Disability Throughout History: Chang & Eng Bunker

This post travels back to the age of "freak shows." Fair warning, this will be a running theme in this blog. It is a tragic but important part of disability and physical differences in the not-too-distant past. Honestly, an entire blog could be devoted to the individuals who performed in these shows (there's one I found that gave me many post ideas: The Human Marvels). This story is of a famous set of twins who have an incredibly unique story that involves race, fame, ability, marriage, children, and slavery in the American South. They are the origin of the term "Siamese twins."

Chang & Eng as adults

Chang and Eng were born in modern-day Samut Songkhram, Thailand (at the time, Meklong, Siam). Their date of birth is unknown, but it is thought to be in May 1811. Their mother, Nok, reported that their delivery was unremarkable and similar to her other children's. The boys were conjoined twins, connected at the sternum by a band of flesh, cartilage, and their fused livers. The band joining them was about five inches long and nine inches of circumference. They only shared sensation at the middle of the ligament. Today, surgery would easily separate them, though this was not possible in the time and place where they were born.

Their father, Ti-eye, was a fisherman of Chinese descent. It is unclear what ethnicity their mother was, as different reports record her as Siamese, Chinese, Malay, or some mix of these. Their children were raised as Theravada Buddhists. Chang and Eng were treated just like their siblings, in a "matter-of-fact" way without any special attention on their physical differences. They ran and played with the other village children. After their father died, possibly in the smallpox epidemic of 1819, their mother supported the family by raising ducks.

A drawing of Chang & Eng as children

Photo advertising Chang & Eng as teenagers

When Chang and Eng were young teenagers, in the summer of 1824, a Scottish merchant, Robert Hunter, met them while traveling in Siam. Hunter reported that he was on a fishing boat in the Menam River at dusk while he came across them swimming, mistaking them for a "strange animal." Once he realized they were conjoined twins, he saw their financial potential. It took him five years to bring them out of Siam. Hunter reported later that this was because the Siamese king had ordered Chang and Eng's deaths and forbade them from leaving the country. Hunter and Abel Coffin, an America sea captain, finally left with the twins in the summer of 1829. The brothers had signed a contract to tour with Hunter and Coffin for five years. The ship, complete with a Siamese translator, arrived in Boston, Massachusetts on August 16. The Boston Patriot confirmed that the twins "will probably be exhibited to the public." Other newspapers reported their arrival too, with a nice mix of racist language and misinformation. Physicians, using physiognomy and phrenology, inspected Chang and Eng, judging them to be Chinese. (I'm not sure what the point in that was, but it was nineteenth-century America, which was strange, racist, and strangely racist.)

James W. Hale, their first manager, took them on tour in the British Isles initially, advertising them as the "Siamese Youths" and charging 25 cents admission (about $7 today). While there, they gained some proficiency in reading, writing, and speaking English. Hale sent flyers ahead of time to towns to let them know of the upcoming "freak show." They stayed in hotels for a day to a week in each location. At the shows, the brothers performed physical feats, like running, doing somersaults, or swimming. They played checkers and did parlor tricks. Hale emphasized their "exoticness," having them wear pigtails and dress in "Oriental" clothing.

Two years later, Chang and Eng returned to Massachusetts. They and Hale went on a retreat in Lynnfield. There, they were harassed by a dozen local men. In retaliation, one brother hit a man named Elbridge Gerry with the butt of his gun. Gerry threw a heavy stone at one brother's head and drew blood. The twins then shot at Gerry, but the gun had a blank. This was enough to run the group off. The next day, one man pressed charges against Chang and Eng. They were arrested for disturbing the peace but paid the bond. The Salem Mercury and other papers reported the incident, portraying the brothers as the victims. Gerry then published a letter saying that they had started the trouble. Hale was upset that they had gotten into a situation that would negatively affect their public image. He resigned as their manager in September 1831 and was replaced by his friend, Charles Harris. As far the public was concerned, the sea captain Coffin continued to serve as their father figure, though relations with him and his wife were strained by that time.

The twins found trouble once again in Alabama. A surgeon in an audience wanted to perform a close examination of them but they refused (they had not permitted close inspections since arriving in Boston). The doctor called them "imposters and pickpockets," causing the audience to throw objects at them. Chang and Eng fled, later having to pay a bond for disturbing the peace.

Coffin left for Asia in late 1831, expecting to be back by January. The twins' and Mrs. Coffin's relationship collapsed entirely. They had previously been angry with her for refusing their financial requests, even necessary ones like an additional $3 a week (about $95 today) to feed their horse. They were also anxious for Coffin to return, as they were promised freedom from their commitment on their 21st birthday in May 1832. They believed Mrs. Coffin to be "deceitful and greedy." Chang and Eng were angry that she "encouraged" them to perform when sick or had them stay in steerage, listed as servants, while she paid full fare. When Coffin finally returned to the States in July, the twins were missing. They had gone to Bath, New York, engaging in "whoring, gaming, and drinking," according to Coffin. He "gave Chang Eng [sic] the damndest thrashing they ever had in their lives." Coffin wrote to his wife, "We have had much talk; they seem to feel themselves quite free from me."

Chang & Eng, after they took control of their career

Chang and Eng did not alter much about their public persona and did not immediately release that they were now in business on their own. They made their stage name the "Siamese twins" and changed some parts of their act, such as speaking English, wearing more American clothes, and calling themselves "men" instead of "youths" or "boys." The two were now the bosses of their own act and hired their own staff. They went on a sightseeing tour of Europe from 1835-36.

After this trip, they settled in Wilkes County, North Carolina after touring for nearly a decade. The two purchased 150 acres for $300 (almost $9000 today) near Traphill. They "engaged in chasing stag and catching trout...to enjoy the recreation which they had desired to find far away from the hurrying crowds." They were part of the elite Wilkes County society and became US citizens in October 1839. Technically, there was a federal 1790 law restricting naturalization to "free white persons," so Chang and Eng were not legally eligible. However, the law tended to be enforced depending on local attitudes. This small Southern community deemed the brothers able to be naturalized citizens.

The brothers built a home on their land in 1840, hiring several women as housekeepers and purchasing enslaved workers. They lavishly decorated their new house, living "happy as lords." They continued to shock society when they both wed, on April 13, 1843, to a pair of sisters: Chang married Adelaide Yates and Eng married Sarah Yates. The twins were 33 and their new wives 20 and 21, respectively. A Baptist preacher, Colby Sparks, officiated the ceremony. Reportedly the Yates' parents' home was vandalized the night before the wedding and Northern newspapers condemned the marriages, though locally nothing much changed for the brothers. They adopted an English surname, Bunker, after a New York woman they had known and admired. They spoke English fluently, voted, and filed criminal charges against white people. Chang and Eng were an incredible exception in their time: nonwhite but given many white privileges because of their wealthy, plantation-owning status (they had even purchased another 650 acres of land near Mount Airy in 1845).

Chang & Eng, their wives, and two of their sons

Along with their wealth and continued success, Chang and Eng's families expanded: Chang's wife had ten children and Eng's had eleven. Their first children were born six days apart. Another set of cousins was born eight days apart. Two of the 21 total children were born deaf and two died from burns before the age of three. None were born as twins. The children were formally educated and went to church with their mothers and occasionally their fathers.

Newspaper drawing of the Bunker families

The Bunker families, with one of their enslaved women

The two split their time between their two plantations, three days at a time. Whoever's house it was would be in charge of what they would do, while the other brother would be quiet and go along with it. This would eventually be formalized into a legal division of property and individual wills. Their plantations produced wheat, rye, corn, oats, potatoes, cows, sheep, and pigs. By 1850, they had 18 enslaved workers, ten of whom were under age seven. Chang and Eng told the public that they were not cruel owners (contrary to what the press claimed), saying that their wives were the supervisors who also raised money for their slaves' educations. The brothers also continued to perform manual labor sometimes, such as chopping wood (using the axe with all four hands or rapidly alternating turns swinging). They also kept fishing, drinking, hunting, and doing other sports.

Due to their rapidly growing families, the brothers decided to return to touring for extra money. There was a brief New York City stint in 1849 with two daughters, then a successful year-long tour in 1853 with a daughter and a son. In 1860, Chang and Eng signed on with P.T. Barnum for a month in his New York City museum. After this, they traveled to San Francisco and performed there for several weeks. They were received favorably as the "greatest of living curiosities." The brothers returned home to North Carolina a month before the state seceded from the Union at the beginning of the American Civil War. The newspapers claimed that the brothers each had differing views on secession (which was untrue) and used them as metaphors for political parties, elections, the war, and more.

Following the war, the Bunkers' enslaved workers were emancipated. Because of this and other financial difficulties, the brothers began touring again. The North was not very enthusiastic, since they had been Confederate slaveholders, so Chang and Eng presented themselves as old men (they were in their mid-fifties at this point) who had reluctantly supported North Carolina when it decided to leave the Union. The performances did not go well, so the two toured Britain from 1868-69. The following year, they visited Germany and Russia (the rest of their European tour was cut short by the Franco-Prussian War). By this time, the combined Bunker estates were worth $30,000 (over $600,000 today).

On the way home, Chang suffered a stroke and his right side became paralyzed. They retired from touring and Eng cared for his brother. Chang's right leg needed to be kept in a sling and he became a heavy drinker. He contracted bronchitis in January 1874 and deteriorated after traveling through cold weather to Eng's house. The brothers slept upright in a chair, though Eng, who was healthy but exhausted, asked Chang to move to their bed. On the morning of January 17, one of Eng's sons checked on them and saw that Chang had died in the night. Eng responded, "Then I am going!" He died about two hours after his brother. They were 62 years old and had the record for the longest known lifespan of any conjoined twins until 2012.

Chang & Eng as older adults

Their widows, Sarah and Adelaide, were pressured by physicians to donate Chang and Eng's bodies to science. They were shipped to the College of Physicians in Philadelphia where an autopsy was performed. Doctors determined that Chang had died of a cerebral blood clot and Eng had "died of fright" upon seeing his dead brother. An alternate, and more likely theory, is that Eng died of blood loss as his circulatory system pumped blood into his dead brother's body and received no blood in return. Doctors took photos of the connecting band and had a sculptor make a plaster cast of the twins. Their fused livers are preserved in fluid and displayed with the death cast at the Mütter Museum. There are also displays about them at the Andy Griffith Museum and Circus World Museum. Their papers are kept at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Their bodies were returned to North Carolina to be buried.

Death cast of Chang & Eng

As with so many of these stories, the arts keep the memory of Chang and Eng alive today. They have been referenced many times in classic literature, such as by Mark Twain and Herman Melville. A Singaporean musical, Chang & Eng, debuted in 1997. Novels, such as Chang & Eng (2000) by Darin Strauss and God's Fool (2002) by Mark Slouka, have been published about them. A play, I Dream of Chang and Eng, debuted at UC-Berkeley in 2011. The twins were played by Jeremy Irons in the 1988 movie Dead Ringer and by Danial Son and Yusaku Komori in the 2017 biopic The Greatest Showman.

Something interesting that I noted was that the contemporaries of the brothers often referred to them as Chang-Eng. This shows how inseparable the two were, both physically and in the minds of those around them. It amazed me how the two men were able to work a system designed to oppress them and somehow financially and personally succeed. They are complicated people, like all humans, and lived their lives the best they could in their communities. As of 2018, their descendants numbered about 1500, including eleven sets of twins. For the last 30 years, family reunions have been held in Mt. Airy on the last Saturday in May, fed with Thai food courtesy of the Embassy of Thailand.

Most sincerely,

Clem

Disability Throughout History

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Tuesday, October 26, 2021

Chang & Eng Bunker - The Siamese Twins