Burke and Hare murders two men were hanged in December 1831 for the crime. A bill was quickly introduced into Parliament, and gained royal assent nine months later to become the Anatomy Act 1832. This Act authorised dissection on bodies from workhouses unclaimed after 48 hours, and ended the practice of anatomising as part of the death sentence for murder. The events of the West Port murders have made appearances in fiction. They are referred to in Robert Louis Stevenson's 1884 short story, "The Body Snatcher", and Marcel Schwob told their story in the last chapter of "Imaginary Lives" (1896), while the Edinburgh-based author
What the Night Knows John goes to visit Billy; Billy indicates that the reason he killed them was because of “Ruin”. As John is leaving, Billy’s countenance changes and he begins saying “help me”. John begins to investigate the murders, and finds that there are a number of similarities between the murders committed by Billy, and murders committed by Alton Turner Blackwood some 20 years previously. Alton Blackwood killed John’s entire family. The two families were murdered in almost exactly the same way. John’s family (his wife Nicolette, and his children Zach, Naomi, and Minette), begin to be haunted by dreams, sounds in the