William Hare.
(From a Sketch taken in Court)
Burke was supported on either side, as he walked up Liberton’s Wynd towards the Lawnmarket, by the Catholic priests, and he leaned on the arm of Mr. Reid. The two bailies headed the procession, and whenever they made their appearance the enormous crowd sent up one loud and simultaneous shout. The condemned man was affected by this outburst of popular feeling, and, as if afraid the mob might break through the barriers and tear him to pieces, he made haste to ascend the scaffold. His appearance there was the signal for another yell of execration from the multitude. Shouts of “Burke him,” “choke him,” “No mercy, hangie,” came from all sides; but otherwise the crowd showed no signs of interfering. They wished to see the hangman do his duty properly—if he did so, they had no particular desire to take part in the work. Burke looked round somewhat defiantly, and then quietly kneeled down by the side of one of the priests, and engaged in devotional exercises for a few minutes; after which the Rev. Mr. Marshall offered up a short prayer. This solemn ceremony, however, found small favour with the spectators—they wished to see the culprit, and the kneeling kept him out of their view, so they cried out to the persons on the scaffold, “Stand out of the way,” “Turn him round;” and though the magistrates intimated by signs as well as they could the nature of the ceremony that was going on, the clamour still continued, and there were frequent shouts of “Hare, Hare, bring out Hare! Hang Knox, he’s a noxious morsel!” and others of a similar kind. About ten minutes had now gone, and the crowd was becoming impatient. After he had completed his devotions, Burke lifted the silk handkerchief upon which he had been kneeling, and put it in his pocket. He gave a glance up to the gallows, and then stepped on the drop with a firm step. The executioner proceeded to adjust the rope round his neck, and his confessor said to him, “Now say your creed; and when you come to the words, ‘Lord Jesus Christ,’ give the signal, and die with his blessed name on your lips.” The shouts from the crowd still continued, and the people, out of their better reason by the excitement, cried out, “Burke him; give him no rope;” “Do the same for Hare;” “Weigh them together;” “Wash the blood from the land;” and “You’ll see Daft Jamie in a minute.” Williams then tried to loosen Burke’s neckerchief, but he found some difficulty in doing so, and the condemned man said, “The knot’s behind.” These were the only words Burke uttered on the scaffold. The rope was then adjusted, a white cotton night-cap was put on his head and pulled over his face, and Burke, with an air of firmness, began the recitation of the creed. When he came to the holy name he gave the signal, the bolt was drawn, and the greatest murderer of his time—except, perhaps, his associate Hare—was swinging on the gallows. The multitude set up a fearful yell, and every time the body of the dying man gave a convulsive twitch the crowd cheered to the echo. An eye witness said—“He struggled a good deal, and put out his legs as if to catch something with his feet; but some of the undertaker’s men, who were beneath the drop, took him by the feet, and sent him spinning round—a motion which was continued until he was drawn up above the level of the scaffold.” It was now fully a quarter past eight o’clock, and Burke had been “separated from this world.” The body was allowed to hang until five minutes to nine o’clock, when the executioner cut it down amid the gloating yells of the people. They made a rush forward to the scaffold as if to lay hold of the corpse of the murderer, but they were kept back by the strong force of policemen who lined the barriers. The assistants at the scaffold, too, seemed to be affected by the general frenzy, and a scramble took place among them for portions of the rope, or shavings from the coffin, or any thing that would serve as a relic of the closing scene of the West Port murders—the great Burke and Hare tragedies. The body was conveyed to the lock-up, and the large crowd dispersed, without a single mishap having occurred, though the people still laboured under intense excitement, which even an accident might divert in a dangerous direction.
CHAPTER XXIX.
Lecture on Burke’s Body—Riot among the Students—Excitement in Edinburgh—The Public Exhibition—Dissection of the Body of the Murderer—Phrenological Developments of Burke and Hare.
It was certainly a strange conclusion to the West Port tragedies that the man who had been so active a participant in them, and who had assisted in supplying so many “subjects” for dissection, should himself, after death—a death also by strangulation—become a “subject” of more than ordinary interest. Not only was that the case, but the public exhibition of the body, while it may be regarded as being in a sense an act of retributive justice, displays a certain amount of barbarity of feeling and sentiment which it is difficult to believe could have existed in this country so short a time ago as fifty years. The rapid advance made by all classes during that period is generally admitted, but it should be borne in mind, in reference to the events now about to be described, that only a few years ago public executions were common, and that the change in the manner caused among certain classes some little irritation. The propriety of having executions in private is now fully and freely acknowledged, but having regard to the comparatively recent change we should not look upon our respected fathers and grandfathers as altogether barbarous.
But passing from the line of thought suggested by the events that followed Burke’s execution, the thread of the narrative may be continued. The body, as already stated, was conveyed from the scaffold to the lock-up, and there it remained until the next morning. It was expected it would be taken to the College during the day, and a large crowd surrounded the building. The motive of the people may have been simple curiosity, but the authorities, being afraid the rougher part of the crowd, if they obtained an opportunity, might seize the body and treat it with scant respect, deemed it proper to delay the removal until such time as it could be done with safety. This was done early on Thursday morning, when the excited populace was asleep. The body was laid out on a table, and several eminent scientists—among them Mr. Liston, Mr. George Combe, Sir William Hamilton, and Mr. Joseph, the sculptor—who took a cast for a bust—examined it before the students began to gather.
Leighton, who seems to have seen the body, says it was “that of a thick-set muscular man, with a bull-neck, great development about the upper parts, with immense thighs and calves, so full as to have the appearance of globular masses. The countenance, as we saw it, was very far from being placid, as commonly represented, if you could not have perceived easily that there remained upon it the bitter expression of the very scorn with which he had looked upon that world which pushed him out of it, as having in his person defaced the image of his Maker.” He supplements this by a sentence from the notes of another eye-witness:—“He (Burke) was one of the most symmetrical men I ever saw, finely-developed muscles, and finely-formed, of the athlete class.”
Dr. Munro, in the afternoon of the day the body was removed to the College, gave a lecture upon it, and for this purpose the upper part of the head was sawn off, and the brain exposed. The brain was described as being unusually soft, but it was pointed out that a peculiar softness was by no means uncommon in criminals who had suffered the last penalty of the law. While this lecture was going on a large number of students had assembled in the quadrangle of the College, and clamoured for admission. Those who were entitled to be present at the class, opening at one o’clock in the afternoon, were provided with tickets, but owing to the greatness of the crowd it was with the utmost difficulty that these could be made available, even with the assistance of the police. At last all the ticket-holders were admitted, and then the doors were thrown open to as many of the other students as the room would accommodate. Many, however, were left outside. The lecture began at the regular hour, but the nature of the subject caused it to extend over two hours, instead of the usual time. Meanwhile, the crowd in the quadrangle had grown so unruly that a strong body of police had to be called to preserve order. Instead of keeping the youths in awe, this display of force rather exasperated them, and they made several attempts to overpower the constables. In the course of the struggle the glass in the windows of the dissecting room was destroyed. The police had to use their staves, and many of the combatants on both sides were injured, some of them rather seriously. The Lord Provost and Bailie Small, the college bailie, put in an appearance, thinking their presence would have a salutary effect, but they were glad to retire with whole bones under the abuse that was showered upon them. The disturbance continued until four o’clock, when Professor Christison came to the rescue. He intimated that he had arranged for the admission of the young men in bands of fifty at a time, and had given his own personal guarantee for their good behaviour. This was an appeal to their honour, which is always found to be effectual with a crowd of students, however riotously inclined, and in the present instance the youths cheered the professor lustily. The tumult ceased, and some of the ringleaders, who had been apprehended by the police, were liberated on their parole by the magistrates.