Free Burke and Hare by Brian Bailey Page A

the Dean of Faculty asked Fisher if Hare denied all knowledge of it.
    ‘Yes; he said he never saw it, dead or alive.’
    ‘His wife the same, I suppose?’ said Mr Cockburn.
    ‘Yes.’
    Burke and McDougal had sat calmly and attentively throughout the proceedings thus far, sipping water and occasionally exchanging a word or two. Around four o’clock in the afternoon, Burke asked when they would be given dinner, and was told they must wait until six. When this hour came, they were given bread and soup and had to consume it in the dock while the trial continued.
    Outside, as darkness fell, large numbers of people hung around in the streets waiting for news, while inside the courtroom there was much excitement and anticipation as Sir William Rae called his star witness, William Hare. Every spectator seems to have been struck by this man’s loathsome appearance as the artificial light emphasised his hollow cheeks and sunken eyes. He stepped up to the witness box with a sinister smile on his face and took the oath.
    Lord Meadowbank addressed him first. If Hare spoke the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about the transaction now under investigation, he could never afterwards be questioned in a court of justice. His Lordship meant, of course, about these particular matters, but did not say so. If Hare should deviate from the truth, however, or prevaricate in the slightest degree, the inevitable result would be the most ‘condign punishment’ that could be inflicted. It is open to question whether Hare understood ‘condign’. It may have crossed some minds that he was being threatened with the death penalty for contempt of court. Lord Boyle reminded him that he was here only in connection with the death of an elderly woman named Campbell or McGonegal.
    ‘T’ould woman, sir?’ Hare asked, and this was confirmed.
    Hare told the Court, in answer to Sir William Rae’s questions, that he was an Irish Catholic, had been in Scotland ten years and had known Burke about twelve months. He had seen Burke in Rymer’s on the morning of 31 October and Burke had told him that there was an old woman in his house he had got off the street and ‘he thought she would be a good shot to take to the doctors’.
    ‘What,’ asked the Lord Advocate, ‘did you understand by the word “shot” for the doctors; did you understand the meaning of it?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘What was it?’
    ‘That he was going to murder her.’
    After describing the drinking and merry-making of the evening, which led to a fight between himself and Burke, Hare was asked where the old person was at this time.
    ‘She was sitting at the fire, and she got up and desired Burke to sit down, and she said that she did not want to see Burke abused.’
    ‘Did she run out?’
    ‘Yes, she ran out twice to the entry, and cried out for the police.’
    ‘She went out twice to the passage?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘What did she call out?’
    ‘It was either murder or police, I could not say which, but it was some of them.’
    ‘Well, how was she brought back again?’
    ‘It was Nelly McDougal that fetched her back.’
    ‘Both times?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Did she then get any push, or fall over on the ground?’
    ‘Yes, she did; when we were struggling, I pushed her over a little stool.’
    ‘And you continued to struggle while she lay there?’
    ‘Yes; she raised herself on her elbow – she was not able to rise, being drunk – and called on Burke to be quiet.’
    Sir William asked Hare what Burke did after they had stopped fighting.
    ‘He stood on the floor; he then got stride-legs on the top of the woman on the floor, and she cried out a little, and he kept in her breath.’
    ‘Did he lay himself down upon her?’
    ‘Yes, he pressed down her head with his breast.’
    ‘She gave a kind of cry, did she?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Did she give that more than once?’
    ‘She moaned a little after the first cry.’
    ‘How did he apply his hand towards her?’
    ‘He put