Crossing Blackfriars Bridge to Guy’s
then back to Bart’s for a better price
Our goods are dear but they’re never shoddy
Tell me: anybody need a body
from a resurrectionist?
Medical scientist?
We’ve all got to earn ourselves a living
all it takes is a little bit of digging
by a resurrectionist
I met a man down Thieving Lane
He told me he was in the same game
We both talked the same body language
On Newgate Street we saw the hanging
of a resurrectionist
medical scientist
We’ve all got to earn ourselves a living
all it takes is a little bit of digging
by a resurrectionist
Got a nice thing for the right punter
used to be a fogle-hunter
We had a drink then a couple more
at the King of Denmark and the Fortune of War
A handsome lad lay in a Hansom cab
soon to be a stiff ’un on the slab
from a resurrectionist
medical scientist
We’ve all got to earn ourselves a living
all it takes is a little bit of digging
We don’t bring them back to life
but we do bring them back from the dead
2005. I read a book by Sarah Wise called The Italian Boy about the professional graverobbers known as ‘resurrectionists’ who, in the early nineteenth century, used to supply the corpses needed by medical students and scientists for dissection. I thought that this dreadful profession was an excellent subject for a macabre lyric. In writing it, I particularly enjoyed putting in references to real places, some of which I used to pass while walking from Blackfriars underground station on my way to our studio near Old Street: Blackfriars Bridge, Bart’s Hospital and the site of the demolished Fortune of War pub where a plaque informs passers-by that it was ‘the chief house of call north of the river for resurrectionists in body-snatching days years ago. The landlord used to show the room where on benches round the walls the bodies were placed with the snatchers’ names waiting till the surgeons at Saint Bartholomew’s could run round and appraise them.’ A ‘fogle-hunter’ was a pickpocket specialising in stealing pocket handkerchiefs. Sarah Wise kindly wrote to me to say that she’d enjoyed the song.