Back In 1998, Around 1,200 Human And Animal Bones Were Found Buried At Benjamin Franklin’s Home In London, And The Reason Why Might Make You Feel A Little Queasy

He’s the face of the $100 bill and the only one of the Founding Fathers to sign the Declaration of Independence, the Treaty of Paris, and the Constitution.

His prominence was a result of not only his scientific and mathematical prowess – did you know he invented bifocals? – but also his writing and his ambassadorial roles.

There’s little wonder that his memory is kept alive and well, even 236 years after he died – he was central to the foundations of the US we know today.

But that doesn’t mean that some surprises don’t work their way out of the woodwork every now and then. Like, did you know that 1,200 human and animal bones were discovered buried under the floor of his London property back in 1998?

Relax, this isn’t an article about Franklin’s secret criminal activities. Rather, it is a curious story of some less than savoury scientific research that Franklin likely knew about, though there’s no evidence that he ever played a part in it.

Back in 1998, conservation work was underway at Franklin’s last remaining residence 36 Craven Street in London. While Franklin only lived there between 1757 and 1775 (he passed away in Philadelphia in 1790), this is the only one of Franklin’s homes that is still standing.

But conservation work was stalled when the 1,200 bones were discovered buried in what was once the garden. Given their age, the bones were quickly turned over to archaeologists, as Benjamin Franklin House explains in an article.

Why were there so many bones, so unceremoniously buried in a one meter square pit in the garden? Well, to answer that question we need to turn to others who lived in the house, namely a scientist by the name of Willam Hewson, who was the son-in-law of Margaret Stevenson, Franklin’s landlady.

Why Hewson? Well, from the house in which Franklin lived, Hewson – who specialised in research on blood and the lymphatic system – ran an anatomy school, with the bones presumably what was left of demonstrations of processes like amputation.

Though there was no anaesthetic in the 1700s, surgery was already being carried out – with significant pain and infection risk, of course.

Hewson’s research was fundamental to understanding of exactly how the lymphatic system worked, with experiments on turtles evidencing this to growing audiences, progressing the field of medicine considerably.

But given there was no legal route to obtain bodies for such demonstrations, it’s likely that they were obtained by less than savoury measures.

If you thought that was interesting, you might like to read about a quantum computer simulation that has “reversed time” and physics may never be the same.