It has been sometimes declared that criminals were at one time actually hung alive in chains, but this is pure fiction. Before being hung, a criminal, it is true, was measured for his irons—an ordeal under which many completely broke down. After the hanging, the body was taken down and thrown into a cauldron of boiling pitch, on being taken out of which it was placed in the chains, which were riveted around it, and then slung up upon a gibbet, where it swung in the wind as long as the chains held together. In some instances sacks took the place of chains.
At the last public execution in England, which took place in 1852 at Northampton, the crowd which had assembled was exceedingly incensed at finding that the day had been changed. Some of them, indeed, loudly declared that if they could only get at the Under-Sheriff “they would let him know what it was to keep honest folk in suspense,” whilst one old lady, who was especially vociferous in her denunciation, announced that she should certainly claim her expenses from the authorities. It was also at Northampton in 1818 that the governor proudly described the new drop set up at the county gaol as being admirably suited for the hanging of twelve persons comfortably.
THE GIBBET AND GALLOWS
It may be observed that pictures of gibbets are exceedingly rarely to be found, the greatest number, oddly enough, being in works illustrated by Thomas Bewick. There are several gibbets in the tailpieces of his British Birds, and also one or two in his Quadrupeds. I may add that some sixteen years ago a very interesting little volume on the subject of Hanging in Chains was written by Mr. Albert Hartshorne, a gentleman well known for his knowledge of old English glass and general love of research into the past. The book in question, however, which is fully illustrated, has now, unfortunately, become somewhat difficult to procure.
On North Heath, north of Midhurst, a gallows once stood. From this, some hundred and eight years ago, swung in chains the brothers Drewitt, convicted of having robbed the mail on that spot. Their guilt, nevertheless, does not appear to have been thoroughly proved, the real criminal, it was thought by some, having been their father, who after the execution used to be seen sitting at the foot of the gallows beneath the bodies of his sons. A curious old Sussex tradition declared that a dead man’s hand would cure any affection of the throat, and people would walk great distances to put this cure to the test. Whilst the body of the younger of the two Drewitts swung in the wind (which it did for a long time, a further proof, it was pointed out, of his innocence), children were brought from far away and held up in the air in order that the dead man’s hand might swing across their throat. The younger Drewitt, who to his last breath maintained that he was quite unconnected with the robbery, was generally considered a martyr in the district, and the tale of his unjust fate, together with numerous details of his capture, “in a new pair of buckskin breeches,” was told at many a cottage fireside long years after hanging in chains had become but a memory of the past.
PRESSING TO DEATH
A far more barbarous method of punishment than hanging in chains was “pressing to death,” the last recorded infliction of which took place in Sussex, at Horsham gaol, in 1736. When a man, for no matter what reason, refused to plead, he was ordered to be laid naked on his back on the bare floor of a low dark chamber, and as great a weight of iron as he could bear—and more—put upon him. From time to time he was questioned, and should he continue to refuse to answer, heavier weights were added. As the victims of this torture sometimes survived for days, the law very humanely provided that on the first day they were to be allowed three morsels of the “worst bread procurable,” whilst on the second three draughts of “standing water” were allowed. This alternation of food and drink was to continue from day to day till the prisoners answered or till they died. The last man to suffer this horrible punishment was one who was charged with robbery and with murdering a woman at Bognor, and who refused to plead, not uttering a word. Many endeavours were made to induce him to speak, but all of them proving useless, he was taken back to Horsham gaol to be pressed to death. The weight which finally killed him was some four hundred pounds, in addition to which the executioner, a man turning the scale at sixteen stone, jumped upon the board and thus administered the coup de grâce.
Executions in quite modern times were horrible affairs. Within my own lifetime the skin of more than one murderer has been taken from his body, tanned, and used to bind a book. Such a thing happened after the execution of William Corder, who was hung at Bury St. Edmunds in the year 1828, having been found guilty of murdering Maria Martin. On this occasion the Bury coach on its way to London was stopped in order that the passengers might witness the execution. Macready used to say that during the performance of Macbeth the same evening at Drury Lane the actor who impersonated Duncan was interrupted at the words, “Is execution done on Cawdor?” by a man in the gallery who shouted out, “Yes! He was hung this morning at Bury.” In connection with books bound in human skin it may be mentioned that a copy of the Poetical Works of John Milton in the Exeter Museum is said to be bound in the skin of George Cudmore, a Devonshire murderer executed in 1830, whilst I believe there is also a large quarto volume preserved at Bristol which is bound in the skin of a murderer executed as recently as 1843.
During the Reign of Terror in France, it has been stated, several pairs of ladies’ white kid gloves were made from the same gruesome material.
In my childhood also, “resurrection men,” as those who stole dead bodies for sale to the surgeons were called, were much dreaded, extraordinary methods of protecting corpses from being carried away being often employed. Such things seem quite of another age to-day, but the evil in question was only ended in 1832 when the Anatomy Act was passed.