March 5, 2025 • 24 mins
In 1788, bodysnatchers were snatching so many bodies from their graves that New York City citizens rioted. And who were the bodysnatchers?? Silly little medical students.
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Speaker 1 (00:08):
School of humans. Nowadays, if someone tells you you got
a snatched bod, that means you're looking fit, you're looking swell. Me.
I was pretty snatched in twenty twenty three, but now
I'm looking a little bit more released, if you know
what I'm saying. Yeah, I'm getting fayat. But back in
(00:30):
the olden days, a snatched body was actually no good.
What that meant was that your dead ass corpse got
snatched out of the ground. Yeah, that meant somebody, a
body snatcher had taken you out of the ground for
their own fun and games. And by fun and games,
I of course mean their medical education. Ooh, spooky music. Yes,
(01:03):
body snatchers were huge in the eighteenth century, and even
before that, medical students and teachers thought they didn't have
any other options. People weren't donating their bodies to science
when they died because you know, Christianity and stuff like that.
And people were so afraid of their bodies getting snatched
(01:26):
that those who could afford it would buy traps around
their graves or have people on cemetery patrol. But the
men of science believed they were entitled to these bodies,
since they weren't just forwarding their own education, but also
the education of mankind. They need to learn the secrets
(01:46):
of the body, and one way to do that was
to get up in the guts of a dead person.
But the body snatchers, well, sometimes they snatched too close
to the sun. And that's what happened in New York
City in seventeen eighty eight. Bodies were getting snatched that
(02:07):
the citizens of the city decided it was time for
those doctors to get a little snatched themselves.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Cue the theme song.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
This is American filth and I'm Gabby Watts. Every week
I tell you a filthy story from American history. Today's
episode the seventeen eighty eight doctors riot be de Beniti
be be Beta, Betta beta beta, but a bettada. Really, guys,
(02:48):
I always sing the theme song because again one guy
emailed me one time and said, I like when you
sing it, so now I sing it even more. Really,
I'll do anything. Just give me a suggestion. I'll put
it into the next show. In the seventeen eighties in
New York City, a lot of his body snatching was
(03:10):
going on. It was also called resurrecting spooky. Some of
the snatchers were medical students at Columbia College, which was
the only school of medicine in the city at the time.
These young lads started their medical education around age fifteen,
(03:30):
and they liked to walk around the city in their
little suits, wreaking of entitlement and bragging about their body
snatching ways. Many of them were encouraged to body snatch
by their professor, Charles McKnight. McKnight was a big surgeon
at the time, and in class he would complain about
(03:51):
the lack of cadavers at their disposal. He's like, it's
so hard to find a body these days, especially since
it's illegal to just take dead bodies off the street. Ugh.
Back in my day, you could just find a dead
poor person and do whatever you wanted. And so McKnight
(04:12):
would complain like this in his classes, being like, hint, hint, boys,
go get your shovels and bring back a body for
us to dissect and defile. Columbia College was by several
cemeteries by the city border, and that's where these students
did a lot of their looting, and city officials didn't
(04:32):
stop them because these particular cemeteries entombed the bodies of
black people, meaning when the living relatives of the deceased
complained to city officials, their complaints weren't taken seriously or
even hurt. A group of freedmen even addressed the Common
(04:52):
Council in early seventeen eighty eight, being like, can you
please stop these dumbass medical students from taking the bodies
of our loved ones in such a horrible way like
in this petition. They weren't even asking for bodies snatching
to stop, just to stop it being conducted so terribly.
The petition said, under the cover of night, they dig
(05:16):
up bodies of our deceased friends and relatives, carrying them
away without respect for age or sex. Your petitioners are
well aware of the necessity of physicians and surgeons consulting
dead subjects.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
For the benefit of mankind.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Your petitioners do not presuppose it as an injury to
the deceased, and will not be adverse to di section
in particular circumstances, that is, if it is conducted with
the decency and propriety which the solemnity of such an
occasion requires. Unfortunately, this petition was ignored, so instead they
(05:53):
organized patrols to make sure these medical students wouldn't dig
up any more of their loved ones, and when medical
students couldn't do their body snatching there, they moved on
to the cemeteries of poor white people. Another doctor in
the city was Richard Bailey. He wasn't associated with Columbia College,
(06:17):
and he was known around the town as a real
sick oh. There were rumors that he had hacked up
people who were still alive, the poor and the sick,
and would do experiments on them. But Bailey was talented,
so he and his apprentices were allowed to do their work.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
At New York Hospital. Isn't that great? How if you're
good at something.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
People will just let you do whatever you want. Well.
New York Hospital was also close to these cemeteries that
buried black and poor people, so Bailey's apprentices would snatch
bodies from there as well. In the winter of seventeen
eighty eight, body statching had reached a climax. Stealing bodies
(07:01):
in the winter was most common because the cold meant
that the bodies didn't composes quickly, and these medical students
were being careless, just taking bodies willy nilly, not even
covering their tracks or closing the graves.
Speaker 2 (07:14):
When they were done.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
I mean, that doesn't make it any better, but at
least they could have tried to be better thieves.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
That just shows how entitled they were.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
And then it started affecting well to do white people.
On February twenty first, seventeen eighty eight, a story ran
about a white lady's body getting snatched from Trinity's cemetery,
and with that, more and more people started getting on
board with the costs of stopping these.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
Good for nothing doctors.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
There are some discrepancies in the sources about what exactly
happened next, but what we do know is that in
April seventeen.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
Eighty eight, there was a riot.
Speaker 1 (07:59):
So let's take a look at one source again. Are
you guys enjoying this creepy music? This letter was from
a retired colonel who had been sent from Virginia to
New York on business, and he wrote a letter to
the governor of Virginia about what was going on. So
this is what he said about it, and I condensed
(08:19):
it a bit because his sentences.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Were very long.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
People have been loudly complaining about the young students of
medicine for their very frequent and wanton trespasses in the
burial grounds of this city. The corpse of a young
gentleman from the West Indies was recently taken, the grave
left open and the funeral clothing scattered about. A very
handsome and much esteemed young lady of good connections was
(08:46):
also recently carried off. These, with various other acts of
a similar kind, inflamed the minds of people exceedingly, and
the young members of the faculty, as well as the
cemeteries have been closely watched. Last Sunday, as some people
were strolling by the hospital, he discovered something hanging up
(09:07):
at one of the windows, which excited their curiosity, and
making use of a stick to satisfy that curiosity, part
of a man's arm or leg tumbled out upon them.
That's right, some people were having a nice leisurely Sunday
(09:27):
when a man's arm or leg fell on them. And
I imagine it's pretty shocking, just in the middle of
April to have an arm fall on you. It wasn't Halloween,
it's not even seasonal to have something spooky like that happen.
Another account makes this story even more grim. This came
from an eighteen seventy three book by historian Thomas Hedley.
(09:51):
The book is called The Great Riots of New York,
And honestly, what he says makes sense that people were
rioting because this is freaky deeky. He said that Richard Bailey,
that doctor who was known for being particularly gruesome, was
dissecting a body at the hospital with a team of
(10:11):
his apprentices and students. One of the students was this
little brat named John Hicks. Remember him, He sucks. Apparently
some children were outside climbing a tree when they peered
into the hospital room where they were doing a dissection.
They were dissecting an arm, and when John Hicks, that
stupilil idiot, saw the children, he probably thought he was
(10:35):
being absolutely hilarious. He picked up the arm and waved
it at the kids, haha. And then he said to
one of the kids that this arm belonged to that
kid's recently deceased mom.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
Isn't that messed up?
Speaker 1 (10:53):
Like? I don't know if John Hicks was a good
medical student at this point, but he definitely wasn't gonna
make it as a humorist.
Speaker 2 (11:00):
It's like read the room.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
A kid doesn't want to see their recently deceased mom's
dism membered arm. Comedy equals tragedy plus time, and hardly
anytime had elapsed.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
This guy's bad at math.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
And of course this account is unbelievable because how did
John Hicks know that this was the arm of that
kid's mom. It was New York in seventeen eighty eight,
it's a bump in town. How would he know everybody
who lives there? There was like twenty five thousand people.
But if this was true, that kid obviously was very
upset and ran home and told his dad what happened.
(11:35):
Then his dad rushed the cemetery to find his late
wife's coffin empty. And then this dad assembled a group
of concerned citizens and they marched to the hospital. There
a mob was forming, and they were ready to fuck
some shit up. Be right back after these soothing advertisements.
(12:02):
On Sunday, April thirteenth, seventeen eighty eight, a mob assembled
outside of New York Hospital, and they were thirsty for vengeance.
Too long had these entitled medical students and doctors ravaged
their cemeteries. Now it was time to snatch the bodies
of these body snatchers. According to the Virginia Colonel's Letter,
(12:24):
the mob started ransacking the hospital, and as.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
They went they only got more and more enraged. He wrote.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
In the anatomy room they found three fresh bodies, one
boiling in a kettle, and two others cut up, with
certain parts of the two sexes hanging up in a
most brutal position. These circumstances, together with the wanton and
apparent inhuman complexion of the room, exasperated the mob beyond
all bounds, to the total destruction of every anatomy in
(12:55):
the hospital, one of which was of so much value
and utility that it is justly esteemed a great public loss,
having been prepared in a way which much time and
attention and requires great skill to accomplish.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
That aside, is very funny to me.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
Uh the He's like, well, actually that was very valuable.
Why are they destroying property property over people? Heath is
just like, you know, even though these doctors aren't behaving morally,
they are very good at pickling body parts. We shouldn't
destroy everything. But the mob wasn't just there to destroy property.
(13:34):
They were also after blood.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Heath continued.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
Vengeance was denounced against the faculty in general, but more
particularly against certain individuals. Not a man of the profession
thought himself safe. An innocent person got beat and abused
for being only dressed in black. Two of the young
tribe were unfortunate enough to fall into their hands.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
Oh yes, this moment was dramatic.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
At this point, most of the doctors of the city
had gone into hiding to escape the mob. No one's
sure where exactly Richard Bailey went, but John Hicks had
scadaddled into the care of a surgeon who had served
in the Continental Army at this man's house. Hicks allegedly
hid in the chimney, but Bailey's other assistants weren't so lucky.
(14:27):
Some of them had stayed behind to try to guard
the specimens. But unfortunately for these nerds, the mob got
their hands on those specimens and took them outside and
burned them. And then the mob dragged out the young doctors,
ready to get their collective revenge. But before anything happened
to them, the mayor, James Duane thrusted his way through
(14:50):
the crowd and was like, hey, mob, I'm taking these
boys down to jail.
Speaker 2 (14:54):
Okay there.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
They can't dissect anyone's loved ones, they can't snatch anybodies.
They can't wave any dead corpse arms at children. Okay,
I'm going to take them to jail. The mob was
still enraged but permitted him to take them. And really,
Dwayne wasn't taking them to jail for the mob's sake,
but for the doctors. He was like, the mob can't
kill them if they're protected by a jail cell. The
(15:24):
next morning, officials thought the riot was over, but oh no,
the citizens of New York City couldn't be stopped. Hundreds
of rioters flooded into the streets searching for John Hicks,
who started this whole mess by being bad at comedy.
Some of the members of the mob marched to Columbia
(15:45):
College and Alexander Hamilton arrived himself at the scene to
try to calm them down, but the mob was like,
fuck you, Alexander Hamilton, get out.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Of the way. Who the heck do you think you are?
Speaker 1 (15:57):
And Alexander Hamilton was like, well, they're gonna make a
musical about me one day, so I'm super important. But
the mob marched past him looking for dice sected bodies.
The students, though, had gotten rid of all of their
cadavers the night before, and the mob was like shit,
we can't find anything that justifies our crusade. But that
(16:18):
didn't stop them. They had another place they could go.
Some accounts say there are two thousand people, others say
five thousand. But all these people assembled at the jail
where the mayor had sent those doctors and medical students,
and the mob began to attack. Heath described it rather condescendingly.
(16:43):
He said, they commenced their attack with all that intemperance
and folly, whichever marks the conduct of people assembled in
that way, vainly endeavoring to break in when they could
do nothing more than break windows, which they will be
taxed to repair. Heath is like, why are you fighting?
Speaker 2 (17:02):
This is stupid.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
You're just destroying property and then you're gonna be tacked
to repair that.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
You guys are dumb. Uh property, I love property. Uh.
Speaker 1 (17:15):
When it was clear that the mob wasn't going to disperse,
the governor finally got involved. Governor George Clinton was like, ugh,
I hope this gets resolved organically, but alas he had
to do his job and call in the militia. At
first he told the militiaman he was like, don't shoot,
(17:35):
Let's just try to get them to disperse.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
Let's try to get them to chill the fuck.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
Out, Okay, But then the rioters started attacking the prominent
people assembled who were there to try to quell the attack.
Founding Father John Jay was there and he got hit
with a rock in his head and collapsed. And then
our gay ass General Baron von Steuben was also there
(18:00):
and also got hit by a rock. Of course, that
is according to the official record written by people who win,
and the winners in this case or the government, and
the government was there to quella.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
Right. Did the rioters really throw rocks.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
At them or did they incite something first?
Speaker 2 (18:16):
Who knows.
Speaker 1 (18:18):
But there's this guy, William Deer, who was seven years
old when all this was going down. He later wrote
a book about the whole event, and this is what
he said. He said, the Baron Steuben was struck by
a stone, which knocked him down, inflicted a flesh rune
upon his forehead, and brought a sudden change in the
compassionate feelings he had previously.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
Entertained towards the mop.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
At the moment of receiving it, he was earnestly talking
to the governor about not ordering the militia to fire
on the people, But as soon as he was struck,
the baron's benevolence deserted him, and as he fell he
lustily cried out, fire, governor, Fire, So indeed the militia
(19:00):
started shooting the rioters. Twenty people ended up dying, mostly
citizens and three members of the militia per time. Doctors
didn't know if John Jay would survive.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
They were like, his brain is injured. His brain is injured. No,
but don't worry. He was fine, and Steuben he was
completely fine.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
After this, the riot simmered down, but the people weren't done.
The city had become anti doctor. Over the course of
the riot, newspapers stopped running ads for medical schools. More
groups formed patrol cemeteries to defend against the body snatchers.
(19:51):
Some of the students were brought to court, but nothing happened,
and Richard Bailey he published a public notice being like, hey,
I actually never stole bodies inside of New York City.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
You guys are crazy for real.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
But that was him being sneaky, because yeah, technically he
didn't rob from cemeteries inside the city. Most of the
cemeteries were technically outside of the city. Isn't he a
clever little goose. One good thing that happened for the
citizens of New York City is that the authorities were
(20:25):
finally ready to make space for people whose relatives are
being dug up. They were finally listening a little bit,
and a year after the riot, they passed legislation specifically
quote an Act to prevent the odious practice of digging
up and removing for the purpose of dissection, dead bodies
interred in cemeteries or burial places. But they all knew
(20:49):
these little doctors wouldn't stop, so for them, they passed
some other legislation. They're like, hey, maybe instead of digging
up nice dead citizens, we'll just give you the bodies
of executed criminals, Okay, Like if someone's executed for arson
or for burglary or for murder, you can just have
(21:09):
their body and do whatever you want with it, Okay,
And that kind of works, But there still weren't enough
criminals who are being executed. So the body snatchers they
just had to be more discreet, you know, they covered
their tracks, they were subtle, and body snatching continued well
into the nineteenth century.
Speaker 2 (21:31):
And while I.
Speaker 1 (21:32):
Kind of want to hate Richard Bailey forever, I can't,
because during his medical career he did a lot of
good things for New York City.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
He improved sanitation.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
He also did a lot of research.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
On yellow fever.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
He figured out how to quarantine people effectively and how
to stop the spread. And then he died of yellow
fever in eighteen oh one. As for John Hicks, that
little bitch who hid in this chimney, he eventually finished
his medical training and became a doctor, but in seventeen
ninety seven he was involved in another public scandal. He
(22:10):
and his students had dissected a corpse of a man
who had been hanged for murder, and in a public notice,
Hicks was like, we did it in a discreet and
secret manner, even though it was actually in an anatomical theater.
Speaker 2 (22:23):
So I guess a discreet theater. Who knows.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
The problem was that the students who were supposed to
dispose of the body did so incorrectly. They were supposed
to put all the body parts in a sack and
throw it in the river with stones so it'd sink
to the bottom, but they forgot to put the stones
in there, so the sack just washed up, and some
people found it a bit of a shock, just some
(22:48):
dismembered body parts, and so Hicks had to publicly apologize, Hey,
sorry about those body parts, just.
Speaker 2 (22:58):
Willy nilly.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
And in the next year, in seventeen ninety eight, John
Hicks also died of yellow fever. Every episode of American
Filth we learn a lesson, and I think the lesson
here is sometimes it's inappropriate to joke around, right, you know,
(23:23):
especially in front of.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
A child who just lost their mother.
Speaker 1 (23:26):
You know, perhaps don't take the mother's body part and
wave it at the child.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
It's not a good joke.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
That being said, people probably would have found another reason
to write anyway, because guys, if you're gonna take someone's body, ask,
ask before you take. That's like a simple thing. Some
of the people of New York were like, yeah, it's fine.
If you want to dissect bodies, just ask before you
do it. So if you want to dissect someone's body,
(23:53):
all you gotta do is ask.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
I mean, I think you have to do a lot
more at this point, but whatever. Queue the credits.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
American Filth is a production of School of Humans and
iHeart Podcasts. This episode was produced, edited hosted.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
By me Gabby Watts.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Our theme song is by Jesse Niswanger.
Speaker 2 (24:15):
Virginia Prescott, Brandon Baughr.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
Or Elisie Crowley are executive producers. You can follow along
with the show on Instagram at American filth Pod, and
make sure you give the show a review some stars,
even the bad reviews. We love to see it, We
love feedback. Do we follow the feedback?
Speaker 2 (24:31):
Sometimes?
Speaker 1 (24:32):
Do we not?
Speaker 2 (24:33):
Most of the time?
Speaker 1 (24:34):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Who knows?
Speaker 1 (24:36):
But please help us out and we'll be back next
time with even more phil phil filthy phil filth.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
Bye talking next time. School of Humans
School of humans. Nowadays, if someone tells you you got
a snatched bod, that means you're looking fit, you're looking swell. Me.
I was pretty snatched in twenty twenty three, but now
I'm looking a little bit more released, if you know
what I'm saying. Yeah, I'm getting fayat. But back in
(00:30):
the olden days, a snatched body was actually no good.
What that meant was that your dead ass corpse got
snatched out of the ground. Yeah, that meant somebody, a
body snatcher had taken you out of the ground for
their own fun and games. And by fun and games,
I of course mean their medical education. Ooh, spooky music. Yes,
(01:03):
body snatchers were huge in the eighteenth century, and even
before that, medical students and teachers thought they didn't have
any other options. People weren't donating their bodies to science
when they died because you know, Christianity and stuff like that.
And people were so afraid of their bodies getting snatched
(01:26):
that those who could afford it would buy traps around
their graves or have people on cemetery patrol. But the
men of science believed they were entitled to these bodies,
since they weren't just forwarding their own education, but also
the education of mankind. They need to learn the secrets
(01:46):
of the body, and one way to do that was
to get up in the guts of a dead person.
But the body snatchers, well, sometimes they snatched too close
to the sun. And that's what happened in New York
City in seventeen eighty eight. Bodies were getting snatched that
(02:07):
the citizens of the city decided it was time for
those doctors to get a little snatched themselves.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Cue the theme song.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
This is American filth and I'm Gabby Watts. Every week
I tell you a filthy story from American history. Today's
episode the seventeen eighty eight doctors riot be de Beniti
be be Beta, Betta beta beta, but a bettada. Really, guys,
(02:48):
I always sing the theme song because again one guy
emailed me one time and said, I like when you
sing it, so now I sing it even more. Really,
I'll do anything. Just give me a suggestion. I'll put
it into the next show. In the seventeen eighties in
New York City, a lot of his body snatching was
(03:10):
going on. It was also called resurrecting spooky. Some of
the snatchers were medical students at Columbia College, which was
the only school of medicine in the city at the time.
These young lads started their medical education around age fifteen,
(03:30):
and they liked to walk around the city in their
little suits, wreaking of entitlement and bragging about their body
snatching ways. Many of them were encouraged to body snatch
by their professor, Charles McKnight. McKnight was a big surgeon
at the time, and in class he would complain about
(03:51):
the lack of cadavers at their disposal. He's like, it's
so hard to find a body these days, especially since
it's illegal to just take dead bodies off the street. Ugh.
Back in my day, you could just find a dead
poor person and do whatever you wanted. And so McKnight
(04:12):
would complain like this in his classes, being like, hint, hint, boys,
go get your shovels and bring back a body for
us to dissect and defile. Columbia College was by several
cemeteries by the city border, and that's where these students
did a lot of their looting, and city officials didn't
(04:32):
stop them because these particular cemeteries entombed the bodies of
black people, meaning when the living relatives of the deceased
complained to city officials, their complaints weren't taken seriously or
even hurt. A group of freedmen even addressed the Common
(04:52):
Council in early seventeen eighty eight, being like, can you
please stop these dumbass medical students from taking the bodies
of our loved ones in such a horrible way like
in this petition. They weren't even asking for bodies snatching
to stop, just to stop it being conducted so terribly.
The petition said, under the cover of night, they dig
(05:16):
up bodies of our deceased friends and relatives, carrying them
away without respect for age or sex. Your petitioners are
well aware of the necessity of physicians and surgeons consulting
dead subjects.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
For the benefit of mankind.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Your petitioners do not presuppose it as an injury to
the deceased, and will not be adverse to di section
in particular circumstances, that is, if it is conducted with
the decency and propriety which the solemnity of such an
occasion requires. Unfortunately, this petition was ignored, so instead they
(05:53):
organized patrols to make sure these medical students wouldn't dig
up any more of their loved ones, and when medical
students couldn't do their body snatching there, they moved on
to the cemeteries of poor white people. Another doctor in
the city was Richard Bailey. He wasn't associated with Columbia College,
(06:17):
and he was known around the town as a real
sick oh. There were rumors that he had hacked up
people who were still alive, the poor and the sick,
and would do experiments on them. But Bailey was talented,
so he and his apprentices were allowed to do their work.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
At New York Hospital. Isn't that great? How if you're
good at something.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
People will just let you do whatever you want. Well.
New York Hospital was also close to these cemeteries that
buried black and poor people, so Bailey's apprentices would snatch
bodies from there as well. In the winter of seventeen
eighty eight, body statching had reached a climax. Stealing bodies
(07:01):
in the winter was most common because the cold meant
that the bodies didn't composes quickly, and these medical students
were being careless, just taking bodies willy nilly, not even
covering their tracks or closing the graves.
Speaker 2 (07:14):
When they were done.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
I mean, that doesn't make it any better, but at
least they could have tried to be better thieves.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
That just shows how entitled they were.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
And then it started affecting well to do white people.
On February twenty first, seventeen eighty eight, a story ran
about a white lady's body getting snatched from Trinity's cemetery,
and with that, more and more people started getting on
board with the costs of stopping these.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
Good for nothing doctors.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
There are some discrepancies in the sources about what exactly
happened next, but what we do know is that in
April seventeen.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
Eighty eight, there was a riot.
Speaker 1 (07:59):
So let's take a look at one source again. Are
you guys enjoying this creepy music? This letter was from
a retired colonel who had been sent from Virginia to
New York on business, and he wrote a letter to
the governor of Virginia about what was going on. So
this is what he said about it, and I condensed
(08:19):
it a bit because his sentences.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Were very long.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
People have been loudly complaining about the young students of
medicine for their very frequent and wanton trespasses in the
burial grounds of this city. The corpse of a young
gentleman from the West Indies was recently taken, the grave
left open and the funeral clothing scattered about. A very
handsome and much esteemed young lady of good connections was
(08:46):
also recently carried off. These, with various other acts of
a similar kind, inflamed the minds of people exceedingly, and
the young members of the faculty, as well as the
cemeteries have been closely watched. Last Sunday, as some people
were strolling by the hospital, he discovered something hanging up
(09:07):
at one of the windows, which excited their curiosity, and
making use of a stick to satisfy that curiosity, part
of a man's arm or leg tumbled out upon them.
That's right, some people were having a nice leisurely Sunday
(09:27):
when a man's arm or leg fell on them. And
I imagine it's pretty shocking, just in the middle of
April to have an arm fall on you. It wasn't Halloween,
it's not even seasonal to have something spooky like that happen.
Another account makes this story even more grim. This came
from an eighteen seventy three book by historian Thomas Hedley.
(09:51):
The book is called The Great Riots of New York,
And honestly, what he says makes sense that people were
rioting because this is freaky deeky. He said that Richard Bailey,
that doctor who was known for being particularly gruesome, was
dissecting a body at the hospital with a team of
(10:11):
his apprentices and students. One of the students was this
little brat named John Hicks. Remember him, He sucks. Apparently
some children were outside climbing a tree when they peered
into the hospital room where they were doing a dissection.
They were dissecting an arm, and when John Hicks, that
stupilil idiot, saw the children, he probably thought he was
(10:35):
being absolutely hilarious. He picked up the arm and waved
it at the kids, haha. And then he said to
one of the kids that this arm belonged to that
kid's recently deceased mom.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
Isn't that messed up?
Speaker 1 (10:53):
Like? I don't know if John Hicks was a good
medical student at this point, but he definitely wasn't gonna
make it as a humorist.
Speaker 2 (11:00):
It's like read the room.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
A kid doesn't want to see their recently deceased mom's
dism membered arm. Comedy equals tragedy plus time, and hardly
anytime had elapsed.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
This guy's bad at math.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
And of course this account is unbelievable because how did
John Hicks know that this was the arm of that
kid's mom. It was New York in seventeen eighty eight,
it's a bump in town. How would he know everybody
who lives there? There was like twenty five thousand people.
But if this was true, that kid obviously was very
upset and ran home and told his dad what happened.
(11:35):
Then his dad rushed the cemetery to find his late
wife's coffin empty. And then this dad assembled a group
of concerned citizens and they marched to the hospital. There
a mob was forming, and they were ready to fuck
some shit up. Be right back after these soothing advertisements.
(12:02):
On Sunday, April thirteenth, seventeen eighty eight, a mob assembled
outside of New York Hospital, and they were thirsty for vengeance.
Too long had these entitled medical students and doctors ravaged
their cemeteries. Now it was time to snatch the bodies
of these body snatchers. According to the Virginia Colonel's Letter,
(12:24):
the mob started ransacking the hospital, and as.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
They went they only got more and more enraged. He wrote.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
In the anatomy room they found three fresh bodies, one
boiling in a kettle, and two others cut up, with
certain parts of the two sexes hanging up in a
most brutal position. These circumstances, together with the wanton and
apparent inhuman complexion of the room, exasperated the mob beyond
all bounds, to the total destruction of every anatomy in
(12:55):
the hospital, one of which was of so much value
and utility that it is justly esteemed a great public loss,
having been prepared in a way which much time and
attention and requires great skill to accomplish.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
That aside, is very funny to me.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
Uh the He's like, well, actually that was very valuable.
Why are they destroying property property over people? Heath is
just like, you know, even though these doctors aren't behaving morally,
they are very good at pickling body parts. We shouldn't
destroy everything. But the mob wasn't just there to destroy property.
(13:34):
They were also after blood.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Heath continued.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
Vengeance was denounced against the faculty in general, but more
particularly against certain individuals. Not a man of the profession
thought himself safe. An innocent person got beat and abused
for being only dressed in black. Two of the young
tribe were unfortunate enough to fall into their hands.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
Oh yes, this moment was dramatic.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
At this point, most of the doctors of the city
had gone into hiding to escape the mob. No one's
sure where exactly Richard Bailey went, but John Hicks had
scadaddled into the care of a surgeon who had served
in the Continental Army at this man's house. Hicks allegedly
hid in the chimney, but Bailey's other assistants weren't so lucky.
(14:27):
Some of them had stayed behind to try to guard
the specimens. But unfortunately for these nerds, the mob got
their hands on those specimens and took them outside and
burned them. And then the mob dragged out the young doctors,
ready to get their collective revenge. But before anything happened
to them, the mayor, James Duane thrusted his way through
(14:50):
the crowd and was like, hey, mob, I'm taking these
boys down to jail.
Speaker 2 (14:54):
Okay there.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
They can't dissect anyone's loved ones, they can't snatch anybodies.
They can't wave any dead corpse arms at children. Okay,
I'm going to take them to jail. The mob was
still enraged but permitted him to take them. And really,
Dwayne wasn't taking them to jail for the mob's sake,
but for the doctors. He was like, the mob can't
kill them if they're protected by a jail cell. The
(15:24):
next morning, officials thought the riot was over, but oh no,
the citizens of New York City couldn't be stopped. Hundreds
of rioters flooded into the streets searching for John Hicks,
who started this whole mess by being bad at comedy.
Some of the members of the mob marched to Columbia
(15:45):
College and Alexander Hamilton arrived himself at the scene to
try to calm them down, but the mob was like,
fuck you, Alexander Hamilton, get out.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Of the way. Who the heck do you think you are?
Speaker 1 (15:57):
And Alexander Hamilton was like, well, they're gonna make a
musical about me one day, so I'm super important. But
the mob marched past him looking for dice sected bodies.
The students, though, had gotten rid of all of their
cadavers the night before, and the mob was like shit,
we can't find anything that justifies our crusade. But that
(16:18):
didn't stop them. They had another place they could go.
Some accounts say there are two thousand people, others say
five thousand. But all these people assembled at the jail
where the mayor had sent those doctors and medical students,
and the mob began to attack. Heath described it rather condescendingly.
(16:43):
He said, they commenced their attack with all that intemperance
and folly, whichever marks the conduct of people assembled in
that way, vainly endeavoring to break in when they could
do nothing more than break windows, which they will be
taxed to repair. Heath is like, why are you fighting?
Speaker 2 (17:02):
This is stupid.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
You're just destroying property and then you're gonna be tacked
to repair that.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
You guys are dumb. Uh property, I love property. Uh.
Speaker 1 (17:15):
When it was clear that the mob wasn't going to disperse,
the governor finally got involved. Governor George Clinton was like, ugh,
I hope this gets resolved organically, but alas he had
to do his job and call in the militia. At
first he told the militiaman he was like, don't shoot,
(17:35):
Let's just try to get them to disperse.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
Let's try to get them to chill the fuck.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
Out, Okay, But then the rioters started attacking the prominent
people assembled who were there to try to quell the attack.
Founding Father John Jay was there and he got hit
with a rock in his head and collapsed. And then
our gay ass General Baron von Steuben was also there
(18:00):
and also got hit by a rock. Of course, that
is according to the official record written by people who win,
and the winners in this case or the government, and
the government was there to quella.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
Right. Did the rioters really throw rocks.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
At them or did they incite something first?
Speaker 2 (18:16):
Who knows.
Speaker 1 (18:18):
But there's this guy, William Deer, who was seven years
old when all this was going down. He later wrote
a book about the whole event, and this is what
he said. He said, the Baron Steuben was struck by
a stone, which knocked him down, inflicted a flesh rune
upon his forehead, and brought a sudden change in the
compassionate feelings he had previously.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
Entertained towards the mop.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
At the moment of receiving it, he was earnestly talking
to the governor about not ordering the militia to fire
on the people, But as soon as he was struck,
the baron's benevolence deserted him, and as he fell he
lustily cried out, fire, governor, Fire, So indeed the militia
(19:00):
started shooting the rioters. Twenty people ended up dying, mostly
citizens and three members of the militia per time. Doctors
didn't know if John Jay would survive.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
They were like, his brain is injured. His brain is injured. No,
but don't worry. He was fine, and Steuben he was
completely fine.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
After this, the riot simmered down, but the people weren't done.
The city had become anti doctor. Over the course of
the riot, newspapers stopped running ads for medical schools. More
groups formed patrol cemeteries to defend against the body snatchers.
(19:51):
Some of the students were brought to court, but nothing happened,
and Richard Bailey he published a public notice being like, hey,
I actually never stole bodies inside of New York City.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
You guys are crazy for real.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
But that was him being sneaky, because yeah, technically he
didn't rob from cemeteries inside the city. Most of the
cemeteries were technically outside of the city. Isn't he a
clever little goose. One good thing that happened for the
citizens of New York City is that the authorities were
(20:25):
finally ready to make space for people whose relatives are
being dug up. They were finally listening a little bit,
and a year after the riot, they passed legislation specifically
quote an Act to prevent the odious practice of digging
up and removing for the purpose of dissection, dead bodies
interred in cemeteries or burial places. But they all knew
(20:49):
these little doctors wouldn't stop, so for them, they passed
some other legislation. They're like, hey, maybe instead of digging
up nice dead citizens, we'll just give you the bodies
of executed criminals, Okay, Like if someone's executed for arson
or for burglary or for murder, you can just have
(21:09):
their body and do whatever you want with it, Okay,
And that kind of works, But there still weren't enough
criminals who are being executed. So the body snatchers they
just had to be more discreet, you know, they covered
their tracks, they were subtle, and body snatching continued well
into the nineteenth century.
Speaker 2 (21:31):
And while I.
Speaker 1 (21:32):
Kind of want to hate Richard Bailey forever, I can't,
because during his medical career he did a lot of
good things for New York City.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
He improved sanitation.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
He also did a lot of research.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
On yellow fever.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
He figured out how to quarantine people effectively and how
to stop the spread. And then he died of yellow
fever in eighteen oh one. As for John Hicks, that
little bitch who hid in this chimney, he eventually finished
his medical training and became a doctor, but in seventeen
ninety seven he was involved in another public scandal. He
(22:10):
and his students had dissected a corpse of a man
who had been hanged for murder, and in a public notice,
Hicks was like, we did it in a discreet and
secret manner, even though it was actually in an anatomical theater.
Speaker 2 (22:23):
So I guess a discreet theater. Who knows.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
The problem was that the students who were supposed to
dispose of the body did so incorrectly. They were supposed
to put all the body parts in a sack and
throw it in the river with stones so it'd sink
to the bottom, but they forgot to put the stones
in there, so the sack just washed up, and some
people found it a bit of a shock, just some
(22:48):
dismembered body parts, and so Hicks had to publicly apologize, Hey,
sorry about those body parts, just.
Speaker 2 (22:58):
Willy nilly.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
And in the next year, in seventeen ninety eight, John
Hicks also died of yellow fever. Every episode of American
Filth we learn a lesson, and I think the lesson
here is sometimes it's inappropriate to joke around, right, you know,
(23:23):
especially in front of.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
A child who just lost their mother.
Speaker 1 (23:26):
You know, perhaps don't take the mother's body part and
wave it at the child.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
It's not a good joke.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
That being said, people probably would have found another reason
to write anyway, because guys, if you're gonna take someone's body, ask,
ask before you take. That's like a simple thing. Some
of the people of New York were like, yeah, it's fine.
If you want to dissect bodies, just ask before you
do it. So if you want to dissect someone's body,
(23:53):
all you gotta do is ask.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
I mean, I think you have to do a lot
more at this point, but whatever. Queue the credits.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
American Filth is a production of School of Humans and
iHeart Podcasts. This episode was produced, edited hosted.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
By me Gabby Watts.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Our theme song is by Jesse Niswanger.
Speaker 2 (24:15):
Virginia Prescott, Brandon Baughr.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
Or Elisie Crowley are executive producers. You can follow along
with the show on Instagram at American filth Pod, and
make sure you give the show a review some stars,
even the bad reviews. We love to see it, We
love feedback. Do we follow the feedback?
Speaker 2 (24:31):
Sometimes?
Speaker 1 (24:32):
Do we not?
Speaker 2 (24:33):
Most of the time?
Speaker 1 (24:34):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Who knows?
Speaker 1 (24:36):
But please help us out and we'll be back next
time with even more phil phil filthy phil filth.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
Bye talking next time. School of Humans
Host
Gabbie Watts
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