RedHanded - Episode 321 - LIVE: Halloween Special Part 2 – Corpsewood Manor and Burke & Hare

Episode Date: October 26, 2023

’Tis the season, the SpOoKy season… And that means part two of our annual Halloween story swap, this time LIVE from Dallas, Texas!!! Listen up as Suruthi tells you all about the aptly named Corpsewood Manor and Hannah discusses the murderous Victorian antics of Burke & Hare. WATCH THIS EPISODE LIVE WITH THE SLIDES AT: https://youtu.be/3dnlbuxf8f8Follow us on social media:InstagramTwitterVisit our website:WebsiteSources available on redhandedpodcast.comSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Hello friends, Romans, countrymen, spooky Halloween lovers. Welcome to the second edition of our annual Halloween Story Swap. This is a live that was recorded at Obsessed Fest in Dallas this weekend, just gone. The sound's a bit off. We've worked really hard on fixing it and this is the best

it's going to get. We had an enormous echo in the room, so we really have done our best. Also, it's quite difficult for Saru and I to hear each other or what we were saying, but we've done our best to clean it up and we really hope that you enjoy it. You can listen to it as it is if you would like, but I would encourage you to go over to our YouTube channel where you can see the slides that we were using for our visual aids throughout the show. The clicker didn't work, so it wasn't as slick as we wanted. But it still will make a lot more sense if you're watching the YouTube version. Also, today is Thursday, if you're listening on day of release. Tomorrow is Friday.

And Friday brings with it the release of our ghost hunting video. We asked you what you wanted us to do if we won Listener's Choice for three years in a row, and we went to a haunted house, and we filmed it, and it was terrifying. Don't believe a word Saru says now. She was horrified.

And that video is coming out tomorrow. You can see it for yourselves. But for now, here's your Halloween story swap. Happy Halloween. Hello, everyone. How are you guys doing? I can hear myself back. That's strange.

Yeah. We've had quite a few technical difficulties, which is why we're running a bit late. Don't look. As you can see, it's been a bit more complicated than we thought. We also weren't able to print off our scripts, so I apologise,

but we are going to have to read off our phones. Saving the planet. It's fine. We can do it this way. But yes. So, hi, guys. It's so good to be here are you all having a fantastic time excellent so are we we love coming to the us we love coming to meet all of you and to go to

target we've had a great time thank you thank you for your great work so everyone listening to this we are going to do not our actual live show so So if anyone's ever come before, that's not what we're going to do. We don't have enough time. We're going to be doing a Halloween story swap. And yeah, everyone watching and listening along at home to the recording. Hello. Thanks for being with us. So we don't have a lot of time.

So we're going to get on with it. Yeah, we're already late. So this is Charles Scudder. Okay. Dr. Charles Scudder. He was a kind of peace-loving hippie professor who could only exist in the late 60s. And we're going to learn quite a lot about him very intimately in a second. So Charles Scudder worked at Loyola University. Is that how I say it? Feels like that's right. And he worked there as part of a government-funded program researching the potential uses of psychoactive drugs like LSD. Now, Charles Gutter was an eccentric, charismatic man.

And he would often turn up to work with bright purple hair. There he is. No, no, I wasn't clicking. Go back. Never mind. Okay. I'm going to let you guys in on a secret. The clicker doesn't work. Rick backstage was like, we want it to look slick. So he was like, you click and I will click backstage. It's going seamlessly as you can tell. So yes, Charles Scudder. this is him with his purple hair. I'll wave with my hand when I don't want it to click.

Charles had had two marriages in pretty quick succession. Click. The second of which had produced four sons. However, by the time he was working at Loyola, he was divorced and living in Chicago with his kids. It was here that he met Joseph Odom. Nice. That was slick. Or Joey. And he would actually turn out to be the love of Charles's life. Now, Joey's life couldn't have been more different to Charles's, like his lead up to that point. He'd grown up in a pretty rough neighbourhood and he dropped out of school in the fifth grade

and following a stint of petty crimes, he eventually got arrested and he spent quite a few years in jail. But Joey wasn't a quitter and in jail he trained as a cook, a skill which he used when he was released and managed to get his life on track. When he met Charles, the pair hit it off and started their relationship. Eventually, Joey moved in with Charles and his boys, seamlessly fitting in as part of the family, making everyone lunches and helping around the house. By the time the kids had flown the nest, Charles was becoming increasingly frustrated with his work. Oh, no. His research grants were getting smaller,

and the university had started to focus more on how to get as many students through the door rather than the research. Boo. Boo, indeed. Charles also felt like Chicago in the 70s was going downhill fast. That's not my opinion, before people get upset.

And so Charles, like many hippies before and since, started to fantasise about living off the grid. Away from the hustle and bustle, it would be just him, Joey and nature. So the couple started looking at land across the country. Now, look. This isn't my opinion. This was what Google autofills when you search, why is insert state so, et cetera. So Texas, big, good, nice. And they were looking at this map to decide where they were going to go, and they decided to go to the backward state of Georgia. Again, not my opinion.

And this is the Georgia state something. And their motto, Hannah, is wisdom, justice, and moderation, all three of which absolutely have nothing to do with today's stores, as you will find out. So they decide on Georgia and they bought a small Jeep and caravans. Come on, guys, there's so much effort to put those. Oh no, no, back, back, Rick. There we go. To put the little Mastiffs in there. Because they also bought two of those. And they called them Beelzebub and Arsenal. Who's Arsenal? I don't know.

I don't know. But there you go. So they've got everybody. They've got their new family. And they head to Georgia. And over the next two years, the pair built their dream home in Chattachoochee National Forest. There's a picture of Chattachoochee National Forest. There's a picture. Chattachoochee? There we go.

Okay. Chattawoochee. There we go. And there, they built a large brick building to look like a castle. Nice brick building. It's nice. It had high ceilings, pointy roofs,

and even stone gargoyles on every corner of this house. Now, this understandably raised a few eyebrows from local hikers when they wandered into the woods and found two blokes building a massive castle out there. There they are. But they pretty quickly started to win over the locals and the people who came by because you see Charles and Joey were very very friendly

people and they'd offer passers-by a drink, something to eat and sometimes even one of their 12,000 tabs of LSD that Charles had stolen from his university before he left. Now eventually the pair moved into this house that they had built and they named it Corpsewood Manor. Yes, Corpsewood Manor. I should have written it up there so everyone could see. Now how they came up with this name is very much up for debate. Some people say that it's a play on words related to the abundance of dead and dying trees that surrounded the manor.

Like dead wood, corpse wood. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Others say one day when Charles was out walking the dogs, he saw a dead horse. Regardless, I don't know what that's got to do with anything, but yeah, okay. So regardless, Corpsewood was built,

and the pair decided to add a finishing touch to their new life in the forest by building one more building that they called the Chicken Coop. Okay. This is going to become a very important part of our story. Are there chickens in it? Yes. Okay. So this wooden building had three floors, as you can see, all of which served a very different purpose.

Now, Rick, you're going to have to be really on it for this, but I spent a very long time putting this bit together. So the bottom floor housed chickens, which the couples used for their eggs. The next floor was used for storage, mainly for canned goods. But it also housed the couple's extensive collection of gay pornography. And on the top floor, the couple called it their pink room or their pleasure chamber.

Oh, I see. Yes. Okay. So it's quite small on the screen down there. I was like, what is that? It's a butt plug. It's a butt plug. Okay.

And a puddle. Oh. That's what people do, right? Sure. So this is a place that Charles and Joey would enjoy, but it's also a place they would encourage their guests to come by. Oh, okay. And indulge their carnal desires.

With the chicken? With the puddle. Oh. And what they wanted was basically for people to throw away any kind of preconceived notions of what was okay. They're hippies. Okay. They're sexy hippies. That's what you need to know. be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. When TV producer Roy Radin was found dead in a canyon near L.A. in 1983, there were many questions surrounding his death. The last person seen with him was Lainey Jacobs, a seductive cocaine dealer who desperately wanted to be part of the Hollywood elite.

Together, they were trying to break into the movie industry. But things took a dark turn when a million dollars worth of cocaine and cash went missing. From Wondery comes a new season of the hit show Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of The Cotton Club Murder early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus.

I'm Jake Warren, and in our first season of Finding, I set out on a very personal quest to find the woman who saved my mum's life. You can listen to Finding Natasha right now exclusively on Wondery+. In season two, I found myself caught up in a new journey to help someone I've never even met. But a couple of years ago, I came across a social media post

by a person named Loti. It read in part, Three years ago today that I attempted to jump off this bridge, but this wasn't my time to go. A gentleman named Andy saved my life. I still haven't found him. This is a story that I came across purely by chance, but it instantly moved me and it's taken me to a place where I've had to consider some deeper

issues around mental health. This is season two of Finding, and this time, if all goes to plan, we'll be finding Andy. You can listen to finding andy and finding natasha exclusively and ad free on wondery plus join wondery plus in the wondery app apple podcast or spotify and just in case anyone thinks i'm joking about this little description here is the official fbi report on what they found at the chicken coop. And I thought it would be quite... Why impress? If we stuck this description written by an actual FBI officer into an AI generator,

do we see what they think the pink room might look like? It's a bit weird. It's really depressing. It's really depressing. It really depressing but like a student bed sit but i also think it probably is quite close to what was actually up there now for long-standing listeners of our show you won't be at all surprised to know that adopting this kind of off-the-grid lifestyle meant that charles and joey became quite interested in the Church of Satan. He'd also started to put up satanic symbols all around Corpsewood Manor.

There you go. Just, you know, because he wasn't freaking out the locals enough, apparently. However, we know and you know that being interested in the Church of Satan does not make you a devil worshipper. But that's not what the locals thought. Charles was actually an atheist and an academic. He certainly didn't believe in any kind of actual literal devil. But that didn't stop him from using devil imagery and satanic pictures to get a rise out of people and generally just freak them out a bit. Now over the years, Corpsewood Manor and the Chicken Coop became a bit of a local local hangout spot

Charles and Joey were more than generous when it came to their homemade wine for whoever was wandering through the woods and everyone was welcome to stay as long as they wanted in the pleasure room and the manor actually

became a bit of a spot because um charles would regularly play his harp there people just come out look at his butt plugs and they're playing the harp and slowly it wasn't just the locals being drawn to the chicken coop and corpsewood manor it started attracting a wider variety of oddball and And two such oddballs were Samuel Tony West and Kenneth Avery Brock. Or as they were known locally, Tony and Avery. Isn't the Dildo and Peep show called Kenneth? Yes, it is. You're right. Tony was the older of the pair, being 30 years old.

And Avery was his 17-year-old sidekick, which is a little bit strange. And the two of them lived together in a trailer. Neither had had a particularly good start in life, although it has to be said that Tony's life was far worse, if we're going to measure it in that way. His dad had died when Tony was just 10 years old. Then three years later, when he was 13, he accidentally shot and killed his own two-year-old cousin.

Oh. While he was playing with a pistol he didn't know was loaded. Don't do that. No. In general, would be my advice. And it gets worse because after that happened, he spent the rest of his childhood in a psychiatric facility. Oh, God.

Before going in and out of prison throughout his 20s. And the longest stretch coming when he shot his brother-in-law four times. So that wasn't so much of an accident. Now, Avery dropped out of school young. He was a hard worker, but his lack of qualifications and troubled background made it hard for him to settle in any kind of job. So when he met Tony, age 17, Avery was essentially homeless, stealing food to survive. Tony offered to let Avery stay in his trailer as a lodger, and he jumped at the chance. And so the pair bonded, living in their trailer home,

drinking and huffing a mixture of paint thinner and model aeroplane glue. So specific. Which they called Tootaloo. Spelled Toot hyphen A hyphen Lou. And it was actually Avery who was the one who found out about Corpsewood Manor. Eventually, after telling Tony it was a great place to get free booze and hang out, Avery convinced his older friend to come along and check it out. So in mid-November, the pair

drove into the hills and found the now infamous Cotswood Manor. When they arrived, things weren't as they always do. Charles came outside, had a chat, and then invited them up to the pink room, a pleasure chamber, for some homemade watermelon

wine. Butt plugs. Yeah. Homemade butt plugs. That's what it means. And so the trio sat at the top of the chicken coop, getting drunk. As Charles told them all about his beliefs, his values and everything else under the sun.

Then things took a bit of a turn. Now we don't know exactly what led to this particular incident, but at some point, Charles, who by this point was in his 50s, started performing oral sex on 17-year-old Avery. Now, the age of consent in Georgia is 16. So nothing illegal happened, but it was an idea. Do you guys get that reference? Do you know who that is? Some one-person class. The Brit in that film.

Okay, this is Philip Schofield. Oh, no, no, no, no, Rick, go back. No, excuse my... This is Philip Schofield. He's a TV presenter who had an affair with a younger man that he worked with. And when he was caught, he said, it wasn't illegal. It was just unwise. So there we go. That's him. Some British knowledge for you. He looks a lot more haggard now.

Yes, he does. So Charles then offered to perform oral sex on Tony, who politely turned him down. And the pair drove home. On their drive home, Avery started to panic. He was worried that his friend Tony might tell people that he was gay, and he begged him not to please tell anyone what had happened. Now, to his credit, Tony seemed genuinely unbothered by what had happened or about Avery's sexuality. Regardless of this situation, Avery was pretty worked up about the whole incident. And the next day he woke up convinced that Charles had in fact taken advantage of him and that he needed to get revenge.

Okay. The revenge was going to come in the form of robbery and murder. Avery was convinced that if the two men had enough money to build a castle in the woods, like they were living it out there with their chicken coop and butt plugs, they must have some pretty valuable items hanging around in that house. Okay. Maybe even some money. So on the 12th of December, Avery and Tony set off for Corpsewood Manor, taking with them a.22 caliber rifle

and two friends, a girl called Teresa Hodges and Tony's nephew, Joey Wells, who were just innocently having a date that day and then they got roped into coming on this revenge mission. So when they arrived at Corpsewood, it was business as usual. Charles came out and had a chat and invited them up to the pleasure room for a chat and a drink and to take some drugs. This time though, when everyone was intoxicated, Avery slipped out, telling the group that he was going to go get more paint thinner when he was actually grabbing his rifle. And then he came back, burst back into the chicken coop with a gun in his hand.

And he assumed that there would be some sort of massive commotion. He was expecting some, you know, some accurate fear from people. But everyone was so far gone that nobody even seemed to notice that Avery was waving a massive gun around. Charles vaguely looked over Avery, jokingly saying, bang, bang, and then just carried on his conversation with Tony as if nothing had happened. Avery stood there, open-mouthed, before snapping back into reality. He grabbed a hunting knife from his boot and took it to Charles's throat. Teresa screamed and Avery spun round and yelled at Tony to shut her up.

Avery then tore up a bedsheet which he used to tie up Charles. The 17-year-old then demanded that Charles tell him where the money was kept in the house and if anyone besides Joey was downstairs. Charles said there wasn't any money in the house. They did have a fair amount of money, but it was all stashed away with the bank, something that Avery thought these two old hippies wouldn't have done. This flipped Avery into a rage

and then he basically tries to torture Charles to tell him where the money is because he doesn't believe him. Avery still convinced that there was something of value in the house, climbed down from the chicken coop and went into Corpsewood Manor. Tony followed, dragging Charles and the two teenagers, Teresa and Joey, along. Inside, a stunned Joey was clearing up dinner. Because remember, Joey's just a chef. He just wants to be a hippie chef living in the woods. He's just making dinner, clearing up, having a good time.

Avery ordered Joey to leave the house. And as he stood, Avery shot him four times without hesitation. At this point, chaos ensued as the two Mastiffs, remember them? Beelzebub and Asenath, barreled into the room to protect their owners. All the while, Avery screamed at Charles to tell him where he kept the money. In the madness, Charles was beside himself with grief, trying to get to his partner, Joey, who was lying on the floor. As Avery pointed the gun at him,

all Charles could muster between his heartbreaking moans was, I asked for this. Oh my God. Within a few seconds, he and his two dogs were dead. Tony and Avery then ransacked the house, looking for anything of value. Allegedly, as they turned the house inside out, they accidentally pressed play on a stereo. And this stereo boomed a recording through the house of Charles playing the harp such an obnoxious instrument how do you get them places that's what I've always wondered like if you're doing like a harp exam that's a good question you have to take a little one like a wheelbarrow maybe I think if you have a harp exam, they should provide the harp. That's what we'll say.

So it blares out this harp music and also Charles's voice reciting the lines to William Blake's The Tiger. So that's going to freak you out. Okay. If you are on a rampage through a man's house after you've just murdered him and his two dogs. But ultimately, Avery and Tony found nothing and ended up taking a pistol and some handcuffs along with Charles's silver medallion and keys to his Jeep. Tony and Avery then ordered the two teenagers, Joey and Teresa, into his car, telling them to drive it home while he and Avery drove the Jeep. During the drive, Teresa told Joey that they should just go to the police station she's like this date has gone to hell take me to the police station right now but Joey said he just couldn't

hand in his uncle no matter what he'd done when they got home Joey's mum drove Teresa home that's the worst day end to a teenage date ever But Joey's mum also agreed that they shouldn't go to the police when Teresa spilled the beans to her boyfriend's mum in the car. She's like, look, your son won't go to the police, but your brother has just killed somebody. And she's like, I don't care. We're not going. So they decided that Teresa and her two-year-old child should come stay with them for a few days so they could keep an eye on her. And all the while, Tony and Avery were making a run for Mexico. On the way, they pulled into a rest stop to nap and woke up to find another car parked next to them. Inside this car was US Navy Lieutenant Kirby Phelps.

There he is. He doesn't look like what you'd expect. No, he looks a bit like Jeffrey Dahmer. He does, I thought that. And this poor guy was just there to pick up some provisions and they decided to rob him. Tony knocked on the door with his stolen pistol and Kirby, who'd seen his fair share of shit,

calmly told him that he could take whatever he wanted but not to shoot him. But Tony was like, whatever, and shot Kirby three times. But when Phelps's body was found just a few days later, because they don't even cover it up. They just shoot him and leave him on the side of the road. He was actually found by some detectorists. Somewhat. Detectorists who were in the wood looking for Civil War relics.

It's like metal detectorists. Oh, I see. Yes. I thought you were just saying detective wrong. No. No, no, no. Have you not seen that incredibly slow BBC show with Mackenzie Crook in it? And it's called The Detectorists.

In that, people are like, it's quite funny. And people are like, are you a metal detector? And they're like, no, this is a metal detector i'm a detectorist god so there you go so yeah this was the beginning of the end for tony and avery after this body was found especially after the body of joey charles and the dogs were found just a few days later. The problem is, as usually happens when pairs murder, Tony and Avery fell out. Okay. Yeah, and they'd gone their separate ways

before they were caught. Avery hitchhiked his way back to Georgia and was picked up by the police after he called his mum for a lift. He immediately made a full confession as soon as he was arrested. And Tony also threw in the towel and started

driving back home these two they've got a lot of ambition but not a lot of like resilience to see their runaway situation through so he's on his way but tony runs out of gas and just hands himself into a police officer who and this i thought was quite interesting, he hands himself into a police officer in Tennessee. But this officer was worried about the legality of arresting someone in his state. And so he told Tony to walk across the state line and hand himself in in Georgia. Okay.

I don't know why. So yeah, that's what happened. And in court, Tony and Avery's defense, well, what they tried to argue was that Charles and Joey had been devil worshipers. But this didn't really go down very well. Basically, they're saying they were devil worshipers, so it was fine that we killed them.

And even the jury were like, no. So they tried to suggest then that they had been drugged with LSD. But this was also quickly disproven. In the end, Tony was given a life sentence. And he actually died in prison in September this year. Avery was sentenced to death by electric chair. Although this was eventually overturned and he was given a life sentence.

And even though Corpsewood Manor has slowly fallen into ruin over the past 40 years, the house and its story has a somewhat of a cult following with people eager to go and visit the ruins and presumably graffiti there. And that's basically the end of our story. And I think we're going to end with a little extract from Charles Scudder himself. If we want a different, fuller, more exciting life than we're leading, one closer to

this beautiful earth, we can have it. Our only chains are those in our minds. Just promise me you'll think about it seriously for a while. After all, wouldn't you like to live in your own castle in the country? Probably not. Well, just don't invite random people over to have sex parties in your chicken coop. Do you know chickens have to eat pebbles to make the eggshell? I do. There you go. Well, now you all know as well. Fun fact. Absolutely disgusting. Thanks, guys. And thanks to rick well done rick he did great work back there okay i'm not gonna be as good as the clicker good start good to set expectations yeah yeah yeah so you didn't see anything um okay i've got a olden timey nice that's the olden days. Go just in case you need it. A visual aid.

So I've actually got the quintessentially British tale of how consumer capitalism led to the death of at least 16 people, 16 innocent people, sorry, and two who were very guilty. I am going to tell you the story of William Burke and William Hare. Nice. First myth to bust. So not British, they're Irish. How are they? Yes, exactly. But everyone thinks they're British, even though it all happens in Scotland. Really interesting to get in the full in. William Burke and William Hare, their names conjure up images of dingy Victorian streets, sadistic surgeons and, of course...

Bodies. Murder. Murder. Yes. I thought they just dug up bodies. See, they actually never robbed a grave. What? Because they just kill the people, spoilers,

before they were buried because you've got to dig them up. It's a whole thing. They didn't even start by stealing bodies. No. Well, they stole the bodies. They just didn't take them from graves. Oh.

They stole the bodies of the people they murdered. Yes. Oh. The end. Okay. So that's what we think they look like. This is what they actually look like. Those are death masks.

Nice. And they are in Edinburgh, if you want to go and have a look at them. So I'm going to tell you what actually happened in 19th century Edinburgh. William Burke, the first one, was born in Tyrone, which is, it says Northern Ireland there, what is now currently Northern Ireland, but at the time was being oppressed by the British. He was born in 1792, and despite what you might have read, he grew up in relative comfort. His upbringing in a middle-class Irish family was far from desperate. He and his brother both joined the British army in their late teens

because they were Irish and had no choice. Burke served with the Northern Irish Militia before settling down with his wife. However, after an argument with his father-in-law, he abandoned his wife and two children and moved to Scotland, which looks like that, even now. And there he moved in with a woman called Helen

McDougall. That sounds like a fake name. Which I was going to do in a Scottish accent but I chickened out. There she is. Ooh, she's a catch. I don't know what's going on here. What's he been doing? Something he shouldn't have. have yeah they also look like the same person I know and I I also think it's very interesting that she's just associate yes yeah yeah and he

is obviously the murderer so Helen McDougall no one actually called her Helen McDougall everyone called her Nellie so that's what I'm gonna do for the rest of the show. And they did get married. And when work dried up on the canals, which is why he was in Scotland working on canal stuff, which I forgot to say, sorry. They moved east to work on the autumn harvest. And there they met another couple, William Hare and his wife, Margaret.

Look how jolly he looks. I would like to take a moment to discuss. Why has this baby got so much facial hair? Why? The baby's grabbing her boob. What's happening? Our babies do that. I'm more concerned about his beard.

Look at it. The bearded baby. The bearded baby. Look how cross she is. Yeah, she's not happy about the boob grabbing, that's for sure.. Look at it. The bearded baby. The bearded baby. Look how cross she is. Yeah, she's not happy about the boob grabbing, that's for sure. But look at him.

He's the happiest grave, not robber, the happiest murderer I've ever seen. Yeah, that is William Hare and his wife, Margaret. We know a lot less about William Hare

than we do about William Burke. We don't know where he was born. We don't know when he was born. We're pretty sure he's Irish. And we also know that he was what we would say in the UK, properly rough. He was scrappy, rude, illiterate, and his face was covered in scars, which is probably why his wife is so angry. And we also know that Maggie married him under some very interesting circumstances. They met when William Hare moved into a lodging room run by Maggie and her previous husband. And then that husband conveniently died. And then William and Maggie got together. You don't believe in ghosts? I get it. Lots of people don't.

I didn't either, until I came face to face with them. Ever since that moment, hauntings, spirits, and the unexplained have consumed my entire life. I'm Nadine Bailey. I've been a ghost tour guide for the past 20 years. I've taken people along with me into the shadows, uncovering the macabre tales

that linger in the darkness. And inside some of the most haunted houses, hospitals, prisons, and more. Join me every week on my podcast,

Haunted Canada, as we journey through terrifying and bone-chilling stories of the unexplained. Search for Haunted Canada on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you find your favorite podcasts. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondery Show American Scandal. We bring to light some of the biggest controversies in U.S. history. Presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our latest series, NASA embarks on an ambitious program to reinvent space exploration

with the launch of its first reusable vehicle, the Space Shuttle. And in 1985, they announced they're sending teacher Krista McAuliffe into space aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger, along with six other astronauts. But less than two minutes after liftoff, the Challenger explodes. And in the tragedy's aftermath, investigators uncover a series of preventable failures by NASA and its contractors that led to the disaster. Follow American Scandal on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Experience all episodes ad-free and be the first to binge the newest season only on Wondery Plus. You can join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Start your free trial today. But none of this put off William Burke. Their mates, look. Despite their differing backgrounds, the two Williams

quickly hit it off and became the best of friends. In fact, when the Hares moved back to Edinburgh post-harvest, the Burkes came back with them and moved into William Hare's boarding house in November 1872. Everyone in this story appears to have their own boarding house. I was going to say. They're back in Edinburgh and they decide that they are going to be hawkers. Is that a person who? I'm going to ask the audience. Okay.

Anyone know what a hawker is? Yeah. A salesperson. Yes. Yeah. Like a peddler. But they like shout really loudly about what they're saying nice nice nice i like it a salesperson yeah that's what they look like got it and uh they were very good

at it but for some reason they decided to be cobblers instead i'm assuming everyone knows what a cobbler is yeah good i love it it's like you've written out because you weren't sure if people would understand what you said They decided to be cobblers Yeah, this is English as a foreign language William Burke was very good at being a cobbler and he made his name

for himself as a bit of an Oliver Twist cheeky chappy click type of guy. I think there's a sound effect here. Good. It's just Dick Van Dyke. That's fine. Yeah. Look at him. He's so happy.

So, he was so popular and so good at cobbling stuff, he earned a pound a week, which at the time was loads. And for a while, things were looking great. Both of the Williams were living together. Chim, chiminy, chim, chiminy, chim, chim, chiminy. Good luck, we're above when I shake hands with you. Click. Click. Click.

Click. And they were earning decent money. But then suddenly, disaster. Ah. Thank you. On the 29th of November, not long after they had settled down in London, one of the lodgers in William Hare's house just died of dropsy. Ah, edema. Yes, exactly. Because because he was an alcoholic this was not good news

especially since that lodger known as old donald owed around four pounds in back payments of rent which again olden times loads and the hares were skint so naturally william Hare and his best mate, William Burke, came up with a plan. Old Donald had no money, but he did leave one valuable thing behind. His body. His body, exactly. And as luck would have it, Edinburgh at the time was considered to be one of the foremost hubs of anatomy in the whole world. Students flocked from across Europe to attend Edinburgh University and in its world-famous anatomy lectures skilled tutors would dissect corpses for their education and entertainment. So Burke and Hare came up with a cunning plan. The pair

informed their local council that Donald had died without any next of kin so it became the council's responsibility to have him buried. The council then sent a coffin over to Hare's house and an undertaker put Donald into the coffin and then when no one was looking in a classic Scooby-Doo switcheroo Burke and Hare took old Donald's body back and replaced it with some heavy wood chips. Do you know what? I kind of feel like fair enough. He owed them a lot of money. He did owe a lot of money.

It's a victimless crime. And then they put old Donald under the bed and sent the coffin off to the cemetery full of wood chips. That night, the pair took the body off to the cemetery full of wood chips. Nice. That night, the pair took the body up to the university looking for a man called Mr Munro. That's them. Mr Munro was a very famous local anatomist. What?

Look at his face. Look how terrified he is. But I'm like, cover up the dead body face then. He's just like, ah! However, when they got to the university looking for Mr Monroe, some narc told them that they should go to Dr Robert Knox instead.

Robert Knox would give them a lot more money for their body, so they went to him. Anatomists would pay top dollar for bodies for dissection. Robert Knox was an ex-army surgeon and now a leading anatomist. He conducted upwards of two full dissections a day in front of an audience of over 400 people. And he famously advertised, that's him advertising, full demonstration on fresh anatomical

subjects. In other words, he needed quite a lot of bodies and he didn't like asking any questions. And on the back of this success, Burke and Hare got £7.10 for old Donald's body. He only owed them four. Yes. It's great.

It's a good return on investment. I guess you've got to factor in the wood chips. You know. Now, remember, when they're cobbling, they're only earning a pound a week, so they're absolutely rolling in it now. Genius. They could sustain their small families for a year, but they didn't stop. As they left the university, one of Robert Knox's assistants told them that they would be glad to see them again when they had another body to dispose of. Subtle.

And just like that, Burke and Hare joined Edinburgh's thriving hidden economy, the trade of human bodies. Truth be told, Burke and Hare were a little bit late to the party. The body business had been booming for quite some time, and so much that grave robbing in edinburgh was absolutely rife it was so commonplace that the rich started to place large heavy stone slabs over their relatives graves to stop their bodies getting stolen in the dead of night others resorted to large coffin shaped cages called mort safes you've seen these oh yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah i when i was a kid i thought they were vampires but yeah they're

not apparently oh wow so you can't nick bodies yeah the most extreme measures were actually taken by the poorer community members who couldn't afford a big cage so they just used to stand next to the grave and watch take it in. Who do you love that much? Would you not guard my grave? No. Your garden? I thought you said guard. You wouldn't guard your grave.

Okay, but... I'd garden it. Would you? Yeah. Did you say garden or guard? I said guard. Oh, right. No, I wouldn't guard your grave. It's such a waste of time, isn't it?

Especially they're poor. I'm like, you're just poor because you can't afford a cage. So you're going to stand there. Yeah. And apparently they would sometimes build castles. Click. To watch the graves from at least inside. Okay.

Okay. And as I already said, biggest misconception about Birkenhair, they were grave robbers. They were not. So they weren't above grave robbing, okay. And as I already said, biggest misconception about Birkenhair, they were grave robbers, they were not. So they weren't above grave robbing, clearly, but it's just a lot simpler and easier to get people before they are buried. Or, as we will soon find out, before they had even died. Given that bodies were going to be dissected in front of a crowd of paying students, Robert Knox wanted the freshest bodies that they could find.

And they didn't ask questions. Who's ever talking? I didn't even. What's he eating? It's like a pepper. So, the law at the time dictated that surgeons could only dissect bodies of dead prisoners, people who'd taken their own lives, or orphans. And that meant that the legal supply of bodies just couldn't keep up with demand. And anatomists would just take whatever they were given. In early 1828, Burke and Hare found themselves in a very similar situation to the one with Donald,

because another lodger in William Hare's house had fallen ill. This guy's name is Joseph. And he had come down with some kind of fever and delirium at the same time. And at the time, an establishment found to be housing the sick could be shut down due to unsanitary conditions.

So Birkenhead decided that the only reasonable thing to do was to kill Joseph. I don't know why he's dressed as Napoleon. I also don't know why the devil's there. There's so much, there's so many questions about this picture. The Pope. Why?

I don't understand. So what they did is they got poor Joseph absolutely plastered on whiskey and then he fell asleep on his bed and then Hare suffocated Joseph with a pillow whilst Burke lay on his chest to push out all the air. Maybe they were at some sort of costume party. Maybe. The Pope, someone's dressed as the Pope, someone's dressed as the devil,

he's dressed as Napoleon, and this guy's dressed as George Washington. Someone's dressed as the devil. He's dressed as Napoleon. This guy's dressed as George Washington. And they're like, quit grabbing him. He's just drunk enough. Exactly. And at the time, this would have been a completely undetectable murder. Of course. So it looked like he died of natural causes.

So they took his body off to Robert Knox, who was so pleased with the condition that he paid them ten whole British pounds, which was enough to see them both through for several months. But they did not. Just a few weeks later, a travelling salesman contracted jaundice while staying at Hare's house. The original script said infected with jaundice. I don't think you get infected with jaundice, do you? Develop jaundice? Yeah, that's what I thought.

So, once again, they decided that the only reasonable course of action was to kill this salesman. There they are again. And they got another £10 note. And this is a real turning point for Burke and Hare. Up until this point, they'd sold one man who'd already died, two more who looked like they were going to die or just weren't very well. And they earned almost £15 doing it. Easily the equivalent of a very reasonable year's salary. And if they had stopped here, we would probably never have heard of them.

In fact, even if they just stuck to one or two a year, they might have gone under the radar. But alas. They did not. On February the 12th, 1828, William Hare invited an elderly salt seller called Abigail Simpson into his home. Burke and Hare plied this poor woman with booze and then they killed her. And then they put her in a tea chest and then they sold her for a tenner.

So you're probably wondering, how is Robert Knox not picking up on what's happening? And how are Burke and Hare's wives not picking up on what's happening? Well, the truth is that Robert Knox never had any suspicions about Burke and Hare, but he also didn't ask any questions. He was just very happy to have a regular supply of bodies. And the wives, different story. Margaret, William Burke's wife, invited an old lady into their house and she gave the old lady enough alcohol to put her to sleep.

And then William Burke returned and covered her mouth with some bedding and slowly suffocated her in her sleep. So the wives are in on it. Margaret's in on it. Margaret's in on it. She likes a steady stream of money. Yes.

And William Burke's wife, Nellie, found out a few weeks after the salt cellar was killed. And she found her husband in the early hours of the morning with two women. That's why she's so unhappy. But the baby's let go of her boob. And he's

out of shape. So the first of these women was called Janet Brown. And she was startled when Nellie arrived because she looks like that. And she left. The other lady was called Mary Patterson. And she was so drunk that she passed out at the table. And didn't even wake when the couple had a blazing row.

In which Burke threw a glass at his wife. Eventually, Burke convinced Nellie to get William Hare and his wife Margaret. And when they arrived at the house, the wives were locked outside while Burke and Hare did the inevitable, smothering Mary Pattinson to death on the table. And they sold her for £8 less. Maybe women are worth less or something. I'd be disappointed if I found out I'd gone for less than all of the other bodies. I know.

How rude. And over the next few months, Burke and Hare and their complicit wives took another 10 victims. And those victims included an old lady who lived at William Hare's boarding house. And the old lady's daughter, a few months later, a washerwoman. And this is really horrible. They also killed a young disabled boy with a club foot, who was known locally, these are not my words, as Daft Jamie. Sorry. They were all taken to Robert Knox, and they all fetched at least eight pounds. Jamie was so recognisable, even by knocks, that the anatomist

removed the boy's face and his clubbed feet immediately before putting him into storage. He knows what's up. He knows exactly what's happening, yeah. At this point, the pair had earned over £100 between them in less than a year, the equivalent of £8,000 in today's money. It was enough for the pair to live very comfortably for several years, or it would have been if they had spent their money carefully. But spent carefully, they did not. We don't know where their money went, but we do know that they drank a lot and they also did a lot of sex worky stuff. Nice.

More boarding houses? Yes, exactly. So despite earning a small fortune between them, Burke and Hare could not and would not stop murdering. And it wasn't until the victim number 16 that the pair finally came unstuck on the 31st of October, 1828. All Hallows Eve. Burke invited Marjorie Campbell, let's see if this, nope, next one, there she is, into his home, which was a boarding house, shared with some other family. Marjorie was a middle-aged Irish woman who Burke managed to convince that he was slightly related to. So they drank whiskey together until the bottle ran out, and then Burke left Marjorie in the company of his wife

before going out under the pretense of buying more alcohol. In reality, he'd gone to go and get William Hare. The pair visited other lodgers that Burke lived with and paid them to go and stay somewhere else, saying that Marjorie was family and they wanted the night to themselves. And at some point during the night, some of the lodgers returned to get some extra clothes for their children. And they saw Burke, Hare, Marjorie and Burke's wife, Nellie, drunkenly dancing and singing. And that would be the last time that anyone saw Margaret alive. They killed her, and hid her body under some straw under the bed.

The next day, the lodgers returned, and immediately felt like something was wrong. One of the lodgers, called Anne, wandered over to her bed to get some stockings, and Burke snapped at her, telling her not to rummage around.

When Burke left, rummage around she did, and she found Marjorie Campbell's body under the bed. The lodgers ran off to find the police and on the way, they bumped into Burke's wife who tried to bribe them with 10 quid.

But it didn't work. That's her face of disappointment when it didn't work. When the police arrived at Burke's house, all that was left was some bloody clothes in the bedroom. When Burke and Hare couldn't provide a consistent story about Marjorie leaving, Robert Knox... One more.

His laboratory raided. And there, police found loads of other bodies already lying on the dissecting table. On the 3rd of November, 1828, Burke, Hare, Margaret and Nellie were all arrested. Knox was questioned and he said that he thought Burke and Hare waited around local lodging houses and picked up the bodies of people who died naturally. It was decided that Knox was deficient in principle and heart,

but technically hadn't broken the law. As their arrest and the story of Burke and Hare spread across the city, more and more people started to come forward to the police. Several identified clothing in men's houses belonging to friends and families who'd just gone missing, and quickly the list of murder charges grew. In the end, Hare turned on Burke like a

classic snake in the grass and he gave a full confession in return for a plea deal. Burke ended up being charged with murder. His wife though was spared momentarily. Hare's testimony completely exonerated Robert Knox who got off scot-free and so did Hare's wife Margaret. But Burke could not escape the gallows. He was hanged and then publicly dissected in January 1829. It's quite poetic, isn't it? And then Burke's wife, Nellie,

was ostracised. A few years later, she suffered a similar fate when she was brutally murdered in a mill by a group of women what rough time burke's skeleton is uh in edinburgh you know look at it it's in the anatomical museum of edinburgh medical school where you can see a book bound in his skin and a note written in his blood wow and. And also, this is the best bit. That, my friends, is a business card that was made out of the skin from his left hand.

By who? Students. Wow. Hare, on the other hand, was released and chased out of Scotland by the public. And we don't know anything else about him. But we do know they have left a legacy behind them in Edinburgh. Nice. I've been there.

It's horrible. It looks horrible. Yeah. It looks very depressing. So here you go, Birkenhead, not grave robbers. There you go. You've all learned something. Thank you, guys.

Well done. Thank you, guys. done thank you guys thank you guys so much for your patience particularly with the technical challenges today um it's been so much fun coming to ObsessFest to meet all of you thank you to everyone who came today we know there's so many other things on so we're always so humbled when everyone wants to come meet us say hello and yeah thank you so much and we will be around for the next day. Thank you. gone. We've exposed the DEI regime, and there's much more to come. This is The Harvard Plan, a special series from the Boston Globe and WNYC's On The Media. To listen, subscribe to On The Media wherever you get your podcasts.

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