Grave-Robbing, Cadavers, Dissection and Doctors’ Mob in 1788 – New York State Quarter Coin

Today, the New York State Quarter Coin remembers a young boy’s curiosity and a young doctor-to-be’s joke in poor taste that resulted in mob riots on April 13, 1788.

The American Magazine of September 1884 included the following account of the Doctors’ Mob in an article by Evert Duyckinck titled “New York After the Revolution:”

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Of the early local events in New York after the Revolution, no one for a long time was better remembered than what with a singular misapplication of phrase, showing the leaning of popular prejudice in the matter, was known as “The Doctors’ Mob.”

The physicians were the sufferers; the mob was composed of the usual element.

In small communities, where science is seeking to a foothold, and where the public hospitals and almshouses do not readily furnish sufficient subjects for dissection, there is apt to be suspicion and jealousy of the anatomical studies of the faculty, which require to be pursued with prudence and privacy.

The old feeling which would deny to surgeons the opportunity of becoming acquainted with the practice of their profession existed in New York in the time of which we are writing, as it prevailed generally sixty years ago.

Many years later, the eminent surgeon, Dr. Valentine Mott, then a student in the city, Quaker though he was, felt obliged to violate the law, and at the risk of personal safety and reputation, provide himself by stealth with the means of pursuing those studies by which he afterward so greatly benefited the world.

His biographer, Dr. Samuel Francis, tells us of a midnight excursion in which, without companion or assistant, he mounted a cart dressed as a common laborer, and, proceeding out of town, received at the side of a field eleven bodies, which he carried in triumph to the Medical College in Barclay Street.

The “Doctors’ Mob, ” for which we may suppose there was some previous incentive, in rumor more or less exaggerated of rifled graves, originated in an accidental way.

One Sunday — the 13th of April, 1788 — a boy, playing with his fellows in the grounds about the Hospital, ascended a ladder or scaffolding placed against the building for repairs, and looking in at the window of the dissecting-room, saw various dissevered portions of human bodies.

A younger surgeon who was present held up before him a human arm telling him it was his mother’s.

It happened unfortunately, to continue the narrative in the words of an eye-witness of much that subsequently occurred, the late President Duer, of Columbia College, “that the boy’s mother had died not long before, and was buried in Trinity Churchyard, and, taking the doctor at his word, he set off to inform his father, who was at work, as a mason, at Macomb’s Buildings, in Broadway.

“He repeated his son’s story to his comrades; who, seizing such of their tools as they could best use as weapons, followed their leader in a body to the hospital.

“Their force increased as they advanced, and when they arrived there, meeting with no resistance, they proceeded to ransack the building.

“Several subjects were discovered in various states of dissection, but none that could be identified.

“It was then proposed to examine the grave in which the body, to which the arm in question was supposed to have belonged, had been laid; and accordingly the whole party, with the new reinforcements it gathered on the way, proceeded to the churchyard.

“On opening the grave it was found empty.

“It was forthwith resolved to repair to the dwellings of the doctors, in search of subjects, and with threats of making them.

“The first house they visited was that of Dr. Cochrane, nearly opposite to the church; but they found nothing there, although they ransacked it from the cellar to the garret.

“Fortunately, they omitted to open the scuttle and look out upon the roof, or they might have executed their threat of making more subjects where they found but one, for a certain Dr. Hicks, who was vehemently suspected to be the guilty party at the hospital, had taken refuge there, and lay snugly ensconced behind the chimney.

“Night coming on, the search was discontinued and the mob in a great measure dispersed.

“Small parties, however, patrolled the streets during the night, and the next morning the assemblage was greater than ever.

“The mob was now joined by parties of sailors, headed by the steward of the British packet lying in the harbor, who became thenceforward the ringleader of the whole force.

“But in the meantime the militia had been ordered out, and the doctors had taken refuge in the jail.

“There they were besieged by the mob, and were in great jeopardy until the siege was raised by the military.

“Matters had now assumed so serious an aspect as to create a general alarm, and call forth the exertions of the principal citizens to aid in restoring the public peace.

“Among those who interposed their personal influence for the purpose was Mr. Jay, then Secretary of Foreign Affairs to Congress.

“In proceeding to the scene of action, he received a severe wound in the head from a stone thrown through the glass of his chariot.

“Governor Clinton (old George), accompanied by the Mayor, Recorder, and some of the principal inhabitants of the city, among whom was Baron Steuben, repaired to the jail to direct the operations of the militia.

“As they were passing along Chatham Bow the Governor declared his determination to resort to the most vigorous and decisive measures for quelling the riot.

“The baron, in the benevolence of his heart, remonstrated with the Governor against ordering the militia to fire; when, in the midst of his harangue, he was struck in the forehead by a brickbat, which, according to the Governor’s account, not only knocked the good baron down, but overset his humanity and brought his compassion with his body to the ground; which he no sooner touched, than he cried out, lustily: ‘Fire ! Governor, fire!’

“I saw the poor baron brought bleeding into my father’s house, and after he had retired to have his wound dressed, I heard the Governor relate the story.”

The fire of the military dispersed the mob.

Five persons were killed, and seven or eight severely wounded.

The students, against whom the chief animosity had been directed, withdrew for a time from the city till the excitement subsided.

A ludicrous incident connected with the affair was an attack by a portion of the mob upon the house of the British Consul, Sir John Temple. His premises were saved with difficulty.

The illiterate marauders are said to have mistaken “Sir John” for “Surgeon.”

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The New York State Quarter Coin shows with an artist’s portrayal of an interrupted dissection at Medical Education in New York, circa 1880s.

New York State Quarter Coin