A rare and shocking discovery has been made in a Suffolk museum: a book bound in the skin of a man once convicted of murder has been discreetly stored on an office shelf for years. It is now planned to go on public display at Moyes Hall Museum in Bury St Edmunds.
As it turns out, the binding is made from the leather of William Corder, the outlaw famous for the brutal murder of Maria Martin in 1827 in the so-called "Red Barn". The story created a sensation in Georgian England and later became the basis for many artistic interpretations, from folk ballads to theatrical productions.
According to the popular version of events, Corder persuaded Mary to elope with him to Ipswich, ostensibly to marry him, but instead killed her and hid her body in a barn. He was arrested, tried and publicly executed in August 1828. After the execution, the criminal's body was anatomized and some of the skin was used to create a book dedicated to his case. The first copy has long been part of the museum exhibition - it was exhibited back in 1933.
The second book went unnoticed for a long time. According to curator Dan Clark, it was donated to the museum by relatives of the doctor involved in the autopsy of Corder's body. However, instead of being stored in the collection, the exhibit ended up among the usual books in the office and was only recently re-registered as a museum object.
Clark emphasizes that despite the macabre nature of the find, it has serious historical value. He also noted that during the whole time not a single visitor expressed dissatisfaction with the display of the first book. However, not everyone shares this opinion. Writer Terry Deary, author of the famous "Horrible Histories" series, criticized the exhibits, calling them "disgusting" and said he would prefer to burn them.
The practice of using human skin in bindings, a phenomenon known as anthropodermic bibliopegia, was more common in the nineteenth century than one might expect.
Such books were sometimes produced as a kind of "punishment" or memorial trophy for doctors and anatomists. Today, this practice is the subject of much ethical debate.
For example, in March 2024, Harvard University decided to remove the leather cover from a similar book in its library, citing moral and ethical considerations. However, Moyes Hall representatives assured that their copies will remain as they were created.
Heritage assistant Abby Smith, who picked up the book for the first time on her first day on the job, admitted that the binding did nothing to give away its sinister origin. "If they hadn't told me, I wouldn't have guessed it was human skin," she said. - "But it's really thought-provoking about what we keep in museums and how that affects the perception of history."