How to Kill a Witch: The Patriarchy's Guide to Silencing Women

Doug Speirs explained how Lilias’s grave was robbed in 1852 by a phrenology and witchcraft enthusiast (who was also very religious) named Joseph Neil Paton, and the grave robber he hired, Robert Baxter Brimer. Grave robbing was a major business at the time, largely because it was an easy way to make money for those who didn’t believe in the possibility of offending the deceased. Brimer and his crew were ordered to take Lilias’s skull, and they also took a couple of other bones and a piece of her coffin. Paton kept the skull for several years before eventually passing it to his son, the famous painter Joseph Noel Paton. The skull is said to be included in Paton’s painting, Luther at Erfort.

Paton eventually passed the skull to Dr. William Dow, who worked at the Fife Medical Association and studied it for several years. It was then given to the University of St. Andrew’s and remained there until it was apparently lost. Brimer apparently gifted the wood he took to Andrew Carnegie. The authors were directed to Dunfermline and the Andrew Carnegie Birthplace Museum, where they were shown a cane made from that same wood, and which included an inscription dedicated to those affected by the trials.