Drive off in a new Hyundai Laundry today with $0 down during the Hyundai Advantage sales event. Take advantage of the $1,000 spring drive bonus and lease the 20-2060 Laundry Essential for just $73 weekly at 4.99% for 60 months. And you're covered by your Laundry's Best in Class 5 year new car warranty. Now that's the Hyundai Advantage.
Conditions apply. Offer includes 1% loyalty rate reduction for qualifying customers. Visit HyundaiCanada.com or your local dealer for details. Before we begin, I'd like to thank Shawna Gonzalez for sending me the book, If you'd like to buy the MCP a book, you can head to our Amazon Wishlist at bit.ly slash Morbid Wishlist.
That's B-I-T dot L-Y slash Morbid Wishlist. We'd be eternally grateful for your help. This episode contains discussions of capital punishment, brutal methods of execution, murder, and desecration of human corpses. If these topics are triggers for you, this may be a good episode to skip.
Humans are fascinated by gore and violence, but even more so, the mysterious and unsolved. Interest in these disturbing and unpleasant subjects is called morbid curiosity and it has gripped millions of people throughout the ages. I am one of those people. My name is Hallie, and this is the Morbid Curiosity Podcast.
Capital Punishment. The Death Penalty. The Bloody Code. These are all official names for the practice of executing criminals, killing them as punishment for actions that were judged criminal by the authorities.
The first documented death penalty laws date back to the 18th century BCE in Babylon. The Code of King Hammurabi codified the death penalty as the punishment for 25 different crimes. The death penalty was codified by the Hittites in the 14th century BCE, by the Athenians as part of the draconian code in the 7th century BCE, and by the Romans in their laws of the 12th tables from the 5th century BCE. Death sentences were carried out in a variety of ways, including crucifixion, drowning, beating to death, burning alive, and impalement.
In the 10th century CE, execution by hanging became the official punishment for several crimes in England. In the following century, William the Conqueror banned criminal execution except in times of war. That ban didn't last. In the 16th century, under the reign of King Henry VIII, around 72,000 people were executed for a variety of crimes from theft to treason.
Methods of execution ranged from hanging to boiling, burning at the stake, and beheading. Certain methods employed multiple steps, such as being hung, drawn, and quartered, being gibbited and being impaled. I'll explain what these mean after the break. The number of capital crimes in England, that is crimes punishable by death, rose over the next two centuries.
In the Elizabethan era, which went from 1558 to 1603, the death penalty applied for treason, murder, manslaughter, infanticide, rape, arson, highway robbery, buggery, sodomy, and heresy. Hanging was the official method used for all but treason, which was punished by drawing, hanging, and quartering for men, burning for women, and beheading for nobility, and heresy, which was considered especially heinous and exclusively punished by burning. While only about 24% of those accused of such offenses were actually executed, 75% of all hangings were for theft. By the 1700s, 222 crimes were punishable by death in England, including stealing, cutting down trees, and robbing a rabbit warren.
In 1808, pickpocketing and lesser offenses were removed from the death penalty list. This began a reform process that continued over the next 50 years. The death penalty was mandatory until 1823, when the Judgment of Death Act gave judges the official power to commute the death penalty, meaning they could substitute a lesser punishment in place of the death penalty. However, treason and murder were still capital offenses.
In 1832, the Punishment of Death, etc. Act reduced the number of capital crimes by two-thirds, finally removing theft from the list. The Murder, Abolition of Death Penalty Act of 1965, suspended the death penalty for murder in England for five years. The Act was made permanent in December of 1969.
Before 1868, executions in England were held in designated public spaces. The purpose was to make a public example of the criminal, to deter others from committing similar crimes. However, public executions had the opposite effect and became a source of entertainment. They became spectacles that attracted massive crowds.
Thousands turned up to watch, especially for the execution of infamous or high-profile criminals. Sensing money to be made, food vendors, street traders, pulp writers and pickpockets attended to work the crowds. Seeding was even constructed and sold to the wealthy. There were fights over the blood, hands and corpse of the condemned between family members, folk physicians and anatomists.
It became a carnival-esque occasion. The statement the authorities wanted to broadcast was re-appropriated and inverted by an irreverent crowd. Corporal punishment, that is, physical punishment and capital punishment, which is the death penalty, was deeply ingrained in the English popular consciousness. There were several places which were synonymous with execution.
One was the Tower of London, famous for the executions of traders, nobles and royalty. Another was famous due to its long history as a place of death, and for the large number of criminals that could be executed at once. That place was Tibern, and its infamous execution apparatus was known as the Tibern Tree. The Tibern Tree, also called the Tibern Gallows, or the King's Gallows, was triangular-shaped and could accommodate 24 hangings at once, eight people on each wooden beam of the triangle.
This triangle was elevated on three wooden poles, and was a permanent structure that was erected in 1571. It was the principal place and method of execution for criminals of the city of London and the county of Middlesex until 1759. Before it was a famous site of execution, Tibern was a manorist state just outside London, taking its name from the Tibern Brook, which ran nearby. Two Roman roads bordered the estate, one to the west where modern edge-wear road runs, and the other to the south along modern Oxford Street.
Marble Arch now sits at this junction. The junction of the Roman roads was significant long before Tibern Manor occupied the spot. It had been marked by a monument known as Oswald's Stone, a single standing stone with an unknown purpose, possibly a boundary or council meeting space marker. Unfortunately, the monolith was covered over in 1851 when the Marble Arch was moved from Buckingham Palace to the junction.
The stone was excavated not long after and propped up against the arch, but it was stolen in 1869 and is still missing. The first documented mention of Tibern Manor comes from the Doomsday Book, the first great survey of the land holdings of England, which was completed in 1086 at the behest of King William the Conqueror. Tibern consisted of eight households and estimated 40 people. In 1236, the city of London, which was expanding rapidly, drew up a contract with the owner of Tibern Manor to draw and pipe water from Tibern Springs into the city.
It was the first piped water for London and the pump to access it was in cheap side. At the junction of these two Roman roads is where the Tibern gallows were constructed in 1571. However, executions were staged in the area before the Tibern Tree was built. The first recorded execution at Tibern occurred in 1196 when the leader of a populist revolt was cornered in the nearby church of St.
Mary the Bow. He was stripped naked, dragged behind a horse to the crossroads and hanged. This location was favorable because it was outside the city and hangings there were thought to be the least disruptive to daily life in the city. In 1537, King Henry VIII used Tibern to execute the ringleaders of the pilgrimage of Grace, a revolt against King Henry's break from the Catholic Church.
26 men were hanged, many of them monks from Hexen Priory. Henry would go on to execute around 72,000 people in an effort to display the power of the monarchy after years of fighting for the crown in the war of the roses. The Tibern Tree had many nicknames such as the Tree or Triple Tree, Three-Legged Mayor or Three-Legged Stool. The Elms, because the Elm was considered by the Normans to be the Tree of Justice, so many official sites of gallows were often called the Elms, God's Tribunal and the Deadly Nevergreen Tree.
The first execution to utilize the Tree was that of John's story, a Roman Catholic who was tried and convicted of treason in 1571. After this, there were over 100 hangings a year from the Tree. The Tibern Tree permanently stood for 188 years, with parts being replaced as they fell into disrepair. In October of 1759, due to vandalism between hangings, the original structure was dismantled and replaced with a moving version of the gallows, one that could be stored between hangings.
The last execution at the Tibern Gallows was in November of 1783, when highwayman John Austin was hanged. Between the first and the last executions, it's estimated that around 50,000 people were killed at Tibern, most by hanging on the Tibern Tree. After the last execution at Tibern, for the next 85 years, hangings occurred outside Newgate Prison. Due to public disorder during the executions, in 1868 it was decided that executions should occur within the prison walls, removing it from public view for the first time.
Newgate Prison was demolished in 1777, and the courts moved into the site. One of the prison's brick walls is all that's left standing. I'd like to go into detail on executions at Tibern, including the order of ceremonies, the methods used, some famous executions, and a few famous executioners, but first an ad must play. If these ads annoy you, you can become a patron or Kofi member at the lowest tier, $2 a month.
You can find our Patreon page at bit.ly slash morbidpatron, that's b-i-t dot l-y slash morbidpatron, and our Kofi page at kofi.com slash m-c-p. And now back to the podcast. Because Newgate Prison, the main prison for London, was in the city, prisoners had to be transported 3 miles or 5 kilometers to Tibern for their executions. A sort of ceremony and ritual developed around this journey, both for the prisoner and for the crowds that would witness their execution.
Executions usually occurred once a month on a Monday. The ritual began the Sunday before execution, when a sermon was preached at Newgate Prison. Members of the public could pay to attend this service with the condemned. Then, around midnight on the night before the execution, verses and prayers were called out under the window of the condemned by a sexton, or low-level minister, of St.
Sepulcher's Church. On the morning of the execution, the condemned heard prayers and was encouraged to confess their sins and receive the holy sacrament, also known as communion. The condemned was then transported from Newgate to Tibern in an open, horse-drawn cart, or sometimes dragged on a sledge behind a horse. Crowds gathered to witness the journey, and sometimes followed behind to attend the execution.
They jeered through food, blue kisses, and sometimes attempted rescues. These were usually thwarted by armed guards that escorted the cart. The streets were often so crowded with onlookers that it could take hours for the cart to reach Tibern. In these cases, the condemned would likely have to go on foot as the cart couldn't move for the crowds of people surrounding it.
The cart usually stopped about halfway through the journey at the Church of St. Giles in the field, or a local pub, where the condemned was allowed to drink a jug of ale or other strong alcohol. The pub was usually the angel in, which was sometimes referred to as the bowl, due to the ale being served in a broad wooden bowl. The pub was remodeled in 1893 and still stands today.
Upon arrival at Tibern, the condemned was greeted by an awaiting crowd, filling the square around the Tibern tree. Wealthy people paid to sit on stands called Mother Proctor's Pews, which were close enough that they could hear the final speeches and last breaths of the condemned. Everyone else stood around the structure. The condemned was expected to say a few words before their death, either to admit guilt or beg forgiveness.
A noose was then placed around their neck, and the cart was pulled away. This method of hanging was not quick, and often the condemned would struggle, swing, and kick for up to 45 minutes before strangling to death. Many times, loved ones would rush forward to pull down on the legs of the condemned, so they would die more quickly. When the body was still and the bowels had emptied, the condemned was considered dead.
Then the fight for the body would ensue. Anatomists would try to claim it for dissections, as bodies for science were in short supply. Families would try to protect their loved ones so they could be given a proper burial. Epileptics and people with other illnesses would rush in and try to touch the body, collect some blood or cut off a hand for luck.
Most of the time, the body was carted back to Newgate to be buried in the prison graveyard. Because of how out of hand the procession and hangings became at Tibern, executions were moved to just outside Newgate prison. Newgate prison stood at the corner of Newgate Street and Old Bailey Street, just inside the city of London. The prison functioned from 1188 to 1904 and was attached to the criminal court of the Old Bailey.
The modern Old Bailey, now called the Central Criminal Court, occupies the site. This execution procession wasn't unique to Tibern and occurred in many other execution sites in England. The speeches given beforehand were expected at most executions, and the condemned was often coached by a member of the clergy on what to say. Before their deaths, they were pushed to repent and reconcile themselves to their fate.
Many speeches contained phrases such as, even though I am the greatest of sinners, Christ's mercy is far above, his blood sufficient to wash away the blood from my own soul. They were coached to make sure their speeches reminded the spectators that death was the consequence of wrongdoing. But the crowd was more interested in the listing of wrongdoings, the life story of the condemned. The crowd wanted all the details from Sabbath-breaking to whoring, robbery and murder.
A penitent end was also expected. Going to their deaths with acceptance, reconciled to their fate was considered honorable. Hearing the condemned beseech the crowd not to do as they did didn't really influence the crowd, but the confession was expected and enjoyed. A last-minute reprieve was often very exciting for the crowd as well as the condemned.
Clergy members were often aggressive in seeking confessions before the execution, refusing communion unless the condemned confessed and gave details of the crime. These details were often later published by the clergy member, either as a pamphlet or in the broadsheets. The clergy also tried hard to help the person find reconciliation in their fate. At the time, it was strongly believed that salvation was only granted through understanding of your crimes and repentance.
Those who didn't repent were seen as despicable. The cases in which the condemned refused to confess on the gallows weren't as well reported. Neither were the cases where the condemned maintained their innocence. This aspect of the execution ritual is known as the theatre of confession.
They were dramatic performances carefully managed by the authorities to show people that crime did not pay. It was a reinforcement of the values of the ruling society, the legitimacy of the powers which condemned them to death. For both the lowly and the once rich and powerful, this procedure of confession and speech was the same. Because of the lack of orderkeeping forces at the time, ideological control was the best way to keep civil order.
The internalization of obedience according to the church kept the people in fear of breaking the law. There wasn't much distinction between disobedience to the crown and to divine authority between crime and sin because the monarch was also the head of the church. This is why the authorities were happy to allow huge crowds to witness executions and happy to let descriptions of the final speeches to be spread further in print. But were the executions effective at preventing crime?
Not so much. People knew the consequences and carried on anyway. There are several late 17th century pamphlets that found it disgraceful that despite seeing the deaths, people were just as likely to commit the same crimes. While hanging was the primary method of execution at Tibern, many others were employed either in concert with hanging or instead of hanging.
Those methods that were used together with hanging included jibbering and drawing and quartering of the condemned. Jibbering, also called hanging in chains, is when the corpse of the condemned was suspended in a cage as a warning to others. It was most often used for traitors, robbers, murderers, high women and pirates. Because it was intended to discourage others from committing similar offenses, jibberts were often placed along public highways, frequently at crossroads and waterways.
Occasionally it was also used as a method of public execution with the condemned being left to die of exposure, thirst and starvation. Jibbering was abolished in 1832. The phrase hung, drawn and quartered still has an air of brutality around it, despite many of us not knowing what it means. Commoners found guilty of treason, were hanged until they were half dead, then cut down whilst still alive.
They were then disemboweled, their internal organs pulled out. They would likely die quickly after this due to blood loss and shock. They were then beheaded and their body would be chopped into four parts, hence the term quartered. The parts were either burned or displayed in a prominent position to warn others against treason.
Other methods of execution included burning at the stake, which was the punishment for heresy and witchcraft. A vendor's would be tied to a stake and a fire would be set around them. Often a gunpowder would be put between the condemned person's legs to speed up the death. Catherine Murphy, a counterfeiter, was the last woman in England to be officially burned at the stake on 18 March 1789.
She was actually strangled first, as death by burning had become distasteful. This form of execution was banned later that year. Another method was beheading. This method of execution was reserved for treasonous royals and nobles.
Royalty were usually beheaded at the Tower of London, not at Tyburn. Mary Queen of Scots was executed in this way in 1587. Notable figures that were executed at Tyburn included criminals, political rebels and religious martyrs. William Wallace, the Scottish Knight and leader of the Wars of Scottish Independence, made famous in the US by the 1990 film Braveheart, was executed for high treason against King Edward I, either at Tyburn or Smithfield Gallows.
They were both nicknamed the Elms, so it's sometimes hard to distinguish them in documentation. Wallace was stripped naked and dragged through the city, then he was hanged, drawn and quartered. Wallace's head was placed on a spike atop London Bridge. Elizabeth Barton, the holy maid of Kent, was hanged for treason on 20 April 1534.
As a nun prone to visions, Barton prophesied that King Henry VIII would die within six months if he annulled his marriage to Catherine of Aragon and married Anne Boleyn. After the hanging, her head was put on a spike on London Bridge. She is the only woman in the history of English execution to receive that dishonor. Oliver Cromwell was Lord Protector of the British Isles until his death in 1658.
He was entombed in Westminster Abbey. His son Richard was unable to main power and was replaced by Charles II. Charles had Cromwell's body exhumed and hanged at Tyburn. Cromwell's head was placed on a pike outside the Tower of London, where it remained for 30 years.
Highwomen Jack Shepherd, also known as Gentlemen Jack, was a notorious thief and four-time prison escapee. His journey from New Gate to Tyburn was attended by some 200,000 people, and his official autobiography was sold at his hanging. He was so likely built that he strangled at the end of the rope for 15 minutes before the crowd rushed forward to pull him down. It's not known if his death was due to his hanging or trampling from the crowd.
Around 105 Catholic clergymen hung at Tyburn have been officially recognized as martyrs for the Catholic faith. English law made it an act of treason to deny King Henry VIII's royal supremacy over the church, and those who denied him were executed. Religious persecution was not reserved for Catholics, however, at other times Protestant believers faced similar fates. While many of the executed are well known, there are also some famous executioners who practiced at Tyburn.
One of the most famous was Jack Ketch, not because he was good, but because he was so bad at it. He was so infamous for his brutal and botched executions that many writers put pen to paper to describe the terrible suffering of those he executed. He first appears in historical records in 1663 when he was appointed as common hangman in London. He was either incredibly sadistic or lacked the skill required to kill quickly, therefore his victims suffered horrifically.
Before Ketch, Richard Brandon was the infamous common executioner of London from 1639 to 1649. He inherited the role from his father, Gregory Brandon, and was sometimes known as Young Gregory. Both Gregory and Young Gregory were so infamous that the Gregory tree became a euphemism for the gallows. Unlike Ketch, Young Gregory was an expert.
He took pride in the use of his axe and the quick drop and sudden stop of a hanging. Three pamphlets from 1649 published shortly after his death claimed he had been the executioner of Charles I, though their authenticity is disputable. Most historians agree that the rowdy ritual that accompanied public executions at Tyburn were the reason executions were moved to just outside Newgate prison and then to within the prison's walls. But according to Simon Devereux, the mindset of the English people also changed.
Hundreds of years of public executions had not stemmed the tides of crime. London was expanding rapidly, growing around Tyburn, and the presence of the Tyburn tree was interfering with the lives of residents and businesses. When executions were moved to Newgate prison at the heart of London, there were immediate complaints about the crowds and the traffic caused on hanging day. However, authorities still wanted the public and the prisoners to witness executions, and so they continued, but they did occur less often.
It's possible this was an attempt to make executions more dramatic and more of a deterrent against crime. When they were finally moved inside the prison, it was probably to heighten fear of the practice to make both the prisoners and the public imagine the worst, internalize that fear, and think twice before committing a crime. The last executions in the United Kingdom took place in 1964. Capital punishment for murder was abolished in 1969.
Beheading was abolished as a method of execution for treason in 1973. Hanging, however, remained available as a punishment until the 30th of September, 1998, when the death penalty was completely abolished. A working gallows was maintained at Her Majesty's Prison Wandsworth until 1994. It was tested every six months until 1992.
It's now housed in the National Justice Museum in Nottingham. Public execution is an example of how brutal the past was, but it's also more complex than that. It was part of the law, a show of authority, a monthly entertainment, and a cultural event. There was a ceremony and ritual to it.
Specific reactions from the crowd were sought by the condemned, the clergy, and even the executioners. It seems gruesome to us because it was, but it also made sense to the English people at the time. It was a physical enactment of their belief system. If you sin, you will be punished.
The whole judgment was performed in front of them during the execution ritual. The life of the condemned was examined, analyzed, and scoured for reasons why they turned to crime. The crowd and authorities wanted to see that the condemned knew they had sinned and were getting what they knew they deserved. If they confessed and accepted their fate, they were seen as stoic and brave in the face of death, rather than cowardly and dishonorable.
Another aspect was the fact that death was all around them in so many other ways, but a scheduled death with some serenity. Morbid curiosity podcast is put to be attention. If you'd like to get in touch or suggest a more talk and you can do so on Facebook and Instagram at Morbid curiosity podcast, or on our website, Francis Lee Wandsworth.org.com. If you like history, please share it with your friends and give us a rating for what are all of our public executions.
And this helped the crowd to see them listen and expand this wide-class community. And why was that? Why was it so popular? According to Malcolm Rivera, in his paper condemned, the tragedy, comedy, and ritual of the early modern execution theater, public executions were the true crime documentaries of the time.
But they were also an embodiment of English cultural beliefs of the time. Making a point in the reality that is growing strong, the crowd and the kids joined a straight-up stream podcast in, which hosted a true crime, and that punishment could be more and other than any acceptance, suffering, and suffering. The MCP is also part of the Belvry Podcast Network, a haven for golf culture featuring podcasts, blogs, and videos, all catering to the darker side of life. If you'd like to support the MCP but would rather not become a patron, you can give one-time donations on our website and our Ko-fi page.
Also on our website are links to all our social media, a full list of episodes, links to our merch and our mailing list. We also have an Amazon Wishlist at Bitly slash Morbid Wishlist, that's B-I-T dot L-Y slash Morbid Wishlist. Any purchases from this list are greatly appreciated. We are eternally grateful for your support.
My name is Halley, and until next time, thanks for listening. Hippopopins, Rose A, Jacob M, Jessica B, Madison G, Miranda S, and Alice P all have my eternal gratitude for becoming patrons. Thank you so much, and thank you to all the free members who have joined. It's nice to see you on Patreon.