‘Abnormalities and deformities’: the dissection and interment of the insane poor, 1832–1929

Abstract

The body trade of anatomy schools in Victorian times that underpinned the expansion of medical education has been neglected. This article examines dissection records of insane paupers, sold to repay their welfare debt to society. Each cadaver was entered in an 'Abnormalities and Deformities' dissection book. Student doctors paid fees to anatomists to be taught the pathology of insanity under the Medical Act. Anatomists also dissected cadavers to do further brain and eye research on epilepsy and glaucoma in the insane. These bodies were often dissected to their extremities. Their fragmentary remains were then disposed of in a common grave. This secret body trade and its asylum supply-chain merit further work in disability studies and the history of psychiatry.