Victorians 5/5 Florence Nightingale

Victorians 4/5 Florence Nightingale

Victorians 3/5 Florence Nightingale

Victorians 2/5 Florence Nightingale

Victorians 1/5 Florence Nightingale

Burke and Hare-The real story...

It's January 1829 and on the Lawnmarket an infamous criminal is about to be put to death-people are clambering to see this historic event. Even Sir Walter Scott has a 'window seat' for the execution. The hanging of William Burke is the culmination of a trial that was dubbed the 'trial of the decade' in a recent documentary. It was the case of the accused William Burke, who was on trial for the murder of Mrs. Docherty, whose body Burke sold to one Dr. Knox. But this story isn't just about one death, it is believed that Mrs. Docherty was victim number 17 in a string of murders, committed by not just Burke but William Hare too.

In the 1820s, Edinburgh was leading the way in the field of medical science, and in order to continue this trend it is believed that the medical schools needed 520 bodies a year in order to teach anatomy. The only legal way to obtain cadavers was through taking the bodies of executed convicts. This was socially accepted because people thought that criminals did not have the right to a Christian burial-but this did not garner enough corpses for the schools. Anatomists were willing to pay large sums for cadavers; between £7 and £10 per corpse. This led to a lucrative trade in body snatching-Resurrectionists, as the grave robbers were known, provided many of the cadavers needed to the medical schools and quite a few pickled specimens found their way from Ireland to Edinburgh every year. But Burke and Hare were no Resurrectionists-what they were doing was far more sinister.

Edinburgh in the 1820s was a city divided-it had just gone through a phase of growth and regeneration, but in 1826 the boom went bust and the divide between the rich and the poor was even more extreme. Many of the working class lost their jobs and things went from bad to worse. 

Margaret Laird arrived in Edinburgh in the 1820s and found a bustling environment-full of opportunity but with the bust of 1826, this opportunity very quickly diminished.  Like many women in similar situations the only option was prostitution. It was through prostitution that Margaret seized her opportunities when she could-marrying a succession of men, almost bettering herself every time. Margaret ended up marrying the owner of a lodging house called Logue, who was fairly old compared to herself. It is believed that Margaret met William Hare at this lodging house. William Hare was an Irish immigrant who had been working on the canal as a navvy. Shortly after moving into Logue's lodge house, Hare and Logue had an argument and Hare left the lodge house. Logue mysteriously turned up dead not long after, and Hare quickly moved in with and married Margaret. 

William Burke was also an Irish immigrant who emigrated to Scotland in 1817. There he had had many different jobs, but at the time of meeting Margaret Hare, Burke was a cobbler. Burke and his wife, Helen McDougal, were invited by Margaret to stay at her lodge house. It is then that these string of murders started. It is believed that the first body Burke and Hare sold was not the result of a murder, but rather the result of a fellow lodger dying. Burke and Hare sold the body as the old war pensioner, called Donald had no family and so no one to bury him. The man they sold the body to was the enigmatic Dr.Knox-a lecturer of anatomy at the medical school. Knox made it clear to Burke and Hare that he would always be willing to buy bodies in the future.
The first murder took place about a month later, the result of fear. It was clear that one of the lodgers was dying in his room-the man was probably dying of the plague. If the plague had been discovered at the lodge house then it would have been closed down by the authorities. Remembering what Knox had told the two men, acting quickly Burke and Hare finished the dying man off and promptly took his body to Knox. Burke and Hare's murderous career had begun. How Burke and Hare went on to kill their victims is still known as 'burking' today-the method was Hare would hold his hand over the victim's nose and mouth and Burke would put the weight of his body across the chest of the victim-asphyxiating them.  Burke and Hare would ply their chosen victim with drink before leading them away to kill them in the burking fashion. No one was safe and Burke and Hare generally preyed on the weak, vulnerable and lonely-even children.
Dr. Knox certainly knew what Burke and Hare were doing and even took part in covering up the murders. One of the victims, known as 'Daft Jamie', had deformed feet and was well known in the area. When Burke and Hare delivered Jamie's body to the doctor, Knox cut off Jamie's feet and face so that his cadaver was unrecognisable when he came to use it in a dissection for his students.
Dr.Knox was a flamboyant lecturer who wore a bright purple coat, had curly hair, one eye and pitted skin as a result of smallpox. He attracted many students to Edinburgh, at one point teaching 500 in one year. Dr. Knox would cut up about 80 bodies a year in order to attract high numbers of students, which meant he needed a steady supply. He also brought great wealth to the area-could this mean that people were willing to turn a blind eye to these murders?

Within a few months, Burke and Hare had provided Knox with 16 bodies-netting the equivalent of £130,000 in today's money. It would be victim number 17 that saw the end to this horrendous string of murders. By the time victim number 17 met her fate, Burke had his own house, let's be honest he could afford it, and it was there that he murdered Mrs. Docherty. At the time, two of Burke's wife's relatives were staying at the house and it was them who found the body and alerted the police. By the time the police arrived at Burke's house, the body was gone. The police were tipped off though-they were told to check Dr.Knox's office and they would find the body of the recently deceased victim. In November 1828 Burke, Hare, Margaret Hare and Burke's wife were arrested.. In exchange for immunity for himself and his wife, Hare agreed to testify against Burke and Burke wrote a written confession in which he stated his wife and Knox were innocent. So, in the end, only Burke was convicted of the murder.
The notoriety of the case made it Britain's 'trial of the decade'-all of Scotland's top lawyers were involved, and on the first day of the trial (24th December 1828) the 'court was packed to suffocation'. Burke was found guilty and one month after the conviction he was hanged by the neck until he was dead. The 'honour' of dissecting Burke's body was given to Dr. Monroe. A number of items were made of out Burke's skin and his skeleton is still used in the same medical school where he was dissected today.
I will be eagerly awaiting the release of the new feature film, Burke and Hare, to see how accurate the portrayal of the story is!!

The Battle of Ruddy Balaclava!

Michael's blog

The other day I thought it would be a good idea to get my A level students to use historical sources in a slightly different way to what they're used to. So using the events of the Charge of the Light Brigade I gave my students sources related to particular people involved in the charge.
So one pair were given sources about Lord Lucan's actions, another pair about Lord Cardigan's and so on. The idea was that the students would use the sources to write a blog of that particular person's perspective on the charge-as if it was happening in real time (I told them to imagine that everyone there had Blackberry phones!) I had originally wanted them to use Twitter for this as I have seen similar things done using that particular medium-but unfortunately, Twitter is blocked by our school server, so we used blogspot instead. Despite this, the finished blogs were absolutely fab! I told my year 12 class that the one I thought was the best (although it was tough decision to make, as they were all so good), would be featured on my blog. So, the 'winning' blog was the one done by Michael who had to blog about Lord Raglan's perspective of the Charge. Please go over to Michael's blog and take a look at what he's written and if you see what you like, let him know by leaving a comment! Thank you.  

A War over Keys??

We all know that there are many examples in History where war has started over, what seem to be, rather silly reasons. For the A Level course I am teaching, The Experience of Warfare 1855-1929; I have been researching the Crimean War (1855-1856), and I must say the short term causes of the war seem to be, to me, borderline ridiculous.

Crimea at the time was part of the Ottoman Empire-the Ottoman Empire had control of the ports that led out to the Mediterranean Sea-favourable for trade. This is something that Russia lacked and was envious of-Tsar Nicholas I even alluded to wanting to carve up the Turkish empire, calling it the 'sick man of Europe'. The Tsar saw the Ottoman Empire as weak and could see huge benefits in taking a large proportion of it.

According to historian Christopher Hibbert the Prime Minister, Lord Aberdeen, and the Foreign Secretary, Lord Clarendon did not want war with Russia.  But the more powerful Lord Palmerston, Home Secretary and Russophobe, saw Russia's imperialism as a threat to the British Empire, in particular to India. He saw that the areas around the Med needed to remain in friendly hands, that of the Turks, in order to maintain the route the British took to India and continue lucrative trade.

A quarrel in the Holy Land provided a reason for tensions to escalate not only between Turkey and Britain with Russia, but also with France and Russia.  The monks of the Roman Catholic Church, supported by France, and the monks of the Orthodox Church, supported by Russia, were arguing over rights and privileges concerning the Church of the Nativity and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.  In 1852 the Turks, being the imperial rulers of the Holy Lands, decided that the Roman Catholic monks should have the keys to these important churches-aligning themselves with France.

In 1853 the Tsar sent Prince Menshikov (left) to maintain the privileges of the Orthodox Christians and to insist on Russia's rights to protect the Ottoman Empire's Orthodox Christian subjects.Arguments over the holy places came to a head when the Roman Catholic monks placed their own silver star over the manger in the Church of the Nativity. The Orthodox monks tried to prevent the Catholic monks from doing this and in the struggle some were killed. The Russians thought that the Turkish authorities had connived in the murder of the monks-within days a Russian army was marching towards the Danube in order to protect the Holy Places from Islam.  

The Russians demanded that Turkish troops withdraw from Christian Montenegro, where they were suppressing a revolt-this demand was rejected.  To 'encourage' Turkish cooperation, the Russian government announced that unless Turkey did what they wanted, Russian troops would occupy Moldavia and Wallachia-countries under joint protectorate of Turkey and Russia as they bordered the boundaries of both the Russian and Turkish empires.

Behind the scenes the British ambassador in Turkey, Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, had been encouraging the Sultan to reject the Russian demands. Learning of the Russian threats, Britain and France decided to intervene. On June 15th 1853, a combined British and French fleet was sent to the Dardanelles to show solidarity with Turkey.

A draft compromise, drawn up by Austria, was rejected by the Sultan-perhaps he was buoyed up by the support of Britain and France? In July the Tsar ordered Russian troops into Moldavia and Wallachia. It was still hoped by many that war would not come. But, on 5th October 1853, hoping Britain and France would support Turkey rather than see the Ottoman Empire collapse, the Sultan declared war on Russia.

Weeks later thousands would be slaughtered as the result of strategic mishaps-young men cut down in their prime.  All over keys??

Let me know what you think...

The Twentieth Century in 5 minutes...

We didn't start the Fire, by Billy Joel, must be one of the best songs ever-as a History teacher I find this song fascinating-there is so much mentioned! The song basically accounts for most major events that happened in the twentieth century mixed with some American popular culture. It is basically the Cold War in a song.

What If....

Adolf Hitler had been accepted into the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna? Would he still have developed his intolerable hatred of Jews? Would he have ever become interested in Politics and go on to be Chancellor of Germany? Would the dreadful atrocities of the Holocaust have happened?

Adolf Hitler was born in Austria on 20th April 1889, but his family moved to Passau, Germany when Adolf was three, which led Hitler to later identify more with Germany than his native Austria. As a young boy, Adolf was a normal child who played 'cowboys and Indians', a game that first sparked his fascination with war and being a soldier. But in 1900, Hitler's younger brother, Edward died after contracting measles. After this, Hitler is said to have become sullen, morose and detached, often arguing with teachers at school and his strict Father at home.  Adolf and his Father, Alois, would often clash, mainly over Hitler's desire to attend the Classical High School rather than the Technical School, which is where his Father wanted him to go so that Adolf could become an Austrian Customs Official.  Adolf and Alois could never see eye to eye and Adolf was regularly beaten by his Father. In order to show his resentment towards his Dad, a keen lover of all things Austrian, Hitler became obsessed with German Nationalism, using the German greeting 'Heil' and singing the German national anthem rather than the Austrian one.

Despite the obvious tension between Adolf and Alois, when his father suddenly died in 1903 Hitler became very disruptive at school and was asked to leave. Hitler enrolled at a different school but was expelled in his second year after an incident with his school certificate.  At a loss of what to do Hitler travelled to Vienna in 1905, living a bohemian life, in order to gain acceptance into the Academy of Fine Arts.

   

Hitler drew scenes around Vienna and lived off an Orphan's pension and support from his beloved Mother. Hitler made his first attempt at gaining entry into the art school in 1907 but was told that his skill as a painter was not good enough. Above is one of Hitler's drawings-to the untrained eye it looks rather skilfully done.

In December 1907, Hitler's Mother, Klara, who Adolf adored, died of breast cancer. A court ordered that Hitler give his share of the Orphan's pension he received to his sister, Paula. With no money Hitler struggled as a painter in Vienna-he would copy post cards and sell them but this made him very little. In 1908, Hitler failed a second time to be accepted into art school-with no money left Hitler had no choice but to live in a shelter for the homeless (incidentally, a group of 'undesirables' that Hitler would later persecute).

It was in Vienna that Hitler, as he describes in Mein Kampf, first began hating Jews. Where Hitler had grown up he had only ever seen 'Europeanised' Jews but in Vienna he saw Orthodox Jews-Hitler didn't like what he saw-he even went as far as questioning whether these deeply religious people could possibly be German.  

Hitler's way out of homelessness came in 1914-the outbreak of the First World War. Hitler was desperate to fight for a Bavarian regiment, and so petitioned King Ludwig III of Bavaria for permission to serve-this was granted.  By all accounts Hitler was a rather good soldier-a runner on the front line he was twice decorated for bravery and ended his army career as the British equivalent of a Lance Corporal. Hitler even suffered temporary blindness as a result of a mustard gas attack and had to spend a few weeks in a military hospital. Some Historians argue that it is during this period that Hitler first had the unforgivable idea of exterminating Jews. 

Hitler was a firm lover of Germany and his service during the Great War only cemented this further. So when the armistice was signed in November 1918 and Germany admitted defeat, Hitler was devastated and couldn't understand why Germany had surrendered when they still held enemy territory.  Further humiliation came with the signing of the Treaty of Versailles in 1919-terms of the treaty saw Germany take full blame for outbreak of war in 1914, a massive reduction in Germany's standing army, demilitarisation of the Rhineland, and a massive debt, or reparations, that surmounted to an amount that was unrealistic to expect Germany to pay.  Hitler became obsessed with getting revenge for the treaty, which he saw as the cause of many of Germany's problems after the war, that of course and the Jews.  Hitler saw Germany go from a great nation before the war to a struggling country where unemployment was sky high and people were miserable-forced to be humiliated first by defeat and then by the conditions of Versailles.  All the while, as Hitler saw it, German people were starving and poor, whereas Jewish people seemed to be getting on fine-Hitler's hatred of the Jews was gradually getting deeper and deeper.

After the war, Hitler became actively involved in politics, shaping his political ideas in the German Workers Party (the name would later be changed to the infamous name of National Socialist German Workers Party), where the leaders were impressed by his oratory skills.  Hitler was eventually elected leader of this party in 1921. The party was elected to power in Germany with Hitler becoming Chancellor of Germany in 1933. The rest as they say, is History. A very dark and disgusting period of history to say the least.

Could it be that if Hitler had been accepted into art school that he would not have gone on to be Chancellor of Germany? Could he have ended up just another humble painter? It certainly wouldn't have prevented his hatred of Jews as this first started when he was in Vienna. But could it have provided Hitler with a different path? Even if he had have gained entry into art school the First World War still came along. Hitler was Germany obsessed-he certainly would have still wanted to fight for Germany in 1914. It is during his time as a soldier that his love with Germany became a sort of intense 'love affair', and where he experienced the cutting humiliation of defeat and the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. Maybe then we could argue that if the First World War had never have happened that Hitler would not have experienced such humiliation, and therefore, have not had the need to vent his frustration with the world in a hot bed of politics, leading to his domination of a party full of anti-Semites.

Let me know what you think on this subject.

Please note-this post is not designed in any way to offend anyone and is certainly not absolving Hitler's behaviour in any way. What Ifs in history are just things I like to contemplate.