Tag Archives: The Father of Forensics: How Sir Bernard Spilsbury Invented Modern CSI

The People’s Pathologist

Before there was CSI, there was Bernard Spilsbury.

No major spoilers about clues or endings in this episode. However, there is some mention or discussion of the books listed below. Please be aware there is a brief mention of suicide at the end.

Sources and further information:

— The Florence Maybrick episodes of this podcast: part one and part two
Taylor’s Principles and Practice of Medical Jurisprudence by Alfred Swaine Taylor
Busman’s Honeymoon by Dorothy L. Sayers
The Poisoned Chocolates Case by Anthony Berkeley
The Red Thumb Mark by R. Austin Freeman
The Crippen episode of this podcast
The Father of Forensics: How Sir Bernard Spilsbury Invented Modern CSI by Colin Evans
Trial Of Thomas Smethurst”, British Medical Journal, August 27, 1859
“The Case of Thomas Smethurst, Convicted of the Crime of Murder”, The Lancet, September 1859
The Magnificent Spilsbury and the Case of the Brides in the Bath by Jane Robbins
The “Brides in the Bath” episode of this podcast
Bernard Spilsbury’s index cards at the Wellcome Collection
Some Cases of Sir Bernard Spilsbury and Others : Death Under The Microscope by Harold Dearden
Bernard Spilsbury: His Life and Cases by Douglas G. Browne and E.V. Tullett
“The rise and fall of celebrity pathology” by Ian Burney and Neil Pemberton in the British Medical Journal, December 2010
“Bruised Witness: Bernard Spilsbury and the Performance of Early Twentieth-Century English Forensic Pathology” in Medical History, January 2011

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Find a full transcript of this episode at shedunnitshow.com/thepeoplespathologisttranscript.

Music by Audioblocks and Blue Dot Sessions. See shedunnitshow.com/musiccredits for more details.

The People’s Pathologist Transcript

The murder mystery is a form that brings forth certainty from uncertainty. The job of the detective is to sort through the chaotic mass of clues and testimony to create an ordered, coherent narrative of how a crime was committed. Medical evidence forms a vital part of this process, often creating the parameters for a… Continue Reading