know but body snatching was well rewarded a laborer in early 19th century london might earn around 15 pounds a year a body sold to a medical school might fetch anything from 2 to 20 pounds and it really was a roaring trade an 1828 parliamentary select committee examining the issue of body snatching found that 592 bodies had been dissected in medical schools in 1826 around 10 times the number of executions surprisingly body snatching wasn't technically illegal as bodies were not legally considered to be property in 1822 a man named william millard was arrested whilst attempting a body snatch in the grounds of royal london hospital he couldn't be arrested for stealing the body because it wasn't illegal so he was arrested for the spurious charge of vagrancy instead but millard protested his innocence not only had he previously worked for the hospital he told the police he had an arrangement with them for 12 years when a patient's body was buried he would be asked to simply head down into the hospital's graveyard and dig it back up again well then what was the bloody point in burying it in the first place but it's suspected that usually royal london didn't even bother to bury a body before they sent it on to an anatomy theater archaeologists working in the hospital's grounds in 2006 found something unexpected [Music] not neatly placed skeletons that had been buried whole in the usual manner but jumbles of bones mixed up and buried together these included skulls with the tops sliced off bones that had been dissected and animal bones from dogs and tortoises there were bodies missing skulls and others missing hands and feet across 262 burials they estimated there were the remains of around 500 different people [Music] by piecing together records stretching from 1820 to 1850 researchers worked out where all these bodies had come from people would die in the hospital's wards be taken to the adjoining medical school for the section and afterwards their remains were simply chucked into unmarked graves in this unofficial secret graveyard but how did the hospital decide whose body went on to the medical school and who was to be buried normally well this east end hospital was close to london's docks so they were supplied with a steady stream of patients who'd picked up one of the many diseases that regularly ravaged 19th century sailors or had otherwise suffered a fatal injury whilst on board these were generally young strong men in the prime of their lives perfect dissection material and usually no one in london would be looking for them but it's thought that the majority of bodies that ended up on medical school dissection tables got there via body snatchers to protect themselves from the snatchers inevitable invasion people began to take increasingly ingenious measures watchtowers were hastily built in graveyards across the country to look out for body snatchers families of the recently deceased would protect graves with cages or gates some had locked iron coffins that were almost impossible to open those who couldn't afford such measures would cover their relatives graves with stones rather than soil in a desperate attempt to dissuade the snatchers in 1828 it was thought that there were around 200 body snatchers working in london in gangs of four or five but even with 200 men regularly digging up bodies and many more in other british cities they still couldn't meet the endless demand this meant that gravesnatching quickly turned to murder rather than stealing the bodies of already dead people the body snatchers started to make dead people the most famous of these were william burke and william hare who went about their gruesome trade in edinburgh supplying the edinburgh university medical school with bodies as and when needed both men had left northern ireland to work as labourers on the union canal where they met became friends and ended up living on the same street both settled down with a partner and each couple would regularly take in lodges when in 1827 one of the long-term tenants of william hare's house died owing rent the two friends decided they would sell his body to the medical school to get some of that money back and they made a profit the rent owed was just four pounds and they were paid seven pounds and ten shillings for the body by robert knox the medical school's anatomist that's around 900 pounds in today's money not bad for a side hustle book and hair could smell the business opportunity right in front of them in 1828 an unfortunate tenant named joseph became very ill while staying in hare's house but they didn't fancy popping the kettle on and patiently waiting for him to die they gave joseph a helping hand after encouraging the poor boy to drink more whiskey than was probably advisable they restrained and suffocated him with their bare hands this method of killing became burke and hare's modus operandi and it was later given a catchy title burking and whilst burke and hare had perhaps justified the burking of joseph on the basis that he was already ill and likely to die anyway there was no such dubious moral code attached to their later killings they began actively encouraging people to stay with them with full intentions to give them a good burking they are reported to have murdered 16 people and made at least 15 000 pounds from the cadavers though these official figures are likely to be a drop in the bloody bucket without any obvious injuries burked bodies were perfectly fresh and easily sellable whilst robert knox the anatomist later denied all knowledge of the origins of the bodies he purchased from burke and hare a man of his profession would certainly have known that these weren't dug up weak old bodies but burke and her soon came unstuck and their last victim was a woman named marjorie dougherty he was suitably murdered on halloween night in 1828 she was invited to stay with burke and was in fact a distant relative of his but burke had other lodges at the time a couple named james and ann gray even though their method of suffocation wasn't outwardly injurious to the victims it wasn't necessarily quiet and so burke sent the couple to stay at hare's house whilst they got busy killing margaery when the couple returns the next day the greys asked where marjorie had gone they were told she'd been asked to leave because she was flirting with burke but when they asked to enter the room where marjorie had been killed to collect their belongings they were told they couldn't if they weren't suspicious already i'm sure they were by now when they were finally allowed in they found marjorie's lifeless body hidden underneath the bed they were offered a significant bribe of 10 pounds around 1700 pounds in today's money a week to keep quiet presumably burke and her plans to simply kill an extra person a week to fund the bribe but unwilling to retire on the proceeds of crime the couple hot-footed it to the nearest police station and burke hair and their partners were all arrested and questioned it didn't take long for the accomplices to turn against each other the police knew they didn't have strong enough evidence to convict and so they convinced her to turn state's evidence he confessed to 16 murders including marjories and gave evidence against burke in return for immunity against prosecution burke was convicted of murder and hanged in front of a crowd of 25 000 people in january 1829 ironically his body was donated to medical science and his skeleton can still be seen in surgeons hall in edinburgh it's said that some of the students who worked on his body took strips of his skin as souvenirs beats a fridge magnet if you ask me after burke was hanged hare was released from prison he had become a notorious figure whose face would have been highly recognizable by now so he left edinburgh on a male coach chances are if he tried to walk he wouldn't have reached a city border without being attacked by an angry mob in fact he only made it as far as dumfries before he was recognized and attacked by said angry mob he escaped though we don't know where to one story is that he ended up in liverpool hospital several years later where he was recognized and killed by a fellow patient another is that he was blinded by an angry mob who threw quick lime in his face and he ended up begging on the streets of london whatever happened to him it's safe to say he wasn't britain's most popular man burke and hare's body snatching career may have been short but it did provide inspiration to other body snatchers most notably a gang who became known as the london burkas for a long time they successfully stole and sold bodies to several hospitals including saint bartz and saint thomas's one of the men john bishop would later admit to stealing a staggering 1000 bodies but that's just bragging if you ask me like others before them stealing bodies proved a gateway crime and soon they were luring people to their untimely deaths they would find people sleeping rough on the streets promised them a place to stay and then once out of sight drug and kill them they rented two small cottages in an undesirable area prone to flooding in order to carry out their crimes the gang was discovered in 1831 when they tried to sell the body of a 14 year old boy named charles ferrari to king's college hospital they of course told the anatomist that he died of natural causes but when he inspected the corpse he found a swollen cut face bloodshot eyes and what was clearly a very fresh body as this particular anatomist clearly had more scruples than edinburgh's robert knox he reported the gang to the police and three members john bishop james may and thomas williams were arrested when police searched their rented cottages they found the clothes of multiple victims discarded in the well and outside toilet the free men were tried at the old bailey with their trial causing a media sensation all three were found guilty two of them williams and bishop were sentenced to death hanged in front of 30 000 people and their bodies of course donated to medical science for dissection mate was transported to tasmania where he died in 1834 the trials of both the burqas and burkhand were the catalysts for the passing of the anatomy act of 1832 this act made bodies legal property for the first time and required anatomists to have a license to possess them that license gave them legal access to the bodies of people who died in prisons workhouses and hospitals and were unclaimed by relatives relatives could also choose to donate a body in return for funeral expenses conveniently this also meant that the local authorities didn't have to pay funeral costs for paupers in their care the act put an end to the body snatchers trade as medical schools then had ready access to a stream of bodies that's supply and demand for you though it's fair to say it wasn't popular with everyone and was widely criticized for targeting the poor unsurprisingly britain's wealthy failed to come forward to donate their bodies and the act remained in force until 1984. [Music] thanks for watching

Channel: Thoughty2

Views: 2,658,433

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Id: vnAoWBaBEAE

Length: 21min 25sec (1285 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 02 2021