One who snatches or purloins bodies, newly buried, to sell them to surgeons for dissection. By a play on the words, a bum-bailiff was so called, because his duty was to snatch or capture the body of a delinquent.
⁂ The first instance of body-snatching on record was in 1777. It was the body of Mrs. Jane Sainsbury from the burial groundnearGray’s InnLane. The men, being convicted, were imprisoned for six months.
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