Durham prison was built
at Elvet in 1810 to replace the earlier jail in the Great North Gate which was
the cause of serious traffic congestion in its day. Bishop Shute Barrington
pledged £2,000 towards the construction of the new building and on the 31st of July 1809, the foundation
stones were laid by Sir Henry Vane Tempest. The building was started by a Mr.
Sandys, who was dismissed before its completion. A new architect called
Moneypenny took over, but died during its construction and the prison was
finally completed by Ignatius Bonomi. Durham prison has some
600 cells and took its first batch of prisoners in 1819.
In total,
92 men and 3 women were hanged at Durham between 1800 and
1958. Ninety one of these executions took place at the prison or nearby
courthouse (14 in public) and 4 at Dryburn in public. Fifty five men were
hanged here in the 20th century. Of these 95, only 5 were to die for crimes
other than murder.
Like most
of the older jails, Durham Prison also reputedly has its ghost. In December
1947, an inmate stabbed a fellow prisoner to death with a table knife. A few
days later another prisoner was put into this cell and was found the next
morning crouched in the corner, in abject fear. He told the warders he had seen
the murder re-enacted. Other prisoners objected to being locked up in this cell
so it was converted into a storeroom.
The
gallows at Durham.
Up
to 1816, the place of execution at Durham was in the
grounds of the present day Dryburn hospital. The name Dryburn may have come
from the case of a man who was hanged there for being a Jesuit priest. The
legend has it that after his death, the local stream (burn) mysteriously dried
up and never flowed again, hence Dryburn. Alternatively, the name may be a
corruption of Tyburn, the site of London's gallows at the
time.
Ann Crampton was probably the last person to die at Dryburn, having been found
guilty of "cutting and maiming." Forty year old Ann suspected her husband was
being unfaithful to her. So when he was asleep she cut off his penis! For this
she was reputedly hanged on Thursday, the
25th of August 1814, although this cannot be absolutely confirmed.
Cutting off his manhood was seen as almost equivalent to cutting him off in the
male dominated society of the time. Was Ann the original role model for Lorena
Bobbitt, who hit the world headlines in the 1990's for committing the same
offence?
After
1816, a "New Drop" style gallows was erected on the steps outside the
new courthouse for each hanging. The holes for the beams supporting the
platform can still be seen in the wall, filled with stone plugs. The courthouse
is next door to the prison and the prisoner was brought back from the prison
through an internal passage, now blocked off.
The condemned person came out through a window onto the platform of the
gallows set over the main door. (This
was not an unusual arrangement as it was simpler and more secure than bringing
the person out of the prison gates and then making them climb steps up to the
gallows platform. It was thus quite
convenient and was an easy location to guard.
Across the street is a house with an iron balcony that was rented out to
wealthy spectators to watch the hanging from.)
After the abolition of public hangings, the gallows was set up in the condemned
prisoner’s exercise yard. The platform
was level with the ground set over a brick lined pit. Later still, around 1890,
an execution shed was built. This was standard practice at the time but still
involved the prisoner in quite a long walk from the condemned cell on A Wing to
the gallows. Normally, the shed was used
to house the prison van, which was also a common practice at other prisons,
e.g. Exeter.
In the
20th century, Durham was one of the
few prisons to retain a permanent gallows. This was housed in a fairly standard
pattern Home Office execution block at the end of D wing which was built in
1925. It had two condemned cells, one immediately adjacent to the gallows and
one separated from the execution chamber by the corridor which led to the exercise
yard. The main condemned cell was formed from 3 standard cells knocked into
one and contained a toilet and washbasin.
There was a small lobby between the cell and the gallows room. A
mortuary was available in the yard
adjoining the ground floor of the execution chamber. Parts of the execution block still remain to
this day, although the condemned cell has been removed and the pit covered over
(this area is now used for storage).
This wing was later renamed E Wing. The execution chamber is pictured here. This unique
photo was supplied by and is copyright of Aaron Bougourd and may not be
reproduced.
In the early 1990’s when the prison
was being modernised, the graves of some of those executed were disturbed,
including that of Mary Ann Cotton. A pair of female shoes belonging to her were
found along with her bones. Several bodies (including Cottons) were removed and
all were later cremated. All of the inmates hanged in the 20th century were
buried alongside the prison hospital wall with only a broad arrow and the date
of execution carved into the wall to mark the location of their grave. The
original instructions regarding the burial of executed inmates stated that the
only clothing an inmate should be buried in was a prison issue shirt. The body was to be placed into a pine box and
covered with quicklime and that holes were to be bored into the box before
burial.
Some
of Durham's famous cases.
The
first execution outside the courthouse, took place on Saturday, the 17th of August 1816 when John Grieg
was hanged for the murder of Elizabeth Stonehouse.
On April the 12th, 1819, 68 year old
George Atcheson was hanged at the same location for the rape of 10 year old
Isabella Ramshaw. The only other execution for rape here took place on March the 18th, 1822, when a miner
called Henry Anderson suffered for raping Sarah Armstrong.
Nineteen
year old Thomas Clark, a domestic servant at Hallgarth Mill, was convicted of
the murder of 17 year old Mary Ann Westhorpe, the housemaid there on Sunday, the 8th of August 1830. On that day
their employers, Stephen Oliver and his wife, had gone out and left some money
locked in the house. Mary's body was found to have been severely beaten and her
throat had been cut. The house had been ransacked and the money was missing.
When questioned, Thomas claimed that he and Mary had been attacked in the house
but that he had managed to escape. This story was not supported by the crime
scene evidence and Thomas was arrested, coming to trial on Thursday, the 25th of February 1831 before Justice
Littledale. There was great public interest in the case which was to hear the
testimony of more than 40 witnesses over two days. It took the jury just 22
minutes to find Thomas guilty. He was sentenced to hang and afterwards for his
body to be handed over to surgeons for dissection, as was still the practice
with murderers. The execution took place at midday on the following
Monday, (the 28th of February) in front of a crowd estimated at more than
15,000. On the gallows, Thomas is reported to have said "Gentlemen I die
for another man's crimes. I am innocent."
In 1832,
there were public protests over the conditions in the South Shields workhouse which
were supported by strikes of the local miners. The authorities attempted to
crackdown on these and sent in soldiers to quell the disturbances. They also
tried to evict striking miners from their tied houses. One of the miners,
William Jobling, was convicted of the murder of Nicholas Fairles, a local
magistrate, near Jarrow Slake. A policeman was also killed in the disturbances.
Jobling was hanged in the normal way amid tight security. Fifty mounted Hussars and 50 infantrymen were
positioned in front of the goal to protect the gallows. To make a special example of him, his body
was gibbeted after death, as a warning to the populace. Gibbeting was still a
legal punishment at the time but was abolished 2 years later. After hanging for
the customary hour, his body was taken off the rope, stripped naked and
immersed in molten pitch (tar) to preserve it. It was then re-dressed in the
original clothes and loaded into a cart and taken on a tour of the area before
arriving at Jarrow Slake where the crime had been committed. Here it was placed
into an iron gibbet cage. The cage and the scene being described thus,"
the body was encased in flat bars of iron of two and a half inches in breadth,
the feet were placed in stirrups, from which a bar of iron went up each side of
the head, and ended in a ring by which he was suspended; a bar from the collar
went down the breast, and another down the back, there were also bars in the
inside of the legs which communicated with the above; and crossbars at the
ankles, the knees, the thighs, the bowels the breast and the shoulders; the
hands were hung by the side and covered with pitch, the face was pitched and
covered with a piece of white cloth." The gibbet was a foot in diameter
with strong bars of iron up each side. The post was fixed into a 1-1/2 ton
stone base, sunk into the Slake. Jobling's body was suspended and left as a
grim reminder of the consequences of crime.
Sadly, Jobling was not actually guilty of this murder. Before he died, Nicholas
Fairles was able to identify his killer (a friend of Jobling's, one Ralph
Armstrong). However, Armstrong was not able to be arrested and Jobling, who had
been present and had done nothing to prevent the killing was therefore judged
to be equally guilty.
At this
time, however, large number of death sentences were commuted to transportation,
even for very serious crimes. On the 9th of April
1836, two men who had been sentenced to death for rape and robbery, were
offered a reprieve on condition of being transported for life to Australia.
The last
public execution here occurred on the
16th of March 1865 when Matthew Atkinson was hanged by Thomas Askern for
the murder of his wife at Spen, near Winlaton. When Askern drew the bolt,
Atkinson plunged downwards and the rope broke. He had to be extracted from
under the scaffold and a new rope found so that he could be hanged again 30
minutes or so later. Thomas Askern was the hangman of York, but also worked
further afield and continued to visit Durham up to 1873.
After the
Act of 1868, all executions had to take place within the prison walls and the
first of these "private" executions at Durham was a double
hanging that took place on March the 22nd,
1869, when 37 year old John Donlan suffered for the murder of Hugh Ward at Sunderland. Beside him on
the drop, was 23 year old John M'Conville, who had been convicted of the murder
of Philip Trainer at Darlington. William Calcraft officiated
at this hanging.
Mary Ann Cotton
has the dubious distinction of being Britain's worst female
serial killer and her tally of killings remained unequalled by either sex until
the 1980's. She is strongly suspected of 14 or 15 murders, either for gain or
to enable her to marry or both, and 21 people who were close to her died over a
20 year period. These comprised of 10 children, 3 husbands, 5 stepchildren, her
mother, a sister in law Margaret, and one lover.
She was born Mary Ann Robson in 1833 to a mining family, and her father was
killed in an accident at the colliery when she was 8, leaving her and her
mother in poverty. Mary bitterly resented this poverty and vowed that she would
not live like this as an adult.
She married for the first time on the
18th of July 1852, to 26 year old William Mowbray and moved with him to
Cornwall, where Mary was
to give birth to 4 children, all of whom died in their first year of life. All
the deaths were officially recorded as being from "gastric fever," a
common enough diagnosis at that time. In January 1865, William succumbed to the
same "illness" and Mary collected £35 in life insurance.
Mary moved back north and took a job at Sunderland Royal Infirmary as a ward
attendant. In this role, she had free access to the hospital's drug stocks.
While working at the Infirmary, she met and married a patient there, George
Ward (also given as Wade). George too began to get symptoms of poisoning and
was to remain married just 15 months, before he too died in 1866. Naturally,
Mary had taken out a life insurance policy on him as well as benefiting under
his will.
Her next marriage was to widower John Robinson, a foreman in the shipyard, who
had 4 children by his previous marriage. Three of these children died of the,
by now, inevitable "gastric fever" within a year. The marriage didn't
last as John evicted Mary after he found out that she had helped herself to
some of his possessions. He probably didn't realise at the time just what a
good decision he had made. Mary then went to look after her elderly mother,
Margaret, who not surprisingly did not survive the experience for long and soon
died of gastric fever!
Mary
Ann's next (bigamous) husband was to be widower Frederick Cotton whom she
married in September 1870 and by whom she quickly became pregnant, with her
sixth child. The new family moved to West Auckland and Mary took out
life insurance policies on all of them, except herself. Predictably, death now
entered the Cotton family, firstly Frederick's sister, Margaret, died followed
by 39 year old Frederick himself in September 1871, soon after his 10 year old
son Frederick, Jr., then by the couple’s new baby, Robert, and finally on the
12th of July 1872, Charles, Frederick's younger son by his former marriage.
Mary was also seeing her erstwhile lover, Joseph Natrass, who died soon after
moving in with her at the beginning of 1872. Young Charles Cotton was seen as
an impediment to Mary's love life and she offered him to the local workhouse.
They would not accept him on his own without her so clearly another means of
removing him had to be found. Arsenic as usual provided the solution! The
manager of the workhouse, who had interviewed Mary, became suspicious when he
heard of the death of Charles and reported it to the police.
Mary Ann, who was now unencumbered by children and relationships, once more
began an affair with the local excise officer, Mr. Quick-Manning by whom she as
usual became pregnant, giving birth to Mary Edith Quick-Manning Cotton on the 10th of January 1873 while in prison
on remand. The little girl was adopted after Mary's execution.
So many deaths in one household looked increasingly suspicious and after the
death of Robert, Dr. Kilburn ordered a post-mortem which discovered a large
amount of arsenic in the child's body. Arsenic always tends to deposit itself
in the fingernails and hair even when it has left the stomach. The symptoms of
arsenic poisoning are in some ways similar to gastric fever (gastro-enteritis)
and include nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, abdominal pain, fever, cramps,
lethargy, convulsions and dizziness.
Mary Ann was arrested on the 18th of July
1872 and remanded in custody by the magistrates to stand trial at the Spring
Assizes of the following year. The police now sought permission to exhume the
bodies of those who had been close to Mary Ann and called on the services of
Professor Thomas Scattergood from Leeds University, a leading
pathologist of his day, to examine them. Predictably, he found large amounts of
arsenic in each one. It could not, however, be proved that Mary Ann had
administered it.
Mary was to be charged only with the murder of her stepson, Charles Edward
Cotton. This was standard practice at the time as the defendant would be
sentenced to death for a single murder. If the first trial resulted in an
acquittal, a second charge could be brought.
Mary Ann was tried before Mr. Justice Archibald at the Durham Assizes of March
1873, her trial opening on Monday, the 3rd. She pleaded not guilty and was
represented by Mr Thomas Campbell Foster who put forward a defence that Robert
had been poisoned accidentally by the arsenic contained in their green floral
wallpaper which formed a poisonous dust when cleaned with soft soap. This was
not as fanciful as it may sound today. Arsenic really was used in some wallpaper
dyes at the time. The prosecution, led by Sir Charles Russell, however, were
able to show that Mary had actually purchased arsenic and pointed out that at
least 10 of her alleged victims had never been in the "arsenic room."
The trial lasted 5 days and the jury brought in their verdict after about an
hour's deliberation. Mr. Justice Archibald donned the black cap and passed
sentence upon her, saying :
"In these words I shall address you, I would earnestly urge you to seek
for your soul that only refuge which is left for you, in the mercy of God
through the atonement of our Lord, Jesus Christ. It only remains for me to pass
upon you the sentence of the law, which is that you will be taken from hence to
the place from whence is that you came, and from thence to a place of
execution, and there to be hanged by the neck until you are dead, and your body
to be afterwards buried within the precincts of the gaol. And may the Lord have
mercy upon your soul." On hearing her sentence Mary exclaimed, "Oh
no! Oh no! She had to be carried from the dock in a state of collapse.
Extraordinarily, there was some public sympathy for Mary Ann and a petition was
got up for a reprieve, possibly because of her baby. The Home Secretary
declined this, however, so 5 days before her execution her new baby daughter
was taken from her and placed with a childless couple for adoption.
On the Saturday before the execution the simple gallows, comprising two
uprights and a crossbeam with a double leaf trap below, was erected over a
brick lined pit in the condemned prisoner’s exercise yard and hidden from direct view until Mary
Ann and her escorts rounded a corner. Thomas Askern, assisted by William
Calcraft, had been hired by the Under-Sheriff to carry out the execution. Both
men were noted for their short drops.
There had been some discussion as to whether in view of the nature of her
crimes, she should be hanged strapped to a chair. The pit beneath the trapdoors was apparently
widened to accommodate this, although in the event the chair was not used.
The execution was set for 8.00 a.m. on the morning of
Monday, the 24th of March
1873 and Mary breakfasted on just a few sips of tea. Throughout her
time in prison she had refused religious counsel but during her last few
hours, became most devout and contrite. She prayed with the 3 matrons who guarded her round the clock in the
condemned cell and recalling her childhood Sunday school lessons, declared her
favourite hymn to be "Rock of ages."
It is said that Mary made the warders wait to escort her to the gallows while
she brushed her long black hair. When she was ready, she let the hangman pinion
her wrists in front of her with a leather strap and place a further leather
strap around her elbows and upper body. Wearing
a coarse black and white checked shawl, Mary walked resignedly to the
gallows. Once on the trapdoors, her
legs were strapped and the white hood placed over her head, followed by the
noose. Two warders supported her during this preparation. The trap was released
from under her and she dropped about 18 inches (450mm). For a moment she hung
still, presumably stunned by the impact of the drop. But then she began to
struggle violently, her agonies lasting some 3 minutes before she dangled
lifeless in the pit. Local newspaper reporters recorded the distressing scene. Following the post mortem, a plaster cast was taken of her face and she
was buried in the western part of Durham prison at 2 p.m. She is said to still haunt
her old home in Newcastle upon Tyne.
Mary Ann
seemed to have become addicted to murder by arsenic poisoning when she found
how easy it was to do, how she could get away with it, and how each killing
could earn her a small amount of life insurance or remove some inconvenient
person in her life or both. It is often said that the first murder is the
hardest - it gets easier the more one does. Today it would be much more
difficult to get away with so many murders of this sort but in those days,
public hygiene standards were low and child (and adult) mortality rates very
high. By moving around, she was able to get different doctors to sign death
certificates so that she was not immediately suspected. Communications were
very limited - there were no telephones in 1873, so the doctors were unlikely
to talk to each other and post-mortems were rarely carried out on deaths that
appeared natural. Gastric fever was a common cause of natural death at this
time.
Mary Ann seemed also to have a magnetic attraction for men - she was never
without one!
No doubt
to the relief of the prison officials, William Marwood took over from Askern
and Calcraft after this and introduced the long drop method of hanging which
(normally) removed the distressing duty of having to watch another human being
strangle to death a few feet away. His first appointment at Durham was a triple
hanging on the 5th of January 1874. His clients were
Charles Dawson, who had murdered his girlfriend, Margaret Addison, at Darlington, Edward Gough,
for the murder of James Partridge, at Marley Hill and William Thompson, for the
murder of his wife, at Annfield Plain. These were the first of a dozen hangings
carried out here by Marwood, including two triple executions and one double. At
this time, it was normal to execute prisoners in groups after the Assize, for
unrelated crimes, as it saved on the expense of erecting and guarding the
gallows and travelling expenses for the hangman.
The only
other woman to be hanged within Durham prison was 28
year old Elizabeth Pearson on Monday the 2nd of
August 1875. She had been convicted at the Summer Assizes of that
year of the wilful murder of her uncle, James Watson at Gainford, Durham. She was acting
as a housekeeper for her uncle, after the death of his wife. She soon started
stealing from him and decided to get rid of him, presumably in the hope of
inheriting from him. To this end, she added a strychnine based rat poison to
his medicine which had the desired effect. The death had all the classic signs
of strychnine poisoning and James' son, Robert, was suspicious and obtained a
post-mortem. Elizabeth began to empty
the house of its contents, in the meantime, further casting suspicion on
herself. James' stomach contents revealed large quantities of strychnine and
iron cyanide.
At her trial, Elizabeth's lawyer
contended that she had no motive for killing her uncle and the poison must have
been given to James by their lodger, who had since left. The jury were
unimpressed with this and brought in a guilty verdict within an hour. Elizabeth was to be one of 3
people to be hanged that morning. With her on the gallows was William M'Hugh,
who had been convicted of drowning Thomas Mooney and Michael Gillingham, who
had murdered John Kileian. At just after 8.00 a.m., William Marwood
launched them all into eternity together. Elizabeth was buried in an
unmarked grave next to Mary Ann Cotton, from whose death two years earlier, she
had apparently learned no lessons.
James
Burton, aged 33, went to the gallows on the
6th of August 1883 for the murder of 18 year old Elizabeth Ann Sharpe at
Tunstall in Sunderland. Burton had married Elizabeth, but the marriage
had quickly fallen apart and she left him. In a fit of jealous rage, he had
battered her to death. He was arrested and tried at the Summer Assizes of 1883
and was convicted after the jury had deliberated for just 23 minutes. In the
condemned cell, he made a full confession to the crime. His execution was set
for 3 weeks hence and the Under Sheriff had given the job of executing him to
William Marwood. Burton's drop was set at
7 feet 10 inches, which should have been quite sufficient to produce a pain
free death. Marwood did not coil up the free rope as some of his successors
did, but instead allowed it to loop down behind the prisoner's back, to about
waist level. As newspaper reporters were still permitted at executions, we are
able to know the sad details in this case.
"The culprit walked firmly to the scaffold but on being placed in position
looked up at the cross beam and on those assembled around the scaffold. Marwood
the executioner at once placed the white cap over the culprit's face, fastened
his legs and fixed the rope. Immediately the bolt was drawn it was obvious
something had gone wrong, the body was swinging violently to and fro in the
pit. Marwood seized hold of the rope and assisted by two warders, dragged the
still living man out of the pit. When drawn up Burton presented a
shocking appearance." As Marwood went to pull the lever, Burton fainted
and began to fall sideways, his pinioned arms catching in the loop of the rope
hanging down his back, thus prevented him dropping properly. The noose had also
slipped up over Burton's chin. Marwood
and the warders now had to get the poor man back onto the platform to
disentangle him and having done so, Marwood pushed him off the side of the
trap. He swayed back and forth, struggling for a couple of minutes before
unconsciousness supervened. His face was badly contorted and his neck very swollen
when his body was viewed by the coroner's jury at the formal inquest the
following day, and it was clear that he had strangled to death.
The press
were still permitted to attend executions up to 1934 (in some counties), and
thus we have the benefits of the report of two Durham hangings.
The first was carried out by Henry Pierrepoint and William Willis on Wednesday, the 8th of December 1909. The criminal was
of 29 year old, Abel Atherton, who had been convicted at Durham Assizes, before
Mr. Justice Walton, of the murder by shooting of 33 year old Elizabeth Ann
Patrick. He maintained throughout that the shooting was an accident and that he
had not meant to kill Elizabeth.
At 7.50 a.m. that Wednesday morning, the
Under Sheriff entered the prison with 3 newspaper reporters who were stationed
in front of the execution shed. Atherton was brought to the doctor's room by
two warders, where his hands were pinioned, and then led forward to the gallows
in a procession consisting of the Chief Warder, the Chaplain, Atherton, held by
a warder on either side, Pierrepoint and his assistant William Willis, the
Principal Warder, the governor, the prison surgeon and finally another warder.
All but the Chaplain entered the shed and once Atherton was on the drop, Willis
dropped to his knees behind him to pinion his legs, while Pierrepoint placed
the noose over his head and adjusted it before pulling the white hood over him.
(Henry Pierrepoint did do it in this order, unlike most other hangmen.) On the
gallows, Atherton exclaimed "Yer hanging an innocent man."
The prison bell was tolling and the nearby Assize Courts clock striking the
hour when Pierrepoint released the trap giving Atherton a drop of 7 feet 3
inches. The execution was over before the clock finished striking and the press
men who looked down into the pit reported that Atherton's death was
instantaneous and that he was hanging perfectly still. The execution shed was
locked up and Atherton was left on the rope for the customary hour. The
official notice of the execution was posted on the prison gate and an autopsy
carried out later in the morning.
The
second is that of 44 year old Joseph Deans who had been convicted of the murder
of his girlfriend, 48 year old Catherine Convery. He had battered Catherine with an axe at Monkwearmouth
in Sunderland, on the night of October
7th 1916,
and she died of her wounds 6 days later.
He was tried at Durham on the 15th of November and it took
the jury only 5 minutes to convict him.
When asked if he had anything to say before he was sentenced, he
replied, “I killed the woman and I am pleased I killed her”. He was transferred after the trial to the
Condemned Cell in A Wing. The following
description of his execution comes from the Durham Chronicle of Friday
December 22nd 1916.
”The morning broke the cold and cheerless for Deans last brief day on earth. He
had retired to rest early on Tuesday evening and slept most soundly, having to
be wakened in order to await the coming of the prison chaplain. Attired in the
clothes that he wore for the trial Deans ate a hearty breakfast and afterwards
listened very attentively to the ministrations of Rev D. Jacob who remained
with him to the end.
Outside the prison everything was quiet and peaceful and the only thing
to indicate that a terrible tragedy was being enacted within the prison walls
was a notice issued the previous day by the High Sheriff (Mr Hustler) and the
Governor (Mr. Hellier), under the Capital Punishment Amendment Act. 1868 to the
effect that the sentence of the law passed upon Joseph Deans, found guilty of
murder would be carried into execution at 8am on
Wednesday morning. Only a solitary pressman and a police sergeant were to be
seen on the prison green, the public apparently taking no interest in the
proceedings. The only sound heard by
them was the padded doors of the scaffold, and the noise they made could be
distinctly heard in the calm of the morning outside. The prison bell was tolled when all was over, and notices signed by Dr. Gilbert the prison
surgeon to certify that the man was dead,
and by the Governor and the Under Sheriff and the chaplain intimating
that the sentence had been carried into execution were afterwards casually read
by the passers by.
Meanwhile the
arrangements had been completed for the carrying out of the sentence. John Ellis the executioner and his assistant
(George Brown) who had arrived the previous night and were accommodated with
lodgings in the prison, made a final test of the arrangements and found all satisfactory.
The prison chaplain arrived early then came the Under Sheriff, followed at quarter
to eight o'clock by the prison surgeon and the Governor. In the doctors room the next
scene was enacted, and there the condemned man met his executioner face to face
for the first time. Ellis speedily
strapped the condemned mans hands behind his back and bared his neck, and whilst the Cathedral bell was striking
the hour the little procession started on its way to the place of execution. In front came the chaplain reading the
service for the dead, the intervening space between the doctors room and the
van house was covered in a few seconds and what followed was also the work of a
remarkably short space of time, walking across the van house over the drop to
the west wall he then turned and faced the culprit Deans who was accompanied by
two warders walked firmly and without assistance followed by Ellis and his
assistant the rear being brought up by the Governor, prison surgeon and other
officials. Deans entered the van house and took up his position on the drop
indicated by a chalk mark, then he was given into the hands of the executioners
and whilst Ellis arranged the noose his assistant adjusted the ankle straps
then Ellis produced the sugar loaf white cap and having drawn it over Deans
head he sprang aside gripped the lever and released the bolts, the heavily
padded doors swung open and Deans was precipitated into the pit below. The signal having been given a warder rang
the bell announcing the fact that the grim tragedy was over. The execution was
speedily carried out and death which was instantaneous, occurring just as the
last stroke of eight rang out from the Cathedral clock, for an hour the corpse
was allowed to hang and afterwards was drawn up and placed in a plain coffin.
The Governor intimated privately that the execution had been most expeditiously
carried out, in fact he never remembered
an occasion where the sad proceedings had been so short and satisfactory.”
On the
evening of Thursday, the 29th of February 1940, a robbery took place at a shop in
Cuxhoe County Durham. Two young men, 24 year old Vincent Ostler and 27 year old
William Appleby, had broken into the Co-op store there in the early hours of
the morning. A passing cyclist, Jesse Smith, noticed the light on (unusual in a
shop at night in those days) and thought he saw a person inside. He decided to
report this immediately to the police and Constables William Shiell and William
Stafford went back with Smith to see what was going on. When they heard the
police, the robbers made a break for it and were chased by Shiell. One of the
men shot Shiell in the stomach and he remained conscious long enough to tell Stafford that there were two assailants and
that one of them had said "let him have it" before the shot was
fired. (Sound familiar? See the case of Derek Bentley.) Shiell was able to
describe one of his attackers to colleagues before he died later the next day
in hospital. Ostler and Appleby were arrested on the 4th of March, both blaming
the other. Once again the words "let him have it" were to prove
significant at their trial at Leeds before Mr. Justice Hilbery in May. It was
shown that Ostler had fired the fatal shot but by saying "let him have
it" which constable Shiell had insisted Appleby had said. Appleby was held to have incited Ostler and
was therefore equally guilty. Their appeals were dismissed and the law took its
course on Thursday, the 11th of July 1940 when Thomas Pierrepoint hanged them
side by side.
Most
prisons seem to have their "oddball" cases and that of Patrick
Turnage was certainly one. Turnage pleaded guilty to the murder of 78 year old
Julia Beesley, at his 7 minute long trial at Durham on the 26th
of October 1950. Julia Beesley was a prostitute and Turnage a merchant seaman who had
come ashore for drink and sex on the 22nd of July 1950. After they had had sex, they
quarrelled over her proposed charge for this service and he had strangled her.
He was arrested the next day and confessed that he had killed Julia. However,
the facts of the case pointed more to a conviction for manslaughter than murder,
but Turnage refused to accept this and insisted on pleading guilty to murder so
that he could be hanged rather than serve a potential 15 year sentence for
manslaughter. Steve Wade granted him his wish on Thursday,
the 14th of November 1950.
Twenty
two year old John Vickers became the first person executed in England and Wales since August
1955, and the first under the Homicide Act of 1957, having been convicted of
the murder of 72 year old Jane Duckett. Miss Duckett owned and ran a small
grocery shop in Carlisle and Vickers decided to rob
her. She heard the sounds of someone on her premises and put up a fight in the
course of which he battered her to death. Section 5 of the Homicide Act made
murder committed in the course or furtherance of theft a capital crime.
Vickers was soon arrested and tried at Carlisle on the 23rd of May 1957. He was convicted
and sentenced to death but appealed on the grounds that there was no malice a
forethought in the killing. The appeal was dismissed and after an unsuccessful
attempt to take the case to the House of Lords, he was hanged on Tuesday, the 23rd of July 1957 by Harry Allen, assisted by Harry Smith.
Private
Brian Chandler was the last person to be executed at Durham. The 20 year old
soldier was hanged on Wednesday, the
17th of December 1958 by
Robert Stewart, assisted by Tommy Cunliffe, for battering to death 83
year old Martha Dodd at Darlington in June of that year. Like
Vickers before him, it had to be shown that he had stolen from Mrs. Dodd, to be
guilty of capital murder under the provisions of the Homicide Act of 1957. The
jury found that he had after only 1-1/2 hours of deliberation, and he was
sentenced to death on the 29th of October by Mr. Justice Ashworth.
HMP
Durham remains in service to this day and as a maximum security prison houses
some our most dangerous criminals.
With special thanks to Aaron Bougourd
for his help with this article.
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