“Before me as I write lies an inch-square bit of brown leather --- not, you would think, an inspiring subject for a tale. But perpend. This fragment of human skin, for such it is, has been since 1829 in the possession of three persons only: The original owner, my grandfather, and myself. Inconsiderable in size and unimpressive of aspect, it was nevertheless potent to influence the direction of my future studies…
While yet a small boy, my grandfather would often show me by request this singular relic and I never wearied of hearing how he came by it. As a matter of history, its first proprietor, the late Mr. William Burke of Edinburgh, in the circumstances hereafter to be related, was publicly anatomized, his carcass thereafter flayed, his hide tanned, and his skeleton by order of Court preserved in the Anatomical Museum of Edinburgh University, where it remains as a memorial of his infamy even unto this day. Mr. Burke’s integument being cut up into sortable parcels to suit buyer’s tastes and exposed for sale by private bargain, my grandfather, who was then but a young man, invested a modest shilling’s worth. Wealthier purchasers bought larger lots --- I have heard that the late Professor Chiene had a tobacco pouch made of this unique material. Personally, despite my predilection for crime, I prefer India-rubber.” ---
"The Wolves of the West Port"So begins William Roughead’s description of the careers of the infamous resurrection men
Burke and Hare. Confidante and friend of Henry James and
sometime crusader for justice alongside
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle,
William Roughead was a Scottish solicitor whose interest in and write-ups of criminal trials led to a career as one of the earliest true crime writers (and, according to Alexander Wolcott, a place on the bedside table of Franklin Delano Roosevelt).
Using primary source material such a trial transcripts and contemporary newspaper accounts, Roughead’s filigreed style---by turns arch, ironical, censorious and sly---raised shivers from cold cases as far back as the 16th century and into the 20th, including the yet notorious Burke and Hare and
Madeleine Smith (
previously, links broken).
His essays were much anthologized on both sides of the pond during the 1930s and 40s ---leaving him with a tangled bibliography, a lot of which is out of print. Your best offline bet for a taste of the master is
Classic Crimes, which contains twelve of his juiciest cases and was reprinted in 2000 by New York Review of Books, with an intro by Luc Sante (a contemporary review can be
found here).
But for those who wish a free sample, hidden in the nooks and crannies of the internet can find some of his rarer, public domain works available for kindle and or pdf consumption including:
Glengarry’s Way, a full accounting of several famous Scottish crimes and trials going back as far as the 1600s
Notable British Trials: Dr. Pritchard (with pictures of the
supercilious medico par excellence)
Notable British Trials: Deacon Brodie
(Can’t resist a quote: “It is nearly 120 years since Deacon Brodie played out his two-fold part at the west end of the Luckenbooths one grey afternoon of October, 1788…here he was born and lived, man and boy, robber and decent burgess, for many reputable years; here his old father passed away, happy in the possession of so excellent a son; and from hence did that son essay that ‘last fatal’ adventure, the issue of which, for him, was discovery and the scaffold.”)
His first book, Twelve Scots Trials
The Trial of Mary Blandy, on a 18th-century heiress, her rascal of a fiancé and her luckless father
And, for preview on Google Books UK,
The Murder’s Companion, in which may be found “The Wolves of the West Port.”
Bonus Link, to play in the background while you’re downloading all these pdfs:
Science Writer John Emsley talks about the history of poison as a murder weapon on NPR’s Fresh Air.
posted by tumid dahlia at 9:23 PM on August 24, 2011