Olde London Punishments

by David Brandon

  Block and axe in the Tower of London.

  When the head was severed, it was normal for the executioner to hold it up for the crowd to see that the deed had been properly completed. Later, the head was sewn back on for the sake of appearances. The executioner would accompany the act by a statement such as, ‘Behold the head of a traitor!’ At least one severed head is supposed to have snarled back a statement such as, ‘You lie, I am no traitor!’ This ritual was important because it provided evidence of death and supposedly prevented an impostor coming forward at a later stage.

  The execution of the Earl of Strafford in 1641; a crowd of over 100,000 was reputed to have attended.

  The block was of course the axe’s partner in crime and it evolved over the years from a plain log into something specially shaped for its purpose. It was usually about 2ft high and designed so that the head fell off into a waiting basket of sawdust. If the first blow inflicted a deep but not fatal wound, severing the artery, it was by no means unknown for those close by to be sprayed by high-pressure blood.

  Death by Burning

  This was the punishment largely reserved for heretics. The theory was that they had been guilty of thought-crime, of holding and practising unacceptable religious ideas, and that death by burning was a condign preparation for the fires waiting for them in Hell. The burning was a symbolic destruction of the evil ideas the person harboured as well as the death of the reprobate himself.

  Witches and women found guilty of murdering their husbands were also burned to death. It seems almost inconceivable by modern standards, but burning was devised as a method of execution for women to protect their modesty! It was though that public hanging, drawing and quartering would be indelicate as parts of their bodies would be exposed to public gaze.

  Death by burning.

  The victim was tied to a stake with a rope around her neck and at the agreed moment the executioner ignited the firewood and tugged on the rope. The theory was that the victim would be dead by the time the flames were licking around her body. However, in the case of Catherine Hayes, who was executed at Tyburn in 1726 for killing her husband, the wood flared up so quickly that the executioner had to remove himself before strangulation was complete. The crowd was then treated to the sight of Catherine’s prolonged and excruciating death agonies. The executioner had little option but to pile on more faggots hoping that the conflagration would be intense enough to shorten her sufferings.

  Death by Boiling

  Perhaps fortunately, the authorities did not often have recourse to this diabolical form of execution. Seemingly the first person to suffer this fate was one Richard Rose in 1531. He was a cook who was found guilty of high treason for poisoning the family and household of the Bishop of Rochester. Seventeen people suffered severely and two actually died. Rose was placed in an iron cauldron of water over a fire which was then brought to the boil. He took two hours to die in full public view at Smithfield. It was assumed that the poisoning was deliberate. Modern scientific techniques might instead have detected poor hygiene standards or even a dose of salmonella.

  The horror of death by this singularly unpleasant, but fortunately rare, method was perhaps slightly lessened in later years when the victim was placed in water that was already at boiling point. Would that actually be any better?

  Gibbeting

  The English were not known to be particularly fastidious when it came to the methods of punishment and execution they employed. However, it does seem that unlike their counterparts in some European countries, they did not very often gibbet people alive. Instead, they usually employed gibbeting as a kind of aggravated punishment with the added bonus that it was believed to be a deterrent to wrongdoing on the part of those whose glance fell on the gruesome remains of some miscreant swaying to and fro in an iron cage caught up by the wind. Certain types of offender – highwaymen and pirates in particular – had their bodies daubed in tar or some other preservative substance after death, whereupon they were placed in chains inside a hanging iron cage and displayed in some conspicuous place such as a crossroads or, in the case of the pirates, a prominent spot near a river frequented by large numbers of passing ships.

  The fleshy parts of the gibbeted cadaver and such items as the eyes soon disappeared thanks to the attentions of birds, especially of the crow family, and rats, which were not averse to making their way up the wooden supports into the cage where the corpse provided, literally, easy meat. Such corpses soon became little more than a collection of bones, which often collapsed and often fell out of the cage to gladden the hearts of passing dogs.

  The Judas Cradle

  Just because no one in English officialdom has ever admitted that this diabolical procedure has been used, we cannot therefore assume that it has not. England had all manner of close links with governments in Western Europe in medieval times and word got about. The Judas Cradle was such a simple, economical and effective means for extracting information that it somewhat stretches the bounds of credibility to think that this device never lurked in the darkest and dingiest dungeon of the Tower of London.

  The victim had his hands tied behind his back and was secured in an iron waist ring. He was then hoisted up by a system of winches and pulleys only to be lowered onto the sharp point of a pyramid surmounting a sturdy tripod. The victim was placed in such a way that his or her weight rested on the apex of the pyramid positioned in the anus, in the vagina, under the scrotum or the coccyx. The torturer responded to the requirements of the interrogator by varying the pressure being applied and could rock the victim or make him fall repeatedly on the point.

  The Cat O’ Nine Tails

  This instrument was used as a means of punishment in the Royal Navy, whose ships were frequently to be seen around Deptford Dockyard and occasionally in the Pool of London. A somewhat lighter version was used in the Army. The naval cat had a handle of rope or sometimes of wood about 2ft long and 1in in diameter. Each of the nine tails or thongs was ¼in in diameter and 2ft long. They usually had one or two knots along their length.

  The crew would be assembled to witness the punishment, with marines standing by with muskets and fixed bayonets. The offender was tied to an upright grating and stripped to the waist. Punishment was then inflicted by the bosun’s mates and the lashes were usually administered in multiples of six. The knots in the tails had the effect of lacerating the skin in a prolonged flogging and on occasions the flesh was stripped away to reveal the bones. When punishment was completed, the offender was cut down and usually swabbed with salt water to stem the bleeding.

  The cat was sometimes used in civil prisons.

  The Scavenger’s Daughter

  On display in the White Tower at the Tower of London is this device also known as ‘Skeffington’s Gyves’. Leonard Skeffington was a Lieutenant of the Tower in the 1530s (though he is more likely to have adapted an existing device than to have invented one himself). Made of iron, this fiendish apparatus had spaces for the neck, the wrists and the ankles and it had the effect of compressing the body of the victim, inducing excruciating pain, especially in the abdominal and rectal areas. Its advocates considered that it induced more pain than the rack. It was probably the ideal torture machine. It was light and easily transported, and the mere sight of it was often enough to persuade a prisoner to cooperate fully with his inquisitors.

  Whipping

  Whipping was an economical punishment since little capital outlay was required. A common practice was ‘whipping at the cart’s tail’. The offender was stripped to the waist and tied to the back of a horse-drawn wagon. As the horse drew the wagon and the offender slowly through the streets, whipping would be administered at prescribed places, particularly at the scene of the crime. The more serious the offence, the longer the journey around town. This punishment involved public humiliation as well as pain. Sometimes the public were allowed to whip the offender as he passed by where they were standing. Whippings or floggings with a birch were also administered for various misdemean
ours in prison.

  Mutilation

  Tongues that had uttered blasphemous, treasonable or otherwise unacceptable words might be ripped out or have a hole bored in them. The hand of a thief or assailant might be removed. The punishment of time in the pillory might be aggravated by the offender having his ears nailed to the woodwork. Prostitutes sometimes had their noses slit – perhaps this was intended to be bad for their business activities.

  Branding

  Branding was a handy punishment, combining as it did the administering of pain with the depositing of a permanent visible scar or stigma. Different letters were burned into the flesh to signify different offences. A ‘V’ indicated a runaway servant while ‘T’ was a thief and ‘FA’ was a false accuser. The law banned civil branding in 1829. Vagrants were frequently branded, which often made it difficult for them to ever become gainfully employed.

  The Rack

  The rack was used in the Tower of London to extort information and ‘confessions’ from, among others, those who thought up the Gunpowder Plot in 1605. The victim was tightly secured to a table and attached to an apparatus which literally stretched him – several inches. The pull exerted was usually comparatively gentle at first but would be intensified by the torturer if he felt that his victim was holding back vital information. Every joint in the arms and legs would be dislocated, the spinal column dismembered and the muscles of the limbs, thorax and abdomen ripped apart. This appalling device served the purposes of the interrogator, the torturer and the executioner.

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  The Pillory

  The pillory was another form of torture, although on rare occasions those subjected to such punishment were ‘rewarded’ by the crowd who laid flowers at their feet or even collected money for them. Stocks and pillories were used in parts of Europe for more than 1,000 years. They became common in England by the mid-fourteenth century. In 1351 a law (Statute of Labourers) was introduced requiring every town to provide and maintain a set of stocks. The pillory was a device made of a wooden or metal framework erected on a post, with holes for securing the head and hands in which the convicted person would face the wrath of the public.

  A stock is simply a wooden board with one or more semicircles cut into one edge. Initially used for quacks and mountebanks, stocks were later used to control the unemployed. In 1287 Robert Basset, Mayor of London, punished bakers for making underweight bread. A number of them were put in the pillory, as was Agnes Daintie, for selling ‘mingled butter’. A statute passed in 1495 required that vagabonds should be set in the stocks for three days on bread and water and then sent away. A further statute of 1605 required that anyone convicted of drunkenness should receive six hours in the stocks. After 1637, it became the recognised punishment for those who published books without a licence or criticised the government. The pillory was abolished in England in 1837.

  The status of the pillory was elevated from a punishment reserved for cheats, thieves and perjurers to one which also punished those involved in political disputes. This was due to the work of the Archbishop of Canterbury William Laud (1573-1645) and the Star Chamber in 1637.

  In the same year a high profile case saw the brutal punishment of three Puritan preachers: William Prynne, Henry Burton and John Bastwick. In the growing discontent prior to the Civil Wars they were prosecuted by Star Chamber for publishing pamphlets attacking the rule of the bishops and criticising the doctrines of Archbishop Laud. All three were sentenced to stand in Palace Yard in the pillory and have their cheeks branded and ears cropped before being imprisoned for life. The following account gives a graphic description of what happened:

  William Prynne, who had his ears lopped off in 1637.

  Dr Bastwick spake first, and (among other things) said, had he a thousand lives he would give them all up for this cause. Mr Prynne... showed the disparity between the times of Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth, and the times then [of King Charles], and how far more dangerous it was now to write against a bishop or two than against a King or Queen: there at the most there was but six months imprisonment in ordinary prisons, and the delinquent might redeem his ears for £200, and had two months’ time for payment, but no fine; here they are fined £5,000 a piece, to be perpetually imprisoned in the remotest castles, where no friends must be permitted to see them, and to lose their ears without redemption. There no stigmatizing, here he must be branded on both cheeks... The Archbishop of Canterbury, being informed by his spies what Mr Prynne said, moved the Lords then sitting in the Star Chamber that he might be gagged and have some further censure to be presently executed on him; but that motion did not succeed. Mr Burton spake much while in the pillory to the people. The executioner cut off his ears deep and close, in a cruel manner, with much effusion of blood, an artery being cut, as there was likewise of Dr Bastwick. Then Mr Prynne’s cheeks were seared with an iron made exceeding hot which done, the executioner cut off one of his ears and a piece of his cheek with it; then hacking the other ear almost off, he left it hanging and went down; but being called up again he cut it quite off. [Source: John Rushworth (1706, abridged edition) Historical Collections, volume two, pp. 293]

  The following year, political radical and Leveller John Lilburne (1614-1657) was charged with printing and circulating unlicensed books. He was found guilty and fined £500, whipped, pilloried and imprisoned. He was whipped from Fleet Prison to Palace Yard. When he was placed in the pillory he tried to make a speech and distribute pamphlets...

  Henry Burton, who was publicly mutilated in 1637.

  The Quaker James Nayler rode into Bristol on a donkey in 1656, imitating Christ’s entry into Jerusalem. For this act the government, in December 1656, declared him guilty of blasphemy. Some MPs demanded that he should be stoned to death in accordance with the Old Testament penalty for blasphemy. Nayler was taken to the pillory at Westminster and then whipped through the streets to the Old Exchange, where he stood again in the pillory for two hours. He then had his tongue bored through with a red-hot iron and was branded on the forehead with the letter ‘B’ for blasphemer. He was then returned to Bristol and made to repeat his ride while facing the rear of his horse. Finally, he was taken back to London and committed to solitary confinement in Bridewell for an indefinite period.

  Titus Oates (1649-1705) was an Anglican priest who claimed there was a Jesuit-led plan to assassinate Charles II in order to hasten the succession of the Catholic James. Oates’ story was a complete fabrication, but it was sufficient to create a scare as well as sending a number of innocent men to their deaths at Tyburn. These events sparked a wave of anti-Catholic persecution with thirty-five innocent people executed and hundreds of others suffering as a consequence of Oates’ claims. In sentencing Oates, Judge Withers said, ‘I never pronounce criminal sentence but with some compassion; but you are such a villain and hardened sinner, that I can find no sentiment of compassion for you’. Found guilty of perjury on two separate indictments, he was condemned in 1685 to public exposure on three consecutive days. According to his sentence, Oates was to stand every year of his life in the pillory on five different days: before the gate of Westminster Hall, at Charing Cross, at the Temple, at the Royal Exchange and at Tyburn. However, the government eventually made the infamous villain a pensioner.

  James Nayler being punished in the pillory.

  The crowd did not always respond in a brutal way. The Post Boy newspaper recorded that Tristrum Savage stood in the pillory in June 1702 at the ‘Chancery Lane end in Fleet Street, for publishing a scandalous paper, called, The Black List, and some people had the confidence to give him wine and money as he stood in the pillory’.

  Likewise with Daniel Defoe, famous for his novel Robinson Crusoe (1719): in 1703, the government offered a reward of fifty pounds for the arrest of Defoe for being the author of a ‘scandalous and seditious’ pamphlet which lampooned the Church. Defoe gave himself up and was sentenced to be pilloried three times. On 29 July he stood in the pillory at Cheapside, two days later in the Temple, Fleet Stre
et. Here he met with a sympathetic crowd who flung garlands, instead of rotten eggs and garbage at the pamphleteer and drank his health.

  In June 1732 the robber John Waller was sentenced to stand twice in the pillory at Seven Dials, bareheaded, with his crime written in large characters. He did not reach his second stint in the pillory. Such was the indignation of the populace that they pelted him to death. The day after, the coroner’s inquest gave a verdict of ‘Willful murder by persons unknown’.

  The attitude towards homosexuals was vicious, as newspaper accounts confirm. In January 1727 Robert Whale and York Horner were found guilty of sodomy and for keeping a ‘House for the Entertainment of Sodomites’. Their punishment was to stand in the famous pillory at Charing Cross. One month later the London Journal (7 February) reported that Peter Dubourg stood in the ‘Pillory at the Royal-Exchange, for attempting to commit Sodomy; and was severely treated by the populace’. In April 1727 Charles Hitchin, City Marshal, was committed to Newgate by Justice Haynes for the ‘odious and detestable Sin of Sodomy, committed on the Body of Richard Williamson’ (Daily Post). He was sentenced to stand in the pillory in the Strand. His punishment took place in May but his friends attempted to intervene. They barricaded the avenues leading to him with coaches and carts, rendering any ‘approaches by the Mob inaccessible’ (The Weekly Journal: or, The British Gazetteer, 6 May). However, the attempt to repel ‘the Fury of the Populace proved ineffectual. He was taken down at the usual Time, and carried back to Newgate, almost ready to expire, with the Fatigue he had undergone in the Rostrum, his Night-Gown and Breeches being torn in Pieces from his Body’. In October 1727 John Croucher stood in the ‘Pillory in New Palace Yard, for Sodomitical Practices, and was very severely treated by the Populace’ (The British Journal).