On November 5, 1831, two east Londoners turned up at King's College School of Anatomy in The Strand with the body of a young boy to sell.
Gruesome though it was, their deal was not unusual. John Bishop and James May along with Thomas Williams, who lived in Nova Scotia Avenue in Shoreditch, were Resurrection Men who made a living answering the needs of the anatomy schools.
As a new exhibition at the Museum of London attests, the economics were grim but undeniable - demand outstripped supply.
The hospitals and private schools needed 5,000 cadavers a year for dissections. In 2006, the Museum of London Archeology uncovered a cemetery at the Royal London Hospital in use between 1825 and 1841.
The skeletons found there showed evidence of dissection, from craniotomies to severed limbs.
Surgery was something of a bloody lottery but lack of training material hampered would-be surgeons further - they were left to share bodies or study wax models.
Thomas Wakley, founder of The Lancet, wrote in 1827: "Even at the enormous prices now demanded by the Resurrection Men an exceedingly small supply can only be obtained."
The trade of the grave robbers was necessary but reviled. Fears about entering the afterlife intact and the serial killing indignities of Edinburgh grave robbers Burke and Hare persuaded many to take precautions.
Some were buried in metal coffins (Mrs Campbell's last refuge of 1819 is on display), while others stood guard over newly-buried loved ones. Some laid mantraps in cemeteries.
But still the deals between the Resurrection Men - "burkers" - and the hospitals held firm.
So, when Bishop and May presented the corpse at the Strand school and demanded 12 guineas, it was not an unusual transaction.
And although the fresh state of the body alarmed anatomist Richard Partridge, he still handed over eight guineas.
However, his suspicions grew and he alerted police. A coroners jury offered a verdict of murder with Bishop, Williams and May the prime suspects.
On 19 November, Supt Joseph Sadler Thomas searched the cottages at Nova Scotia Gardens and found clothing in a well and one of the privies. Not just from the so-called Italian boy (believed to have been Carlo Ferrari) but from multiple murders.
Bishop, 33, Williams, 26, and May, 30, were all found guilty of related crimes. Before sentence was passed Bishop admitted that the Italian boy was, in fact, from Lincolnshire on his way to Smithfield. He had been drugged with rum and laudanum and when he lost consciousness he was pitched into a well to drown.
They also admitted to the murder of Frances Pigburn and her child who were sleeping rough in Shoreditch, and a boy named Cunningham. Williams and Bishop admitted to stealing up to 1,000 bodies over 12 years.
They were hanged at Newgate on December 5, 1831, before a crowd of 30,000 with May respited because he had no knowledge of the murders.
The case of the "Italian boy" was one of the drivers of the Anatomy Act of 1832 which tried to put the Resurrection Men out of business by providing "unclaimed" bodies for dissection.
In the 100 years following the Act 99.5% of the 5,700 corpses delivered came from workhouses, asylums and hospitals. The poor paid the price but the Resurrection Men were out of business.
These days, 1,000 bodies are needed a year. They are provided mostly by donors but, still, demand outstrips supply.
And the bodies of May and Williams? They were removed the same night - for dissection.
- Doctors, Dissection And Resurrection Men at the Museum of London. Go to museumoflondon.org.uk.
