Report from the Select Committee on Anatomy.

THE BODY-SNATCHING CRISIS - AN IMPORTANT REPORT IN MEDICAL HISTORY
first edition follscap folio 150, [2 (blank)]pp., original blue wrappers, title page repeated on front panel, edges untrimmed as issued, slight cracking of wrapper front 'joint', wrappers and edges a little dusty, else very good in its original state.

Garrison-Morton.com 'History of Medicine Bibliography', 7096.
In early nineteenth century Britain and Ireland the supply of dead bodies for teaching purposes in medical schools was regulated by the Murder Act of 1752 which stipulated that only corpses of executed criminals could be used for dissection. While the 18th. century hundreds had been executed for trivial crimes by the 19th century that number had dropped to about 56 people annually, while at the same time the expansion of the medical schools meant that upwards of 500 cadavers were needed annually. The anatomy teachers in medical schools resorted to paying for bodies without asking too many questions which resulted in a huge increase in body-snatching or the robbing of the graves of the recently decreased by the 'resurrection' men'. The most notorious of these suppliers of corpses were two Irishmen, Burke and Hare, living in Edinburgh who murdered their victims and who were only stopped by the arrest of Burke in 1828.In 1828 the British parliament appointed a Select Committee to "inquire into the manner of obtaining subjects for dissection by schools of Anatomy and the State of law affecting persons employed in obtaining and dissecting bodies". Included here are their report together with the extensive verbatim minutes of evidence (p.14-123) of those called as witnesses and appendicies (p.124-150) of related documents and data. Many of the leading medical men of the day gave evidence to the committee. Dr. James Macartney, Prof. of Anatomy and Surgery at Trinity College Dublin, gave evidence on the situation in Ireland, p.106-112. The report led directly to the 1832 Anatomy Act which granted licenses to teachers of anatomy and gave physicians, surgeons and medical students legal access to corpses unclaimed after death.