This "Hot Cripple" Series is an experiment; an effort to bring attention to the fact that Disability isn't necessarily synonymous with Ugly- as in Ugly Laws, which proliferated this country for over a century.
This month we feature conjoined twins, Chang & Eng Bunker.
This month we feature conjoined twins, Chang & Eng Bunker.
The Bunker Borhters were born on May 11, 1811, in Siam (now Thailand), in the province of Samutsongkram, to a fisherman and his wife. They were joined at the sternum by a small piece of cartilage. Their livers were fused but independently complete. The twins were spotted in their teens by a British merchant who first thought they were “some strange animal.” When they turned eighteen, he made a deal to bring them to America and exhibit them as public curiosities.
One thing we know for sure about the sexuality of conjoined twins: People who aren't conjoined are fascinated by it. When it was announced that conjoined twins Chang & Eng Bunker, best known as The Siamese Twins, were planning to come to France in 1831, French authorities were so afraid of the effect the men, then twenty, would have on France’s women that they banned their entrance into the country.
One story held that Chang interfered in one of Eng’s pursuits, and that, according to one newspaper, “the brothers would have engaged in a duel, but ‘the parties could not agree on a distance’.” This and other tales were more than likely unfounded, but provided opportunities for public mockery.
In one extreme example, when a woman in Kentucky gave birth to stillborn conjoined twins, she “claimed she had seen numerous representations of the twins in newspaper advertisements around the time she conceived her children, which affected her imagination.”
One thing we know for sure about the sexuality of conjoined twins: People who aren't conjoined are fascinated by it. When it was announced that conjoined twins Chang & Eng Bunker, best known as The Siamese Twins, were planning to come to France in 1831, French authorities were so afraid of the effect the men, then twenty, would have on France’s women that they banned their entrance into the country.
One story held that Chang interfered in one of Eng’s pursuits, and that, according to one newspaper, “the brothers would have engaged in a duel, but ‘the parties could not agree on a distance’.” This and other tales were more than likely unfounded, but provided opportunities for public mockery.
In one extreme example, when a woman in Kentucky gave birth to stillborn conjoined twins, she “claimed she had seen numerous representations of the twins in newspaper advertisements around the time she conceived her children, which affected her imagination.”
In 1839, while visiting Wilkesboro, North Carolina, the twins were attracted to the area and settled on a 110-acre farm in nearby Traphill. Determined to start living a normal life as much as possible, the brothers settled on a plantation, bought slaves and adopted the name "Bunker". On April 13, 1843, they married two sisters: Chang to Adelaide Yates and Eng to Sarah Anne Yates. Upon their marriage, the brothers became naturalized American citizens.
Their Traphill home is where they shared a bed built for four. Chang and his wife had eleven children; Eng and his wife had ten. In time, the wives began to squabble and eventually two separate households were set up just west of Mount Airy, North Carolina in the community of White Plains – the twins would alternate spending three days at each home. During the American Civil War, Chang's son Christopher and Eng's son Stephen both fought for the Confederacy. Chang and Eng lost part of their property as a result of the war, and were very bitter in their denunciation of the government in consequence. After the war, they again resorted to public exhibitions, but were not very successful. They always maintained a high character for integrity and fair dealing, and were much esteemed by their neighbors. Today their descendants number more than 1500.
Their Traphill home is where they shared a bed built for four. Chang and his wife had eleven children; Eng and his wife had ten. In time, the wives began to squabble and eventually two separate households were set up just west of Mount Airy, North Carolina in the community of White Plains – the twins would alternate spending three days at each home. During the American Civil War, Chang's son Christopher and Eng's son Stephen both fought for the Confederacy. Chang and Eng lost part of their property as a result of the war, and were very bitter in their denunciation of the government in consequence. After the war, they again resorted to public exhibitions, but were not very successful. They always maintained a high character for integrity and fair dealing, and were much esteemed by their neighbors. Today their descendants number more than 1500.
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