The Great Majority Body Snatching and Burial Reform in 19th-Century Britain
As populations flocked to city centres in the 19th century, church cemeteries began to overflow with the dead. Roger Luckhurst exhumes the history of this period, when anatomists fuelled a body-snatching trade led by “resurrection men” and reformers sought alternatives to the toxic urban graveyards and their pestilent fume...
This shift in burial practices can be seen as a response to growing public health concerns and the recognition of the need for more sanitary and spacious burial grounds. The establishment of suburban garden cemeteries marked a departure from traditional churchyards, which were often overcrowded, unsanitary, and located in densely populated urban areas. This transformation not only improved public health but also reflected broader cultural changes, such as the rise of the middle class and an incr...