In 1857, T.R. Roberts, medical student at the University of Virginia, pleaded to the governor of his state that “studying anatomy without subjects for demonstration is as fruitless as geometry without diagrams.” The sentiment behind Roberts’ words continues to ring true today, but they also raise a key issue in medical education prior to the Civil War: difficulties with acquiring cadavers for anatomical study. While the North had established legal precedence and organization for the collection of cadavers for medical education prior to the Civil War, the South relied on more clandestine and disorderly methods.
In the preparation of his letter to Governor Henry Wise, perhaps Roberts had heard horror stories from alums of his university, one of whom might have been A.F.E. Robertson who in 1834 was “shot in the back by an old fellow” while attempting a grave robbery to acquire a body for anatomical study. The legacy of grave robbing does not stop with Robertson, however, as Professor of Anatomy at the University of Virginia, Dr. Augustus Warner, devised a scheme to steal the university’s cart and horse to perform grave robbing at a larger scale. In this plan, Dr. Warner enlisted one of the university’s janitors to “break open the door to the stable, taking care, whilst so doing to commit the least possible injury to the property.” This clandestine operation was further developed in collaboration with “resurrectionists” who performed the body snatching themselves. Many times, however, the line between “resurrectionist” and “professor of anatomy” became one, as described in a letter by Medical College of Virginia Professor A.E. Peticolas: “to continue my lectures I was forced to play resurrectionist myself; by no means a pleasant profession, when the snow is 8 inches deep and the thermometer near zero.” In the absence of legal precedence, anatomy professors and students in the South formed “pseudo crime rings” to acquire bodies for anatomical study.
These records of grave robbing highlight that anatomical dissection did take place in the South, however the difficulties associated with acquiring bodies likely limited the supply of cadavers for study in southern medical schools. Therefore, medical students in the South had less exposure to primary dissections and likely learned anatomy in a more theoretical or academic sense. Given the lack of systemic documentation for health outcomes in the Confederacy during the Civil War, it is difficult to assess what role this diminished exposure to anatomy had on health outcomes, and how that might have contributed to the outcomes of the war itself. Nonetheless, the extensive nature of graverobbing operations by students and professors provide a strong contrast to the environment experienced by medical students in the North prior to the Civil War.
While not entirely immune to the practice of graverobbing, the North had a more cohesive system for delivering bodies to medical schools for anatomical study, established by the Massachusetts Anatomy Act of 1831 and the New York Bone Bill of 1854. The Massachusetts Act, titled “An act more effectually to protect the sepulchres of the dead, and to legalize the study of anatomy in certain cases” created a system that would deliver “unclaimed bodies” to physicians “within twenty-four hours from and after death.” This act, in conjunction with the New York Bone Bill, provided powerhouses in medical education such as Harvard Medical School and University Medical College of New York University with ample bodies for anatomical study. Going beyond advantages in legal backing, northern medical schools were located in more urban settings, compared to the rural environment of most southern medical schools. This disparity is highlighted in correspondence between Thomas Jefferson of the University of Virginia and Dr. Philip Physick of the University of Pennsylvania. In an 1824 letter responding to Jefferson’s request for advice on the development of an anatomy department, Physick mentions how “in our dissecting rooms every facility of dissecting and making preparations is afforded, the supply of subjects on moderate terms, being ample.” Given that this correspondence took place prior to any legal acts that provided a system for cadaver delivery to medical schools, it highlights that the dense population centers in the North likely provided greater access to cadavers.
Ultimately, the study of anatomy was troublesome for both northern and southern medical schools prior to the Civil War. Grave robbing was the predominate form of acquiring bodies for dissection in both regions, however legal acts allowed northern medical schools to develop a more sophisticated method of acquiring bodies for dissection. For southern medical schools, students and professors organized with resurrectionists to acquire bodies and would also perform the grave robbing themselves. Assessments of how discrepancies in the study of anatomy between the North and South impacted the war are difficult to make given less significant data collection in the South.
References:
1. Anatomical Theatre at the University “Subjects” for Anatomy Class. Virginia.edu. Published 2023. Accessed September 17, 2025. https://exhibits.hsl.virginia.edu/anatomical-theatre/subjects-for-anatomy-class/index.html
2. Report of the Select Committee of the House of Representatives on so much of the governor’s speech, at the June session, 1830, as relates to legalizing the study of anatomy - Digital Collections - National Library of Medicine. Nih.gov. Accessed September 17, 2025. http://resource.nlm.nih.gov/61111250R?_gl=1
3. Breeden JO. Body Snatchers and Anatomy Professors: Medical Education in Nineteenth Century Virginia. The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography. 1975;83(3):321-345. doi:https://doi.org/10.2307/4247966
4. NYU Langone Health History | The Lillian & Clarence de la Chapelle Medical Archives. Nyu.edu. Published 2019. https://archives.med.nyu.edu/about/nyu-langone-health-history
5. Gates E. Theatre of the Macabre. UVA Magazine. Accessed September 19, 2025. https://uvamagazine.org/articles/theatre_of_the_macabre
6. T.R. Roberts to Henry A. Wise, January 12, 1857. Governor Henry A. Wise Executive Papers, 1856-1859, Box 6: Folder 2. Accession #36710, January 14, 1857, The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia.
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