The Anatomy Act 1832

[rjpalmer]

Hi RJ,

Not sure if this is what you are referring to? 1st proximo would be the 1st of October since this article is dated in September of 1873.

Hi Jerry. Well done for finding that reference. I'm confident that a very similar observation was made at the time of the Pinchin Street torso case in Sept, 1889, pointing out that the major teaching hospitals in London had not yet begun the new term, and thus were not currently dissecting cadavers. I'll keep looking for it; I'm pretty sure I have the reference among my notes. RP

[Joshua Rogan]

Hi Jerry. Well done for finding that reference. I'm confident that a very similar observation was made at the time of the Pinchin Street torso case in Sept, 1889, pointing out that the major teaching hospitals in London had not yet begun the new term, and thus were not currently dissecting cadavers. I'll keep looking for it; I'm pretty sure I have the reference among my notes. RP

Here's a quote about the arm (from the Whitehall torso) found in the Thames;

Western Mail 14 Sept 1888
"The limb could not, it is thought, have been cut from a corpse legitimately dissected. The anatomical schools are now, it is stated, in vacation."

And here's an interview with a medical man about the Pinchin St Torso, originally from the Pall Mall Gazette. Is this what you were thinking of, rj?

Manchester Courier and Lancashire General Advertiser - Saturday 14 September 1889
"Wishing to find out whether there is anything in the theory which has been suggested, and which has become somewhat popular in the East-end, that the trunk of the woman found in Pinchin-street, last Tuesday morning has come from some dissecting room, a correspondent of the Pall Mall Gazette called at the London Hospital and had a chat with one of the resident surgeons. “I am not at all surprised,” said the doctor, smiling, “that many people think this affair a hoax on the part of medical students. It is, of course, within the range of possibility that students may get possession of a body; but as to the theory that this particular trunk has been taken from some dissecting room, it is really, in my opinion, absurd. It is the most unlikely thing in the world that a trunk should be in a state in which I understand this one to be in, after being in the dissecting room. It is against dissecting room rules that it should be as it is.” “Will you kindly explain how?” “Well, you see, there are standing rules for dissecting bodies. The corpse is dissected in a thoroughly systematic fashion. It is left almost entirely to the students. The body is laid out on the dissecting table, and each student takes a certain part. By the time a body is dissected it is, as you may imagine, quite unrecognisable.” “Is it a fact, as you have seen alleged, that it is a common thing for students to possess themselves of portions of bodies after dissection?” “Oh, yes. They often take away a foot or a hand, but it is not very likely that the would cart home a head or a leg.” “What, may I ask, is done with the remains after dissection?” “The different portions are collected and the whole buried together.” “May I inquire where you get your dissecting room subjects from here?” “We get them generally from the workhouse, as at Cambridge, where the workhouse authorities have a sort of stock supply.” “Could students obtain a body from the workhouse on their own account?” “Well, that I can’t say. It might be possible for them to do so. I may observe so long as I remember that even if this trunk affair is a hoax by medical students, none of our young men have anything to do with it, because they are all away just now. This is vacation time, and the dissecting room is not open.” “From what you have heard about this trunk, do you think that great surgical skill must have been possessed by the person or persons who dismembered it?” “Of course I have not seen the remains, and I can only go by what I have read and heard; but let me say that it is ridiculous to talk about surgical skill in the way that people are doing in connection with the Whitechapel horrors. Any butcher could do what has been done in any of the cases, this trunk case included. One does not necessarily require to be a doctor or a medical student to be able to dismember a body. I think there has been rather too much made of this point in connection with the murders.”

[rjpalmer]

Thanks Joshua. It was working from another source, but the wording was almost identical. "This is vacation time, and the dissecting rooms are not open."

I think that pretty much puts an end to the 'medical student prank' theory for the Pinchin Street torso case.

[Trevor Marriott]

Here's a quote about the arm (from the Whitehall torso) found in the Thames;

Western Mail 14 Sept 1888
"The limb could not, it is thought, have been cut from a corpse legitimately dissected. The anatomical schools are now, it is stated, in vacation."

And here's an interview with a medical man about the Pinchin St Torso, originally from the Pall Mall Gazette. Is this what you were thinking of, rj?

Manchester Courier and Lancashire General Advertiser - Saturday 14 September 1889
"Wishing to find out whether there is anything in the theory which has been suggested, and which has become somewhat popular in the East-end, that the trunk of the woman found in Pinchin-street, last Tuesday morning has come from some dissecting room, a correspondent of the Pall Mall Gazette called at the London Hospital and had a chat with one of the resident surgeons. “I am not at all surprised,” said the doctor, smiling, “that many people think this affair a hoax on the part of medical students. It is, of course, within the range of possibility that students may get possession of a body; but as to the theory that this particular trunk has been taken from some dissecting room, it is really, in my opinion, absurd. It is the most unlikely thing in the world that a trunk should be in a state in which I understand this one to be in, after being in the dissecting room. It is against dissecting room rules that it should be as it is.” “Will you kindly explain how?” “Well, you see, there are standing rules for dissecting bodies. The corpse is dissected in a thoroughly systematic fashion. It is left almost entirely to the students. The body is laid out on the dissecting table, and each student takes a certain part. By the time a body is dissected it is, as you may imagine, quite unrecognisable.” “Is it a fact, as you have seen alleged, that it is a common thing for students to possess themselves of portions of bodies after dissection?” “Oh, yes. They often take away a foot or a hand, but it is not very likely that the would cart home a head or a leg.” “What, may I ask, is done with the remains after dissection?” “The different portions are collected and the whole buried together.” “May I inquire where you get your dissecting room subjects from here?” “We get them generally from the workhouse, as at Cambridge, where the workhouse authorities have a sort of stock supply.” “Could students obtain a body from the workhouse on their own account?” “Well, that I can’t say. It might be possible for them to do so. I may observe so long as I remember that even if this trunk affair is a hoax by medical students, none of our young men have anything to do with it, because they are all away just now. This is vacation time, and the dissecting room is not open.” “From what you have heard about this trunk, do you think that great surgical skill must have been possessed by the person or persons who dismembered it?” “Of course I have not seen the remains, and I can only go by what I have read and heard; but let me say that it is ridiculous to talk about surgical skill in the way that people are doing in connection with the Whitechapel horrors. Any butcher could do what has been done in any of the cases, this trunk case included. One does not necessarily require to be a doctor or a medical student to be able to dismember a body. I think there has been rather too much made of this point in connection with the murders.”

Please read above the bold and highlighted parts, which are relevant to the matters being discussed. But let me reiterate that the medical student theory is but one of several theories, none of which can be evidentially disproved and as there are dissimilarities with regars to the disposal of the torsos other should not be discounted, and of course we dont know if St Barts students were away at that time.

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

[jerryd]

Please read above the bold and highlighted parts, which are relevant to the matters being discussed. But let me reiterate that the medical student theory is but one of several theories, none of which can be evidentially disproved and as there are dissimilarities with regars to the disposal of the torsos other should not be discounted, and of course we dont know if St Barts students were away at that time.

www.trevormarriott.co.uk

Must've been Thomas Miller Beach, then?

[Debra A]

Since the article referred to concerns itself with the 1873 torso victim, it could also be asked to what degree it was common practice in the dissection rooms to cut away the face from an object by making two cuts in the skull, grabbing hold of the flesh and pulling it off from the skull while helping the process along with the odd slicing by means of the knife? I am unaware of any such practice. In fact, I am unaware of any other case, dissection, murder or otherwise, where this was performed.
If anybody differs and can elaborate on any context in which such a thing has transpired, I´d be interested to hear about it.

'from an object' ?! subject at a push?
The 1873 case file seems to have favoured Mrs Cailey as the victim because just before the torso find, Mary Ann Cailey reported that she was attacked (by a gang of youths, one whom she accused of trying to rape her but later withdrew the accusation) on a footpath near the Thames and the police recorded that she sustained a bruise to the side of her head...then she went missing -only to turn up in the nick of time.