# Can one half of a siamese twin die without the other dying?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-one-half-of-a-siamese-twin-die-without-the-other-dying/656453>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [April 23, 2013, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-one-half-of-a-siamese-twin-die-without-the-other-dying/656453 "2013-04-23T00:49:58Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\
**Post date:** [April 23, 2013, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-one-half-of-a-siamese-twin-die-without-the-other-dying/656453/21 "2013-04-23T21:16:17Z")

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> [@Ambrosio\_Spinola](#):
>
> They married sisters, in fact, and they started out sharing a huge bed. But that didn’t work out, so they got one house for each of their wives to live in and alternated days. They also owned slaves. Talk about a crazy life…

Legally the Bunker brothers were considered white under state law. Being white wasn’t a legal requirment to own slaves, but it sure as hell was to marry a white woman.

> [@thicksantorum](#):
>
> They’re usually only very difficult to separate _without killing one of them_, though. If one is already dead, it’s a matter of stuffing the essential organs into a single body and lopping off the rest. Most of the cases mentioned were deaths caused by infections.

It’d be a trivial matter to seperate Chan and Eng with modern medicine; it wouldn’ve been done as a matter of routine in any first world country while they were still infants. Even 19th century medicine it would’ve been possible to seperate them and expect at least one to survive if they could avoid infection. Of course 19th surgeons would also have no way of knowing just what tissue they shared with cutting them open. :smack:

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**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\
**Post date:** [April 24, 2013, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-one-half-of-a-siamese-twin-die-without-the-other-dying/656453/22 "2013-04-24T16:06:20Z")

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> [@Leo\_Bloom](#):
>
> Missionary, doggie, cowgirl, which? Anyway, my BSometer just went off the chart.
> 
> That must be some engrossing book. What would _you_ do in a similar situation?

It’s no myth that they had 21 children between the two of them, so obviously they were able to work out the logistics of reproduction somehow.

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