These murders are generically known as the Bodies Under the Bridge and the Jigsaw Murders, while Ruxton himself became known as The Savage Surgeon.
The case became known as the "Bodies Under the Bridge" due to the location, near the Dumfriesshire town of Moffat in the Southern Uplands of Scotland, where the bodies were found.
The case was also called the "Jigsaw Murders" because of the painstaking efforts to re-assemble and identify the victims and then determine the place of their murder.
Ruxton earned the title of "The Savage Surgeon" due to his occupation and the extensive mutilation he inflicted upon his victims' bodies.The prosecution of Ruxton's murders would prove to be one of the United Kingdom's most publicised legal cases of the 1930s.
The case itself is primarily remembered for the innovative forensic techniques employed to identify the victims and prove that their murders had been committed within the Ruxton household.