OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.
WORKS BY WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S.

Mr. William Andrews has produced several books of singular value
in their historical and archazological character. He has a genius for
digging among dusty parchments and old books, and for bringing
out from among them that which it is likely the public of to-day will
care to read.—Scotsman.

Curiosities of the Church.

A volume both entertaining and instructive, throwing much light
on the manners and customs of bygone generations of Churchmen,
and will be read to-day with much interest.—Newéery House
Magazine.

An extremely interesting volume.-—Nor#k British Daily Mail.

A work of lasting interest.——H ull Examiner.

Full of interest.— 7%e Globe.

The reader will find much in this book to interest, instruct, and
amuse.— Home Chimes.

We feel sure that many will feel grateful to Mr. Andrews for
having produced such an interesting book.— Ze Antiguary.

Historic Yorkshire.

Cuthbert Bede, the popular author of ‘‘ Verdant Green,” writing
to Society, says: ‘Historic Yorkshire,” by William Andrews, will
be of great interest and value to everyone connected with England’s
largest county. Mr. Andrews not only writes with due enthusiasm
for his subject, but has arranged and marshalled his facts and
figures with great skill, and produced a thoroughly popular work
that will be read eagerly and with advantage.

Historic Romance.

STRANGE STORIES, CHARACTERS, SCENES, MYSTERIES, AND
MEMORABLE EVENTS IN THE HisTory oF OLD ENGLAND.

In his present work Mr. Andrews has traversed a wider field than
in his last book, “Historic Yorkshire,” but it is marked by the
same painstaking care for accuracy, and also by the pleasant way in
which he popularises strange stories and out-of-the-way scenes in
English History. There is much to amuse in this volume, as well
as to instruct, and it is enriched with a copious index.—Nofes and
Queries.

A fascinating work.— Whitehall Review.

Famous Frosts and Frost Fairs
in Great Britain.
CHRONICLED FROM THE EARLIEST TO THE PRESENT TIME.

The work is thoroughly well written, it is careful in its facts, and
may be pronounced exhaustive on the subject. Illustrations are
given of sveral frost fairs on the Thames, and as a trustworthy
record this volume should be in every good library. The usefulness
of the work is much enhanced by a good index.—Public Opinion.

A great deal of curious and valuable information is contained in
these pages. . A comely volume.—LZiterary World.

Not likely to fail in interest.— Manchester Guardian.
 
_ Speamen of a Bank Note __ not to be imitated.
Submitizd tv the Consideration of the Bank Directors and the inspection

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OLp-Time

PUNISHMENTS:

BY

WILLIAM JANDREWS, F.RH.S,

AUTHOR OF

‘ CURIOSITIES OF THE CHURCH,”
‘“ HISTORIC ROMANCE,”
‘ FAMOUS FROSTS AND FROST FAIRS,”
‘“ HISTORIC YORKSHIRE,”
ETC.

HULL:
WILLIAM ANDREWS & CO.

LoNDON :
SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HamirLToN, KENT & Co.,
LIMITED.

1890.
 
ITY 2971 <
rss

To

Atperwax JOHN LOVE SEATON, J.P.
THE PARK, HULL,

This Volume

IS

RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED.

W. A

MI07392
 
Contents.

"Tug DuckING-SToOL
THE BRANK, OR ScoLp’s BRIDLE
TE PIrLLory
PuNisHING AUTHORS AND BURNING Books
FINGER-PILLORY...
THE Jovucs
THE STOCKS
TE DRUNKARD’S CLOAK
WHIPPING
PuBLIC PENANCE
REPENTANCE-STOOL
RipiNxeg THE STANG
(GIBBET-LORE :
DrowNING
BurNING TO DEATH
Bouin To DEATH
BEHEADING
HANGING, DRAWING, AND QUARTERING
Pressing To DEATH
HANGING ..
HaxciNG IN CHAINS
Tur HavLirax GIBBET ...
Tue ScorrisH MAIDEN

INnpEx
 
Preface.

N the year 1881, I produced a small work,
entitled, “ Punishments in the Olden Time,”
and, to my surprise, in less than three months
four thousand copies were sold. After that
number had been published, and numerous flat-
tering notices given by the critical press, I
resolved to write a larger book on the same
subject. The result of my labours is presented
in the following pages. I hope this volume
contains interesting information which does not
usually come under the notice of the reader,
but nevertheless important in throwing light on
the history of bygone times.

In the preparation of this book, I have
consulted several hundred works, and drawn
facts from ancient records which still remain in
manuscript; and the daily and weekly news-
papers have also supplied me with items I have

deemed worthy of quotation. It will be found
x PREFACE.

that where I have obtained information due
acknowledgment is given.

My gratitude is due to the following, who
have cheerfully and freely given me valuable
assistance: Mrs. G. Linnzus Banks; Mr.W. E. A.
Axon; Dr. T. N. Brushfield; Mr. Alfred Burton;
Mr. E H Coleman: the Rev. J. Charles
Cox, L1.D.; Mr. Walter Hamilton; Mr. Jno.
Nicholson; Mr. T. Tindall Wildridge ; the late
Llewellynn Jewitt, F.S.A.; and the late Rev.
Charles Rogers, LL.D.

In conclusion, I have only to repeat some words
I have previously used, namely: that if this volume
meets with a similar welcome from the press and
the public to that which has been awarded to my
former works, I shall have every reason to feel

thankful.
WILLIAM ANDREWS.

Hunn Literary CLus,
December 1st, 1890.
OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS,

 

The Ducking=Stool.
COLDING women in the olden times were

treated as offenders against the public peace,
and for their transgressions were subjected to seve-
ral cruel modes of punishment. The Corporations
of towns during the Middle Ages made their own
regulations for punishing persons guilty of crimes
which were not rendered penal by the laws of the
land. The punishments for correcting scolds
differed greatly in various parts of the country.
It is clear, from a careful study of the history
of medieval times, that virtue and amiability
amongst the middle and lower classes, generally
speaking, did not prevail. The free use of the
tongue gave rise to riots and feuds to such an
extent that it is difficult for us to realise at the
present day. A strong feeling against scolding

women came down to a late period. Readers of
B
LL

2 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Boswell’s delightful “Life of Johnson” will re-
member how the burly, but dear old Doctor, in
reply to a remark made by a celebrated Quaker
lady, Mrs. Knowles, observed: ¢ Madam, we

have different modes of restraining evil—stocks

for men, a ducking-stool for women, and a pound

for beasts.”

The cucking-stool in the early history of
England must not be confounded with the duck-
ing-stool. They were two distinct machines. It
appears, from a record in the “ Domesday Book,”
that as far back as the days of Edward the
Confessor, any man or woman detected giving
false measure in the city of Chester was fined
four shillings; and for brewing bad ale, was
placed in the cathedra stercoris. It was a
degrading mode of chastisement, the culprits
being seated in the chair at their own doors or
in some public place. At Leicester, in 1467, the
local authorities directed “scolds to be punished
by the Mayor on a cuck-stool before their own
doors, and then carried to the four gates of the
town.” According to Borlase’s “Natural His-

tory of Cornwall,” in that part of the country

- the cucking-stool was used “as a seat of infamy,

where strumpets and scolds, with bare feet and
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 3

head, were condemned to abide the derision of
those that passed by, for such as the bailiffs of
the manors, which had the privilege of such
jurisdiction, did approve.” Ale-wives in Scot-
land in bygone times who sold bad ale were
placed in the cucking-stool. In the year 1555, we
learn from Thomas Wright that “it was enacted
by the queen-regent of Scotland that itinerant
singing women should be put on the cuck-stoles
of every burgh or town; and the first ‘ Homily
against Contention, part 3, published in 1562,
sets forth that “in all well-ordered cities common
brawlers and scolders be punished with a notable
kind of paine, as to be set on the cucking-stole,
pillory, or such like’ By the statute of 3
Henry VIIL, carders and spinners of wool who
were convicted of fraudulent practices were to
be sett upon the pillorie or the cukkyng-stole,
man or woman, as the case shall require.” We
agree with Mr. Wright when he observes that
the preceding passages are worded in such a
manner as not to lead us to suppose that the
offenders were ducked. In the course of time the
terms cucking and ducking stools became syn-
onymous, and implied the machines for the duck-
ing of scolds in water.
4 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

An intelligent Frenchman, named Misson,
visited England about 1700, and has left on
record one of the best descriptions of a ducking-
stool that has been written. It occurs in a work
entitled “Travels in England.” “The way of
punishing scolding women,” he writes, “is pleas-
ant enough. They fasten an arm chair to the
end of two beams, twelve or fifteen feet long, and
parallel to each other, so that these two pieces of
wood, with their two ends, embrace the chair,
which hangs between them upon a sort of axle,
by which means it plays freely, and always re-
mains in the natural horizontal position in which
the chair should be, that a person may sit con-
veniently in it, whether you raise it or let it down.
They set up a post on the bank of a pond or
river, and over this post they lay, almost in equi-
librio, the two pieces of wood, at one end of which
the chair hangs just over the water. They place
the woman in this chair, and so plunge her into
the water, as often as the sentence directs, in
order to cool her immoderate heat.” In some
instances the ducking was carried to such an
extent as to cause death. An old chap-book,
without date, is entitled, « Strange and Wonder-
ful Relation of the Old Woman who was Drowned
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 5

at Ratcliff Highway a fortnight ago.” It appears
from this work that the poor woman was dipped
too often, for at the conclusion of the operation
she was found to be dead. We reproduce from
this quaint chap-book a picture of the ducking-
stool. It will be observed that it is not a

stationary machine, but one which can be wheeled

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DUCKING-STOOL, FROM A CHAP-BOOK.
to and from the water. Similar ducking-stools
were usually kept in some convenient building,
and ready to be brought out for immediate use,
but in many places the ducking-stools were per-

manent fixtures.
Many of the older poets and dramatists refer

to this ancient mode of punishment. Tord
Dorset thus alludes to it :

“She in the ducking-stool should take her seat,
Dressed like herself in a great chair of state.”
6 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Say Beaumont and Fletcher in the Tamer

Tamed :”

“We'll ship them out in cuck-stoles ;
There they’ll sail
As brave as Columbus did.”

In the year 1665 was issued “ Homer a la Mode,”
and respecting a woman says the author :

“She belonged to Billingsgate,
And often times had rid in state,
And sate i’ the bottome of a poole,
Inthroned in a cucking-stool.”

Butler in his “ Hudibras ” has an allusion to this

subject. He says:

“These mounted on a chair curule,
Which moderns call a cucking-stoole,
March proudly to the river side,
And o'er the waves in triumph ride.
Like Dukes of Venice who are said
The Adriatic Sea to wed,
And have a gentler wife than those
For whom the State decrees these shows.”

Nash, in his notes to “ Hudibras,” adverts to
having seen “a stool of this kind near the bridge
at Evesham, in Worcestershire, not above eight
miles from Strensham, the place of the poets
birth.” The erudite historian of Leominster, the
Rev. George Fyler Townsend, M.A., says that

in Butler's lines it is evident that he referred to a
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 7

moveable machine, and as the poet lived in the
Castle of Ludlow, within a few miles of Loe-
minster, it is very probable that he had the
ducking-stool of the town in his memory when he
wrote his poem. Vincent Bourne died in 1747,
and a few years previously published a volume of
verse in Latin and English, and in one of his

poems writes as follows :

“ Near many a stream was wont to meet us
A stool, to broils a sure quietus.
It curb’d the tongue, the passions rein’d,
And reason’s empire firm maintained.
Astride it set but a Xanthippe,
Then twice or thrice virago dip ye ;
And not a lambkin on the lea
Will leave the stream more meek than she.
A Lethe o’er her memory shed,
The very shades of anger fled.
Cool grows the fever of the breast,
And surging passions seek to rest.
The lesson ex cathedra taught
Here balance in the scale of thought ;
Then say if e’er Socratic school
Such lesson taught as ducking-stool.”

Vincent Bourne, the author of the foregoing
spirited lines, was one of the under-masters at
Westminster School. It will be noticed that he
spoke of the custom as a thing of the past, but it
remained a public institution for many years after

the poet had passed away. Gay, another poet of
8 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

the eighteenth century, in his pastoral of “The
Duress” makes his heroine say :
“T’ll speed me to the pool where the high stool,
On the long plank, hangs o’er the muddy pool :

That stool, the dread of every scolding quean—
Yet sure a lover should not die so mean.”

Old municipal accounts and records contain many
references to this subject. Cole, a Cambridge
antiquary, collected numerous curious items con-
nected with this theme. In some extracts made
from the proceedings of the Vice-Chancellor’s
Court, in the reign of Elizabeth, it is stated :
“Jane Johnson, adjudged to the ducking-stool
for scolding, and commuted her penance.” The
next person does not appear to have been so for-
tunate as Jane Johnson, who avoided punishment
by paying a fine of about five shillings. Tt is
recorded : “ Katherine Saunders, accused by the
churchwardens of Saint Andrews for a common
scold and slanderer of her neighbours, was
adjudged to the ducking-stool.”

We find in one of Cole’s manuscript volumes,
preserved in the British Museum, a graphic
sketch of this ancient mode of punishment. He
says: “In my time, when I was a boy, I lived
with my grandmother in the great corner house
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 9

at the foot, neath the Magdalen College, Cam-
bridge, and rebuilt since by my uncle, Joseph
Cook. I remember to have seen a woman
ducked for scolding. The chair was hung by a
pulley fastened to a beam about the middle of the
bridge, in which [he means the chair, of course,
not the bridge] the woman was confined, and let
down three times, and then taken out. The
bridge was then of timber, before the present
stone bridge of one arch was built. The ducking-
stool was constantly hanging in its place, and on
the back of it were engraved devils laying hold of
scolds, ete. Some time afterwards a new chair
was erected in the place of the old one, having
the same devices carved upon it, and well painted
and ornamented. When the new bridge of stone
was erected, in 1754, this chair was taken away,
and I lately saw the carved and gilt back of it
nailed up by the shop of one Mr. Jackson, a
whitesmith, in the Butcher's Row, behind the
Town Hall, who offered it to me, but I did not
know what to do with it. In October, 1776, I
saw in the old Town Hall a third ducking-stool,
of plain oak, with an iron bar in front of i, to
confine the person in the seat, but I made no
inquiries about it. I mention these things as the
10 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

practice of ducking scolds in the river seems now
to be totally laid aside.” Mr. Cole died in 1782,
so did not long survive the writing of the fore-
going curious notes.

The Sandwich ducking-stool was embellished
with men and women scolding. On the cross-bar

were carved the following words :

“Of members ye tonge is worst or best,—an
YII tonge oft doeth breede unrest.”

Boys, in his “Collections for the History of

Sandwich,” a in 1792, remarks that the
ducking - stool was

 
 

5 preserved in the

bi
Sn 8 MEM
my >
=f second storey of the

  

Town Hall, along
with other arms,
offensive and defen-
sive, of the Trained
Bands. Boys’s book
includes some im-
portant information
on old-time punish-

SANDWICH DUCKING-STOOL. ments. In the year
1534, 1t is recorded that two women were
banished from Sandwich for immorality. To
deter them from coming back to the town it was
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 11

decided that “if they return, one of them is to
suffer the pain of sitting over the coqueen-stool,
and the other is to be set three days in the
stocks, with an allowance of only bread and water,
and afterwards to be placed in the coqueen-stool
and dipped to the chin.” A woman, in the year
1568, was “carted and banished.” At Sandwich,
Ipswich, and some other places, as a punishment
for scolding and other offences it was not an
uncommon thing to compel the transgressors to
carry a wooden mortar round the town.
Respecting the cost of erecting a ducking-stool,
we find a curious and detailed account in the
parish books of Southam, Warwickshire, for the
year of grace 1718. In the first place, a man was
sent from Southam to Daventry to make a draw-
ing of the ducking-stool of that town, at a cost of
three shillings and twopence. In the next place,
the sum of one pound one shilling and eightpence
is charged for labour and material in making and
fixing the engine of punishment. An entry of
ten shillings is made for painting it, which ap-
pears a rather heavy amount when we observe
that the carpenter only charged a little over a
pound for labour and timber. Perhaps, like
the good folks of Sandwich, the authorities of
12 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Southam had their chair ornamented with artistic
portraits and enriched with poetic quotations.
The blacksmith had to furnish ironwork, ete., at
a cost of four shillings and sixpence. For carry-
ing the stool to its proper place half-a-crown was
paid. Lastly, nine shillings and sixpence had to
be expended to make the pond deeper, so that
the ducking-stool might work in a satisfactory
manner. The total amount reaches £2 11s. 4d.
At Coventry, in the same county, we find traces
of two ducking-stools, and respecting them Mr.
W. G. Fretton, F.S.A., supplies us with some
curious details. The following notes are drawn
from the Leet Book, under date of October 11th,
1597 : “ Whereas there are divers and sundrie
disordered persons (women) within this citie that
be scolds, brawlers, disturbers, and disquieters
of theire neighbors, to the great offence of
Almightie God and the breach of Her Majestie’s
peace : for the reformation of such abuses, it is
ordered and enacted at this leet, that if any dis-
ordered and disquiet persons of this citie do from
henceforth scold or brawle with their neighbo’rs
or others, upon complaint thereof to the Alder-
man of the ward made, or to the Maior for the
time being, they shall be committed to the cooke
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 13

stoole lately appointed for the punishment of
such offenders, and thereupon be punished for
their deserts, except they, or everie of them, do
presentlie paie iijs iijd for their redemption
from that punishment to the use of the poore of
this citie.”

The old accounts of the City of Coventry con-
tain numerous items bearing on the ducking-
stool.

In a volume of “Miscellaneous Poems,” by
Benjamin West, of Weedon Beck, Northampton-
shire, published in 1780, we find some lines
entitled, “The Ducking-Stool,” as follows :

“There stands, my friend, in yonder pool,
An engine called the ducking-stool,
By legal pow’r commanded down,
The joy and terror of the town,
If jarring females kindle strife,
Give language foul or lug the coif ;
If noisy dames should once begin
To drive the house with horrid din,
Away, you cry, youll grace the stool,
We'll teach you how your tongue to rule.
The fair offender fills the seat,
In sullen pomp, profoundly great,
Down in the deep the stool descends,
But here, at first, we miss our ends ;
She mounts again, and rages more
Than ever vixen did before.
So, throwing water on the fire
Will make it but burn up the higher ;
14 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

If so, my friend, pray let her take
A second turn into the lake,

And, rather than your patience lose,
Thrice and again repeat the dose.
No brawling wives, no furious wenches
No fire so hot, but water quenches.
In Prior’s skilful lines we see

For these another recipe :

A certain lady, we are told

(A lady, too, and yet a scold),

Was very much reliev’d, you'll say
By water, yet a different way ;

A mouthful of the same she'd take,
Sure not to scold, if not to speak.”

>

A footnote to the poem states: “To the honour
of the fair sex in the neighbourhood of R——y,
this machine has been taken down (as useless)
several years.” Most probably, says Mr. Jewitt,
the foregoing refers to Rugby. In the old
accounts of that town several items occur, as for

example :

1721. June 5. Paid for a lock for ye ducking-

stool, and spent in towne business ... 1s. 2d.
1739. Sept. 25. Ducking-stool repaired. Aud
Dec. 21, 1741. A chain for ducking-stool . 2s. 4d.

Mr. Pretty, F.S.A., in a note to Mr. Llewellynn
Jewitt, which is inserted in The Reliquary for
January, 1861, states that the Rugby ducking-
stool “was placed on the west side of the horse-
pool, near the footpath leading from the Clifton
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 15

Road towards the new churchyard. Part of the
posts to which it was affixed were visible until
very lately, and the National School is now
erected on its site. The last person who under-
went the punishment was a man, for beating his
wife, about forty years since; but although the
ducking-stool has been long removed, the cere-
mony of immersion in the horsepond was recently
inflicted on an inhabitant for brutality towards
his wife.” The Rugby ducking-stool was of the
trebuchet form, somewhat similar to one which
was in use at Broadwater, near Worthing, and
which has been frequently engraved. We repro-
duce an illustration of the latter from the Wilt-

shire Archeological Magazine, which represents it

 

DUCKING-STOOL, BROADWATER, NEAR WORTHING,

as it appeared in the year 1776. It was in exist-
ence at a much later period. Its construction was
16 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

very simple, consisting of a short post let into the
ground at the edge of a pond, bearing on the top
a transverse beam, one end of which carried the
stool, while the other end was secured by a rude
chair. We are told, in an old description of this
ducking-stool, that the beam could be moved
horizontally, so as to bring the seat to the edge
of the pond, and that when the beam was moved
back, so as to place the seat and the person in it
over the pond, the beam was worked up and
down like a see-saw, and so the person in the seat
was ducked. When the machine was not in use,
the end of the beam which came on land was
secured to a stump in the ground by a padlock,
to prevent the village children from ducking each
other. |
Mr. T. Tindall Wildridge, author of several
important local historical works, and Keeper of
the Records of Kingston-upon-Hull, informs us
that the great profligacy of that port frequently
gave rise in olden times to very stringent exercise
of the magisterial authority. Not infrequently
this was at the direct instigation and sometimes
command of the Archbishop of York. Occasion-
ally the cognisance of offences was retrospective.

Thus, in November, 1620, it was resolved by the
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 17

Bench of Magistrates, then composed of the
Aldermen of the town, that such as had been
“faltie for bastardes” should be carted about the
town and afterwards “ducked in the water for
their faults, for which they have hitherto escaped
punishment.” At a little later period, in England,
in the days of the Commonwealth, it was enacted
on May 14th, 1650, that adultery should be pun-
ished with death, but there is not any record of
the law taking effect. The Act was repealed at
the Restoration. About a century before this
period, namely, in 1563, in the Scottish Parlia-
ment this crime was made a capital offence. In
New England, in the year 1662, several men and
women suffered for this crime. Our Saxon an-
cestors were extremely severe in respect to
adultery. In the earlier Saxon era it was the
custom to burn the adulteress, and over her ashes
to erect a gibbet, on which the adulterer was
hanged. Coming down to the reign of Canute
(1016), we find that he “adjudged the man to
exile, and the woman to have her nose and ears
cut off” Resuming our notes on the Hull
ducking-stool, we find, according to Hadley, the
historian, that in the year 1731 Mr. Beilby, who

held the office of town’s husband, was ordered to
Cc
18 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

take care that a ducking-stool should be provided
at the Southend for the benefit of scolds and
unquiet women. Six years later, John Hilbert
published a view of the town of Hull, in which is
a representation of the ducking-stool. Mr. M. C.
Peck exhibited this very rare engraving at a
meeting of the Hull Literary Club, and it is sup-
posed to be the only picture in which a drawing
of the Hull ducking-stool is given. Mr. Wildridge
has found traces of another local ducking-stool.
He states that in some accounts belonging to the
eighteenth century is a charge for tarring a duck-
ing-stool situated on the Haven-side, on the
East-side of the town.

At the neighbouring town of Beverley are
traces of this old mode of punishment, and in the
town records are several notes bearing on the
subject. Brewers of bad beer and bakers of bad
bread as well as scolding women were placed in
the ducking-stool.

The Leeds ducking-stool was at Quarry Hill,
near the Spa. At the Court of Quarter Sessions,
held in the town in July, 1694, it was “ordered
that Anne, the wife of Phillip Saul, a person
of lewd behaviour, be ducked for daily making
strife and discord amongst her neighbours.” A
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 19

similar order was made against Jane Milner and
Elizabeth Wooler.

We find in the Session records of Wakefield,
for 1602, the following : “ Punishm® of Hall and
Robinson, scolds fforasmuch as Katherine Hall
and M’garet Robinson, of Wakefield are great dis-
turbers and disquieters of their neighbours w’thin
the toune of Wakefield, by reason of their daily
scolding and chydering, the one w’th the other, for
reformacon whereof ytt it is ordered that if they
doe hereafter continue their former course of life
in scolding and brawling, that then John Mawde,
the high constable there, shall cause them to be
soundlye ducked or cucked on the cuckstool at
Wakefield for said misdemeanour.”

In the records of Wakefield Sessions, under
date of October 5th, 1671, the following appears :
“ Forasmuch as Jane, the wife of William Farrett
of Selby, shoemaker, stands indicted at this ses-
sions for a common scold, to the great annoyance
and disturbance of her neighbours, and breach of
His Majesty’s peace. It is therefore ordered
that the said Jane Farrett, for the said offence be
openly ducked, and ducked three times over the
head and ears by the constables of Selby aforesaid,
for which this shall be their warrant.”
20 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

At Bradford the ducking-stool was formerly at
the Beck, near to the Parish Church, and on the
formation of the canal it was removed, but only a
short distance from its original position. Still
lingering in the West Riding of Yorkshire, we
find in the parish accounts of East Ardsley, the

following item :

1683-4. Paid John Crookes for repairing stool ... 1s. 8d.

Norrisson Scatcherd, in his “ History of Morley,”
and William Smith, in his “ Morley Ancient and
Modern,” give interesting details of the ducking-
stool at Morley. Not far distant from Morley is
Calverley, and in the Constable’s account of the

village it is stated :
1728. Paid Jeremy Booth for powl for ducking-stool ... 2s.

At Haworth we have traces of this ancient mode
of punishment. Says Mr. J. Horsfall Turner, at
Ilkley in bygone times, scolds were ducked in the
Wharfe, if unable to pay a fine of 6s. 8d.

Mr. Joseph Wilkinson, in his volume on Wors-
borough, near Barnsley, has some important
information on this theme. “The ducking-stool,”
says Mr. Wilkinson, “ was not only used as a

punishment for scolds and brawlers, but also for
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 21

brewers and bakers, who either in the one case
sold ale in short measure or of bad quality, or, in
the other, made bad bread or sold short weight.
There is said to have been two ducking-ponds in
the township—one in the village of Worsborough
and another near to the Birdwell tollbar; and,
judging from the frequency of their being re-
paired by the township, it would seem they were
often brought into requisiton.” The following

extracts are drawn from the parish accounts :

1703. For mending ye cuck-stool fa no E0 00
1721. Ducking-stool mending ... : Be 0-1 8
1725. For mending and hanging ye cuck-stool ... 0 1.0
1730. Pd. Thos. Moorhouse for mending ye
stocks and cuck-stool oo x i 0 29
,» Pd. Jno. South for 2 staples for ye cucking-stool 0 0 4
1731. Thos. Moorhouse for mending ye ducking-stool 0 1 0
1734-5. To ye ducking-stool mending ... 5s 0 0 6
1736. For mending ye ducking-stool ... ie 010 0
1737. John Ellot, for ye ducking-stool and
sheep-fold door oe “he Hh: oe 014 6

Mr. W. H. Dawson, the historian of Skipton, has
devoted considerable attention to the old-time
punishments of the town, and the first reference
he was able to discover amongst the old accounts
of the township is the following :

1734. October 2nd. To Wm. Bell, for ducking-
stool making and wood ve ios ie 8s. 6d.
22 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

“This must,” says Mr. Dawson, “surely mean
that the chair was changed, for the amount is
too small for the entire apparatus. In this case a
ducking-stool must have existed before 1734,
which is very likely.” In the same Skipton
township account-book is an entry as follows :

1743. October. Ben Smith for ducking-stool... 4s. 6d.

Twenty-five years later we find a payment as

follows :

1768. October 17th. Paid John Brown
for new ducking-stool a or £1 0s 114d,
Mr. Dawson has not been able to discover the
exact date when the ducking-stool fell into dis-
use, but has good reason for believing that it was
about 1770. We gather from a note sent to us
by Mr. Dawson that: “A ducking-pond existed
at Kirkby, although it had not been used within
the memory of any living person. Scolds of both
sexes were punished by being ducked ; indeed, in
the last observance of the custom, a tailor and his
wife were ducked together, in view of a large
gathering of people. The husband had applied
for his wife to undergo the punishment on
account of her quarrelsome nature, but the magis-
"trate decided that one was not better than the
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 23

other, and he ordered a joint punishment! Back
to back, therefore, husband and wife were chaired
and dipped into the cold water of the pond!-
Whether it was in remembrance of this old ob-
servance or not cannot be definitely said, but it
is, nevertheless, a fact that in East Lancashire, in
1880, a man who had committed some violation of
morals was forcibly taken by a mob, and dragged
several times through a pond until he had ex-
pressed penitence for his act.” i

We have found several allusions to the Derby
ducking-stool. Wooley, writing in 1772, states
that “over against the steeple [All Saint's] is St.
Mary’s Gate, which leads down to the brook
near the west side of St. Werburgh’s Church,
over which there is a bridge to Mr. Osborne’s
mill, over the pool of which stands the ducking-
stool.” Mr. Jewitt found particulars of a charge

made in 1729 for repairing it by a joiner named
"Thomas Timmins :
To ye Cuckstool, the stoop . re Se 0 01 0
2 Foot and } of Toyce for a Rayle ei Sr 0 00. 5
Ja. Ford, junr., 1 day at Cuckstool 0 00

The Chesterfield ducking-stool was pulled down
towards the close of the last century. Tt is
stated by Mr. Jewitt that in the latter part of
24

OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

its existence it was chiefly used for punishing
refractory paupers.

   
  

 

 

  

     
 
   

er]
EE

  
 
  

WI

ll\ ir

  

 

 

 

Ea

RA

 

SCARBOROUGH "DUCKING-STOOL.

The Scarborough ducking-stool was formerly

placed on the old pier, and was last used about
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 25

the year 1795, when a Mrs. Gamble was ducked.
The chair is preserved in the Museum of the
Scarborough Philosophical Society. We are in-
debted to Dr. T. N. Brushfield for an excellent
drawing of it.

An object which attracts much attention from
visitors to the interesting museum at Ipswich
is the ducking-stool of
the town. We give
a carefully executed
drawing of it. It is
described as a strong-
backed arm-chair, with
a wrought-iron rod,
about an inch in dia-
meter, fastened to each

arm in front, meeting

 

in a segment of a circle

IPSWICH DUCKING-STOOL.

above; there is also
another iron rod affixed to the back, which
curves over the head of the person seated in the
chair, and is connected with the other at the top,
to the centre of which is fastened an iron ring
for the purpose of slinging the machine into the
river. It is plain and substantial, and has more
the appearance of solidity than antiquity in its
Z

26 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

construction. We are told by the local historian
that in the Chamberlain’s books are various en-
tries for money paid to porters for taking down
the ducking-stool and assisting in the operation
of cooling, by its means, the inflammable passions
of some of the female inhabitants of Ipswich.

We give a spirited sketch of the Ipswich
ducking-stool, from the pencil of Campion, a local
artist. It is worthy of the pencil of Hogarth,
Gilray, or Cruikshank; indeed, it is often said
to be the production of the last-named artist,
but though after his style it is not his work.

There are traces in the Court-Book of St.
George's Gild of the use of the ducking-stool at
Norwich. Amongst other entries is one to the
effect that in 1597 a scold was ducked three times.

The ducking-stool at Nottingham, in addition

to being employed for correcting scolds, was used

“for the exposure of females of bad repute. “It

consisted,” says Mr. J. Potter Briscoe, F.R.H.S.,
“of a hollow box, which was sufficiently large to
admit of two persons being exposed at the same
time. Through holes in the side the heads of
the culprits were placed. In fact, the Notting-
ham cuck-stool was similar to a pillory. The last
time this ancient instrument of punishment was
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 27

brought into requisition was in 1731, when the
Mayor (Thomas Trigge) caused a female to be
placed in it for immorality, and left her to the

mercy of the mob, which ducked her so severely

nn
i]

rE A
l 1 ih
Eh J |
hil | al I

a4

 

IPSWICH DUCKING-STOOL.

that her death ensued shortly afterwards. The

Mayor, in consequence, was prosecuted, and the
Nottingham cuck-stool was ordered to be des-
28 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

troyed.” In the Nottinghamshire records are
traces of the ducking-stool at Southwell and Ret-
ford. The example at the latter town is traced
back to an unusually early period.

The old ducking-stool of King’s Lynn, Norfolk,
may now be seen in the Museum of that town.
The annals of the borough con-
tain numerous allusions to the
punishment of women. In the
year 1587, it is stated that for
immoral conduct, John Wan-
ker’s wife and widow Parker
were both carted. It is recorded
that, in 1754, “one Elizabeth
Neivel stood in the pillory, and

that one Hannah Clark was

 

ducked for scolding.” There 1s

DUCKING-STOOL, KING'S

Toe. mention of a woman named

Howard standing in the pillory in 1782, but no
particulars are given of her crime. In another
chapter we advert to the boiling and burning to
death of women at this town.

In a note written for us in 1881, by Mr. R. N.
Worth, the historian of Plymouth, we are told
that in Devon and Cornwall the ducking-stool

was the usual means employed for inflicting pun-
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 29

ishment on scolding women. At Plymouth, the
ducking-stool was erected at the Barbican, a site
full of historic interest. From here Sir Walter

Raleigh was conducted to his long imprisonment,
followed by death on the scaffold. It was here

that the Pilgrim Fathers bade adieu to the shores
of their native land to es-
tablish a New England
across the Atlantic. As
might be expected, the old
municipal accounts of Ply-
mouth contain many curi-
ous and interesting items
bearing on the punish-
ment of women. Mr. W.
H K. Wright, editor of
the “ Western Antiquary,”
tells us, as recently as the
year 1808 the last person
was ducked. At Ply-

mouth, at the present

 

PLYMOUTH DUCKING-STOOL.

time, are preserved two
ducking-chairs, one in the Athensum and the
other in the office of the Borough Surveyor. Mr.
Wright has kindly supplied illustrations of both.

It will be observed that the chairs are made of iron.
30 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

The last time the Bristol ducking-stool was
used was, it is said, in the year 1718. The
Mayor gave instructions for the ducking of scolds,
and the immersions took place at the weir.

We have numerous accounts of this engine of
punishment in Lancashire. In the ‘Manchester
Historical Recorder” we find it stated, in the
year 1775: ‘Manchester ducking-stool in use.
It was an open-bottomed
chair of wood, placed upon
a long pole balanced on a
pivot, and suspended over
the collection of water
called the Pool House and
Pool Fold. It was after-
wards suspended over the
Daubholes (Infirmary pond)

and was used for the pur-

N\ Win

Ire

4 [HAAN

= N
\

I NA

A

 

PLYMOUTH DUCKING-STOOL.

pose of punishing scolds
and prostitutes.” We find, on examination of an
old print, that it was similar to the example at
Broadwater, of which we give a sketch. Accord-
ing to Mr. Richard Brookes ¢ Liverpool from
1775 to 1800,” the ducking-stool was in use in
1779, by the authority of the magistrates. We
have particulars of the ducking-stool at Pres-
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 31

ton, Kirkham, Burnley and other Lancashire
towns.

At Wootton Bassett there was a tumbrel,
which, until within the last few years, was per-
fect. The chair is still preserved by the Corpora-
tion of that town. We give a drawing of it from
the Wiltshire Archeological and Natural History
Magazine. We are told the machine, when com-

plete, consisted of a chair, a pair of wheels, two

 

TUMBREL AT WOOTTON BASSETT.

long poles forming shafts, and a rope attached to
each shaft, at about a foot from the end. The
person to be ducked was tied in the chair, and
the machine pushed into a pond called the Weir-
pond, and the shafts being let go, the scold was
lifted backwards into the water, the shafts flying
up, and being recovered again by means of the
ropes attached to them. The chair is of oak,
and bears the date of 1686 on the back. In some
32 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

places, millers, if detected stealing corn, were
placed in the tumbrel.

The wheels of a tumbrel are preserved in
the old church of St. Mary’s, Warwick, and the
chair, it is said, is still in the possession of an
inhabitant of the town.

At Kingston-upon-Thames ducking was not
infrequent. The Chamberlain’s accounts include
many items relating to the subject. We are
disposed to believe, from the mention of three
wheels, in a payment made in 1572, that here the
engine of punishment was a tumbrel. The fol-

lowing amounts were paid in 1572:

The making of the cucking-stool ... dar wat 88, Od
Iron work for the same  ... vii = ae Bn Od,
Timber for the same ny oo oe
Three brasses for the same, and three wheels ... 4s. 10d.

£1: 3s. 4d,

In the London Evening Post, April 27th to
30th, 1745, it 1s stated : ¢ Last week a woman who
keeps the Queen’s Head alehouse, at Kingston, in
Surrey, was ordered by the court to be ducked
for scolding, and was accordingly placed in the
chair and ducked in the river Thames, under
Kingston Bridge, in the presence of 2000 to 3000
people.”
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 33

We have previously mentioned the fact that at
Leicester the cucking-stool was in use as early as
1467, and from some valuable information brought
together by Mr. William Kelly, F.S.A., and in-
cluded in his important local works, we learn that
the last entry he has traced in the old accounts
of the town is the following :

1768-9. Paid Mr. Elliott for a Cuckstool by order
of Hall ... a on 0 Lh 2 Oz. Od.

Mr. Kelly refers to the scolding-cart at Lei-
cester, and describes the culprit as seated upon it,
and being drawn through the town. He found
in the old accounts in 1629 an item :

Paid to Frauncis Pallmer for making two wheels and one
barr for the Scolding Cart ... a on cant ie
Scolding-cart is another name for the tumbrel.

The latest example of Leicester cucking-stool
is preserved in the local museum, and was placed
there at the suggestion of Mr. Kelly.

The Leominster ducking-stool is one of the
few examples still preserved. It was formerly
kept in the parish church. We have an excellent
drawing of it in that building from the pencil of
the genial author of “ Verdant Green,” Cuthbert

Bede. The Rev. Geo. Fyler Townsend, M.A,
D
34 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

the euridite historian of Leominster, furnishes us
with some important information on this interest-
ing relic of the olden time. He says that it is a
machine of the simplest construction. “It con-
sists merely of a strong narrow under framework,
placed on four wheels, of solid wood, about four
inches in thickness, and eighteen in diameter. At

 

LEOMINSTER DUCKING-STOOL.

one end of this framework two upright posts,
about three feet in height, strongly embedded in
the platform, carry a long movable beam. Each
of the arms of this beam are of equal length (13
feet), and balance perfectly from the top of the
post. The culprit placed in the seat naturally
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 35

weighs down that one end into the water, while
the other is lifted up in the air; men, however,
with ropes, caused the uplifted end to rise or fall,
and thus obtain a perfect see-saw. The purchase
of the machine is such that the culprit can be
launched forth some 16 to 18 feet into the pond or
stream, while the administrators of the ducking
stand on dry land. This instrument was men-
tioned in the ancient documents of the borough
by various names, as the cucking-stoole or timburill,
or gumstole.”

The latest recorded instance of the ducking-
stool being used in England occurred at Leo-
minster. In 1809, says Mr. Townsend, a woman,
Jenny Pipes, alias Jane Corran, was paraded
through the town on the ducking-stool, and actu-
ally ducked in the water near Kenwater Bridge,
by order of the magistrates. Dr. Watling, of
Kingsland, who has since that date served as bailiff
to the borough, and who was present on that
occasion, described the scene to Mr. Townsend.
Dr. Watling gives his testimony to the desert of
the punishment inflicted on this occasion, in the
fact that the first words of the culprit on being
unfastened from the chair were oaths and curses

on the magistrates. In 1817, a woman named
36 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Sarah Leeke was wheeled round the town in the
chair, but not ducked, as the water was too low.
Since this time, the use of the chair has been laid
aside, and it is an object of curiosity, rather than
of fear, to any of the spectators. During the
recent restoration of Leominster Church, the
ducking-stool was removed, repaired, and re-
novated by Mr. John Hungerford Arkwright,
and is now kept at the borough gaol of the
historically interesting town of Leominster.

The early English settlers in the United States
introduced many of the manners and customs of
their native land. The ducking-stool was soon
brought into use. Mr. Henry M. Brooks, in his
carefully written work, called “Strange and Curi-
ous Punishments,” published in 1886, by Ticknor

   
 
 

“& Co., Boston, gives many important details re-
specting punishing scolds. At the present time,
~ An some parts of America, scolding females are
liable to be punished by means of the ducking-
stool. We gather from a newspaper report that,
in 1889, the grand jury of Jersey City—across
the Hudson River from New York—caused a
sensation by indicting Mrs. Mary Brady as a
“ common scold.” Astonished lawyers hunted up
their old books, and discovered that scolding is
THE DUCKING-STOOL. 37

still an indictable offence in New Jersey, and that
the ducking-stool is still available as a punish-
ment for it, not having been specifically abolished
when the revised statutes were adopted. In
Delaware, the State next to the south of New
Jersey, the whipping-post is an institution, and
prisoners are sentenced to suffer at it every week.
The Common Scold Law was brought from
England to Connecticut by the Puritans and
settlers, from Connecticut they carried it with them
into New Jersey, which is incorrectly considered
a Dutch State. In closing this chapter, we may
state that a Dalziel telegram from Ottawa,
published in the London newspapers of August
8th, 1890, says that Miss Annie Pope was yester-
day charged before a police magistrate, under the
provisions of an antiquated statute, for being a
“common scold.” She was committed for trial at
the assizes, as the magistrate had no ducking-
stool. :

Vv
The Brank, or Scold's Bridle.

HE brank was an instrument employed by

our forefathers for punishing scolds. Tt is

also sometimes called the gossip’s bridle, and in the
Macclesfield town records it is designated “a
brydle for a curste queane.” In the term “queane”
we have the old Eng-
lish synonym for a
woman ; now the
chief woman, the
Queen. The brank
is not of such great
antiquity as the duck-
ing-stool, for the
earliest mention of it
we have been able to
find in this country

 

is in the Corporation
records of Maccles-
field, of the year 1623. At an earlier period, we

have traces of it in Scotland. In Glasgow burgh
THE BRAXNK. 39

records, it is stated that in 1574 two scolds were
condemned to be “branket.” The Kirk-session
records of Stirling for 1600 mention the
‘“brankes” as a punishment for the shrew. It
is generally believed that the punishment is of
Continental origin.

The brank may be described simply as an iron
framework ; which was placed on the head, enclos-
ing it in a kind of cage; it had in front a plate of
iron, which, either sharpened or covered with
spikes, was so situated as to be placed in the mouth
of the victim, and if she attempted to move her
tongue in any way whatever, it was certain to be
shockingly injured. With the brank on her head
she was conducted through the streets, led by a
chain, held by one of the town’s officials, an object
of contempt, and subjected to the jeers of the
crowd and often left to their mercy. In some towns
it was the custom to chain the culprit to pillory,
whipping-post, or market-cross. She thus suffered
for telling her mind to some petty tyrant in office,
or speaking plainly to a wrong-doer, or for taking
to task a lazy, and perhaps a drunken husband.

In Yorkshire, we have only seen two branks.
We give a sketch of one formerly in possession
of the late Norrisson Scatcherd, F.S.A., the
40 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

historian of Morley. We believe that we are the
first to give an engraving of it. It is from the
accurate pencil of Mr. T. Tindall Wildridge, of
Hull, and is now in the Leeds Philosophical
Museum, where it at-
tracts a considerable
share of attention. Tt
is one of the most
simple and harmless
examples that has
come under our notice.
Amongst the relics of
the olden time in the
Museum of the York-
shire Philosophical So-

 

BRANK IN THE LEEDS PHILOSOPHICAL

MUSEUM. ciety, York, 18 another

specimen, equally simple in its construction. It
was presented by Lady Thornton to the Society
in 1880, and near to it may be seen thumb-screws
from York Castle; leg bar, waist girdle, and wrist
shackles, worn by the notorious highwayman,
Dick Turpin, executed April 17th, 1739; and a
leg bar, worn by another notorious highwayman,
named Nevison, who suffered death on the
gallows, May 4th, 1684.

The brank which has received the greatest
THE BRANK. 41

attention is the one preserved in the vestry of
Walton-on-Thames Parish Church. It bears the
date of 1632, and the following couplet :—

“ Chester presents Walton with a bridle
To curb women’s tongues that talk too idle.”

It is traditionally said that this brank was given
to Walton Parish by a person named Chester,
who had, through a gossiping and lying woman
of his acquaintance, lost an estate he expected to
inherit from a rich relative. We are enabled to
“give an illustration of the Walton brank.

 

BRANK AT WALTON-ON-THAMES.

Dr. T. N. Brushfield described in an ex-

haustive manner all the Chester branks, in an able

paper read before the Architectural, Archao-
logical, and Historic Society of Chester, and pub-
lished in 1858. We are unable to direct attention
to all the branks noticed by Dr. Brushfield, but

cannot refrain from presenting the following ac-
42 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

count of the one at Congleton, which is preserved
in the Town Hall of that ancient borough. “Tt
was,” we are informed, ‘formerly in the hands
of the town jailor, whose services were not in-
frequently called into requisition. In the old-
fashioned, half-timbered houses in the borough,
there was generally fixed on one side of the large
open fire-places a hook, so that, when a man’s
wife indulged her scolding propensities, the hus-
band sent for the town jailor to bring the bridle,
and had her bridled and chained to the hook until
she promised to behave herself better for the
future. I have seen one of these hooks, and have
often heard husbands say to their wives: ‘If you
don’t rest with your tongue I'll send for the bridle
and hook you up.’ The Mayor and Justices
frequently brought the instrument into use; for
when women were brought before them charged
with street-brawling, and insulting the constables
and others while in the discharge of their duty,
they have ordered them to be bridled and led
through the borough by the jailor. The last time
this bridle was publicly used was in 1824, when a
woman was brought before the Mayor (Bulkeley
Johnson, Esq.) one Monday, charged with scold-
ing and using harsh language to the church-
THE BRANK. 43

wardens and constables as they went, on the
Sunday morning, round the town to see that

all the public-houses were empty and closed during
divine service. On examination, a Mr. Richard
Edwards stated on oath that on going round the

town with the churchwardens on the previous

 

BRANK AT CONGLETON.

day, they met the woman (Ann Runcorn) in a
place near ‘The Cockshoot, and that imme-
diately seeing them she commenced a sally of
abuse, calling them all the scoundrels and rogues
she could lay her tongue to; and telling them ‘it
would look better of them if they would look
44 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

after their own houses rather than go looking
after other folk’s, which were far better than their
own.” After other abuse of a like character, they
thought it only right to apprehend her, and so
brought her before the Bench on the following
day. The Mayor then delivered the following
sentence : ‘That it 1s the unanimous decision of
the Mayor and Justices that the prisoner (Ann
Runcorn) there and then have the town’s bridle
for scolding women put upon her, and that she be
led by the magistrate’s clerk’s clerk through every
street in the town, as an example to all scolding
women; and that the Mayor and magistrates were
much obliged to the churchwardens for bringing
the case before them.” “In this case,” Mr. War-
rington, who furnished Dr. Brushfield with the
foregoing information, adds : “I both heard the
evidence and saw the decision carried out. The
bridle was put on the woman, and she was then
led through the town by one Prosper Haslam, the
town clerk’s clerk, accompanied by hundreds of
the inhabitants; and on her return to the Town
Hall the bridle was taken off in the presence of
the Mayor, magistrates, constables, churchwar-
dens, and assembled inhabitants.”

In Cheshire, at the present time, there are
THE BRANK. 45

traces of thirteen branks, and at Stockport is the
most brutal example of the English branks. «It
will be observed,” says the local historian, Dr.
Henry Heginbotham, J.P., “that the special
characteristic of this brank is the peculiar con-
struction of the tongue-plate or gag. It is about
two inches long, having at the end, as may be
seen in the engraving, a ball, into which is
inserted a number of sharp iron pins, three on the
upper surface, three on
the lower, and two
pointing backwards.
These could not fail to
pin the tongue, and
effectually silence the
noisiest brawler. At
the fore part of the
collar, there is an iron
chain, with a leathern
thong attached, by

which the offender was

 

BRANK AT STOCKPORT.

led for public gaze

through the market-place.” It was formerly on
market days exhibited in front of the house of
the person who had charge of it, as a warning to

scolding or swearing women. Dr. Heginbotham
46 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

states that : « There is no evidence of its having
been actually used for many years, but there is
testimony to the fact, that within the last forty
years the brank was brought to a termagant
market woman, who was effectually silenced by
its threatened application.”

 

BRANK AT MACCLESFIELD.

We are indebted to Mr. Alfred Burton for a
drawing of the Macclesfield brank. Dr. Brushfield
describes this as ‘a respectable-looking brank.”
He tells us that “the gag is plain, and the end of
THE BRANK. 47

it is turned down ; there is only one band which
passes over the head, and is hinged to the hoops ;
a temporary joint exists at the upper part, and
ample provision is made for readily adjusting it to
any description of head. The chain still remains
attached to the hoop. About the year 1858,
Mr. Swinnerton informed Dr. Brushfield that he
had never seen it used, but that at the petty
sessions it had often been produced in terrorem,
to stay the volubility of a woman’s tongue ; and
that a threat by a magistrate to order its appli-
ance had always proved sufficient to abate the
garrulity of the most determined scold. Mr.
Way, however, says that it had been used within
the memory of an aged official of the municipal
authorities.”

Towards the close of the first quarter of the
present century, the brank was last used at
Altrincham. A virago, who caused her neigh-
bours great trouble, was frequently cautioned in
vain respecting her conduct, and as a last
resource she was condemned to walk through the
town wearing the brank. She refused to move,
and it was finally decided to wheel her in a
barrow through the principal streets of the town,
round the market-place, and to her own home.
48 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

The punishment had the desired effect, and for
the remainder of her life she kept a quiet tongue.

There are many traces of the brank in Lanca-
shire. Mr. W. E. A. Axon informs us that his
father remembers the brank being used at Man-
chester at the commencement of the present
century. Kirkham had its brank for scolds, in
addition to a ducking-stool. We find, in the same
county, traces of the brank at Holme, in the Forest
of Rossendale. In the accounts of the Greave for
the Forest of Rossendale for 1691-2 is an entry of

the true antiquarian cast:
Item, for a Bridle for scouldinge women, Pin 2s. "6d.

In “Some Obsolete Peculiarities of English
Law,” by Mr. William Beamont, are some inter-
esting particulars respecting the Warrington
brank. ¢ Hanging up in our museum,” says Mr.
Beamont, “may be seen a representation of a
withered female face wearing the brank or scold’s
bridle ; one of which instruments, as inflexible as
iron and ingenuity can make it, for keeping an
unruly tongue quiet by mechanical means,
hangs up beside it; and almost within the time
of living memory, Cicily Pewsill, an inmate of the

workhouse, and a notorious scold, was seen wear-
THE BRANK. 49

ing this disagreeable head-gear in the streets of
Warrington for half-an-hour or more . ig
Cicily Pewsill’s case still lingers in tradition, as
the last occasion of its application in Warrington,
and it will soon pass into history.” According to
Mr. Jewitt, “at Bolton-le-Moors, even within
memory, a brank has been used as a punishment -
for prostitutes. The bridle was fixed in their
mouths and tied at the back of their heads with
gay ribbons, and thus the frail ones were paraded
from the cross to the church steps and back again
by the parish beadles.”

Respecting the Preston brank, we find some
notes in a work by Mr. W. Dobson, entitled,
“ Preston in the Olden Time,” published in 1857.
Mr. Dobson says: “The Rev. J. Clay tells me
that since his connection with our House of Cor-
rection the brank was put on a woman there, but
the matter coming to the knowledge of the Home
Secretary, its further use was prohibited, and to
make sure of the barbarous practice being dis-
continued the brank itself was ordered to be sent
to London.” A second brank was kept in the
prison, principally formed of leather, but with an
iron tongue-piece.

At the north country town of Morpeth a brank
E
50 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

is still preserved. The following is a record of its
use: “Dec. 3, 1741, Elizabeth, wife of George
Holborn, was punished with the branks for two
hours, at the Market Cross, Morpeth, by order of
Mz. Thomas Gait and Mr. George Nicholls, then

bailiffs, for scandalous and opprobrious language to

 

BRANK AT THE MANOR HOUSE, HAMSTALL RIDWARE.

several persons in the town, as well as to the said
bailiffs.”

Staffordshire supplies several notable examples
of the brank. They were formerly kept at Ham-
stall Ridware, Beaudesart, Lichfield, Walsall,
and at Newcastle-under-Liyme. The branks in
THE BRANK. 51

the two towns last named are alluded to by the
celebrated Dr. Plot, the old historian of the
county, in an amusing manner. “We come to
the arts that respect mankind,” says Plot,
“amongst which, as elsewhere, the civility of
precedence must be allowed to the women, and
that as well in punishments as favours. For the
former, whereof they have such a peculiar artifice
at Newcastle [under Lyme] and Walsall for
correcting of scolds, which it does, too, so
effectually and so very safely, that I look upon it
as much to be preferred to the cucking-stool,
which not only endangers the health of the party,
but also gives her tongue liberty "twixt every dip,
to neither of which is this at all liable, it being
such a bridle for the tongue as not only quite
deprives them of speech, but brings shame for the
transgression, and humility thereupon, before ’tis
taken off. Which, being an instrument scarce
heard of, much less seen, I have here presented
it to the reader’s view [here follows a reference to
a plate] as it was taken from the original one,
made of iron, at Newecastle-under-Liyme, wherein
the letter a shows the jointed collar that comes
round the neck ; 0, ¢, the loops and staples to let
it out and in, according to the bigness and
52 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

slenderness of the neck ; d, the jointed semicircle
that comes over the head, made forked at one end
to let through the nose, and e, the plate-iron that
is put into the mouth and keeps down the
tongue. Which, being put upon the offender by
order of the magistrate, and fastened with a pad-
lock behind, she is led through the town by an

 

BRANK AT LICHFIELD.

officer, to her shame, nor is it taken off until after
the party begins to show all external signs
imaginable of humiliation and amendment.” This
brank afterwards passed into the hands of Joseph
Mayer, Esq., F.S.A., founder of the Museum
at Liverpool.

In a copy of Dr. Plot’s “ History of Stafford-
THE BRANK. 53

shire,” in the British Museum library, a marginal
note bearing on this subject appears, which is
supposed to be in the author’s hand-writing. Tt
reads as follows: “This bridle for the tongue
seems to be very ancient, being mentioned by an
ancient English poet, I think Chaucer, quod vide:

But for my daughter Julian,

I would she were well bolted with a Bridle,
That leaves her work to play the clack,
And let’s her wheel stand idle,

For it serves not for she-ministers,

Farriers nor Furriers,

Cobblers nor Button-makers,

To descant on the Bible.

It is pleasing to record the fact that there is
only trace of one brank belonging to Derbyshire
—a circumstance which speaks well for its men
and women. The latter have for a long period
borne exemplary characters. Philip Kinder, in
the preface of his projected “ History of Derby-
shire,” written about the middle of the seventeenth
century, alludes to them. “The country-women
here,” says Kinder, “are chaste and sober, and
very diligent in their housewifery ; they hate
idleness, love and obey their husbands; only in
some of the great towns many of the seeming
sanctificators used to follow the Presbyterian gang,

and on a lecture day put on their best rayment,
54 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

and doo hereby take occasion to goo a gossipping.
Your merry wives of Bentley will sometimes look
in ye glass, chirpe a cupp merrily, yet not
indecently. In the Peak they are much given to
dance after the bagpipes—almost every towne hath
a bagpipe in it.” In the Reliquary for October,

 

CHESTERFIELD BRANK.

1860, we have an account of the Derbyshire
brank. The editor, Mr. Llewellynn Jewitt, says :
“The Chesterfield brank, for the first time en-
graved, is a remarkably good example, and has
the additional interest of bearing a date. It is
Z7HE BRAXNK. 5d

nine inches in height, and six inches and three-
quarters across the hoop. It consists of a hoop of
iron, hinged on either side and fastening behind,
and a band, also of iron, passing over the head
from back to front, and opening in front to admit
the nose of the woman whose misfortune it was to
wear it. The mode of putting it on would be thus :
the brank would be opened by throwing back the
sides of the hoop, and the hinder part of the band
by means of the hinges, ¢, r, ¥. The constable,
or other official, would then stand in front of his
victim, and force the knife, or plate, a, into her
mouth, the divided band passing on either side of
her nose, which would protrude through the
opening, B. The hoop would then be closed
behind, the band brought down from the top to
the back of the head, and fastened down upon it,
at ©, and thus the cage would at once be firmly
and immovably fixed so long as her tormentors
might think fit. On the left side is a chain, b,
one end of which is attached to the hoop, and at
the other end is a ring, by which the victim was
led, or by which she was, at pleasure, attached to
a post or wall. On front of the brank are the
initials “r.c.,” and the date “ 1688 "—the year of
the « Glorious Revolution ”—the year of all years,
56 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

memorable in the annals of Chesterfield and the
little village of Whittington, closely adjoining, in
which the Revolution was planned. Strange
that an instrument of brutal and tyrannical
torture should be made and used at Chesterfield,
at the same moment that the people should be
plotting for freedom at the same place. The
brank was formerly in the old poor-house at
Chesterfield, and came into the hands of Mr.
Weale, the assistant Poor-law Commissioner, who
presented it to Lady Walsham. It is (August,
1860) still in the hands of Sir John Walsham,
Bart.,, and the drawing from which the
accompanying woodcut is executed, and kindly
made and furnished to me by Miss Duley Bell,
Sir John’s sister-in-law.”

The Leicester brank is similar to the one at
Chesterfield. At the back of the hoop is a chain
about twelve inches long. It was formerly kept
in the Leicester borough gaol.

In the year 1821, Judge Richardson gave orders
for a brank to be destroyed which was kept ready
and most probably frequently used at the
County Hall, Nottingham. We gather from a
note furnished by Mr. J. Potter Briscoe a curious
circumstance in connection with this brank—
THE BRANK. 57

that it was used to subdue the unruly tongues of
the sterner sex, as well as those of noisy females.
James Brodie, a blind
beggar, who was executed
on the 15th July, 1799,
for the murder of his
boy-guide, in the Notting-
ham Forest, was the last

person punished with the

 

brank. During his im-
prisonment, prior to exe- aa

cution, he was so noisy that the brank was called
into requisition, to do what he refused to do him-

self, namely, to hold his tongue.  *

 

BRANK FORMERLY IN POSSESSION OF MR. CARRINGTON.

Here is a picture of a brank formerly in the
58 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

possession of the late Mr. F. A. Carrington, the
well-known antiquary. It is supposed to belong
to the period of William III. Mr. Carrington
could not give any history of this curious relic of
the olden time.

At Doddington Park, Lincolnshire, a brank is
preserved, and is of a decidedly foreign appear-
ance. It will be noticed that it bears some

 

BRANK AT DODDINGTON PARK.

resemblance to the peculiar long-snouted visor of
the bascinets, occasionally worn in the reign of
Richard II. No historical particulars are known
respecting this grotesque brank.

In the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, a curious
brank may be seen. It is not recorded in the
catalogue of the collection by whom it was
THE BRANK. 59

presented, or where it was previously used ; it is
described as “a gag or brank, formerly used with
the ducking-stool, as a punishment for scolds.”
It will be noticed that a chain is attached to the
front of this brank, so that the poor unfortunate
woman, in addition to being gagged, had the

 

BRANK IN THE ASHMOLEAN MUSEUM.

mortification of being led by the nose through the
town. The gag is marked o, and b is the
aperture for the nose.

A curious engine of torture may be seen in the
Ludlow Museum, and of which we give an
60 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

illustration. It belongs to a class of engines
far more formidable than branks. A descrip-
tion of this head-piece appears in the Archeo-
logical Journal for September, 1856, from the
pen of Mr. W. J. Bernard Smith. “The power-

>

ful screwing apparatus,” says Mr. Smith, ¢ seems
calculated to force
the iron mask with
torturing effect upon
the brow of the vie-
tim; there are no
eye-holes, but con-
cavities In their
places, as though to
allow for the start-
ing of the eye-balls
under violent pres-

 

gure.” There iz a

ENGINE OF TORTURE IN THE LUDLOW

MUSEUM. strong bar with a

square hole, evidently intended to fasten the cri-
minal against a wall, or perhaps to the pillory ; and
I have heard it said that these instruments were
used to keep the head steady during the inflic-
tion of branding.” A curious instrument of
punishment, belonging to the same class as
that at Ludlow, is described at some length,
THE BRANE,. . 61

with an illustration in “ Worcester in Olden
Times,” by John Noake (London, 1849). The
picture and description have been frequently
reproduced.

Several Shropshire branks remain at the
present time. The one at Shrewsbury does not
appear to be of any great antiquity. Its form is
simple and its character harmless. We give an
illustration of it from “The Obsolete Punish-
ments of Shropshire,” by S. Meeson Morris,

 

SHREWSBURY BRANK.

contributed to the pages of the transactions
of a local antiquarian society. ¢ This bridle
was,” says Mr. Morris, “at one time, in constant
use in Shrewsbury, and there are those yet living
whose memories are sufficiently good to carry
them back to the days when the effects of the
application of the brank in question were to be
seen, rather than, as now imagined.” The year

cannot be ascertained when this brank was first
62 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

worn, but it is known to have been last used in
1846. We learn from Mr. Morris, in that year
“a woman, then a resident in Frankwell, was
ordered to undergo this peculiar punishment, for
having made use of abusive and opprobrious
epithets to a neighbour, and she suffered
accordingly. This woman is still living, and she
refers to the occasion in question with evident
pride, rather than evincing any signs of
humiliation for the ignominious position in which
she was placed. Probably her fellow-townspeople
had, by the time she suffered, become aware of
the fact that so barbarous a punishment was not
altogether suited to the spirit of the age, and
received her with expressions of sympathy rather
than with jeers of laughter.” At Oswestry are
two branks, one belonging to the Corporation
and the other in the storeroom of the Workhouse.
The Rector of Whitchurch has in his possession
a brank, which was formerly used by the town
and union authorities. At Market Drayton
are two branks : one is the property of the Lord
of the Manor, and the other formerly belonged to
the Dodcot Union. The Market Drayton brank,
and also the one at Whitchurch, have on each a

revolving wheel at the end of the gag or tongue-
THE BRANK. 63

plate. Inbygone times, the brank was frequently
used for correcting unmanageable paupers.

In the Museum, at Edinburgh, of the Society
of Antiquaries of Scotland, is a brank said to be
from a town in East Fifeshire, having a rowel-
shaped gag. In the year 1560, it was decided
by the Town Council of Edinburgh, that all
persons found guilty of blasphemy should be
punished by the iron brank. Dr. Charles Rogers,
in his “ Social Life in
Scotland,” has numer-
ous references to the
brank. In North
Britain, it appears to |
have been much used
for punishing persons
guilty of fornication.
On the 7th October,
says Dr. Rogers, the

Kirk-Session of Canon-

 

gate sentenced David

BRANK IN THE ANTIQUARIAN MUSEUM,
EDINBURGH.

Persoun, convicted of
fornication, to be “brankit for four hours,”
while his associate in guilt, Isobel Mountray, was
“banisit the gait,” that is, expelled from the
parish. Only a week previously, the same Kirk-
64 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Session had issued a proclamation that all women
found guilty of fornication “be brankit six
houris at the croce.”

In 1848 was discovered, behind the oak panell-
ing in one of the rooms of the ancient mansion of
the Earls of Moray, in the Canongate, Edinburgh,
a brank, of which a picture is given in Dr. Daniel
Wilsons  ¢ Prehistoric Annals of Scotland,”
vol. 1i., p. 520. It is one of the more harmless,
and not calculated to wound the mouth of the
person wearing it.

We close this chapter by directing attention to
the Bishops brank, kept at St. Andrews,
respecting which a singular story is told. A
woman in a humble walk of life, named Isabel
Lindsay, stood up in the parish church of
St. Andrews, during the time of divine service,
when Archbishop Sharp was preaching, and
declared that when he was a college student he
was guilty of an illicit amour with her. She was
arrested for this statement, and brought before
the Kirk-Session, and by its members sentenced
“to appear for a succession of Sundays on the

repentance stool, wearing the brank.”
The Pillory.

HE pillory may be traced back to a remote
period in England and in other European
countries. The mention of it calls to remembrance
the names of many who figure in the annals of
our country, embracing not a few of the noblest
and the best ; but there are those of others which,
for the credit of the nation, we would gladly allow
to sink into oblivion. Round it gathers tragedy and
comedy, and, altogether, its history is of interest
and importance.

In this country, in bygone days, the pillory
was a familiar sight, and, perhaps, no engine of
punishment was more generally employed. Where
there was a market, a pillory might be seen, for
the local authorities, neglecting to keep it ready
for immediate use as occasion might require, ran
the risk of forfeiting the right of holding a market.
Lords of Manors, in addition to having the right
of a pillory, usually had a ducking-stool and

gallows. Thomas de Chaworth, in the reign of
F
66 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Edward III, made a claim of a park, and the
right of free warren, at Alfreton, with the
privilege of having a gallows, tumbrel, and
pillory. ~

In the middle ages, frequently a pillory,
whipping-post, and stocks were combined, and

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PILLORY, WHIPPING-POST, AND STOCKS, WALLINGFORD.

we give a picture of a good example from
Wallingford, Berkshire. It will be observed that
they are planned to hold four delinquents, namely,
one in the pillory, one at the whipping-post, and
two in the stocks. They stood near the town
THE PILILORY. 67

hall, in the market-place, down to about the year
1830, when the pillory and whipping-post were
taken down. The stocks remained for a few
years longer to remind the tippler of his fate, if
he overstepped the bounds of temperance and
was caught drunk. In course of time they fell
into disuse, and were finally presented by the
Corporation to Mr. J. Kirby Hedges, of Walling-
ford Castle, the historian of the ancient town.
He informs us that there was a pillory at
Wallingford in 1231, and probably earlier.

A good representation of the pillory formerly
much used is furnished in a cut of Robert Ockam.
undergoing part of his
sentence for perjury, in
the reign of Henry VIII.
In the year 1543, Ockam,

with two other criminals

         
   
  

   

Z
SZ) fi
i

ZZ
ZZ

pp

Zi

mounted on horseback,

era

   
 
 

     

with papers on their heads,

and their faces towards
the tails of the horses, had ‘ag
to ride about Windsor, JE
Newbury and Reading,

and stand in the pillory of each of the three
towns,
68 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

We give a view of an ancient pillory which
formerly stood in the market-place of the village
of Paulmy, in Touraine. It is copied from a
picture of the Castle of Paulmy in Cosmographie
Unaverselle, 1575. 1t will be observed that it is

   

  

: |
5

EE |
B
8 |

0 a

 

PILLORY FOR A NUMBER OF PERSONS.

planned for holding a number of offenders at the
same time. This form of pillory was not generally
used. It was usually much simpler in construction,
and frequently was not a permanent structure.
THE PILLORY. 69

The following are some of the offences for
which persons have been condemned to this
species of discipline : Bakers for default of weight
(without remittance “for gold or silver.”)
Brewers for not keeping the assize. Butchers
for exposing unwholesome meat, which was
burned under their noses. Adulterers and fore-
stallers, dice coggers, forgers, cut-purses, liars and
libellers, and passers-off of latten rings for gold.

| Ten bakers, in the year 1327, were pilloried for
having trap-doors on their moulding-boards,
through which confederates abstracted part of the
+ dough. Those bakers beneath whose table any
dough was found, were adorned in the pillory by
having some of the stolen property hung round
their necks! In 1364, John de Hakford, for
telling a friend that there were ten thousand men
ready to rise and slay the chief men of London,
was sentenced to be imprisoned for a year and a
day, and to stand in the pillory for three hours
once every quarter ‘without hood or girdle,
barefoot and unshod, with a whetstone hung by a
chain from his neck, and lying on his breast, it
being marked with the words, 4 False Liar, and
there shall be a pair of trumpets trumpeting
before him on his way.” A man, in the year
70 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

1371, was put into the pillory for saying that
aliens might sell as freely as freemen. In 1379,
a fellow suffered the pillory for taking false
invitations to dine and receiving gratuities for the
same. In 1382, a maltman was pilloried and
burdened with a whetstone for saying the mayor
had been sent to the tower. It was in the same
year a conjuror was sent to the pillory for causing,
by his divinations, a woman to be accused of a
theft ; a quack also suffered the same punishment
for affecting to cure a sick woman by wrapping a
piece of parchment about her neck. A gentle-
man, in 1552, was “set on” the Cheapside pillory
for fraud, with his ears nailed to it, and, when the
prescribed period being fulfilled, ‘he would not
rent his eare, one of the bedles slitted yt upwards
with a penkniffe to loose yt.” In some cases the
nose was slit, the face branded with letters, and
one or both ears cut off. During the trembling
reign of the ill-starred Lady Jane Grey, a
vintner’s drawer had both ears nailed to the
pillory, by commandment of the Privy Council,
and cut clean off, «for seditious and trayterous
words speaking of the Queene yesternight.” A
trumpeter blew a blast to announce the perform-
ance of the act, while during the actual
7HE ‘PILLORY. 71

““ cuttinge,” his enormity was proclaimed by a
herald. Later, Queen Mary’s reign was diversi-
fied by like exhibitions. In 1556, one offender
was brought “from Westminster Hall, ridinge
with his face to the horse tayle, with a paper on
his head, to the Stenderd in Cheape, and there
set on the pillorie, and then burned with a hott
iron on both his cheeks with two letters (F. and
A.) for false accusinge of the Court of the
Common Place for treason.”

Stow, in his “ Survey of London,” supplies a
description of the Cornhill pillory, and gives
particulars of the crimes for which it was brought
into requisition. After adverting to the making
of a strong prison of timber, called a cage, and
fixing upon it a pair of stocks for night-walkers,
he next tells us: “On the top of the cage was
placed a pillory, for the punishment of bakers
offending in the assize of bread; for millers
stealing of corn at the mill; for bawds, scolds,
and other offenders.” As in the year 1486, the
seventh of Kdward IV., divers persons, being
common jurors, such as at assizes, were forsworn
for rewards or favour of parties, were judged to
ride from Newgate to the pillory of Cornhill,
with mitres of paper on their heads, there to
72 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

stand, and from thence again to Newgate ; and
this judgment was given by the Mayor of
London. In the year 1509, the first of Henry
VIIL, Darby, Smith, and Simson, ringleaders of
false inquests in London, rode about the city with
their faces to the horses’ tails, and papers on
their heads, and were set on the pillory in Corn-
hill, and after brought again to Newgate, where
they died for very shame, saith Robert Fabian.

A curious note, relating to this topic, ap-
pears in the “Journal of Henry Machyn,
Citizen of London,” published by the Camden
Society. It is stated that, on the 1st July, 1552,
there was a man and woman on the pillory in
Cheapside : the man sold pots of strawberries,
the which were not half full, but filled with fern.
On the 30th May, 1554, two persons were set on
the pillory, a man and a woman ; but the woman
had her ear nailed to the pillory for speaking
of false lies and rumours. The man was for
seditious and slanderous words.

An instance of great severity is recorded in
1621, when Edward Floyd was convicted of
having used slighting expressions concerning the
king’s son-in-law, the Elector Palatine, and his
wife. The sentence was given as follows: (1)
7878 PILLORY. 73

Not to bear arms as a gentleman, nor be a
competent witness in any Court of Justice.
(2) To ride with his face to a horse's tail, to
stand in the pillory, and have his ears nailed, ete.
(3) To be whipped at the cart’s tail. (4) To be
fined £5,000. (5) To be perpetually imprisoned
in Newgate. It was questioned whether Floyd,
being a gentleman, should be whipped, and have
his ears nailed. It was agreed by a majority that
he should be subject to the former, but not to the
latter. He stood two hours in the pillory, and
had his forehead branded.

Pepys, writing in his diary under date of
March 26th, 1664, relates that he had been
informed by Sir W. Batten that “some "prentices,
being put in the pillory to-day for beating of
their masters, or such-like thing, in Cheapside, a
company of ’prentices came and rescued them,
and pulled down the pillory ; and they being set
up again, did the like again.” We may infer,
from the foregoing and other facts that have
come down to wus respecting the London
apprentices, that they were a power in bygone
times, doing very much as they pleased.

We are enabled, by the courtesy of Messrs.
WwW. & RE Chambers, to reproduce from their
74 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

“Book of Days” an excellent illustration of
Oates in the pillory (from a contemporary print).
“ Found guilty,” says the writer in the “ Book of

 

 

OATES IN THE PILLORY (FROM A CONTEMPORARY PRINT).

Days,” “of perjury on two. separate indictments,

the inventor of the Popish Plot was condemned,
YHE PILIORY. 75

in 1685, to public exposure on three consecutive
days. The first day’s punishment, in Palace
Yard, nearly cost the criminal his life; but his
partisans mustered in such force in the city, on
the succeeding day, that they were able to upset
the pillory, and nearly succeeded in rescuing
their idol from the hands of the authorities.

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, on the 9th August; at Charing Cross on
the 10th; at the Temple on the 11th; at the
Royal Exchange on the 2nd September ; and
at Tyburn on the 24th April; but, fortunately
for the infamous creature, the Revolution
deprived his determined enemies of power,
and turned the criminal into a pensioner of
Government.”

It was formerly a common custom to put
persons in the pillory during the time of public
market. We may name, as an example, a case
occurring at Canterbury, in 1524. A man was
set up in the pillory, which was in the Market
Place, and bearing on his head a paper inscribed,
“This is a false, perjured, and forsworn man.”
He was confined in the pillory until the market
76 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

was over, and then led to Westgate and thrust
out of the town, still wearing the paper. “If he
be proud,” says an old writer, “ he may go home
and shew himself among his neighbours.”

The Corporation accounts of Newcastle-on-
Tyne contain, among other curious items, the

following :

1561.—Paid to the Gawyng Aydon, for squrgyn a
: boye about the town, and for settying a man

in the pallerye, two days ... ... ... ... 16d.

1562.—Paid for a tre to the pillyre ... .. 5s.
1574.—Paid to Charles Shawe, for rrres in carry-
inge the man to Durham that stode in the
pillarye, and was skrougide aboute the town

at Mr. Maior’s commandement... ... 3s.
1593.—Paide for a Papist which studd in the pills
for abusing Oure Majestie by slanderous

woordes... ... 4d.
1594.—Paide for 4 papers 0 ! tilke which + was ott on

the pillorie ... ... = 16d,

Paide Ro. Musgrave for takings paines 4

getbtthemaupp noi. oc ain one 3 BA

The “papers” above mentioned were for the
purpose of proclaiming to the world at large the
nature of the bearer’s offence.

At Hull, in the year 1556, the town ordinances
were revised and proclaimed ‘in the Market
Place, in the market-time, according to the yearly
custom.” The twenty-third rule runs as follows :
“ That no person whomsoever, presume to take
THE PILLORY. 7

down and carry away, any brick or stones off
or from the town’s walls, upon pain for every
default to be set upon the pillory, and to pay, for
a fine, to the town’s chamber, forty shillings.”
We may infer, from the foregoing, that the town’s
walls, both the original stone portion of Edward
I., and the later addition of brick, were in a state
of demolition. In 1559, the aldermen of Hull
were directed to take account of “all vagabonds,
idle persons, sharpers, beggars, and such like ;”
and, doubtless, not a few of the persons included
under these wide definitions would come to the
pillory, for the aldermen were ordered to punish

J’

them severely; ” and, as the punishments of Hull
were largely in fines, Mr. Wildridge, author of
“Old and New Hull,” suggests the moneyless
classes of persons above-named would be most
economically and severely dealt with by pillorying.
About 1813, a man, for keeping a disreputable
house, was placed in the pillory erected in the
Market-Place.

At Preston, Lancashire, in 1814, a man about
sixty years of age was pilloried for a similar
offence, and it is said that he was the last person
punished in this manner in the town.

Mr, John Nicholson, author of “ Folk Lore of
78 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

East Yorkshire,” says that the pillory at Driffield
was movable, and when in use stood in the
Market Place, near the Cross Keys Hotel. The
last occupants, a man and a woman, were pilloried
together about 1810, for fortune-telling. The
Bridlington pillory stood in the Market Place,
opposite the Corn Exchange. It was taken down
about 1835, and lay some time in Well Lane, but
it finally disappeared, and was probably chopped
up for firewood. Before its removal, there was
affixed to it a bell, which was rung to regulate
the market hours. Mischievous youths, however,
often rang it, so it was taken down in 1810, and
kept at a house down a court, known as Pillory
Bell Yard.

Mr. W. E. A. Axon, the well-known ILanca-
shire author and antiquary, kindly supplies the
following particulars respecting the Manchester
pillory : “The earliest notice of the pillory in
Manchester,” says Mr. Axon, “is the Court Leet
Records, 8th April, 1624, when the jury referred
the erection of a ‘ gibbett’ to the discretion of the
Steward and the Boroughreeve. Some delay
must have occurred, for on the 8th April, 1625,
‘the jurye doth order that the constables for this
yeare, att the charges of the inhabitants, shall
THE PILLORY. 79

cause to bee erected and sett vp a sufficient
gibbett or pilorye for the vse of this towne, in
some convenient place about the Markett Crosse,
and to take to them the advice of Mr. Steward
and the Bororeve. This to be done before the
xxiiijth day of August next, subpena xx®’ This

 

MANCHESTER PILLORY.

threat of a penalty was effective, and the careful
scribe notes factum est. The convenient place
was in the market-place, close to the stocks. The
pillory remained, more or less in use, until 1816,
when it was removed. Barritt, the antiquary,
made a drawing of it, which has been engraved.
80 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

It was jocularly styled the ‘tea table, and was
used as a whipping place also. In the present
century, it was not a permanent fixture, but a
movable structure, set up when required. One
pilloried individual, grimly jesting at his- own
sorrows, told an inquiring friend that he was
celebrating his nuptials with Miss Wood, and
that his neighbour, whom the beadle was
whipping, had come to dance at the wedding.
During the Civil War, there was a pillory for the
special benefit of the soldiers, and it was removed
from the Corn Market in 1651.”

The Rev. J. Charles Cox, LL.1., in his
“Three Centuries of Derbyshire Annals,” adverts
to the general employment of the pillory in
bygone times. “The two or three calendars,”
says Dr. Cox, “of prisoners of Elizabethan days
pertaining to Derbyshire that have come down to
our times, are a proof of its frequent application.
Five persons on one occasion, and nine on
another, were condemned to exposure in the
pillory at Derby, previous to a short period of
imprisonment. At the summer assizes, 1726,
John Clowne, convicted of a misdemeanor, is
ordered to be set in the pillory next market-day,
at Derby, between the hours of eleven and one,
THE PILIORY. 81

for the space of one hour, and to suffer three
months’ imprisonment.”

The Rye pillory still remains, and we give
a picture of it from a photograph taken for the
late Llewellynn Jewitt, F.S.A. The last time it

 

PILLORY AT RYE.

was used was in the year 1813, when a publican
was put in it for aiding the escape of General
Philippon, a French prisoner of war, who had
been brought to the town. The pullory was
erected on the beach, and the face of the culprit,

when undergoing the punishment, turned to the
G
82 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

coast of France. Mr. Holloway, the historian of
Rye, supplied Mr. Jewitt with some interesting
particulars respecting this pillory. ¢ It measures,”
says Mr. Holloway, “about six feet in height, by
four in width. It consists of two up-posts affixed
to a platform, and has two transverse rails, the
upper one of which is divided horizontally, and
has a hinge to admit of the higher portion being
lifted, so as to allow of the introduction of the
culprit’s head and hands. Through the platform
and the lower rail there are round perforations,
into which, when the instrument was in
requisition, an upright bar, probably of iron, was
introduced, so as to allow the pillory, with its
unfortunate tenant, to be turned bodily round at
pleasure.”

It will not be without interest to reproduce,
from contemporary newspapers and other publica-
tions, particulars of persons being pilloried. We
may learn, from a report in Fog’s Weekly Journal,
for June 12th, 1731, to what a fearful extent old-
time punishments were carried. It is stated that on
“ Thursday, Japhet Cook, alias Sir Peter Stringer,
who was, some time since, convicted of forging
deeds of conveyance of two thousand acres of land
belonging to Mr. Garbett and his wife, lying in
THE PILILORY. 83

the Parish of Claxton, in the County of Essex,
was brought, by the keeper of the King’s Bench,
to Charing Cross, where he stood in the pillory
from twelve to one, pursuant to his sentence.
The time being near expired, he was set on a
chair on the pillory, when the hangman, dressed
like a butcher, came to him, and, with a knife
like a gardener’s pruning-knife, cut off his ears,
and, with a pair of scissors, slit both his nostrils :
all which Cook bore with great patience ; but, at
the searing, with hot irons, of his right nostril,
the pain was so violent that he got up from his
chair. His left nostril was not seared, so he went
from the pillory bleeding.”

A remarkable scene at the pillory is re-
corded in the pages of the “ Annual Register,”
under date of June 25th, 1759 : “ Samuel Scrim-
shaw and James Ross,” it is stated, ““ stood in the
‘pillory for sending a threatening letter to extort a
large sum of money from Humphrey Morrice,
Esq., and were severely pelted by the populace ;
but one of the sheriff’s officers, having received an
affront by being too near the pillory, drew his
sword, and fell pell-mell among the thickest of
the people, cutting his way indiscriminately
through men, women, and children. This diverted
84 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

the fury of the mob from the criminals to the
officer, who, not being able to stand against such
numbers, made good his retreat to an adjoining
alley, where not above two or three could press
upon him at a time, and so escaped.” It will
be gathered from the following report culled
from the Craftsman, of November 25th, 1786,
that large guards of constables attended to
keep order when persons were pilloried. “ Yester-
day,” says the report, “at twelve o'clock, Mr.
A——, the attorney, was brought from New-
gate in a hackney-coach, and put into the
pillory, which was fixed in the middle of Palace
Yard, opposite Westminster Hall gate, and
stood for one hour. He was attended by the
sheriffs, under-sheriffs, and two city marshals, and
about six hundred constables, who kept every-
thing quiet. It is supposed that upwards of four
thousand people were assembled ; but, owing to
the sheriffs and other officers keeping a continual
look-out, and riding on horse-back about Palace
Yard the whole time, not any disturbance
happened. He was then put into a hackney-
coach, and carried back to Newgate.”

The following is extracted from the Morning
Herald, of January 28th, 1804 : “The enormity
THE PILIORY. = 85

of Thomas Scott's offence, in endeavouring to
accuse Captain Kennah, a respectable officer,
together with his servant, of robbery, having
attracted much public notice, his conviction, that
followed the attempt, could not but be gratifying
- to all lovers of justice. Yesterday, the culprit
underwent a part of his punishment: he was
placed in the pillory, at Charing Cross, for one
hour. On his first appearance, he was greeted by
a large mob with a discharge of small shot, such
as rotten eggs, filth, and dirt from the streets,
which was followed up by dead cats, rats, ete.,
which had been collected in the vicinity of the
Metropolis by the boys in the morning. When
he was taken away to Cold Bath Fields, to which
place he was sentenced for twelve months, the
mob broke the windows of the coach, and would
have proceeded to violence had not the police
‘officers been at hand.”

In the “Annual Register,” under date of
September 27th, 1810, are given the following
particulars of a number of persons being placed in
the pillory at the same time: “Cooke, the
publican of the ¢ Swan,” in Vere Street, and five
other of the eleven miscreants convicted of detest-
able practices, stood in the pillory in the
86 ; OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Haymarket, opposite to Panton Street. Such
was the degree of popular indignation excited
against these wretches, and such was the general
eagerness to witness their punishment, that by
ten in the morning all the windows, and even the
roofs of the houses, were crowded with persons of
both sexes; and every coach, waggon, hay-cart,
dray, and other vehicle, which blocked up a great
part of the streets, were crowded with spectators.
The sheriffs, attended by the two city marshals,
with an immense number of constables, accom-
panied the procession of the prisoners from
Newgate, where they set out in the transport
caravan, and proceeded through Fleet Street and
the Strand ; and the prisoners were hooted and
pelted the whole way by the populace. At one
o'clock, four of the culprits were fixed in the
pillory, erected for, and accommodated to the
occasion with, two additional wings, one being
allotted to each criminal. Immediately a new
torrent of popular vengeance poured upon them
from all sides—blood, garbage, and ordure from
the slaughter-house, diversified with dead cats,
turnips, potatoes, addled eggs, and other missiles,
to the last moment. Two wings of the pillory
were then taken off to place Cooke and Amos in,
TBE PILILORY. 87

who, although they came in for the second course,
had no reason to complain of short allowance.
The vengeance of the crowd pursued them back to
Newgate, and the caravan was filled with mud
and ordure. No interference from the sheriffs
and police officers could restrain the popular rage;
but, notwithstanding the immensity of the multi-
tude, no accident of any note occurred.”

The famous Lord Thurlow was eloquent for the
‘preservation of the pillory, which he called “the
restraint against licentiousness, provided by the
wisdom of past ages.” This was in a case against
the Rev. Horne Tooke, who, escaped with a fine
of £200. Of others, who have spoken for and
against it, may be mentioned Lord Macclesfield,
who, in 1719, condemned it as a punishment for

State criminals. In 1791, Pitt claimed to have
dissuaded the Government from its too frequent

use, as had Burke. In 1812, Lord Ellenborough
sentenced a blasphemer to the pillory for two
hours once a month, for eighteen months. In
1814, again, he ordered Lord Cochrane, the
famous sea-fighter of Brasque Roads fame, to be
pilloried for conspiring with others to spread false
news. But his colleague, Sir Francis Burdett,
declared that he would stand by his side in the
88 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

pillory regardless of consequences. In the then
state of public opinion, the Government declined
to undertake the responsibility, and this punish-
ment was waived.

It was no uncommon circumstance for the
offenders to be killed on the pillory, by the
pelting which they were subjected to by the
fury of the crowd. In 1731, a professional
witness, 7.e., one who for the reward offered for
the conviction of criminals, would swear falsely
against them, was sentenced to the pillory of
Seven Dials, where, so bitter were the populace
against him that they pelted him to death. The
coroner's jury returned a verdict of ‘ wilful
murder by persons unknown.” In 1756, the
drovers of Smithfield pelted two perjured thief-
catchers so violently that one died; in 1763,
a man died from a like cause, at Southwark ;
in 1780, a coachman died from injuries before
his time had expired.

An amusing anecdote is related, bearing upon
a pillory accident. “A man,” says Chambers’
“ Book of Days,” “being condemned to the pillory
in or about Elizabeth's time, the footboard on
which he was placed proved to be rotten, and
down it fell, leaving him hanging by the neck, in
THE PILLORY. . 89

danger of his life. On being liberated, he brought
an action against the town for the insufficiency of
its pillory, and recovered damages.”

In the year 1812, the pillory ceased to be
employed for punishing persons, except in cases
of perjury, and for this crime a man was put in
the pillory in 1830. The pillory, in the year
1837, was abolished by Act of Parliament.

The next chapter furnishes further particulars
respecting the pillory. In bygone times it was
very generally used for punishing authors.
Punishing Hutbors and Burning IBOoRs.

ITERARY annals contain many records of

the punishments of authors. The Greeks

and Romans frequently brought writers into
contempt by publicly burning their books. In
England, in years agone, it was a common
practice to place in the pillory authors who
presumed to write against the reigning monarch,
or on political and religious subjects which were
not in accord with the opinions of those in power.
The public hangman was often directed to make
bonfires of the works of offending authors. At
Athens, the common crier was instructed to burn
all the prohibited works of Pythagoras which
could be found. It is well known that Numa did
much to build up the glory of Rome. It was he
who gave to his countrymen the ceremonial
laws of religion, and it was under his rule that
they enjoyed the blessings of peace. His death
was keenly felt by a grateful people, and he was
honoured with a grand and costly funeral. In
PUNISHING AUTHORS. eu 91

his grave were found some of his writings, which

were contrary to his religious teaching ; and the

fact being made known to the Senate, an order

was made directing the manuscripts to be con-

sumed by fire. In the days of Augustus, no less

than twenty thousand volumes were consigned on

one occasion to the flames. The works of
Labienus were amongst those which were burnt.

It was a terrible blow to the author and some of
his friends. Cassius Severus, when he heard the
sentence pronounced, exclaimed in a loud voice

that they must burn him also, for he had learnt

all the books by heart. It was the death-blow to

Labienus ; he repaired to the tomb of his fore-

fathers, refused food, and pined away. It is

asserted that he was buried alive. At Constan-

tinople, Leo I. caused two hundred thousand

books to be consumed by fire.

The Bible did not escape the flames. Tt is
stated by Eusebius that, by the direction of
Dioclesian, the Scriptures were burnt. According
to Foxe, the well-known writer on the martyrs,
on May, 1531, Bishop Stokesley “caused all the
New Testament of Tindal’s translation, and many
other books which he had bought, to be openly
burnt in St. Paul's churchyard.” It was there
92 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

that the Bishop of Rochester in a sermon
denounced Martin Luther and all his works. He
spoke of all who kept his books as accursed.
Not a few of the condemned works were
publicly burnt during the delivery of the sermon.

A man named Stubbs, in the reign of Queen
Elizabeth, lost his hand for writing a pamphlet
of Radical tendencies.

A gentleman named Collingbourne, wrote the
following couplet respecting Gatesby, Ratcliff,
and Lovel giving their advice to Richard IIL,
whose crest, it will be remembered, was a white

boar :
“The cat, the rat, and Lovel our dog,
Rule all England under a hog.”

He was executed on Tower Hill for writing the
foregoing lines. After “having been hanged,” it is
recorded, “he was cut down immediately, and his
entrails were then extracted and thrown into the
fire ; and all this was so speedily performed that,”
Stow says, “ when the executioner pulled out his
heart, he spoke, and said, ¢ Jesus, Jesus.” ”

It is generally understood that Christopher
Marlow translated, as a college exercise, “ Amores
of Ovid.” It was a work of unusual ability ; but

did not, however, meet with the approval of *
PUNISHING AUTHORS. 93

Archbishop Whitgift and Bishop Bancroft. In
consequence, in June, 1599, all copies were
ordered to be burnt. A few escaped the fire,

and are now very valuable. Milton’s books were

burnt by the common hangman, on August 27th,

1659.

Authors and publishers were often nailed
by the ears to the pillory, and when ready to
be set at liberty the ears would frequently
be cut off, and left on the post of the pillory.
A farce called “The Patron,” by Foote, con-
tains allusions to the practice. Puff advises
Dactyl to write a satire. To the suggestion
replies Dactyl: “ Yes, and so get cropped for
libel.” Puff answers him: “Cropped! aye,
and the luckiest thing that could happen you!
Why, I would not give twopence for an author
who is afraid of his ears! Writing—writing
is, as I may say, Mr. Dactyl, a sort of war-
fare, and none can be victor that can be least
afraid of a scar: Why, zooks, sir! I never got
salt to my porridge till T mounted at the Royal

Exchange; and that was the making of me.

Then my name made a noise in the world. Talk
of forked hills and Helicon! Romance and fabul-

ous stuff, the true Castalian stream is a shower

A
94 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

of eggs, and a pillory the poet’s Parnassus.” In
1630, Dr. Leighton, a clergyman, and father of
the celebrated archbishop of that name, was tried
and found guilty of printing a work entitled,
“ Zion’s Plea against Prelacy,” in which he called
bishops men of blood, ravens, and magpies, and
pronounced the institution of Episcopacy to be
satanical ; he called the Queen a daughter of
Heth, and even commanded the murder of
Buckingham. His sentence was a hard one, and
consisted of a fine of £10,000. He was also
degraded the ministry, pilloried, branded, and
whipped ; an ear was cropped off, and his nostril
slit. After enduring these punishments, he was
sent to the Fleet Prison. At the end of the
week, he underwent a second course of cruelty,
and was consigned to prison for life. After
eleven weary years passed in prison, Leighton
was liberated, the House of Commons having
reversed his sentence. He was told that his
mutilation and imprisonment had been illegal!
At this period in our history, a book or pamphlet
“could not be printed without a license from the
Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop of London,
or the authorities of the two universities. Only

authorised printers were permitted to set up
PUNISHING AUTHORS. 95

printing presses in the City of London. Any
one printing without the necessary authority
subjected himself to the risk of being placed in
the pillory and whipped through the City.

Liburn and Warton disregarded the foregoing
order, and printed and published libellous and
seditious works. They refused to appear before
the court where such offences were tried. The
authorities found them guilty, and fined each man
£500, and ordered them to be whipped from
Fleet Prison to the pillory at Westminster. The
sentence was carried out on April the 18th, 1638.
Liburn appears to have been a man of dauntless
courage, and when in the pillory, he gave away
copies of his obnoxious works to the crowd, and
addressed them on the tyranny of his persecutors.
He was gagged to stop his speech.

William Prynne lost his ears for writing
“ Historic-Mastix : the Player's Scourge, or
Actor's Tragedie” (1633). His pillory experi-
ences were of the most painful character.

According to an entry in the annals of Hull, in
the year 1645, all the books of Common Prayer
were burned by the Parliamentary soldiers, in
the market-place.

One of Mr. C. H. Spurgeon’s predecessors,
96 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

named Benjamin Keach, a Baptist Minister, of
Winslow, in the County of Bucks, issued a work
entitled, “The Child’s Instructor; or, a New
and Easy Primmer.” [The book was regarded
as seditious, and the authorities had him tried for

 

BENJAMIN KEACH IN THE PILLORY.

writing and publishing it, at the Aylesbury
Assizes, on the 8th October, 1664. The judge
passed on him the following sentence :

“ Benjamin Keach, you are here convicted of writing and

publishing a seditious and scandalous Book, for which the
Court's judgment is this, and the Court doth award, That you
PUNISHING AUTHORS. 97

shall go to gaol for a fortnight, without bail or mainprise ; and
the next Saturday to stand upon the pillory at Ailsbury for
the space of two hours, from eleven o'clock to one, with a
Paper upon your head with this inscription, For writing,
printing and publishing a schismatical book, intitled, The
Child's Instructor, or a new and easy Primmer. And the next
Thursday so stand in the same manner, and for the same time
in the market of Winslow ; and there your book shall be
openly burnt before your face by the common hangman, in
disgrace to you and your doctrine. And you shall forfeit to
the King’s Majesty the sum of £20 and shall remain in goal
until you find sureties for your good behaviour and appearance
at the next assizes, there to renounce your doctrine, and to
make such public submission as shall be enjoined you.”

We are told that Keach was kept a close
prisoner until the following Saturday, and on that
day was carried to the pillory at Aylesbury,
where he stood two hours without being per-
mitted to speak to the spectators. It is recorded
that his hands as well as his head were care-
fully kept in the pillory the whole time. The
next Thursday he stood in the same manner
and length of time at Winslow, the town
where he lived, and his book was burnt before
him. “ After this,” we learn from Howell's
“ State Trials,” “upon paying his fine, and giving
sufficient security for his good behaviour, he was
set at liberty ; but was never brought to make
recantation.”

Thomas Disney, who appears to have been a
H
98 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

minister at Stoke Hamond, Bucks, addressed to
Luke Wilkes a letter, as follows :

“ Honoured Sir,

And loving Brother this Primer owned by
Benjamin Keach as the Author and bought by my man
George Chilton for five pence of Henry Keach of Stableford
Mill neare me, a miller; who then sayd that his brother
Benjamin Keach is author of it, and that there are fiveteene
hundred of them printed. This Benjamin Keach is a Tayler,
and one that is a teacher in this new fangled way, and lives
at Winslow, a market towne in Buckinghamshire. Pray take
some speedie course to acquaint my Lord Archbishop his grace
with it, whereby his authoritie may issue forth that ye
impression may be seized upon before they be much more
dispersed to ye poysoining of people ; they contayning, (as I
conceive) factious, schismaticall, and hereticall matter. Some
are scattered in my parish, and perchance in no place sooner,
because he hath a sister here and some others of his gang, two
whereof I have bought up. Pray let me have your speedie
account of it. I doubt not but it will be taken as acceptable
service to God’s Church, and beleeve it a very thankefull
obligement to

Stoke hamond in Honoured Sir

Bucks—64 Your truely loving Brother

May 26th Thomas Disney.
(Addressed)

These for his honoured friend Luke
Wilkes esqre. at Whitehall with speed

pray present.”
The above is from the State Papers of-the period.
Defoe wrote much and well. He was by birth
and education a Dissenter, and with much ability
asserted the rights of Nonconformists. At a
time when Churchmen were trying to obtain hard
PUNISHING AUTHORS. 29

measures against the Dissenters, he directed
against the Church party a severe satire, under
the title of “The Shortest Way with the
Dissenters.” Tt exasperated the members of the
Government, and a reward of fifty pounds was
offered for his apprehension. The advertisement
respecting him is a literary curiosity, and appeared
in The London Gazette. It reads as follows :

“Whereas Daniel De Foe, alias De Fooe, is charged with
writing a scandalous and seditious pamphlet, entitled, ‘The
Shortest Way with the Dissenters” He is a middle-sized,
spare man, about forty years old, of a brown complexion, and
dark brown coloured hair, but wears a wig, a hooked nose, a
sharp chin, grey eyes, and a large mole near his mouth ; was
born in London, and for many years was a hose factor, in
Truman’s-yard, in Cornhill, and now is owner of a brick and
pantile works near Tilbury-fort, in Essex. Whoever shall
discover the said Daniel De Foe to any of Her Majesty's
principal Secretaries of State, or any of Her Majesty’s Justices
of the Peace, so as he may be apprehended, shall have a
reward of fifty pounds, which Her Majesty has ordered
immediately to be paid upon such discovery.”

Defoe managed to keep out of the way of the
authorities, but on hearing that the printer and
publisher of the pamphlet were put into prison,
he gave himself up, and they were set at liberty.
He was tried at the Old Bailey, in July, 1704,
and pleaded guilty. Tt is said that he put in
this plea on the promise of pardon secretly given

tohim. He did not, however, escape punishment ;
100 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

he was fined two hundred marks, ordered to
appear three times in the pillory, and remain in
prison during the Queen’s pleasure.

During his imprisonment before being placed
in the pillory, he wrote the famous “ Hymn to the
Pillory,” which was speedily put into type and
sung by the crowd at the time Defoe was in the

pillory. Here are some lines from it:

Hail hieroglyphic State machine,

Contrived to punish fancy in ;

Men that are men, in thee can feel no pain,
And all thy insignificants disdain,

Contempt, that false new word for shame,

Is, without crime, an empty name ;

A shadow to amuse mankind,

But ne'er to fright the wise or well-fixed mind.
Virtue despises human scorn !

Even learned Seldon saw

A prospect of thee through the law.
He had thy lofty pinnacles in view,
But so much honour never was thy due.

The first intent of laws

Was to correct the effect, and check the cause,
And all the ends of punishment

Were only future mischiefs to prevent.

But justice is interverted, when

Those engines of the law,

Instead of pinching vicious men,

Keep honest ones in awe.

Tell them the men that placed him there
Are friends unto the times ;
PUNISHING AUTHORS. 101

But at a loss to find his guilt,
And can’t commit his crimes.

Defoe fared well in the pillory. He was not
pelted with rotten eggs, but with flowers; and
beautiful garlands were suspended from the pillory.
In a modest manner, he gave an account of the
affair. “The people,” he wrote, “ were expected
to treat me very ill, but it was not so. On the
contrary, they were with me—wished those who
had set me there were placed in my room, and
expressed their affections by loud thanks and
acclamations when I was taken down.”

There is not the least truth in Pope's well-

known, and we may say disgraceful line :
Earless, on high stood unabash’d De Foe.

After Defoe had spent about a year in prison,
the Queen sent to his wife money to pay the fine.

A work was issued in 1704, entitled, “The
Superiority and Dominion of the Crown of
England over the Crown of Scotland,” by
William Attwood. The Scottish Parliament had
the publication under consideration, and pro-
nounced it scurrilous and full of falsehoods, and
finally commanded the public hangman of Edin-
burgh to burn the book,
102 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Williams, the bookseller, was put in the pillory
in the year 1765, for republishing the North
Briton in forty-five volumes. “The coach,” says
The Gentleman's Magazine, “that carried him
from the King’s Bench Prison to the pillory was
No. 45. He was received with the acclamations
of a prodigious concourse of people. Opposite to
the pillory was erected two ladders, with cords
running from each other, on which were hung a
jack-boot, an axe, and a Scotch bonnet. The
latter, after remaining some time, was burnt, and
the top-boot chopped off. During his standing,
also, a purple purse, ornamented with ribbands of
an orange colour, was produced by a gentleman,
who began a collection in favour of the culprit by
putting a guinea into it himself, after which, the
purse being carried round, many contributed, to
the amount in the whole, as supposed, of about
two hundred guineas.”

The spectators loudly cheered Mr. Williams on
getting into and out of the pillory. He held a
sprig of laurel in his hand during the time he
was confined in the pillory.

Alexander Wilson, the famous ornithologist
and poet, in the year 1793, was tried for publish-

ing some satirical poems concerning certain
PUNISHING AUTHORS. 103

Paisley manufacturers. The pieces were regarded
as libellous, and he was fined £12 13s. 6d., and
condemned to burn in a public manner his poems
at the Market Cross at Paisley. The poet was
unable to pay the fine, and had to go to prison
for a short time. The circumstance was the chief
cause of Wilson leaving Scotland for America.

A very large number of books taken from the
monasteries were burned in France in the year
1790. At Paris, 808,120 volumes were consumed
by fire, and in the whole country the total is said
to have exceeded 4,194,412, and of this large
number, 2,000,000 were on theology, and 26,000
were manuscripts.

In speaking of France, we are reminded of a
story related of Voltaire, and with it we may
fitly close this section. During a visit to the
King of Prussia, at Berlin, he wrote on his
Majesty a far from complimentary epigram. He
was punished by the sergeant-at-arms for the
offence, and compelled to write a receipt acknow-
ledging that he had been flogged. It ran as
follows :

“ Received from the right hand of Conrad Bochoffner,

thirty lashes on my bare back, being in full for an epigram on
Frederick III., King of Prussia. Vive le Roi.”
Finger=[pillory.

eae or stocks, in past

ages, were probably frequently employed in
the old manorial halls of England; but at the
present period only traces of few are to be found.
The most interesting example is one in the parish
church of Ashby-de-la-Zouch, Leicestershire,
which has been frequently described and
illustrated. An account of it appears in Notes
and Queries of October 25th, 1851. It is
described as “fastened at its right hand extremity
into a wall, and consists of two pieces of oak ; the
bottom and fixed piece is three feet eight inches
long ; the width of the whole is four-and-a-half
inches, and when closed, it is five inches deep :
the left hand extremity is supported by a leg of
the same width as the top, and two feet six
inches in length ; the upper piece is joined to the
lower by a hinge, and in this lower and fixed
horizontal part are a number of holes, varying in

size ; the largest are towards the right hand:
FINGER-PILLORY. 105

these holes are sufficiently deep to admit the
finger to the second joint, and a slight hollow is
made to admit the third one, which lies flat;
there is, of course, a corresponding hollow at the
top of the moveable part, which, when shut down,
encloses the whole finger.” Thomas Wright,
F.S.A., in his “ Archaeological Album,” gives an
illustration of the Ashby-de-la-Zouch example,

 

FINGER-PILLORY, ASHBY-DE-LA-ZOUCH.

and we reproduce a copy. “It shows the manner
in which the finger was confined, and it will
easily be seen that it could not be withdrawn
until the pillory was opened. If the offender
were held long in this posture, the punishment
must have been extremely painful.”

Amongst the old-time relics at Littlecote Hall,
an ancient Wiltshire mansion, may still be seen
106 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

a finger-pillory. It is made of oak. We give an
illustration of it from a drawing executed expressly
for this work. At Littlecote Hall it is spoken of
as an instrument of domestic punishment.

Plot, in his “ History of Staffordshire,” pub-
lished in 1686, gives an illustration of one of

RE A Hii
Wy |

ny m eg

  

FINGER-PILLORY, LITTLECOTE HALL.

»

these old-time finger-pillories. “I cannot forget,
writes Plot, “a piece of art that I found in the
Hall of the Right Honourable William Lord
Paget, at Beaudesart, made for the punishment
of disorders that sometimes attend feasting, in
Christmas time, etc., called the finger-stocks, into
FINGER-PILLORY. 107

which the Lord of Misrule used to put the fingers
of all such persons as committed misdemeanours,
or broke such rules, as, by consent, were agreed
on for the time of keeping Christmas among the
servants and others of promiscuous quality ; there
being divided in like manner, as the stocks of the
legs, and having holes of different sizes to fit for
scantlings of all fingers, as represented in the

table.” We reproduce a sketch of Plot's picture.

 

FINGER-PILLORY, BEAUDESART.

In an account of the Customs of the Manor of
Ashton-under-Tiyne, in the fifteenth century, it is
stated at the manorial festivals, “in order to
preserve as much as possible the degree of decorum
that was necessary, there were frequently intro-
duced a diminutive pair of stone stocks of about
eighteen inches in length, for confining within
them the fingers of the unruly.”
The Fougs.

HIS old-time instrument of punishment was
more generally used in Scotland than in
England. It was employed in Holland, and most
likely in other countries. In Scotland, its history
may be traced back to the sixteenth century, and
from that period down to about a hundred years
ago, 1t was a popular means of enforcing
ecclesiastical discipline, and it was also brought
into requisition for punishing persons guilty of
the lesser civil offences. In North Britain the
Jougs were usually fastened to a church door, a
tree in a churchyard, or to the post of a church
gate, a market cross, a market tron, or weighing-
post, and not infrequently to prison doors.

The jougs are simple in form, consisting of an
iron ring or collar, with a joint or hinge at the
back to permit it being opened and closed, and in
the front are loops for the affixing of a padlock
$0 secure it round the neck of the culprit.

Nm
THE JOUGS. 109

The ‘Diary of Henry Machyn, Citizen and
Merchant-Taylor of London, from a.p. 1550 to
A.p. 15637 (published by the Camden Society in

1848), contains the following note on the use of

 

 

 

 

 

THE JOUGS, PRIORY CHURCH, BRIDLINGTON.

the jougs: “ The 30th day of June, 1553,” it is
stated, “ was set a post hard by the Standard in
Cheap, and a young fellow tied to the post with.a
110 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

collar of iron about his neck, and another to the
post with a chain, and two men with two whips
whipping them about the post, for pretended
visions and opprobrious and seditious words.”
We have modernised the spelling of Machyn.

Disregarding parental authority in Secot-
land was frequently the cause of young folks
being punished by the jougs, and in other ways.
Harsh rules of life were by no means confined to
North Britain. In Tudor England manners
were severe and formal, parents extracting abject
deference from their offspring. A child did not
presume to speak or sit down without leave in
presence of its parents. A little leniency was
extended to girls, for when tired they might kneel
on cushions at the far end of the room ; but boys
were expected to stand with their heads uncovered.
It is to be feared that true domestic bliss was
almost unknown in olden times. Teachers were
equally tyrannical, and it is a matter of history
that Robert Ascham, the tutor of Queen Eliza-
beth, used to * pinch, nip, and bob [slap] the
princess when she displeased him.”

Some very curious facts relating to this subject
were drawn from the old Kirk-Session records, by

the Rev. Charles Rogers, LL.D., for his “Social
THE JOUGS. 111

Life in Scotland,” an important work printed for
the Grampian Club. “David Leyes, who struck
his father,” was, says Dr. Rogers, by a Kirk-
Session of St. Andrews, in 1574, sentenced to
appear before the congregation “ bairheddit and
beirfuttit, upon the highest degree of the penitent
stuool, with a hammer in the ane hand and ane
stane in the uther hand, as the twa instruments he
mannesit his father,—with ane papir writin in
great letteris about his heid with these wordis,
‘ Behold the onnaturall Son, punished for putting
hand on his father, and dishonouring of God in

>.

him. Nor was this deemed sufficient humilia-
tion, for the offender was afterwards made to
stand at the market cross two hours “in the jaggs,
and thereafter cartit through the haill toun.” It
was also resolved that “if ever he offended father
or mother heireafter, the member of his body
quhairly he offendit salbe cuttit off from him,
be it tung, hand or futt without mercy, as
examples to utheris abstein fra the lyke.” At
Glasgow, in the year 1598, the Presbytery care-
fully considered the conduct of a youth who
had passed his father “ without lifting his bonnet.”

A servant at Wigtown, in 1694, was brought

before the magistrates for raising her hand and
112 . OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

abusing her mistress, and was ordered to stand a
full hour with the jougs round her neck.

At Rothesay, a woman gave the members of
the Kirk-Session a great deal of trouble through
departing from the path of sobriety. Persuasion
and rebuke were tried without avail. At last, in
the year 1661, the Session warned her that “if
hereafter she should be found drunk, she would
be put in the jouggs and have her dittay written
on her face”

Mz. James S. Thomson read a paper before the
Dumfries Antiquarian Society, supplying some
interesting glimpses of bygone times furnished by
the Kirk-Session Records of Dumfries. Not the
least important information was that relating to
punishments of the past. It will not be without
interest to notice a few of the cases. In the year
1637, a man named Thomas Meik had been found
guilty of slandering Agnes Fleming, and he was
sentenced to stand for a certain time in the jougs
at the tron, and subsequently on his bare knees at
the market cross to ask her pardon.

The case of Bessie Black was investigated, and
it was proved that for the third time she had

been found guilty of leaving the path of virtue,
gessions she was directed for six

 
gr)

THE JOUGS. 113

Sabbaths to stand at the Cross in the jougs. In
another case it was proved that two servants had
been found guilty of scolding each other, and
sentence was given that they were “to be put
into the jougs presently.” A curious sentence
was passed in the year 1644. A man and his
wife were ordered to stand at the Kirk-style with
their hands in their mouths.

Exposure of persons to the contempt of the
public was formerly a common form of punishment
in Scotland. Curious information bearing on
the subject may be gleaned from the old news-
papers. We gather from the columns of the

» Aberdeen Journal, for the year 1759, particulars

of three women, named Janet Shinney, Margaret
Barrack, and Mary Duncan, who suffered by
being exposed in public. | % Upon trial,” it is
reported, ‘they were convicted, by their own

~ confessions, of being in the practice, for some time

past, of stealing and resetting tea and sugar, and
several other kinds of merchant’s goods, from a
merchant in the town. And the Magistrates
have sentenced them to be carried to the Market
Cross of Aberdeen, on Thursday the 31st [ May,
1759], at twelve o'clock at noon, and to be tied to
a stake bareheaded for one, hour, by the
| I
114 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

executioner, with a rope about each of their
necks, and a paper on their breasts denoting
their crime ; to be removed to prison, and taken
down again on Friday the 1st June at twelve
o'clock, and to stand an hour at the Market Cross
in the manner above mentioned ; and thereafter
to be transported through the whole streets of
the town in a cart bareheaded (for the greater
ignominy), with the executioner and tuck of
drum, and to be banished the burgh and liberties
in all time coming.” In bygone ages, it was a
common custom to banish persons from towns for
frail conduct. A woman at Dumfries, for
example, was for a fourth lapse from virtue
sentenced “to be carted from the toun.”

We have been favoured with an interesting
note bearing on banishing a woman, by Mr.
William Wilson of Sanquhar, a gentleman who
takes a deep delight in all that relate
to the “days o langsyne.” The last case
of banishing a person from Sanquhar occurred
some sixty years since, and there are old people
still living who remember it. A fine-looking
young woman had been found guilty of a petty
theft, and was sentenced to be drummed out of
the town. She was accordingly brought out of

La

4

i
THE JOUGS. 115

the gaol ; round her neck was tied a rope, and the
end of it was held by the jailor. A paper was
pinned to her back bearing an inscription, thus,
“This iz a Thief” She was led the whole
length of the main street and back. A man
followed on her heels, beating a drum to
attract the attention of the public. She was
then ordered to quit the town.

At a meeting of the Kirk-Session at Lesma-
hago, held in June, 1697, the case of a shepherd
who had shorn his sheep on the Parish Fast was
seriously discussed, with a view of severely
punishing him for the offence. A minute as
follows was passed: “The Session, considering
that there are several scandals of this nature
breaking forth, recommends to the bailie of the
bailerie of Lesmahago to fix a pair of jougs at the
kirk door, that he may cause punish corporally
~ those who are not able to pay fines, and that
according to law.”

A common word in Ayrshire for the jougs was
“bregan.” In the accounts of the parish of

Mauchline is an entry as under :

1681. For a lock to the bregan and
mendingit. .... ... .. £116 0

In Jamieson’s « Dictiopary ” it is spelled “brad-
116 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

yeane.” Persons neglecting to attend church on
the Sunday were frequently put into the jougs.
Several cases of this case might be cited, but
perhaps particulars of one will be sufficient. A
man named John Persene was brought before the
Kirk-Session of Galston, in 1651. He admitted
he had not been to church for the space of five
weeks. He, for thus neglecting to attend to the
ordinances, was ““injoyned to apier in the public
place of repentence, and there to be publicly
rebuked, with certificatione that if he be found to
be two Sabbaths together absent from the church
he shall be put in the breggan.”

In “Prehistoric Annals of Scotland,” by
Daniel Wilson, LL.D. (London, 1863), there is a
drawing of a fine old pair of jougs, ¢ found,” says
Wilson, “imbedded in a venerable ash tree,
recently blown down, at the churchyard gate,
Applegirth, Dumfriesshire. The tree, which was
of great girth, is believed to have been upwards
of three hundred years old, and the jougs were
completely imbedded in its trunk, while the chain
and staple hung down within the decayed and
hollow core.” The jougs belonging to the parish
of Galashiels are preserved at Abbotsford. At

Merton, Berwickshire, the jougs may be seen
THE JOUGS. 117

at the church. The Fenwick jougs are still

fastened to the church wall, and the old Session
Records of the parish contain references to cases
where persons were ordered to “stand in the
Jougs from eight till ten, and thence go to the
place of repentence within ye kirk.” At the

village of Kilmaurs, Ayrshire, the jougs are

 

JOUGS FROM THE OLD CHURCH OF COVA, FORFARSHIRE.

attached to the old Tolbooth, at the town of
Kinross are fastened to the market cross, and at
Sanquhar they are in front of the town hall.

We give three illustrations of the jougs. One
represents a very fine example, which may be seen
in the Priory Church of Bridlington, Yorkshire.
We believe that this is the first picture which has
118 : OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

been published of this interesting old-time relic.
It is referred to in the local guide books, but no
information is given saying when last used.

It is stated in the « History of Wakefield
Cathedral,” by John W. Walker, F.S.A., that “an
old chain, leaded into the wall at the junction of

 

THE JOUGS, AT DUDDINGSTON.

the north aisle with the tower in the interior of
the church, is said to have been used for the
purpose of fastening up persons who disturbed the
service.” We think that it may be safely assumed
that formerly the jougs were affixed at the end
of the chain.
THE JOUGS. 119

In the Museum of the Society of Antiquaries of
Scotland, Edinburgh, may be seen the jougs of
the old parish church of Cova, Forfarshire. This
interesting museum also contains other specimens.
About a mile from Edinburgh is the charming
hamlet of Duddingston, and at the churchyard
gate are the jougs, which form a curious link
between the ruder customs of bygone ages and

the more refined life of modern times.
{Bag

 

The Stocks.

N some of the remoter villages of
England, where ancient customs linger the
longest, may still be seen the remains of the old
parish stocks, and in a few places the stocks
themselves still stand In their original form,
Stocks were. used, at an early period, as a
means of punishing breakers of the law. The

   
   
   
     
    
 

illustrations,
e stocks were
eral use amongst
figure in draw-
ings of their pub : le picture we

. an MS., No. 65.
by the side of the
a town. It will be

here give is fror
The stocks were
public road, at -

 
THE STOCKS. 121

observed that two offenders are fastened to the
columns of a public building by means of a rope
or chain. It has been suggested, and is most
likely a court-house. The “Cambridge Trinity
College Psalter —an illuminated manuscript—
presents some curious illustrations of the manners
of the earlier half of the twelfth century. We
give a reproduction of one of its quaint pictures.
Two men are in the stocks ; one, it will be seen,
is held by one leg only, and the other by both,

 

TAUNTING PERSONS IN THE STOCKS.

and a couple of persons are taunting them in
their time of trouble.

Stocks were ndt only used as a mode of punish-
ment, but as means of securing offenders. In
bygone times, every vill of common right was
compelled to erect a pair of stocks at its own
expense. The constable by common law might
place persons in the stocks to keep them in hold,
but not by way of punishment.

 
122 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

We gather from an act passed during the reign
of Edward III., in the year 1351, and known as
the Second Statute of Labourers, that if artificers
were unruly they were liable to be placed in the
stocks. Some years later, namely, in 1376,

 

IN THE PARISH STOCKS, BY ALFRED CROWQUILL.

the Commons prayed that the stocks might be
established in every village. In 1405, an Act
was passed for every town and village to be
provided with a pair of stocks, so that a place
THE STOCKS. 123

which had not this instrument of punishment and
detention was regarded as a hamlet. Mr. S. M.
Morris, in his privately-printed work on “The
Obsolete Punishments of Shropshire,” has an
interesting note bearing on this point. “No
village,” says Mr. Morris, “ was considered to be
complete, or even worthy of the name of village,
without its stocks, so essential to due order and
government were they deemed to be. A Shrop-
shire historian, speaking of a hamlet called
Hulston, in the township of Middle, in order,
apparently, to prove calling the place a hamlet
and not a village he was speaking correctly,
remarks in proof of his assertion, that Hulston
did not then, or ever before, possess a constable, a
pound, or stocks.”

Wynkyn de Worde, who, in company with
Richard Pynsent, succeeded to Caxton’s printing
business, in the year 1491, issued from their press
the play of “Hick Scorner,” and in one of the
scenes the stocks are introduced. The works of
Shakespeare include numerous allusions to this
subject. “Thus,” says Dyer, in “ The Folk-Lore
of Shakespeare,” *“ Launce, in ‘The Two Gentle-
men of Verona’ (IV. 4), says: ‘I have sat in the
stocks for puddings he hath stolen.” In ‘All's
124 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Well that Ends Well’ (IV. 3), Bertram says:
¢ Come, bring forth this counterfeit module has
deceived me, like a double-meaning prophesier.’
Whereupon one of the French lords adds :. ¢ Bring
him forth ; has sat i’ stocks all night, poor gallant
knave.’ Volumnia says of Coriolanus (V. 3):
¢ There's no man in the world

More bound to ’s mother ; yet here lets me prate

Like one i’ the stocks.’
Again, in the ‘Comedy of Errors’ (111. 1),
Luce speaks of ‘a pair of stocks in the town,
and in ‘ King Lear’ (IL. 2), Cornwall, referring

to Kent, says :
‘Fetch forth the stocks!
You stubborn ancient knave.’”

It would seem that formerly, in great houses, as
in some colleges, there were movable stocks for
the correction of the servants.

In Butler's ¢“ Hudebras” are allusions to the

stocks. Says the poet :

¢ An old dull sot, who toll’d the clock
For many years at Bridewell-dock ;

“ Engaged the constable to seize
All those that would not break the peace ;
Let out the stocks and whipping-post,
And cage, to those that gave him most.”
THE STOCKS. 125

We are enabled, by the kindness of Mr. Austin
Dobson, author of “Thomas Bewick and his
Pupils,” to reproduce from that work a picture of
the stocks, engraved by Charlton Nesbit for
Butler's “ Hudebras,” 1811.

Scottish history contains allusions to the
stocks ; but in North Britain they do not appear

 

IN THE STOCKS, BY NESBIT

to have been so generally used as in England.
On the 24th August, 1623, a case occupied the
attention of the members of the Kirk-Session of
Kinghorn. It was proved that a man named
William Allan had been guilty of abusing his
wife on the Sabbath, and for the offence was
condemned to be placed twenty-four hours in the

stocks, and subsequently to stand in the jougs
126 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

two hours on a market day. It was further
intimated to him that if he again abused his wife,
he would be banished from the town.

It was enacted, in the year 1605, that every
person convicted of drunkenness should be fined
five shillings or spend six hours in the stocks, and
James I., in the year 1623, confirmed the Act.
Stocks. were usually employed for punishing
drunkards, but drunkenness was by no means the
only offence for which they were brought into
requisition. We learn from the ““ Social History
of the Southern Counties of England,” by George
Roberts, that wood-stealers, or, as they were
styled, “ hedge-tearers,” were, about 1584, set in
the stocks two days in the open street, with the
stolen wood before them, as a punishment for a
second offence. Vagrants were in former times
often put in the stocks, and Canning’s “ Needy
Knife-Grinder” was taken for one, and punished.

In a valuable work mainly dealing with
Devonshire, by A. H. A. Hamilton, entitled,
“ Quarter Sessions from Queen Elizabeth to
Queen Anne,” there is an important note on this
subject. A favourite punishment,” says Hamil-
ton, “for small offences, such as resisting a
constable, was the stocks, The offender had to
THE STOCKS. 127

come into the church at morning prayer, and say
publicly that he was sorry, and was then set in
the stocks until the end of the evening prayer.
The punishment was generally repeated on the
next market day.”

Tippling on a Sunday during public divine
service was in years agone a violation of the laws,
and frequently was the means of offenders being
placed in the stocks. In Sheffield, from a record
dated February 12th, 1790, we find that for
drinking in a public-house, during the time of
service in the church, nine men were locked in
the stocks. “Two boys,” we find it is stated in
the same work, “ were made to do penance in the
church for playing at trip during divine service,
by standing in the midst of the church with their
trip sticks erect.

Not far distant from Sheffield is the village of
Whiston, and here remain the old parish stocks
near to the church, and bear the date of 1786.

Perhaps the most notable person ever placed in
the stocks for drinking freely, but not wisely, was
Cardinal Wolsey. He was, about the year 1500,
the incumbent as Lymington, near Yeovil, and at
the village feast had overstepped the bounds of

moderation, and his condition being made known
128 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

to Sir Amias Poulett, J.P., a strict moralist, he
was, by his instructions, humiliated by being
placed in the stocks. It was the general practice
in bygone days, not very far remote, for church-

wardens to visit the various public-houses during

   
    

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WHISTON STOCKS.

the time of church service and see that no persons
were drinking. At Beverley, about 1853, the
representatives of the church were on their
rounds, and met in the streets a well-known local
character called Jim Brigham, staggering along
the street. The poor fellow was taken into
THE STOCKS. 129

custody, and next day brought before the Mayor,
and after being severely spoken to about the sin
of Sunday tippling, he was sentenced to the
stocks for two hours. An eye-witness to Jim's
punishment says: “ While he was in the stocks,
one of the Corporation officials placed in Jim’s
hat a sheet of paper, stating the cause of his
punishment and its extent. A young man who
had been articled to a lawyer, but who was not
practising, stepped forward, and taking the paper
out, tore it into shreds, remarking it was no part
of Jim’s sentence to be subjected to that additional
disgrace. The act was applauded by the on-
lookers. One working-man, who sympathised
with him, filled and lit a tobacco pipe, and placed
it in Jim’s mouth ; but it was instantly removed
by one of the constables, who considered it was a
most flagrant act, and one calling for prompt
interference on the part of the guardians of the

2»

law.” Brigham was the last person punished in
the stocks at Beverley. The stocks, which bear
the date 1789, were movable, and fitted into
sockets near the Market Cross. They are still
preserved in a chamber at St. Mary’s in that
town. The Minster had also its stocks, which are

still preserved in the roof of that splendid edifice.
K
130 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

The stocks were last used at Market Drayton
some fifty years ago. “It is related,” writes Mr.
Morris, “that some men, for imbibing too freely
and speaking unseemly language to parishioners,
as they were going to church on a Sunday morn-
ing, were, on the following day, duly charged with
the offence and fined, the alternative being
confinement for four hours in the stocks. Two of
the men refused to pay the fine, and were
consequently put therein. The people flocked
around them, and, while some regaled them with
an ample supply of beer, others expressed their
sympathy in a more practical way by giving them
money, so that, when released, their heads and
their pockets were considerably heavier than they
had been on the previous Sunday.” At Elles-
mere, the stocks, whipping-post, and pillory were
a combination of engines of punishment. The
former were frequently in use for the correction of
drunkards. A regular customer, we read, was
“honoured by a local poet with some impromptu

verses not unworthy of reproduction :

¢A tailor here! confined in stocks,
A prison made of wood—a—,
Weeping and wailing to get out,

But couldna’ for his blood—a—
THE STOCKS. 131

The pillory, it hung o’er his head,
The whipping-post so near—a—
A crowd of people round about
Did at William laugh and jeer—a—"

“The style was,” it is said, “ a sarcastic imitation
of * William’s’ peculiar manner of speaking when
tipsy.”

Mr. Christopher A. Markham has collected
much out-of-the-way information on the history
of ancient punishments, and included many items
of more than local interest in a paper he read at a
meeting of a learned society in 1886. In his
notices of Gretton stocks, he says they “still
stand on the village green ; they were made to
secure three men, and have shackles on the post
for whipping ; they are in a good state of repair.
Joshua Pollard, of Gretton, was placed in them,
in the year 1857, for six hours, in default of paying
five shillings and cost for drunkenness.” In the
following year a man was put in the stocks
for a similar offence. It is asserted that a man
was placed in the Aynhoe stocks in 1846 for
using bad language. Card-sharpers and the like
often suffered in the stocks. It appears from
the Shrewsbury Chronicle of May 1st, 1829, that
the punishment in the stocks was inflicted “at
132 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Shrewsbury on three Birmingham youths for
imposing on ‘the flats’ of the town with the
games of ‘thimble and pea’ and ‘prick the

>

garter’” A very late instance of a man being
placed in the stocks for gambling was recorded in
a Leeds newspaper, under date of April 14th,
1860. “ A notorious character,” it is stated,
“named John Gambles, of Stanningley, having
been convicted some months ago for Sunday
gambling, and sentenced to sit in the stocks for
six hours, left the locality, returned lately, and
suffered his punishment by sitting in the stocks
from two till eight o'clock on Tuesday last.”
Several writers on this old form of punishment
regard the foregoing as the latest instance of a
person being confined in the stocks; it is, how-
ever, not the case, for one Mark Tuck at Newbury,
Berkshire, in 1872, was placed in them. The
following particulars are furnished in Notes and
Queries, 4th series, vol. x.,, p. 6: “A novel
scene was presented in the Butter and Poultry
Market, at Newbury, on Tuesday (June 11th,
1872) afternoon. Mark Tuck, a rag and bone
dealer, who for several years had been well known
in the town as a man of intemperate habits, and

upon whom imprisonment in Reading gaol had
THE STOCKS. 133

failed to produce any beneficial effect, was fixed
in the stocks for drunkenness and disorderly
conduct in the Parish Church on Monday
evening. Twenty-six years had elapsed since the
stocks were last used, and their reappearance
created no little sensation and amusement, several
hundreds of persons being attracted to the spot
where they were fixed. Tuck was seated upon a
stool, and his legs were secured in the stocks at a
few minutes past one o'clock, and
as the church clock, immediately
facing him, chimed each quarter,
he uttered expressions of thank-
fulness, and seemed anything but
pleased at the laughter and

 

Fr STOKESLEY STOCKS
derision of the crowd. Four AND

WHIPPING-POST.

hours having passed, Tuck was

released, and by a little stratagem on the part of
the police, he escaped without being interfered
with by the crowd.”

Mr. George Markham Tweddell, the historian
of Cleveland, informs us that the Stokesley stocks
were used about forty years ago. The public
were so disgusted with the disorder which was
caused, that this antiquated practice was never
renewed, much to the chagrin of the two
134 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

constables, who had hoped to revive the ancient
punishment, for which purpose the old stocks had
been newly repaired.

Attendance and repairing stocks formed quite
important items in old parish accounts. A few
entries drawn from the township account-
books of Skipton may be reproduced as examples:

April 16th, 1763.—For taking up a man and setting s. d.

in ye stocks... . oi 0
March 27th, 1739.—For raepdting stole. word and
iron work... .. 9 6

July 12th, 1756. Ta pillory er sods renewing 3 6
March 25th, 1776.—Paid John Lambert for repairing

the stocks... ... . D8
March 25th, 17 76. Pad Christ, owl for? repair-
Impthestocke 5. iil os a 4

The foregoing entries are reproduced from the
“History of Skipton,” by Mr. W. H. Dawson. He
says “during their later years, the stocks were used
almost solely on Sundays.” A practice prevailed
at Skipton similar to the one we have described
at Beverley. “At a certain stage in the morning
service at the church,” writes Mr. Dawson, “the
churchwardens of the town and country parishes
withdrew, and headed by the old beadle walked
through the streets of the town. If a person was
found drunk in the streets, or even drinking in

one of the inns, he was promptly escorted to the
THE STOCKS. 135

stocks, and impounded for the remainder of the
morning. An imposing personage was the beadle.
He wore a cocked hat, trimmed, as was his official
coat, with gold, and he carried about with him in
majestic style a trident staff. ¢A terror to evil-
doers’ he certainly was—at anyrate, to those of
tender years.” The churchwardens not in-
frequently partook of a slight refreshment during
their Sunday morning rounds, and we remember
seeing in the police reports of a Yorkshire town
that some highly respectable representatives of the
church had been fined for drinking at an inn
during their tour of inspection.

Not a few men think that the stocks might be
again used with advantage. A poetical friend,
Mr. John Cotton, of Birmingham, writes as
follows :

“Thus, times and customs, men and manners change,
And so all institutions have their day ;
Like instruments of torture, out of range
Of memory, the stocks will pass away,

And with them those that neath yon tree decay.

The ducking-stool is done with, and the helm,
Contrivances ordained for scolding wives ;

The pillory is banished from the realm,
And corporal punishment no longer thrives,
Save through the cat, which now alone survives.

Each mode has served its turn, and played a part
For good or ill with man ; but while the bane
136 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Of drunkenness corrupts the nation’s heart —
Discrediting our age—methinks the reign
Of stocks, at least, were well revived again.”

“ At Bramhall, Cheshire,” says Mr. Alfred
Burton, to whom we are indebted for several
illustrations and many valuable notes in this book,
“the stocks were perfect till 1887, when the leg-
stones were unfortunately taken away, and cannot
now be found. Thomas Leah, about 1849, was

 

STOCKS AT BRAMHALL.

the last person put into them. He went to the
constable and asked to be placed in the stocks, a
request that was granted, and he remained there
all night. On the 9th August, 1822, two women
were incarcerated in the stocks in the market
place at Stockport, for three hours, one for getting
drunk, the other for gross and deliberate scandal.

The editor of the New York Herald pays much
attention to old-world lore. and in his columns
THE STOCKS. 137

much that is curious and entertaining finds a place.
On the 29th of June, 1890, a paper was devoted
to a pretty bit of old English scenery, entitled,
“Under the Chilterns.” Aldbury is described
thus: “In the centre of the village green stands a
huge elm, its gnarled roots worn into caverns or
recesses. By it stands the stocks, and close to

these a placid pool, on whose mossy margin a

 

STOCKS AT ALDBURY.

dozen swallows are busy with ceaseless fluttering
of purple-black wings and snowy breasts.”

In closing this chapter we must not omit to
state that in the olden time persons refusing to
assist in getting in the corn or hay harvest were
liable to be imprisoned in the stocks. At the
Northamptonshire Quarter Sessions held in 1688,
the time was fixed at two days and one night.
The Drunkard’s Cloak.

EVERATL historians, dealing with the social
life of England in “bygone times, have
described the wearing of a barrel after the manner
of a cloak as a general mode of punishing
drunkards, in force during the Commonwealth.
There appears to be little foundation for the
statement, and, after careful consideration, we
have come to the conclusion that this mode
of punishment was, as regards this country,
confined to Newecastle-on-Tyne.

In the year 1655 was printed in London a
work entitled, «“ England’s Grievance Discovered
in Relation to the Coal Trade,” by Ralph
Gardner, of Chirton, in the county of Nor-
thumberland, Gent. The book is dedicated to
“Oliver, Lord Protector.” Gardner not only
gave a list of grievances, but suggested measures
to reform them. It will be gathered from the
following proposed remedy that he was not any

advocate of half measures in punishing persons
THE DRUNKARD'S CLOAK. 139

guilty of offences. He suggested that a law be
created for death to such that shall commit
perjury, forgery, or accept bribery.

More than one writer has said that Gardner
was executed in 1661, at York, for coining, but
there is not any truth in the statement. We
have proof that he was conducting his business
after the year it is stated that he suffered death
at the hands of the public executioner.

Gardner, in his work, gave depositions of
witnesses to support his charges against “the
tyrannical oppression of the magistrates of New-
castle-on-Tyne.” John Willis, of Ipswich,” he
writes, “upon his oath said, that he, and this
deponent, was in Newcastle six months ago, and
there he saw one Ann Bridlestone drove through
the streets by an officer of the same corporation,
holding a rope in his hand, the other end fastened
to an engine called the branks, which is like a
crown, it being of iron, which was musled over
the head and face, with a great gag or tongue of
iron forced into her mouth, which forced the
blood out ; and that is the punishments which the
magistrates do inflict upon chiding and scoulding
women ; and he hath often seen the like done to
others.”
140 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

‘“ He, this deponent, further affirms, that he
hath seen men drove up and down the streets,
with a great tub or barrel opened in the sides,
with a hole in one end to put through their heads,
and so cover their shoulders and bodies, down to
the small of their legs, and then close the same,
called the new-fashioned cloak, and so make them

 

 

BRANK AND DRUNKARD'S CLOAK AT NEWCASTLE-ON-TYNE.

march to the view of all beholders; and this is
their punishments for drunkards and the like.”
Several other forms of punishment are
mentioned by Gardner. Drunkards, we gather,
for the first offence were fined five shillings, to be
given to the poor, or in default of payment within
a week, were set in the stocks for six hours. For
THE DRUNKARD'S CLOAK. 141

the second offence they had to be bound for good
behaviour. Scolds had to be ducked over head
and ears in a ducking-stool.

“I was certainly informed,” wrote Gardner,
“by persons of worth, that the punishments
above are but gentle admonitions to what they
knew was acted by two magistrates of Newcastle :
one for killing a poor workman of his own, and
being questioned for it, and condemned, com-
pounded with King James for it, paying to a
Scotch lord his weight in gold and silver, every
seven years or thereabouts, etc. The other
magistrate found a poor man cutting a few horse
sticks in his wood, for which offence he bound
him to a tree, and whipt him to death.”

The Rev. John Brand, in 1789, published his
“ History of Newcastle-on-Tyne,” and reproduced
in it Gardner’s notice of the drunkard’s cloak.
Brand gives a picture of the cloak, and the Rev.
J. RB. Boyle, P.8.A, » leading authority on
North Country bibliography, tells us that he
believes it to be the first pictorial representation
of the cloak. Our illustration is from Richardson’s
“ Local Historian's Table Book.” Mr. Walter
Scott, publisher, of Newecastle-on-Tyne, has kindly
lent us the block.
142 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Dr. T. N. Brushfield, to whom we are under an
obligation for several of the facts included in this
chapter, read before the British Archeological
Association, February 15th, 1888, a paper on this
theme. “It is rather remarkable,” said Dr.
Brushfield, ¢ that no allusion to this punishment
is to be found in the Newcastle Corporation
accounts or other local documents.” We have
reproduced from Gardner's volume the only
testimony we possess of the administration of the
punishment in England. There are many traces
of this kind of cloak on the Continent. It is
noticed in “Travels in Holland,” by Sir William
Brereton, under date of May 29th, 1634, as seen
at Delft. John Evelyn visited Delft, on August
17th, 1641, and writes that in the Senate House
“hangs a weighty vessel of wood, not unlike a
butter-churn, which the adventurous woman that
hath two husbands at one time is to wear on her
shoulders, her head peeping out at the top only,
and so led about the town, as a penance for her
incontinence.” Samuel Pepys has an entry in his
diary respecting seeing a similar barrel at the
Hague, in the year 1660. We have traces of this
mode of punishment in Germany. John Howard,
in his work, entitled ““ The State of Prisons in
THE DRUNKARD'S CLOAK. 143

England and Wales,” 1784, thus writes : “ Den-
mark.—Some (criminals) of the lower sort, as
watchmen, coachmen, ete., are punished by being
led through the city in what is called ‘The
Spanish Mantle.” This is a kind of heavy vest,
something like a tub, with an aperture for the
head, and irons to enclose the neck. I measured
one at Berlin, 1ft. 8in. in diameter at the top, 2ft.
11in. at the bottom, and 2ft. 11in. high.

This mode of punishment is particularly dreaded,
and is one cause that night robberies are never
heard of in Copenhagen.”

We may safely conclude that the drunkards
cloak was introduced into Newcastle from the
Continent. The author of a paper published in
1862, under the title of “ A Took at the Federal
Army,” after speaking of crossing the Susquehara,
has some remarks about punishments. “I was,”
says the writer, “extremely amused to see a
‘rare’ specimen of Yankee invention, in the shape
of an original method of punishment drill. One
wretched delinquent was gratuitously framed in
oak, his head being thrust through a hole cut in
one end of a barrel, the other end of which had
been removed; and the poor fellow *loafed’

~ about in the most disconsolate manner, looking for
144 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

all the world like a half-hatched chicken.
Another defaulter had heavy weights fastened to
his wrists, his hands and feet being chained to-
gether.” In conclusion, we are told that the
punishments were as various as the crimes, but
the man in the pillory-like barrel was deemed the

most ludicrous.

 

PUNISHMENT OF A DRUNKARD.

The early English settlers in America intro-
duced many English customs into the country.
The pillory, stocks, ducking-stool, etc., were
frequently employed. Drunkards were punished

in various ways ; sometimes they had to wear a
THE DRUNKARD'S CLOAK. 145

large “ D ” in red, which was painted on a board
or card, and suspended by a string round the
neck.

At Haddon, Derbyshire, is a curious relic of
bygone times, consisting of an iron handcuff or
ring, fastened to some woodwork in the banquet-
ing hall. If a person refused to drink the liquor
assigned to him, or committed an offence against
the convivial customs at the festive gatherings for
which this ancient mansion was so famous, his
wrist was locked in an upright position in the iron
ring, and the liquor he had declined, or a quantity
of cold water, was poured down the sleeve of his

doublet.
Whipping.

HE Anglo-Saxons whipped prisoners with a
whip of three cords, knotted at the end.
It was not an uncommon practice for mistresses
to whip, or have their servants whipped, to death.
William of Malmesbury relates a story to the
effect that when King Ethelred was a child, he on
one occasion displeased his mother, and she, not
having a whip at hand, flogged him with some
candles until he was nearly insensible with pain.
“ On this account,” so runs the story, he dreaded
candles during the rest of his life to such a degree
that he would never suffer the light of them to be
introduced in his presence.” During the Saxon
epoch, flogging was generally adopted as a means
of punishing persons guilty of offences, whether
slight or serious.
For a long time in our history, payments for
using the lash formed important items in the
municipal accounts of towns or parish accounts of

villages.
WHIPPING. 147

Before the monasteries were dissolved, the poor
were relieved at them. No sooner had they
passed away than the vagrants became a nuisance,
and steps were taken to put a stop to begging ;
indeed, prior to this period attempts had been
made to check wandering vagrants. They were
referred to in the “ Statute of Labourers,” passed
in the year 1349. Not a few enactments were
made to keep down vagrancy. In the reign of
Edward VI., in 1547, an Act was passed, from
which it appears “that any person who had
offered them work which they refused, was
authorised to brand them on the breast with a V,
hold them in slavery for two years, feed them
during that period on bread and water, and hire
them out to others.” The Act failed on account
of its severity, and was repealed in 1549.

It was in the reign of Henry VIII, and in the
year 1530, that the famous Whipping Act was
passed, directing that vagrants were to be carried
to some market town or other place, “and there
tied to the end of a cart naked, and beaten with
whips throughout such market town, or other
place, till the body shall be bloody by reason of
such whipping.” Vagrants, after being whipped,
had to take an oath that they would return to
148 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

their native places, or where they had last dwelt
for three years. Various temporary modifications
were made to this Act, but it remained in force

until the thirty-ninth year of the reign of Queen

Elizabeth, when some important alterations were
made. Persons were not to be publicly whipped
naked, as previously, but from the middle upwards,
and whipped until the body should be bloody. It
was at this time that the whipping-post was
substituted for the cart. =~ Whipping-posts soon
became plentiful. John Taylor, “the water
poet,” in one of his works, published in 1630,

adverts to them as follows :

“In London, and within a mile, T ween,
There are jails or prisons full eighteen,
And sixty whipping-posts and stocks and cages.”

Some of the authorities regarded with greater
favour the punishment at the whipping-post than
at the cart tail. An old writer deals at some
length with the benefit of the former. Says he :
“If to put in execution the laws of the land be of
any service to the nation, which few, I think, will
deny, the benefits of the whipping-post must be
very apparent, as being a necessary instrument to

such an execution. Indeed, the service it does to
WHIPPING. 149

a country is inconceivable. I, myself, know a
man, who had proceeded to lay his hand upon a
silver spoon with a design to make it his own, but
on looking round, and seeing the whipping-post in
his way, he desisted from the theft. Whether he
suspected that the post would impeach him or
not, I will not pretend to determine ; some folks
were of opinion that he was afraid of habeas
corpus. It is likewise an infallible remedy for all
lewd and disorderly behaviour, which the chair-
man at sessions generally employs to restrain ; nor
is it less beneficial to the honest part of mankind
than the dishonest, for though it lies immediately
in the high road to the gallows, it has stopped
many an adventurous young man in his progress
thither.” The records of the Worcester Corpora-
tion contain many references to old-time
punishments. In the year 1656 was made in the
bye-law book a note of the fact that for some
years past a want had been felt “for certain
instruments for applying to the execution of
Justice upon offenders, namely, the pillorie, whipp-
ing-post, and gum-stoole.” The Chamberlain was
directed to obtain the same. We gather from
the proceedings of the Doncaster Town Council
that on the 5th of May, 1713, an order was made
150 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

for the erection of a whipping-post, to be set up
at the Stocks, Butcher-Cross, for punishing
vagrants and sturdy beggars. :

Notices of whipping sometimes appear in old
church books. At Kingston-on-Thames, under
date of September 8th, 1572, it is recorded in the
parish register as follows: “This day, in this
towne, was kept the sessions of Gayle Delyverye,
and ther was hanged vj. persons, and xvj, taken
for roges and vagabonds, and whypped abowte
the market-place and brent in the ears.”

At the Quarter Sessions in Devonshire, held at
Easter, 1598, it was ordered that the mothers of
illegitimate children be whipped. The reputed
fathers had to undergo a like punishment. A
very strange order was made in the same county
during the Commonwealth, and it was to the
effect that every woman who had been the mother
of an illegitimate child, and had not been
previously punished, be committed for trial. Mr.
Hamilton, in his work on “ The Quarter Sessions
from Queen Elizabeth to Queen Anne,” has many
curious notes on this subject. The Scotch pedlars
and others, who wended their way to push their
trade in the West of England, ran a great risk of
being whipped. At the Midsummer Sessions, in
WHIPPING. 151

the year 1684, information was given to the court
shewing that certain Scotch pedlars, or other
petty chapmen, were in the habit of selling their
goods to the “ greate damage and hindrance of
shopp keepers.” The Court passed measures for
the protection of the local tradesmen, and directed
the petty constables to apprehend the strangers,
and without further ceremony to strip them
naked, and whip them or cause them to be openly
flogged, and sent away.

The churchwardens’ account of Barnsley con-
tains references to the practice of whipping.
Charges as follow occur :

1622. William Roggers, for goinge with six wanderers

to Ardsley... ... sist
Mr. Garnett, for makinge Soma a pr sol lee: Hd,
Ridhard White, for lin them accordinge

tolaw  ... : voni avn wi Nd

The constable’s accounts of the same town, from
1632 to 1636, include items similar to the
following :

To Edward Wood, for whiping of three wanderers

sent to their dwelling-place r Sir George Plint

Lad Me Rorkley.. 000 Eg

It appears from the Corporation accounts of
Congleton, Cheshire, that persons were whipped
at the cart tail. We find it stated :
152 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

1637. paid to boy for whippinge John ffoxe ... 0 2 0
paid for a carte to tye the said ffoxe unto
when he was whipped vam 0

We have told at length in the pages of « York-
shire in Olden Times” (London: Simpkin,
Marshall & Co., 1890), the strange story of
“James Nayler, the Mad Quaker, who claimed
to be Messiah.” He was examined before
Parliament in 1656, for blasphemy, and the trial
and debate lasted many hours, and the members
finally resolved “that James Nayler was guilty of
horrid blasphemy, and that he was a grand
imposter and seducer of the people,” and his
sentence was, ‘“that he should be set on the
pillory, in the Palace Yard, Westminster, during
the space of two hours, on Thursday next, and
be whipped by the hangman through the streets
from Westminster to the Old Exchange, London;
and there, likewise, he should be set on the
pillory, with his head in the pillory, for the space
of two hours, between the hours of eleven and
one, on Saturday next, in each place wearing a
paper containing an inscription of his crimes; and
that, at the Old Exchange, his tongue should be
bored through with a hot iron, and that he
should be there also stigmatised in the forehead
WHIPPING. 153

with the letter B; and that he should afterwards
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154 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

next market-day after he came thither ; and that
thence he should be committed to prison in
Bridewell, London, and there be restrained from
the society of all people, and there to labour hard
till he should be released by Parliament; and
during that time he should be debarred the use of
pen, ink, and paper, and he should have no relief
but what he earned by his daily labour.” This
terrible sentence was duly carried out, although
Parliament and Cromwell were petitioned to
mitigate the punishment. During his imprison-
ment, he wrote his recantation in letters addressed
to the Quakers. After being confined for two
years he was set at liberty, and repaired to
Bristol, and at a public meeting made a confession
of his offence and fall. His address moved nearly
all present to tears. The Quakers once more
received him back to their Society. We re-
produce an illustration from a rare picture in
possession of Dr. Brushfield, of Nayler in the
pillory, and also being whipped at the cart’s
tail.

The notorious Judge Jeffreys, who, on one
occasion, in sentencing a woman to be whipped,
said : “ Hangman, I charge you to pay particular
attention to this lady. Scourge her soundly,
WHIPPING. 155

man ; scourge her till her blood runs down! It
is Christmas, a cold time for madam to strip.
See that you warm her shoulders thoroughly ! ”

At Worcester, in 1697, a new whipping-post
was erected in the Corn Market, at a cost of 8s,
“Men and women,” says a local historian, « were
whipped here promiscuously in public till the
close of the last century, if not later. Fourpence
was the old charge for whipping male and female
rogues.”

The next note on whipping is drawn from the
church register of Burnham, Bucks, and is one of
several similar entries : “ Benjamin Smat, and his
wife and three children, vagrant beggars; he of
middle stature, but one eye, was this 28th day of
September, 1699, with his wife and children,
openly whipped at Boveney, in the parish of
Burnham, in the county of Buck. according to ye
laws. And they are assigned to pass forthwith
from parish to parish by ye officers thereof the
next direct way to the parish of St. [Se]pulchers,
Lond., where they say they last inhabited three
years. And they are limitted to be at St. [Se]
pulch within ten days next ensuing. Given
under our hands and seals, Will. Glover, Vicar of
Burnham, and John Hunt, Constable of Bove.

“
156 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

»

ney.” In some instances we gather from the
entries in the parish registers, after punishing the
vagrants in their own parish, the authorities
recommended them to the tender mercy of other
persons in whose hands they might fall.

At Durham, in the year 1690, a married woman
named Eleanor Wilson, was publicly whipped in
the market-place, between the hours of eleven
and twelve o'clock, for being drunk on Sunday,
April 20th.

Insane persons did not escape the lash. In
the constable’s accounts of Great Staughtan,

Huntingdonshire, is an item :

1690-1. Pd. in charges taking up a distracted
woman, watching her, and whipping

hernextday .... ... faa 0.8 6

A still more remarkable charge is the following in

the same accounts :

1710-1. Pd. Thomas Hawkins for whipping 2
people yt had smallpox... ... ... 0 0 8

In 1764, we gather from the Public Ledger
that a woman, who is described as “an old
offender,” was conveyed in a cart from Clerken-
well Bridewell to Enfield, and publicly whipped
at the cart’s tail by the common hangman, for
cutting down and destroying wood in Enfield
WHIPPING. 157

Chase. She had to undergo the punishment
three times.

Persons obtaining goods under false pretences
were frequently flogged. In 1769, at Notting-
ham, a young woman, aged nineteen, was found
guilty of this crime, and was, by order of the
Court of Quarter Sessions, stripped to the waist
and publicly whipped on market-day in the
market-place. In the following year, a female,
found guilty of stealing a handkerchief from a
draper’s shop, was tied to the tail of a cart and
whipped from Weekday-Cross to the Malt-Cross.
It was at Nottingham, a few years prior to this
time, that a soldier was severely punished for
drinking the Pretender’s health. The particulars
are briefly told as follows in Adams's Weekly
Courant for Wednesday, 20th, to Wednesday,
July 27th, 1737: “Friday last, a dragoon,
belonging to Lord Cadogan’s Regiment, at
Nottingham, received 300 lashes, and was to
receive 300 more at Derby, and to be drum’d.
out of the Regiment with halter about his neck,
for drinking the Pretender’s health.”

Whipping at Wakefield appears to have been a
common punishment. Payments like the follow-

ing frequently occur in the constable’s accounts :
158 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

1787, May 15, Assistance at Whiping 3 men... 0 3 0
July 6, 3 i J 50 320
Aug. 17, 23 5 2. ...0 20
Sept. 7, » Bin 0°53 10

A fire occurred at Olney in 1783, and during
the confusion a man stole some ironwork. The
crime was detected, and the man was tried and
sentenced to be whipped at the cart’s tail. Cow-
per, the poet, was an eye-witness to the
carrying out of the sentence, and in a letter to
the Rev. John Newton gives an amusing account
of it. “The fellow,” wrote Cowper, “seemed to
show great fortitude; but it was all an imposition.
The beadle who whipped him had his left hand
filled with red ochre, through which, after every
stroke, he drew the lash of the whip, leaving the
appearance of a wound upon the skin, but in
reality not hurting him at all. This being
perceived by the constable, who followed the
beadle to see that he did his duty, he (the
constable) applied the cane, without any such
management or precaution, to the shoulders of
the beadle. The scene now became interesting
and exciting. The beadle could by no means be
induced to strike the thief hard, which provoked
the constable to strike harder ; and so the double
flogging continued, until a lass of Silver End,
WHIPPING. 159

pitying the pityful beadle, thus suffering under
the hands of the pityless constable, joined the
procession, and placing herself immediately behind
the constable, seized him by his capillary club,
and pulling him backwards by the same, slapped
his face with Amazonian fury. This concentration
of events has taken up more of my paper than I
intended, but I could not forbear to inform you
how the beadle thrashed the thief, the constable
the beadle, and the lady the constable, and how
the thief was the only person who suffered
nothing.” It will be gathered from the foregoing
letter that the severity of the whipping depended
greatly on the caprice of the man who
administered it.

A statute, In 1791, expressly forbade the
whipping of female vagrants. This was certainly
a much needed reform.

Persons still living remember seeing people
publicly whipped in the streets. Mr. Samuel
Corter Hall, born in the year 1800, in his
interesting “ Retrospect of a Long Life” (1883),
relates that more than once he saw the cruel
punishment inflicted. On the 8th of May, 1822,
a man was whipped through the streets of
Glasgow by the hangman for taking part in a riot.
160 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

He was the last person to undergo public
whipping at the cart’s tail in Glasgow.

The Rev. Wm. Cooper, B.A., the historian of
the Rod, found in an old magazine a romantic
story, which is well worth reproducing. “A
young man who,” it is stated, ¢“ was sentenced for
some slight misdemeanor, to be whipped through
the streets of Glasgow, proved on being stripped
to be a female! She was identified at the time,
by a mark on her shoulder, to be the daughter of
a highly respectable merchant, who had run away
from her home at an early age, and had been lost
sight of for a great many years. After leaving
home, she made her way to Port-Glasgow, and
became cabin-boy on a West Indian sugar vessel.
As her uncle was a town councillor at the time,
she was pardoned the public exposure by the Lord
Provost of the period, on condition of submitting
to be whipped by the matron of the gaol.” In
the last century, it was not by any means an
uncommon practice for women to run away from
home in the disguise of men, and join the army or
navy.

A fine example of the whipping-post still
remains at Coleshill, and forms part of a pillory
or stocks. It is, we believe, the only one that is
WHIPPING. 161

left in England, although for an extended period
the whipping-post was to be seen in almost every
town and village of the land.

It was formerly the custom in London and
other places, at the time of executions, for
parents to whip their
children, so as to im-

*

press upon their minds
the awful lessons of
the gallows. Execu-
tions were very often

occurring, for people

 

were hanged fortrifling
offences. Down to the ;
year 1808, the crime

: &

 

 

for stealing from the
person above the value
of a shilling was punish-
able with death. Chil-
dren must have had a Tero, Yoana

hard time of it, and been frequently flogged.

 

Whipping servants was a common practice in
the olden time. Pepys and other old writers
make note of it. The well-known “ Diary of a
Lady of Quality” contains some interesting

glimpses of olden days and ways. Under date of
M
162 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

January 30th, 1760, Lady Francis Pennoyer, of
Bullingham Court, Herefordshire, refers to one of
her maids speaking in the housekeeper’s room
about a matter that was not to the credit of the
family. My lady felt that there was truth in
what the girl said, but it was not in her place to
speak, and her ladyship resolved to make her
know and keep her place. “She hath a pretty
face,” says the diarist, “and should not be too
ready to speak ill of those above her in station.
I should be very sorry to turn her adrift upon the
world, and she hath but a poor home. Sent for
her to my room, and gave her choice, either to
be well whipped, or to leave the house instantly.
She chose wisely, I think, and, with many tears,
sald I might do what I liked. TI bade her attend
my chamber to-morrow at twelve.” Next day
her ladyship writes in her diary: “ Dearlove, my
maid, came to my room, as I bade her. I bade
her fetch the rod from what was my mother-in-
law’s rod-closet, and kneel and ask pardon, which
she did with tars. I made her prepare, and I
whipped her well. The girls flesh is plump and
firm, and she is a cleanly person—such a one, not
excepting my own daughters, who are thin, and
one of them, Eh latte, rather sallow, as I have

>
Fo
WHIPPING. 163

not whipped for a long time. She hath never
been whipped before, she says, since she was a
child (what can her mother and late lady have
been about, I wonder?), and she cried out a
great deal.” Children and servants appear to
have been frequently flogged at Bullingham
Court, both by its lord and lady. In other

homes similar practices prevailed.

   

    

— ———_ =

RE, a Assistant 2

(BY GEORGE CRUIKSHANK.)
Public Penance.

HURCH discipline in the olden days has
caused the highest and lowest in the land
to perform penance in public. A notable instance
of a king subjecting himself to this humiliating
form of punishment is that of Henry II. The
story of the King’s quarrels with Becket, and of
his unfortunate expression which lead four knights
to enact a tragic deed in Canterbury Cathedral, is
familiar to the reader of history. After the foul
murder of Becket had been committed, the King
was in great distress, and resolved to do penance at
the grave of the murdered Archbishop. Mounted
on his horse, he rode for Canterbury, and on
coming in sight of the Cathedral, he dismounted,
and walked barefooted to Becket’s shrine. He
spent the day in prayer and fasting, and at night
watched the relics of the saint. He next, in
presence of the monks, disrobed himself, and
presented his bare shoulders for them to lash.
At Canossa, in the winter of 1077, was

performed a most degrading act of penance, by
PUBLIC PENANCE. 165

Emperor Henry IV. of Germany. He had been
excommunicated by Pope Gregory VII., and had
suffered much on that account. He resolved to
see the Pope, and, if possible, obtain absolution.
The Emperor made a long and toilsome journey
in the cold, in company with his loving wife,
Bertha, his infant son, and only one knight. The
Pope refused to see the Emperor until he had
humbled himself at the gates of the castle. “On
a dreary winter morning,” say Baring-Gould and
Gilman, in their “ History of Germany,” with
the ground deep in snow, the King, the heir of a
line of emperors, was forced to lay aside every
mark of royalty, was clad in the thin white dress
of the penitent, and there fasting, he awaited the
pleasure of the Pope in the castle yard. But
the gates did not unclose. A second day he
stood, cold, hungry, and mocked by vain hope.”
On the close of the third day, we are told that he
was received and pardoned by the Pope.

The romantic story of Eleanor Cobham, first
mistress and afterwards wife of Humphrey, Duke
of Gloucester, is one of considerable interest in
illustrating the strange beliefs of the olden times.
The Duchess was tried in the year 1441, for
treason and witchcraft. It transpired that two
166 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

of her accomplices had made, by her direction, a
waxen image of the reigning monarch, Henry VT.
They had placed before it a slow fire, believing
that the King’s life would waste away as the
figure. In the event of Henry's death, the Duke
of Gloucester, as the nearest heir to the house of
Lancaster, would have been crowned king. On
the 9th November, sentence was pronounced upon
the Duchess : it was to the effect that she perform
public penance in three open places in London,
and end her days in prison in the Isle of Man.
The manner of her doing penance was as follows :
“On Monday, the 13th, she came by water from
Westminster, and landing at Temple Bridge,
walked at noon-day through Fleet Street, bearing
a waxen taper of two pounds weight, to St. Pauls,
where she offered it at the high altar. On the
Wednesday following, she landed at the Old
Swan, and passed through Bridge Street, Grace-
church Street, and to Leadenhall, and at Cree
Church, near Aldgate, made her second offering.
On the ensuing Friday, she was put on shore at
Queenhithe, whence she proceeded to St.
Michael's Church, Cornhill, and so completed her
penance. In each of these processions her head

was covered only by a kerchief; her feet were
PUBLIC PENANCE. 167

bare ; scrolls, containing a narrative of her crime,
were affixed to her white dress; and she was
received and attended by the Mayor, Sheriff, and
Companies of London.”

The historian, biographer, poet, playwright, and
story-teller have all related details of the career of
Jane Shore. A sad tale it is, but one which has
always been popular both with gentle and simple.
It is not necessary to relate here at length the
story of her life. She was born in London, was a
woman of considerable personal charms, and could
do what few ladies of her time were able to
accomplish—namely, read well and write. When
some sixteen or seventeen years of age, she
married William Shore, a goldsmith and banker,
of Lombard Street. She lived with her husband
seven years, but about 1470, left him, to become
one of the mistresses of Edward IV. Her
beauty, wit, and pleasant behaviour rendered her
popular at Court. The King died in 1483, and
within two months she was charged by Richard
ITI. with sorcery and witchcraft, but the charges
could not be sustained. Her property, equal to
about £20,000 at the present time, was taken from
her by the King. He afterwards caused her to
be brought before the Ecclesiastical Courts and

 
168 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

tried for incontinence, and for the crime had to
do penance in the streets of London. Perhaps we
cannot do better than quote Rowe's poetry to
relate this part of her story: .

Submissive, sad, and lonely was her look ;

A burning taper in her hand she bore ;

And on her shoulders, carelessly confused,

With loose neglect her lovely tresses hung ;

Upon her cheek a faintish flush was spread ;

Feeble she seemed, and sorely smit with pain ;

While, barefoot as she trod the flinty pavement,

Her footsteps all along were marked with blood.

Yet silent still she passed, and unrepining ;

Her streaming eyes bent ever on the earth,

Except when, in some bitter pang of sorrow,

To heaven she seemed, in fervent zeal to raise,
And beg that mercy man denied her here.

We need not go into details respecting her life
from this time, but briefly state that it is a
popular error to suppose that she was starved in
a ditch, and that the circumstance gave rise to the
name of a part of London known as Shoreditch.
The black-letter ballad in the Pepys collection,
which makes Jane Shore die of hunger after doing
penance, and a man suffer death on the gallows
for giving her bread, is without foundation. She
died about 1533 or 1534, and when she was up-
wards of eighty years of age. It is asserted that
she strewed flowers at the funeral of Henry VII.
PUBLIC PENANCE. 169

A curious act of penance was performed in
Hull, in the year 1534, by the Vicar of North
Cave. He appears to have made a study of the
works of the Reformers who had settled in
Antwerp, and sent over their books to England.
In a sermon preached in the Holy Trinity
Church, Hull, he advocated their teaching, and
for this he was tried for heresy and convicted.
He recanted, and as an act of penance, one
Sunday walked round the church barefooted, with
only his shirt on, and carrying a large faggot in
his hand to represent the punishment he deserved.
On the next market-day, in a similar manner, he
walked round the market-place of the town.

In the year 1602, a man named Cuthbert
Pearson Foster, residing in the parish of St.
Nicholas, Durham, was brought before the
Ecclesiastical Court, charged with « playing at
nine-holes upon the Sabbath day in time of divine
service,” and was condemned to stand once in the
parish church during service, clad in a white
sheet. In the following year, the four church-
wardens—Rowland  Swinburn, William Harp,
Richard Surtees, and Cuthbert Dixon, men
esteemed in Durham, and holding good positions

—were found guilty and admonished for a serious
170 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

breach of duty, “for not searching who was
absent from the church on the Sabbath and
festive days, for it is credibly reported that
drinking, banqueting, and playing at cards, and
other lawless games, are used in their parish in
alehouses, and they never made search thereof.”

Of persons in the humble ranks of life who
have performed public penance in white sheets in
churches, for wunchastity, there are numerous
entries in parish registers. For immorality,
prior to marriage, man and wife were sometimes
obliged to do penance. The Rev. Dr. J. Charles
Cox found particulars of a case of this kind
recorded in the Wooley MSS. in the British
Museum, where a married couple, in the reign of
James I., performed penance in Wirksworth
Church.

In parish registers are records like the follow-
ing, drawn from the Roxby (Lincolnshire) parish
register : “ Memorandum.—Michael Kirkby and
Dixon, Wid. had 2 Bastard Children, one in 1725,
ye other in 1727, for which they did publick
pennance in our Pish Church.” ‘ Michael
Kirkby and Anne Dixon, both together did
publick penance in our Parish Churche, Feb. ye
‘25th, 1727, for adultery.”
PUBLIC PENANCE. 171

A memorandum in the parish register of North
Aston, Oxfordshire, states: “That Mr. Cooper
sent in a form of penance by Mr. Wakefield, of
Deddington, that Catherine King should do
penance in ye parish church of North Aston, ye
sixth day of March, 1740, and accordingly she
did. Witness, Will Vaughan, Charles May, John
Baillis, Churchwardens.” We learn from the
same records that another person, who had
become a mother before she was made a wife, left
the parish to avoid doing public penance.

Mr. John W. Walker, F.S.A., in his « History
of Wakefield Cathedral,” reproduces from the old
churchwardens’ accounts, several items bearing
on this subject and amongst the number are the

following :
£ sd
1679.—To Jos. Green for black bess penanc sheet... 00 05 06
1709.—Allowed the Parish Churchwardens for goe-
ing to Leeds with ye man and woman to
doepenames: ... ... 0
1725.—June 13. Paid Jno. Briggs for the Lent of
3 sheets for 3 persons to do pennance ... 00 01 6
1731.—Nov. 6. Paid for the loan of two white

0 5 0

Sheets oe TE a Cr 6
1732.—Oct. 8. Pd. for the loan of 7 sheets for

PEMBNeeR Lo. LL a i 9
1735.—Nov. 1. Pd. for a sheet that —— had to

do penance in ... ... 1 0

1736.—Sep. 27. Pd. for two sheets ye women did :
penans ifte.e- LE uR BE 8
172 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

1736.—Oct. 10. Pd. for a sheet for Stringer to do £4

penance in SH bt onl and 4
1737.—June 23. Pd. for a sheet for Eliza Redhead

penance... ,. o.oo. od. 4
1750.—Dec. 26. To Priestley for a sheet & attend-

ing a woman's penance ...  ... ... ... 5 0

“On February 27th, 1815,” says Mr. Walker,
“ William Hepworth, a shoemaker, did penance
in the Parish Church for defaming the character
of an old woman named Elizabeth Blacketer.
They both lived in Cock and Swan Yard, West-
gate, and the suit was carried on by one George
Robinson, an attorney, out of spite to the cobbler.”

“On Sunday, August 25th, 1850, a penance
was performed in the Parish Church, by sentence
of the Keclesiastical Court, on a person who had
defamed the character of a lady in Wakefield.
A recantation was repeated by the penitent
after the Vicar, and then signed by the interested
parties.”

The historian of Cleveland, Mr. George Mark-
ham Tweddell, furnishes us with a copy of a
document enjoining penance to be performed in
1766, by James Beadnell, of Stokesley, in the
diocese of York, tailor : “ The said James Bead-
nell shall be present in the Parish Church of
Stokesley, aforesaid, upon Sunday, being the
PUBLIC PENANCE. 173

fifth, twelfth, and nineteenth day of January
instant, in the time of Divine service, between
the hours of ten and eleven in the forenoon of the
same day, in the presence of the whole congrega-
tion then assembled, being barehead, barefoot,
and barelegged, having a white sheet wrapped
about him from the shoulder to the feet, and
a white wand in his hand, where, immediately
after the reading of the Gospel, he shall stand
upon some form or seat, before the pulpit or
place where the minister readeth prayers, and say
after him as forthwith : ¢ Whereas, I, good people,
forgetting my duty to Almighty God, have
committed the detestable sin of adultery with
Ann Andrewes, and thereby have provoked the
heavy wrath of God against me to the great
danger of my soul and evil example of others. I
do earnestly repent, and am heartily sorry for the
same, desiring Almighty God, for the merits of
Jesus Christ, to forgive me both this and all
other my offences, and also ever hereafter so to
assist me with His Holy Spirit, that I never fall
into the like offence again ; and for that end and
purpose, I desire you all here present to pray
for me, saying, Our Father, which art in heaven,
and so forth.”
174 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Towards the close of the last century, it was
the practice of women doing penance at Poulton
Church, Lancashire, to pass along the aisles
barefooted, clothed in a white sheet, and hav-
ing in each hand a lighted candle. The last
time the ceremony was performed, we are told,
the cries of the poor girl melted the heart of
the people, and the well-disposed raised a clamour
against it, and caused the practice to be dis-
continued.

The Rev. Thomas Jackson, the popular
Wesleyan minister, was born at Sancton, a village
on the Yorkshire Wolds, in 1783. Writing of his
earlier years spent in his native village, he
describes two cases of public penance which he
witnessed. “A farmer's son,” says Mr. Jackson,
“the father of an illegitimate child, came into
church at the time of divine service, on the Lords
day, covered with a sheet, having a white wand in
his hand ; he walked barefoot up the aisle, stood
over against the desk where the prayers were
read, and then repeated a confession at the
dictation of the clergyman, after which he walked
out of the church. The other case was that of a
young woman,

¢ Who bore unhusbanded a mother’s name.’
PUBLIC PENANCE. 175

She also came into the church barefoot, covered
with a sheet, bearing a white wand, and went
through the same ceremony. She had one
advantage which the young man had not. Her
long hair so completely covered her face that not
a feature could be seen. In a large town, few
persons would have known who she was, but in a
small village every one is known, and no public
delinquent can escape observation, and the cen-
sure of busy tongues. These appear to have been
the last cases of the kind that occurred at
Sancton. The sin was perpetuated, but the
penalty ceased ; my father observed that the rich
offenders evaded the law, and then the authorities
could not for shame continue to inflict its penalty
upon the labouring classes.”

In the month of April, 1849, penance was
performed at Ditton Church, Cambridge.
TRepentance=5tool.

HE records of church-life in Scotland, in
bygone times, contain many allusions to
the repentance-stool. A very good specimen of
this old-time relic may be seen in the Museum
of the Society of Antiquaries, at Edinburgh. It
is from the church of Old Greyfriars, of Edin-
burgh. In the same museum is a sackcloth, or
gown of repentance, formerly used at the parish
church of West Calder.

Persons guilty of adultery were frequently
placed on the repentance-stool, and rebuked
before the congregations assembled for public
worship. The ordeal was a most trying one.
Severe laws have been passed in Scotland to
check adultery. ¢ In the First Book of Disci-
pline,” says the Rev. Charles Rogers, LL.D,
“the Reformers demanded that adulterers should
be put to death. Their desire was not fully com-
plied with, but in 1563 Parliament enacted that

‘notour adulterers’ —meaning those of whose
REPENTANCE-STOOL. 177

illicit connection a child had been born—should
be executed.” Dr. Rogers and other authorities
assert that the penalty was occasionally inflicted.

Paul Methven, minister at Jedburgh, in the
year 1663, admitted that he had been guilty of
adultery. The General Assembly conferred with
the Lords of the Council respecting his conduct.

 

REPENTANCE-STOOL, FROM OLD GREYFRIARS, EDINBURGH.

Three years later, we are told, that he was per-
mitted to prostrate himself on the floor of the
Assembly, and with weeping and howling to
entreat for pardon.” His sentence was as follows:
“That in Edinburgh as the capital, in Dundee,
as his native town, and in Jedburgh, the

scene of his ministrations, he should stand in
N
178 "OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

sackcloth at the church door, also on the repent
ance-stool, and for two Sundays in each place.”

A man, on his own confession, was tried for
adultery at the Presbytery of Paisley, on
November 16th, 1626, and directed “to stand and
abyde six Sabbaths barefooted and barelegged at
the kirk-door of Paisley between the second and
third bell-ringing, and thereafter to goe to the
place of public repentance during the said space

“of six Sabbaths.”

At Stow, in 1627, for a similar crime a man
was condemned to “sittin’ eighteen dyetts” upon
the stool of repentance. Particulars of many
cases similar to the foregoing may be found in the
pages of “Social Life in Scotland,” by the Rev.
Charles Rogers, in “ Old Church Life in Scot-
land,” by the Rev. Andrew Edgar, and in other
works.

Notes bearing on this subject sometimes find
their way into the newspapers, and a couple of
paragraphs from the Liverpool Mercury may be
quoted. On November 18th, 1876, it was stated
that “in a church in the Black Isle, Ross-shire, on
a recent Sunday, a woman who had been guilty of
transgressing the seventh commandment was

condemned to the ¢cutty-stool, and sat during
REPENTANCE-STOOL. 179

the whole service with a black shawl thrown over
her head.” A note in the issue for 22nd
February, 1884, says that “one of the ringleaders
in the Sabbatarian riots at Strome Ferry, in
June last, was recently publicly rebuked and
admonished on the ¢cutty-stool, in the Free
Church, Lochcarron, for an offence against the
moral code, which, according to Free Church
discipline in the Highlands, could not be expiated
in any other way.”
Riding the Stang.

HE ancient custom of riding the stang still
lingers in some remote parts of the
country. Holding delinquents up to ridicule was
a favourite mode of punishment practiced by our
forefathers, and riding the stang was the means
generally employed for punishing husbands who
beat their wives, or allowed themselves to be
henpecked, or if their conduct was deemed pro-
fligate. There are various designations for
the custom. In Yorkshire, riding the stang
is the name used; in Scotland the same
term is applied; in the South of England
skimmington-riding is the title generally em-
ployed, and on the Continent it is known by other
appellations.

The mode of carrying out the ceremony is as
follows : A man, having beaten his wife, the
young men of the village assume the attitude
of public censors, and arrangements are made for

riding the stang three nights in succession. A
RIDING THE STANG. 181

trumpeter blows his horn loud and long as day
gives way to night, and the villagers are brought
together. A pole or a ladder is procured, and the
most witty man in the village is placed thereon,
mounted shoulder-high, and carried in great state

through the streets. In one hand he has a large

7

i

pas

 

 

 

 

 

RIDING THE STANG.

key or stick, and in the other a dripping-pan, and
leads the music of the crowd. Men, women, and
children join in the fun, and beat kettles, pans,
pots, or anything else that will make a noise; tin

whistles, horns, and trumpets are blown, the
182 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

noise produced being better imagined than
described. As soon as all is ready, a start is
made, and about every fifty yards the procession
stops, and the mounted man proclaims at the top
of his voice a rhyme suited to the nature of the

offence, somewhat as follows :

“ Ran, tan, tan ; ran, tan, tan,
To the sound of this pan ;
This is to give notice that Tom Trotter
Has beaten his good wo-man !
For what, and for why?
Because she ate when she was hungry,
And drank when she was dry.
Ran, tan, ran, tan, tan ;
Hurrah—hurrah! for this good wo-man !
He beat her, he beat her, he beat her indeed,
For spending a penny when she had need.
He beat her black, he beat her blue ;
‘When Old Nick gets him, he'll give him his due ;
Ran, tan, tan ; ran, tan, tan;
We'll send him there in this old frying-pan ;
Hurrah—hurrah ! for his good wo-man !”

Here is another version of the rhyme, jotted

down in Upper Wharfedale, Yorkshire :

“ Heigh dilly, how dilly, heigh dilly dang,
It’s naether for thy part nor my part
That I ride the stang ;

But it is for Jack Soloman—
His wife he does bang.

He bang’d her, he bang’d her,
He bang’d her indeed ;

He bang’d t’ poor woman,
RIDING THE STANG. 183

Though shoo stood him na need ;

He naether tuke stick, staen, wire, nor stower,
But he up wi’ a besom and knocked her ower.
So all ye good nahbers, who live in this row,

I pray ye tak warning for this is our law ;
And all ye cross husbands

Who do your wife bang,

We'll blow for ye t’ horn,

And ride for ye t’ stang,

Hip, hip, hip, hurrah!”

We have an example noted at Sutton, near
Hull, in August, 1877. It was given with great
spirit by a youth, mounted after the customary
manner on a ladder, to the evident enjoyment
of a large gathering of the inhabitants, who were
enraged at the brutal treatment of a woman by
her husband :

“Here we come with a ran, dan, dang :
It’s not for you, nor for me, we ride this stang ;
But for ————, whose wife he did bang.
He banged her, he banged her, he banged her indeed :
He banged her, poor creature, before she stood need.
He took up neither tipstaff nor stower,
But with his fist he knocked her backwards ower ;
He kicked her, he punched her, till he made her cry,
And to finish all, he gave her a black eye.
Now, all you good people that live in this row
We would have you take warning, for this is our law :
If any of you, your wives you do bang,
We're sure, we're sure, to ride you the stang.”

“ Last night,” says the Sunderland Daily Post
184 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

of March 1st, 1887, “some excitement was caused
in Northallerton by the celebration of the old
custom of ‘riding the stang, which is to expose
some one guilty of gross immoral practices, and of
a breach of sacred matrimonial rights. Some
hundreds of people followed the conveyance, in
which two effigies were erected and exhibited
through the principal streets. At intervals, a
person in the conveyance shouted out in rhyme
their object, and said they fully intended to make
a complete celebration of the custom, which is to
‘ride the stang’ three nights in succession, and
on the last night to burn the effigies on the green
near the church.”

The stang was ridden at the ancient town of
Hedon, 18th, 19th, and 20th, 1889.

The house of the culprit is visited several times
each night, and the proceedings kept up three
nights in succession, and a circuit of the church is
also made, as it is believed that those taking part
in the ceremony will not be amenable to the law,
if they do not omit this part of the custom.
If the offence is a very serious one, the offender is
burnt in effigy before his own door. In the olden
days, the offender himself was often compelled to

ride the stang.
RIDING THE STANG. 185

Several of the old poets refer to this ancient
usage. Allan Ramsay, in his poems, published
in 1721, says :

“They frae a barn a kaber raught
And mounted wi’ a bang,
Betwisht twa’s shoulders, and sat straught
Upon’t, and rade the stang
On her that day.”

Mr. Geo. Roberts, of Lyme Regis, forwarded
to Sir Walter Scott some interesting notes on
skimmington-riding. He wrote Sir Walter, that
in the South of England: “About dusk two
individuals, one armed with a skimmer and the
other with a ladle, come out of some obscure
street attended by a crowd, whose laughter,
huzzas, ete., emulate the well-known charivar: of
the French. The two performers are sometimes
in a cart, at other times on a donkey ; one per-
sonating the wife, the other the husband. They
beat each other furiously with the culinary
weapons above described, and, warmed by the
applause and presence of so many spectators (for
all turn out to see a skimmington), their dialogue
attains a freedom, except using surnames, only
comparable with their gestures. On arriving at
the house ot the parties represented in this

moving drama, animation is at its height : the
186 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

crowd usually stay at the spot some minutes, and
then traverse the town. The performers are
remunerated by the spectators: the parties who
parade the streets with the performers sweep
with brooms the doors of those who are likely
to require a similar visitation.”

Dr. King, in his “ Miscellany,” thus refers to
the subject :

“ When the young people ride the skimmington,
There is a general trembling in the town ;
Not only he for whom the party rides
Suffers, but they sweep other doors besides ;
And by the hieroglyphic does appear
That the good woman is the master there.”

According to Douce, skimmington is derived
from skimmang-ladle, used in the ceremony.

In Butler's ¢“ Hudibras,” considerable attention
is paid to the custom. A few of the lines are as
follow :

“ And now the cause of all their fear,
By slow degrees approached so near,
Of horns, and pans, and dogs, and boys,
And kettle-drums whose sullen dub,
Sounds like the hooping of a tub ;

And followed with a world of tall lads,
That merry ditties troll'd and ballads.
RIDING THE STANG. 187

Next pans and kettles of all keys,
From trebles down to double base :

And at fit periods the whole rout
Set up their throat with clamorous shout.”

A notice of an old Welsh ceremony appeared in
the Liverpool Mercury on March 15th, 1887, and
it will not be without interest to reproduce it.
“That ancient Welsh custom,” says the writer,
“now nearly obsolete, known as riding the ceffyl
pren—aAnglicé, < wooden-horse’—and intended to
operate as a wholesome warning to faithless wives
and husbands, was revived on Saturday night in
an Anglesey village some three miles from
Llangefni. The individual who had drawn upon
himself’ the odium of his neighbours had parted
from his wife, and was alleged to be persistent
in his attentions to another female. On Satur-
day night a large party surrounded the house,
and compelled him to get astride a ladder, carry-
ing him shoulder-high through the village,
stopping at certain points to allow the woman-
kind to wreak their vengeance upon him. This
amusement was kept up for some time until the
opportune arrival of a sergeant of police from
Llangefni, who rescued the unlucky wight.”
Gibbet Lore.

NDER this heading we propose placing
before the reader facts of a curious
character, chiefly relating to the various modes of
execution in past times. In bygone days, capital
punishment formed an important feature in the
everyday life, and was resorted to much more
than it now is, for in those “good old times”
little regard was paid for human life. People
were executed for slight offences.” The painful
story related by Charles Dickens, in the preface
to “Barnaby Rudge,” is an example of many
which might be mentioned. It appears that the
husband of a young woman had been taken from
her by the press-gang, and that she, in a time of
sore distress, with a babe at her breast, was
caught stealing a shilling’s worth of lace from a
shop in Ludgate Hill, London. The poor woman
was tried, found guilty of the offence, and suffered
death on the gallows. During a recent visit to

the ancient burial ground of St. Mary’s Church,
GIBBET LORE. 189

Bury St. Edmunds, we copied the following
epitaph, which relates a painful story :
Reader,
Pause at this humble stone, it records

The fall of unguarded youth by the allurements of
vice and the treacherous snares of seduction.

SARAH LLOYD,
On the 23rd April, 1800, in the 22nd year of her age,
Suffered a just and ignominious death.

For admitting her abandoned seducer into the
dwelling-house of her mistress, on the 3rd of
October, 1799, and becoming the instrument in
his hands of the crime of robbery and
housebreaking.
These were her last words :
“ May my example be a warning to thousands.”

We will now deal with some of the more

mmportant modes of execution in this country.

Drowning.

Amongst the nations of antiquity, drowning
was a common mode of punishment. It has only
been discontinued in recent times in Furope.
Four-and-a-half centuries before the birth of
Christ, the Britons inflicted death by drowning
in a quagmire. Women, in Anglo-Saxon times,
who were found guilty of theft, were drowned.
For a long period in the middle ages, the barons
and others, who had the power of administering
190 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

laws in their respective districts, possessed a
drowning-pit and a gallows. Drowning was a
punishment of King Richard of the Lion Heart,
who ordained by a charter that it should be the
doom of any soldier of his army who killed a
fellow-crusader during the passage to the Holy
Land. "Tt was not infrequently awarded as a
matter of leniency, and as a commutation of what
were considered more severe forms of death.”
Such a case is on record for Scotland, in 1556,
when a man who had been found guilty of
theft and sacrilege, was ordered to be put to
death by drowning, “by the Queen’s special
grace.” The punishment in England had become
obsolete by about the beginning of the seven-
teenth century. At Edinburgh, in 1611, a man
was drowned for stealing a lamb. On the 11th
May, 1685, Margaret M‘Lachlan, aged sixty-
three years, and Margaret Wilson, a girl of
eighteen years, were drowned in the waters of
Blednoch, for denying that James VII. of Scot-
land was entitled to rule the Church according
to his pleasure. Six years prior to this, namely,
on the 25th August, 1679, a woman called Janet
Grant was tried for theft, in the baronial court of
Sir Robert Gordon, of Gordonston, held at
DROWNING. 191

Drainie, and pleaded guilty. She was sentenced
to be drowned next day in the Loch of Spynie.
Bearing on this subject there is an important
statement in Boys’s “ History of Sandwich.” Tt
is recorded that, in the year 1313, “a present-
ment was made before the itinerant Justices
at Canterbury that the prior of Christ
Church had for nine years obstructed the
high road leading from Dover Castle to Sand-
wich by the sea-shore, by a water-mill, and the
diversion of a stream called the Gestlyng, where
felons condemned to death within the hundred
should be drowned, but could not be executed
that way for want of water. Further, that he
raised a certain gutter four feet, and the water
that passed that way to the gutter ran to the
place where the convicts were drowned, and from
whence their bodies were floated to the river ;
and that after the gutter was raised the drowned
bodies could not be carried into the river by the

stream, as they used to be, for want of water.”

Burning to Death.

Burning to death was a frequent method of
punishment in the barbarous days of many

nations. In our own country, it was commonly
192 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

used by the Anglo-Saxons as the penalty of
certain crimes, and, as the ordinary punishment of
witchcraft, was maintained throughout the Middle
Ages. Burning alive was from early times the
recognised method of uprooting heretical notions
of religious belief of every class. The first to
suffer from this cause in England was Alban, who
died at the stake in the year a.p. 304. Since
his day, thousands have suffered death on account
of religious belief, through religious intolerance ;
but that is not a subject we intend dealing with
at the present time. We desire to direct atten-
tion to some of the cases of the burning alive of
women for civil offences. This practice was con-
sidered by the framers of the law as a commuta-
tion of the sentence of hanging, and a concession
made to the sin of the offenders. Concerning
this, Sir William Blackstone writes : “ For as the
decency due to the sex forbids the exposing and
publicly mangling their bodies, their sentence
(which is to the full as terrible to sensation as the
other) is, to be drawn to the gallows, and there
$0. be burnt alive;” and he adds: “ithe
humanity of the English nation has authorised,
by a tacit consent, an almost general mitigation

of such part of these judgments as savours of
BURNING 70 DEATH. 193

torture and cruelty, a sledge or hurdle being
usually allowed to such traitors as are condemned
to be drawn, and there being very few instances
(and those accidental and by negligence) of any
persons being disemboweled or burnt till
previously deprived of sensation by strangling.”

We gather from the annals of King’s Lynn,
that in the year 1515, a woman was burnt in the
market-place for the murder of her husband.
Twenty years later, a Dutchman was burnt for
reputed heresy. In the same town, in 1590,
~ Margaret Read was burnt for witchcraft. Eight
years later, another woman was executed for
witcheraft, and in the year 1616, another woman
suffered death for the same crime. In 1791, at
King’s Lynn, the landlady of a public-house was
murdered by a man let into the house at the
dead of night by a servant gir. The man was
hanged for committing the crime, and the girl
was burnt at the stake for assisting the murderer
to enter the dwelling.

There is an account of a burning at Lincoln, in
1722. Eleanor Elsom was condemned to death
for the murder of her husband, and was ordered
to be burnt at the stake. She was clothed in a

cloth, “made like a shift,” saturated with tar, and
0
194 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

her limbs were also smeared with the same
inflammable substance, while a tarred bonnet had
been placed on her head. She was brought out
of the prison barefoot, and, being put on a hurdle,
was drawn on a sledge to the place of execution
near the gallows. Upon arrival, some time was
passed in prayer, after which the executioner
placed her on a tar barrel, a height of three feet,
against the stake. A rope ran through a pulley
in the stake, and was placed around her neck.
she herself fixing it with her hands. Three irons
also held her body to the stake, and the rope
being pulled tight, the tar barrel was taken aside
and the fire lighted. The account in the “Lincoln
Date Book ” states that she was probably quite
dead before the fire reached her, as the execu-
tioner pulled upon the rope several times whilst
the irons were being fixed. The body was seen
amid the flames for nearly half-an-hour, though,
through the dryness of the wood and the
quantity of tar, the fire was exceedingly fierce.
An example where the negligence of the
executioner caused death to be unnecessarily
prolonged is the case of Catherine Hayes, who
was executed at Tyburn, November 3rd, 1726,
for the murder of her husband. She was being
BURNING 70 DEATH. 195

strangled in the accustomed manner, but the fire
scorching the hands of the executioner, he relaxed
the rope before she had become unconscious, and
in spite of the efforts at once made to hasten
combustion, she suffered for a considerable time
the greatest agonies.

Two paragraphs, dealing with such cases, are
in the London Magazine for J uly, 1735, and are
as follow: “ At the assizes, at Northampton,
Mary Fasson was condemned to be burnt for
poisoning her husband, and Elizabeth Wilson to
be hanged for picking a farmer’s pocket of thirty
shillings.”

“ Among the persons capitally convicted at the
assizes, at Chelmsford, are Herbert Hayns, one
of Gregory’s gang, who is to be hung in chains,
and a woman for poisoning her husband is to be
burnt.”

In the next number of the same magazine, the
first-mentioned criminal is again spoken of :
“Mrs. Fasson was burnt at Northampton for
poisoning her husband. Her behaviour in prison
was with the utmost signs of contrition. She
would not, to satisfy people’s curiosity, be
unveiled to anyone. She confessed the justice of

her sentence, and died with great composure of
196 OLD-TIME PUNISUMENTS.

mind.” And also : “ Margaret Onion was burnt
at a stake at Chelmsford, for poisoning her
husband. She was a poor, ignorant creature, and
confessed the fact.”

In the “New Suffolk Garland,” there are some
particulars of another case of burning for husband
murder (styled petty treason). In April, 1763,
Margaret Beddington, and a farm servant, named
Richard Ringe, her paramour, had murdered
John Beddingfield, of Sternfield. The latter
criminal was the actual murderer, the wife being
considered an accomplice. He was condemned to
be hanged and she burnt, at the same time and
place, and her sentence was that she should “be
taken from hence to the place from whence you
came, and thence to the place of execution, on
Saturday next, where you are to be burnt until
you be dead ; and the Lord have mercy on your
soul.” Accordingly, on the day appointed, she
was taken to Rushmere Heath, near Ipswich, and
there strangled and burnt.

Coining was, until a late period, an offence
which met with capital punishment. In Harri-
son’s Derby and Nottingham Jowrnal, or Midland
Advertiser, for September 23rd, 1779, is an

account of two persons who were, several days
BURNING 70 DEATH. 197

previously, tried and convicted for high treason,
the indictment being for coining shillings in Cold
Bath Field, and for coining shillings in Nag’s
Head Yard, Bishopgate Street. The culprit in
the latter case was a man named John Fields,
and in the former a woman named Isabella
Condon. They were sentenced to be drawn on a
hurdle to the place of execution, where the man
was hanged, and the woman burnt.

In the pages of the Quarterly Review are
particulars of burning alive for coining offences.
It appears that a girl of little more than fourteen
years of age had, at her master’s command,
concealed a number of whitewashed counters
behind her stays, for which she was found guilty
of treason, and sentenced to be executed by the
barbarous method we have described. Her
master was already hanged, and the fagots but
awaiting the application of the match to blaze in
fury around her when Lord Weymouth, who
happened to be passing that way, humanely
interfered. As the Review says: “mere accident
saved the nation from this crime and this national
disgrace.” But such things awakened little
public attention in that day, though the case

above mentioned was discussed in Parliament,
198 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

and, among others, by Sir William Meredith.
The last execution in front of Newgate, by burn-
ing, was about 1786, when a woman was hanged
on a low gibbet; and, when life was extinct,
fagots were piled around and over her, and fire
was put to the pyre, and the body was burnt to
ashes. The latest instance on record is that of a
woman named Christian Murphy, alias Bowman,
who was burnt on March 18th, 1789, for coining.
The barbarous laws which permitted such repug-
nant exhibitions were repealed by the 30th
George III., cap. 48, which provided that, after
the 5th of June, 1790, women were to suffer

hanging, as in the case of men.

Boiling to Death.
Boiling to death was a legal punishment in the

olden time, though instances of its exercise were
not so frequent in the annals of crime as some of
the other modes of execution. In the year 1531,
when Henry VIII. was King, an Act was passed
for boiling poisoners to death. The Act details
the case of one Richard Roose, or Coke, a cook
in the diocese of the Bishop of Rochester, who
had, by putting poison in the food of several
persons, occasioned the death of two, and the
BOILING TO DEATH. 199

serious illness of others. He was found guilty of
treason, and sentenced to be boiled to death
without benefit of clergy ; that is, that no abate-
ment of sentence was to be made on account of
his ecclesiastical connection, nor to be allowed
any indemnity such as was commonly the
privilege of clerical offenders. He was brought
to punishment at Smithfield, on the 15th of April,
1532; and the Act ordained that all manner of
poisoners should meet with the same doom
henceforth. A maid-servant, in 1531, was boiled
to death in the market-place of King’s Lynn,
for the crime of poisoning her mistress.
Margaret Davy, a maid-servant, for poisoning
persons with whom she had lived, perished at
Smithfield on March 28th, 1542. The Act was
repealed in the year 1547.

The punishment had been common both in
England and on the Continent before its precise
enforcement by Henrys Act. It has frequent
mention as a punishment for coining. The
“ Chronicle of the Grey Friars of London ” (pub-
lished by the Camden Society) has an account of
a case at Smithfield, in which a man was fastened
to a chain and let down into the boiling water
several times until he was dead.
200 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

JBebeading.

Beheading, as a mode of punishment, has an
early origin. Amongst the Romans it was
regarded as a most honourable death. It is
asserted that it was introduced into England
from Normandy by William the Conqueror, and
intended for putting to death of criminals
belonging to the higher grades of mankind. The
first person to suffer beheading was Waltheof,
Earl of Huntingdon, Northampton, and North-
umberland, in 1076. Since that year, some of
the leading members of the English nobility have
perished at the block. An early victim of
the axe was William Wallace, of illustrious
memory, who was beheaded on a scaffold at the
Elms, at Smithfield, in 1305. But at this later
period, beheading by sword or axe had become
the established mode of punishment for theft.

Murder, it may be remarked, was punished by
outlawry, but theft of goods and cattle by death ;
while in the Isle of Man the stealing of a beast
was only considered trespass, but the stealing
of a fowl was death. The duration of decapi-
tation as an English punishment in ordinary use
may be considered to have been from about the
BEHEADING. 201

middle, probably, of the twelfth century to the
middle and: end of the fourteenth century.
The long list of beheaded includes several queens
and noble ladies, famous for grace, wit, and

beauty, and ends with Lord Lovat, who was

 

AXE, BLOCK, AND EXECUTIONER'S MASK AT THE TOWER OF LONDON.

beheaded on the 9th April, 1747, for espousing
the Pretender’s cause.

hanging, Drawing, and Quartering.
Hanging, drawing, and quartering, with their
attendant horrors, have been termed godly
butchery,” on account of the divine authority

which was adduced to support their continuance.
202 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Lord Coke finds in the Bible a countenance for
each of the horrid details of the punishment.
We see that the texts supposed to bear upon the
subject are raked from all parts of the Scriptures
with great ingenuity, but with, in our modern
eyes, not much of either humanity or probability
of there being anything more than a forced refer-
ence. The sentence on traitors was pronounced
as follows : ““ That the traitor is to be taken from
the prison and laid upon a sledge or hurdle [in
earlier days he was to be dragged along the
surface of the ground, tied to the tail of a horse],
and drawn to the gallows or place of execution,
and then hanged by the neck until he be half
dead, and then cut down; and his entrails to be
cut out of his body and burnt by the executioner;
then his head is to be cut off, his body to be
divided into quarters, and afterwards his head
and quarters to be set up in some open places
directed.” The headsman, or hangsman com-
monly, sliced open the chest and cut thence the
heart, plucking it forth and holding it up to the
populace, saying, ¢ Behold the heart of a
traitor.” The members were disposed on the
gates of the cities, and in London on London

Bridge, or upon Westminster Hall.
HANGING, DRAWING, ETC. 203

It is stated that this kind of punishment was
first inflicted in the year 1241, on William Marise,
pirate, and the son of a nobleman. On the 1st
May, 1820, the Cato Street Conspirators : were
beheaded after death by hanging.

We must not omit to state that the great
agitator against the continuance of the barbarities
of hanging, drawing, and quartering was Sir
Samuel Romilly, who, in the reign of George ITI.
(for so late did this disgrace to England continue),
brought upon himself the odiumm of the law
officers of the Crown, who declared he was “break-
ing down the bulwarks of the constitution.”
By his earnest exertions, however, the punish-
ment was carried out in a manner much more

amenable to the dictates of mercy and humanity.

Pressing to Death.

One of the most barbarous and cruel of the
punishments of our English statutes was that
distinguished by the name of Peine forte et dure,
or pressing to death with every aggravation of
torture. It was adopted as a manner of punish-
ment suitable to cases where the accused refused
to plead, and was commuted in the year 1406,
from the older method of merely starving the
204 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

prisoner to death. At that time the alteration

was considered to be decidedly according to the
dictates of humanity and mercy, as the sooner
relieving the accused from his sufferings. Such
was the small value set upon human life in those
dark days of British justicee The manner in
which this exceedingly great torture was inflicted
was as follows: ¢ That the prisoner shall be
remanded to the place from whence he came, and
put in some low, dark room, and there laid on his
back, without any manner of covering except a
cloth round his middle ; and that as many weights
shall be laid upon him as he can bear, and more ;
and that he shall have no more sustenance but of
the worst bread and water, and that he shall not
eat the same day on which he drinks, nor drink
the same day on which he eats; and he shall so
continue till he die.” At a later period, the
form of sentence was altered to the following :
“That the prisoner shall be remanded to the
place from whence he came, and put in some low,
dark room, that he shall lie without any litter or
anything under him, and that one arm shall be
drawn to one quarter of the room with a cord,
and the other to another, and that his feet shall
be used in the same manner, and that as many
PRESSING T0 DEATH. 205

weights shall be laid on him as he can bear, and
more. That he shall have three morsels of
barley bread a day, and that he shall have the
water next the prison, so that it be not current,
and that he shall not eat,” ete. The object of
this protracted punishment was to allow the
victim, at almost every stage of the torture, to
plead, and thus allow the law to take its ordinary
course. The object of the persons who have
refused to plead is, that any person who dies
under the Peine forte et dure can transmit his
estates to his children, or will them as he desires ;
whereas, if he were found guilty, they would be
forfeited to the Crown. In connection with this,
it may be mentioned that when the practice of
pressing to death had become nearly extinct,
prisoners who declined to plead were tortured in
order to compel them to do so, by twisting and
screwing their thumbs with whipeord. In 1721,
a woman named Mary Andrews was subjected to
this punishment. After bearing with fortitude
the first three whipcords, which broke from the
violence of the twisting, she submitted to plead
at the fourth. Baron Carter, at the Cambridge
Assizes, in 1741, ordered a prisoner, who refused
to plead, to have his thumbs twisted with cords,
206 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

and when that was without avail, inflicted the
higher penalty of pressing. Baron Thompson,
about the same time, at the Sussex Assizes,
treated a prisoner in a precisely similar manner.
In 1721 also, a like method was pursued with
Nathaniel Hawes, a prisoner who refused to
plead ; when the cord proved ineflicacious, a
weight of 250 pounds was laid upon him, after
which he decided to plead. In the same year
also, which seems prolific of cases of this
character, there are particulars of an instance
to be found in the Nottingham Mercury of
January 19th, 1721. They are included in the
London news, and are as follow: * Yesterday
the sessions began at the Old Bailey, where
several persons were brought to the bar for the
highway, etc. Among them were the highway-
men lately taken at Westminster, two of whom,
namely, Thomas Green, alias Phillips, and
Thomas Spigot, refusing to plead, the court
proceeded to pass the following sentence upon
them : ‘that the prisoner shall be,’ etc. [the
usual form, as given above]. The former, on
sight of the terrible machine, desired to be
carried back to the sessions house, where he
pleaded not guilty. But the other, who behaved
PRESSING TO DEATH. 207

himself very insolently to the ordinary who was
ordered to attend him, seemingly resolved to
undergo the torture. Accordingly, when they
brought cords, as usual, to tie him, he broke
them three several times like a twine-thread, and
told them if they brought cables he would serve
them after the same manner. But, however,
they found means to tie him to the ground,
having his limbs extended; but, after enduring
the punishment for an hour, and having three or
four hundredweight put on him, he at last sub-
mitted to plead, and was carried back, when he
pleaded not guilty.” The Rev. Mr. Willette,
with the ordinary of the prison, in 1776,
published the “ Annals of Newgate,” and from
these we learn further particulars of the torture
of the highwayman, Spigot. “The chaplain
found him lying in the vault upon the bare
ground, with 350 pounds weight upon his breast,
and then prayed with him, and at several times
asked him why he should hazard his soul by such
obstinate kind of self-murder. But all the
answer that he made was, ‘Pray for me; pray for
me.” He sometimes lay silent under the pressure
as if insensible to the pain, and then again would
fetch his breath very quick and short. Several
208 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

times he complained that they had laid a cruel
weight upon his face, though it was covered with
nothing but a thin cloth, which was afterwards
removed and laid more light and hollow ; yet he
still complained of the prodigious weight upon
his face, which might be caused by the blood
being forced up. thither and pressing the veins so
violently as if the force had been externally on
his face. When he had remained for half-an-hour
under this load, and fifty pounds weight more laid
on, being in all four hundred, he told those who
attended him he would plead. The weights were
at once taken off, the cords cut asunder; he was
raised up by two men, some brandy put into his
mouth to revive him, and he was carried to take
his trial.” The practice of Peine forte et dure
gave the name of ‘“Press-yard” to a part of
Newgate, and the terrible machine above referred
to was probably in the form of rack. We require
to go further back to find instances of fatal termi-
nation to the punishment. Such a case occurred
in 1676. One Major Strangeways-and his sister
held in joint possession a farm, but the lady,
becoming intimate with a lawyer named Fussell,
to whom the Major took a strong dislike, he
threatened that if she married the lawyer he
PRESSING TO DEATH. 209

would, in his office or elsewhere, be the death of
him. Surely, Fussell was one day found shot
dead in his London apartments, and suspicion at
once fell upon the soldier, and he was arrested.
At first he was willing to be subjected to the
ordeal of touch, but when placed upon trial,
resolved not to allow any chance of his being
found guilty, and so refused to plead, in order
that his estates might go to whom he willed.
Glynn was the Lord Chief Justice on this
occasion, and in passing the usual sentence for
Peine Jorte et dure, used instead of the word
“weights,” as above, the words “as much iron
and stone as he can bear,” doubtless to suit the
prison convenience, and make the sentence
perfectly legal. He was to have three morsels of
barley bread every alternate day, and three
draughts of “ the water in the next channel to
the prison door, but of no spring or fountain
water,” the sentence concluding, “and this shall
be his punishment till he die.” This was prob-
ably on the Saturday, for on the Monday morning
following, it is stated, the condemned was draped
in white garments, and also wore a mourning
cloak, as though in mourning for his own forth-

coming death. It is curious to notice that his
P
210 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

friends were present at his death, which was
much modified from the lengthy process that
his sentence conveys, as to be in fact an
execution, in which these same friends assisted.
They stood “at the corner of the press,” and
when he gave them to understand that he was
ready, they forthwith proceeded to pile stone and
iron upon him. The amount of weight was in-
sufficient to kill him, for although he gasped,
“ Lord Jesus, receive my soul,” he still continued
alive until his friends, to hasten his departure,
stood upon the weights, a course which in about
ten minutes placed him beyond the reach of the .
human barbarity which imposed upon friendship
so horrible a task.

In 1827, an Act was passed which directs the
court to enter a plea of “not guilty,” when a

prisoner refuses to plead.

hanging.

The usual mode of inflicting death upon
criminals in Anglo-Saxon” times was by hanging.
In our chapter on “Whipping,” we have directed
attention to the cruelty of Anglo-Saxon ladies in
flogging their servants and children, which is a

marked contrast to the laws of the land, more
HANGING. 211

especially those relating to capital punishment.
The laws, as a rule, were mild, and contrary in
spirit to capital punishment. We draw from the
laws of Ethelred as follows: “ And the ordinance
of our lord, and of his witan (parliament), is that
Christian men for all too little be condemned to
death; but in general, let mild punishment be
decreed for the people's
need ; and let not for a little
God’s own handiwork and
His own purchase be des-
troyed, which He dearly
bought.” Canute, in his
laws, repealed the foregoing
injunction. We give a re-
presentation of an Anglo-
Saxon gallows (gala), taken

from the illuminations to

 

 

 

 

Alfric’s version of Genesis.

ANGLO-SAXON GALLOWS.

In course of time, the
gallows were very largely employed, and, in
the Middle Ages, were familiar sights in the
country. “ Kvery town, every abbey, and almost
every large manorial lord,” says Thomas Wright,
“had the right of hanging, and a gallows or
tree, with a man hanging upon it, was so fre-
ND

b

12 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

quent an object in the country, that it seems to
have been considered as almost a natural object
of a landscape, and it is thus introduced, by
no means uncommonly, in medizeval manuscripts.”
In the reign of Henry VI, which extended
over thirty-eight years, it is stated that 72,000
criminals were executed.

In the curious ordinances which were observed
in the reign of Henry VI., for the conduct of
the Court of Admiralty of the Humber, are
enumerated the various offences of a maritime
connection, and their punishment. In view of
the character of the court, the punishment was
generally to be inflicted at low watermark, so as
to be within the proper jurisdiction of the
Admiralty, the chief officer of which, the Admiral
of the Humber, being, from the year 1451, the
Mayor of Hull. The court being met, and
consisting of “masters, merchants, and mariners,
with all others that do enjoy the King’s stream
with hook, net, or any engine,” were addressed as
follows : ““ You masters of the quest, if you, or
any of you, discover or disclose anything of the
King’s secret counsel, or 6f the counsel of your
fellows (for the present you are admitted to be
the King’s Counsellors), you are to be, and shall
HANGING. 213

be, had down to the low water-mark, where must
be made three times, O Yes! for the King, and
then and there this punishment, by the law
prescribed, shall be executed upon them ; that is,
their hands and feet bound, their throats cut,
their tongues pulled out, and their bodies thrown
into the sea.”

The ordinances which they were bound to
observe, include the following: “ You shall in-
quire, whether any man in port or creck, have
stolen any ropes, nets, cords, ete., amounting to
the value of ninepence; if he have, he must be
hanged for the said crimes, at low water-mark.”
“If any person has removed the anchor of any
ship, without licence of the master or mariners,
or both, or if anyone cuts the cable of a ship at
anchor, or removes or cuts away a buoy ; for any
of the said offences, he shall be hanged at low
water-mark.” “All breakers open of chests, or
pickers of locks, coffers, or chests, ete., on ship-
board, if under the value of one and twenty pence,
they shall suffer forty days’ imprisonment; but,
if above, they must be hanged as aforesaid.” «If
any loderman takes upon himself the rule of any
ship, and she perishes through his carelessness

and negligence, if he comes to land alive with two
214 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

of his company, they two may chop off his head
without any further suit with the King or his
Admiralty.” The sailor element of the popula-
tion of the olden days was undeniably rude and
refractory, the above rules showing that the
authorities needed stern and swift measures to
repress evildoers of that class.

The royal burgh of Wigtown had, in early
days, a public executioner of its own, a privilege
which was permitted it upon somewhat peculiar
conditions, if the traditional accounts are to be
credited. The law was that this functionary was
himself to be a criminal under sentence of death,
but whose doom was to be deferred until the
advance of age prevented a continuance of his
usefulness, and then he was to be hanged forth-
with. If, it was said, the town permitted the
executioner to die by the ordinary decay of
nature, and not by the process of the cord, it
would lose for ever the distinguished honour of
possessing a public hangman. The story of the
last official who held the tenure of his life upon
the curious condition of his being able to
efficiently despatch his fellows is sufficiently
interesting. He was taken ill, and it was

seriously contemplated to make sure of having a
HANGING. 215

public hangman in the future by seizing the sick
man and hanging him. His friends, hearing of
this intention, propped the dying Ketch up in
bed, and he, being by trade a shoemaker, the
tools and materials of his trade were placed before
him. He made a pretence of plying his avoca-
tion, and the townsmen, thinking his lease of life
was in no danger of a natural termination,
allowed him to lie in peace. He then speedily
passed away quietly in his bed, and the outwitted
burghers found themselves without a hangman,
and without hope of a successor. This is how
Wigtown, made a royal borough in 1341, lost its
hangman. We glean the particulars of this
strange story from one of Mr. Gordon Fraser's
informing and entertaining historical books. He
tells a good anecdote of Patrick Clanachan,
executed for horse-stealing in 1709. This man
was the last person hanged at Wigtown, and we
are told that « the doom pronounced was that he
be taken on the 31st August, between the hours
of 12 and 2 in the afternoon, to the gyppet at
Wigtown, and there to hang till he was dead.’
Clanachan was carried from the prison to the
gallows on a hurdle, and, as the people were

hurrying on past him to see the execution, he
216 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

is said to have remarked : ¢ Tak’ yer time, boys ;
therell be no fun till 1 gang’” A similar
story is told respecting a criminal in London.

At Wicklow, in the year 1738, a man named
George Manley was hanged for murder, and just
before his execution he delivered an address to
the crowd, as follows: “My friends, you
assemble to see—what? A man leap into
the abyss of death! Look, and you will
see me go with as much courage as Curtius,
when he leapt into the gulf to save his country
from destruction. What will you see of
me ?! You say that no man, without virtue can
be courageous! You see what I am—I'm a
little fellow. What is the difference between
running into a poor man’s debt, and by the power
of gold, or any other privilege, prevent him from
obtaining his right, and clapping a pistol to a
man’s breast, and taking from him his purse ?
Yet the one shall thereby obtain a coach, and
honours, and titles; the other, what %—a cart and
a rope. Don’t imagine from all this that I am
hardened. I acknowledge the just judgment of
God has overtaken me. My Redeemer knows
that murder was far from my heart, and what I

did was through rage and passion, being provoked
HANGING. 217

by the deceased. Take warning, my comrades ;
think what would I now give that I had lived
another life. Courageous? You'll say I've
killed a man. Marlborough killed his thousands,
and Alexander his millions. Marlborough and
Alexander, and many others, who have done the
like, are famous in history for great men. Aye
—that’s the case—one solitary man. T'm a little
murderer, and must be hanged. Marlborough and
Alexander plundered countries; they were great
men. I ran in debt with the ale-wife. 1 must
be hanged. How many men were lost in Italy,
and upon the Rhine, during the last war for
settling a king in Poland. Both sides could not
be in the right! They are great men; but I
killed a solitary man.”

The following curious ineidént is recorded in
the Derby Mercury of April 6th, 1738 : « Here-
ford, - March 25.—This day Will Summers
and Tipping were executed here for house-
breaking. At the tree, the hangman was intoxi-
cated with liquor, and supposing that there were
‘three for execution, was going to put one of the
ropes round the parson’s neck as he stood in the
cart, and was with much difficulty prevented by
the gaoler from so doing.”
218 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Hanging persons was almost a daily occurrence
in the earlier years of the present century, for
forging notes, passing forged notes, and other
crimes which we now almost regard with indiffer-
ence. George Cruikshank claimed with the aid of
his artistic skill to have been the means of putting
an end to hanging for minor offences. Cruikshank,
in a letter to his friend, Mr. Whitaker, furnishes
full details bearing on the subject. ¢ About the
year 1817 or 1818,” wrote Cruikshank, “there
were one-pound Bank of England notes in
circulation, and unfortunately there were forged
one-pound bank notes in circulation also; and the
punishment for passing these forged notes was in
some cases transportation for life, and in others
DEATH.

“ At that time, I resided in Dorset Street,
Salisbury Square, Fleet Street, and had occasion
to go early one morning to a house near the
Bank of England ; and in returning home between
eight or nine o'clock, down Ludgate Hill, and
seeing a number of persons looking up the Old
Bailey, I looked that way myself, and saw
several human beings hanging on the gibbet,
opposite Newgate prison, and, to my horror, two

of them were women ; and upon enquiring what
HANGING. 219

the women had been hung for, was informed that
it was for passing forged one-pound notes. The
fact that a poor woman could be put to death for
such a minor offence had a great effect upon me,
and I at once determined, if possible, to put a
stop to this shocking destruction of life for merely
obtaining a few shillings by fraud; and well
knowing the habits of the low class of society in
London, I felt quite sure that in very many cases
the rascals who had forged the notes induced
these poor ignorant women to go into the gin-
shops to ‘get something to drink,” and thus pass
the notes, and hand them the change.

“My residence was a short distance from
Ludgate Hill (Dorset Street) ; and after witness-
ing the tragic scene, I went home, and in ten
minutes designed and made a sketch of this
‘Bank-note not to be imitated.” About half-an-
hour after this was done, William Hone came
into my room, and saw the sketch lying on my
‘table ; he was much struck with it, and said,
‘ What are you going to do with this, George ?’

“¢To publish it’ I replied. Then he said.
‘Will you let me haveit? To his request I con-
sented, made an etching of it, and it was

published. Mr. Hone then resided on Ludgate
220 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Hill, not many yards from the spot where I had
seen the people hanging on the gibbet; and
when 1t appeared in his shop windows, it caused
a great sensation, and the people gathered round
his house in such numbers that the Lord Mayor
had to send the City police (of that day) to
disperse the crown. The Bank directors held a
meeting immediately upon the subject, and AFTER
THAT they issued no more one-pound notes, and so
there was no more hanging for passing FORGED
one-pound notes ; not only that, but ultimately no
hanging even for forgery. AFTER THIS Sir Robert
Peel got a Bill passed in Parliament for the
“ Resumption of cash payments.” Awrer ars he
revised the Penal Code, and AFTER THAT there was
not any more hanging or punishment of DEATH for
minor offences.” We are enabled, by the
courtesy of Mr. Walter Hamilton, the author of
a favourably-known life of Cruikshank, to
give as a frontispiece to this volume a picture of
the “Bank-note not to be imitated.” In con-
cluding his letter to Mr. Whitaker, Cruikshank
said : “I consider it the most important design
and etching that I ever made in my life ; for it
has saved the life of thousands of my fellow-

_ creatures; and for having been able to do this
HANGING. 221

Christian act, I am indeed most sincerely
thankful.”

It will not be without historical interest to
state that the last execution for attempted
murder was Martin Doyle, hanged at Chester,
August 27th, 1861. By the Criminal Law
Consolidation Acts, passed 1861, death was
confined to treason and wilful murder. The Act
was passed before Doyle was put on trial, but
(unfortunately for him) did not take effect until
November 1st, 1861. Michael Barrett, author
of the Fenian explosion at Clerkenwell, hanged
at Newgate, May 26th, 1868, was the last person
publicly executed in England. Thomas Wells
(murderer of Mr. Walsh, station-master at
Dover), hanged at Maidstone, August 13th,
1868, was the first person to be executed within
a prison.

hanging in Chains.
Gibbeting, or hanging in chains the bodies of

executed criminals, near the site where their
crimes were committed, was a common practice,
which has come down to recent times. Black-
stone, in his “Commentaries,” published in 1769,

has a note bearing on this subject. “In atrocious
222 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

cases” [of murder], writes Blackstone, “it was
frequently usual for the court to direct the
murderer, after execution, to be hung upon a
gibbet where the act was committed : but this
was no part of the legal judgment; and the like
is still sometimes practiced in the case of notorious
thieves. This, being quite contrary to the express
command of the Mosaical law, seems to have been
borrowed from the civil law ; which, besides the
terror of the example, gives also another reason
for this practice, namely, that it is a comfortable
sight to the relations and friends of the deceased.”

It is not an uncommon circumstance for persons
to assert that, in bygone times, criminals were
hanged alive in chains. It is a disputed question
in the history of England. It will be observed,
from the preceding quotation from the works of
Blackstone, that a criminal was suspended in
chains after execution. Holinshed, who died
about the year 1580, in his famous ‘“ Chronicle of
England,” a work which supplied Shakespeare
with materials for historical dramas, states : «In
wilful murder done upon pretended (premeditated)
malice, or in anie notable robbery, the criminal is
either hanged alive in chains near the place

where the act was committed, or else, upon com-
HANGING IN CHAINS. 223

passion taken, first strangled with a rope, and so
continueth till his bones came to nothing.
Where wilful manslaughter is perpetrated, besides
hanging, the offender hath his right hand
commonly stricken off.”

We glean an important item from England’s
Mourning Garment,” written by Henry Chettle,
a poet and dramatist, born about the year 1540,
and died in 1604. He lived in the days of Queen
Elizabeth. «But for herselfe,” wrote Chettle,
“she was alwayes so inclined to equitie that if she
left justice in any part, it was in shewing pittie; as
in one generall punishment of murder it appeared :
where-as before time there was extraordinary
tortore, as hanging wilfull murderers alive in
chains; she having compassion like a true
Shepheardesse of their soules, though they were
of her erring and utterly infected flock, said their
death satisfied for death ; and life for life was all
that could be demanded; and affirming more,
that much torture distracted a dying man.”

Almost every district in England has its
strange story of a man hanging alive in chains.
Mr. H. T. Wake committed to writing, in 1860,
at Wetherell, the following : “ John Whitfield, a

notorious highwayman, was gibbetted alive on
224 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

Barrock, a hill a few miles from Wetherell, near
Carlisle, about the year 1777. He lived at Coat-
hill, and was the terror to all that part of the
country, so that many would not venture out
after nightfall, especially along the road by
Barrock. It appears that he shot a horseman in
the open day, who was travelling to Armath-
waite. As soon as the shot was fired, the
horse galloped off, and, although the man was
mortally wounded, he had sufficient strength to
keep his seat till he had got nearly home, when
he fell and died soon after from exhaustion. A
boy who concealed himself near the place where
Whitfield was shot was the means of bringing
this unmerciful wretch to be identified ; a button
off his coat being part of the evidence adduced.
It is said that he hung for several days, till his
cries were heartrending, and a mail-coachman,
who was passing that way, put him out of his
misery by shooting him.

Terror and indignation were felt by the
inhabitants of the quiet Midland town of
Derby on Christmas day, in the year 1775,
as the news spread through the place that,
on the previous evening, an old lady had

been murdered and her house plundered.
HANGING IN CHAINS. 225

An Irishman named Matthew Cocklain dis-
appeared from the town, and he was suspected of
committing the foul deed. He was traced to his
native country, arrested, and brought back to
Derby. At the following March Assizes, he was
tried, found guilty of committing the crime,
sentenced to be hanged, and afterwards gibbeted.
His body was for some time suspended in the
summer sun and winter cold, an object of fright
to the people in the neighbourhood.

Christmas eve had come round once more, and
at a tavern, near the gibbet, a few friends were
enjoying a pipe and glass around the cheerful
burning yule-log, when the conversation turned
to the murderer, and a wager was made that a
certain member of the company dare not venture
near the grim gibbet at that late hour of the
night. The man agreed to go, and take with
him a basin of broth and offer it to Matthew
Cocklain. He proceeded without delay, carrying
on his shoulder a ladder and in his hand a bowl of
hot broth. On arriving at the foot of the gibbet
he mounted the ladder, and put to Cocklain’s

mouth the basin, saying, “Sup, Matthew,” but,
to his great astonishment, a hollow voice replied,

“It’s hot.” He was taken by surprise; but,
Q
226 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

equal to the occasion, and at once said, “ Blow it,
blow it,” subsequently throwing the liquid into
the face of the suspended body.

He returned to the cosy room of the hostelry
to receive the bet he had won. His mate, who
had been hid behind the gibbet-post, and had
tried to frighten him with his sepulchral speech,
admitted that the winner was a man of nerve,
and richly entitled to the wager.

In the pages of The Antiquary for November,
1890, are some notes on “ Hanging in Chains.”
“It was usual,” says the Rev. J. Charles Cox,
“to saturate the body with tar before it was in
chains, in order that it might last the longer.
This was done with the bodies of three highwaymen
about the middle of last century, gibbeted on the
top of the Chevin, near Belper, in Derbyshire.
They had robbed the North Coach when it was
changing horses at the inn at Hazelwood, just
below the summit of the Chevin. After the
bodies had been hanging there a few weeks, one
of the friends of the criminals set fire, at night
time, to the big gibbet that bore all three. The
father of our aged informant, and two or three
others of the cottagers near by, seeing a glare of
light, went up the hill, and there they saw the
HANGING IN CHAINS. 227

sickening spectacle of the three bodies blazing
away in the darkness. So thoroughly did the tar
ald this cremation, that the next morning only
the links of the iron chain remained on the site
of the gibbet.”

At the Derby March Assizes, 1815, a young
man, named Anthony Lingard, was tried and
convicted for murder-
ing Hannah Oliver, a
widow who kept the
turnpike-gate at Ward-
low Miers, in the parish
of Tideswell. In the
columns of the Derby
Mercury is a full ac-
count of the trial of
Lingard. “ Before the
judge left the town,” 7
says the report, “he im
directed that the body =
of Lingard should be na
hung in chains in the most convenient place
near the spot where the murder was committed,
instead of being dissected and anatomized.”

A paragraph in Rhodes “ Peak Scenery,” first
published in 1818, is worth reproducing. “As

i i

| 4

 
228 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

we passed along the road to Tideswell,” writes
Rhodes, “the villages of Wardlow and Litton lay
onourleft. . . . . Here, at a little distance
on the left of the road, we observed a man
suspended on a gibbet, which was but newly
erected.” The vanity of the absurd idea of our
forefathers, in thinking that a repulsive object
of this kind would act as a deterrent of crime,
was strikingly shown in the case of this Wardlow
gibbet. Tt is related of Hannah Pecking, of
Litton, who was hung on March 22nd, 1819, at
the early age of sixteen, for poisoning Jane Grant,
a young woman of the same village, that she
“gave the poison in a sweet cake to her
companion as they were going to fetch some
cattle out of a field near to which stood the
gibbet-post of Anthony Lingard.”

Dr. J. Charles Cox, in his ¢“ Three Centuries
of Derbyshire Annals,” has some important notes
bearing on Lingard’s case. He states that:
“The treasurer's accounts for Derbyshire, for
1815-16, show that the gibbeting involved a
serious inroad on the county finances. The
expenses for apprehending Anthony Lingard
amounted to £31 5s. 5d.; but the expenses
incurred in gibbeting reached a total of
HANGING IN CHAINS. 229

£85 4s. 1d., and this, in addition to ten guineas
charged by the gaoler for conveying the body
from Derby to Wardlow.”

The gibbet was taken down on April 10th,
1826, by the order of the Magistrates, and the
remains of Lingard buried on the spot. Mr.
Alfred Burton favours us with a drawing of
Lingard’s gibbet-cap, which is now in the
museum at Belle Vue, Manchester.

On the 16th April, 1889, Mr. Charles Madeley
read a paper before the Warrington Literary and
Philosophical Society, under the title of “ Some
Obsolete Modes of Punishment.” His compila-
tion includes much curious information collected
from many sources, states that the last person
gibbeted in the neighbourhood of Warrington
was a man named Edward Miles, who murdered
the postboy who was carrying the Liverpool
mail-bag to Manchester, on September 15th, 1791.
Miles was hanged for the crime, and afterwards
his body was suspended in chains near the scene
of the murder. The gibbet-irons are now in
the Warrington Museum.

In the Daily Graphic of July 19th, 1890, is a
small sketch of the irons kept in the Rye Town
Hall, in which a man named John Breeds was
230 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

gibbeted in 1742, for ther murder of Allen
Grebbell, the Mayor of Rye, in mistake for
another man, with whom he had a dispute about
some property.

Lincolnshire history supplies some curious
details respecting the gibbeting of a man named
Tom Otter, in the year 1806. We are told that
he was “compelled by the old poor regulations
to wed a girl he had injured. He lured her
into a secluded spot the day after their
marriage, and deliberately murdered her.
According to the prevalent custom, Tom Otter’s
corpse was hung in chains. The day selected for
that purpose inaugurated a week of merrymaking
of the most unseemly character. Booths were
pitched near the gibbet, and great numbers of
people came from a distance to see the wretch
suspended. It is reported that some years later,
when the jaw bones had become sufficiently bare
to leave a cavity between them, a bird built its
nest in this unique situation. The discovery of
nine young ones therein gave rise to the follow-

ing triplet, still quoted in the neighbourhood :

‘There were nine tongues within one head,
The tenth went out to seek some bread,
To feed the living in the dead.’ ”
HANGING IN CHAINS. 231

The gibbet was standing until the year 1850,
when 1t was blown down.

The last man gibbeted in this country was
George Cook, a bookbinder, at Leicester. He
was executed for the murder of a commercial
traveller, from London. Cook’s body was sus-
pended on a gibbet thirty-three feet high, on
Saturday, August 11th, 1832, in Saffron Lane,
Aylestone, near Leicester. The body was soon
taken down, and buried on the spot where the
gibbet stood, by order of the Secretary of State,
to put a stop to the disturbances caused by the
crowds of people visiting the place on a Sunday.

The old custom of hanging the bodies of
criminals in chains was abolished on J uly 25th,
1834, and thus ends a strange chapter in the

history of Old England.

The halifax Gibbet.

The mention of the Halifax gibbet suggests a
popular Yorkshire saying, namely : “ From Hell,
Hull and Halifax, good Lord, deliver us.” Fuller
says the foregoing is part of the Beggars’ and
Vagrants’ Litany,” and goes on to state: «Of
these three frightful things unto them, it is to be
feared that they least fear the first, conceiting it
232 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

the farthest from them. Hull is terrible to them
as a town of good government, where beggars
meet with punitive charity; and, it is to be feared,
are oftener corrected than amended. Halifax is
formidable for the law thereof, whereby thieves,
taken in the very act of stealing cloth, are
instantly beheaded with an engine, without any
further legal proceedings. Doubtless, the coinei-
dence of the initial letters of these three words
helped much the setting on foot of the proverb.”
The Halifax gibbet law has been traced back to
a remote period. It has been suggested that it
was imported into the country by some of the
Norman barons. Holinshed’s ““ Chronicle” (edi-
tion published in 1587) contains an interesting
note bearing on this subject. “There is, and has
been, of ancient time,” says Holinshed, “a law,
or rather custom, at Halifax, that whosoever
doth commit any felony, and is taken with the
same, or confess the fact upon examination, if it
be valued by four constables to amount to the
sum of thirteenpence-halfpenny, he is forthwith
beheaded upon one of the next market-days
(which fall usually upon the Tuesdays, Thursdays,
and Saturdays), or else upon the same day that
he is convicted, if market be holden. The engine
HALIFAX GIBBET. 233

wherewith the execution is done is a square
block of wood, of the length of four feet and a
half, which doth ride up and down in a slot, rabet,
or regall, between two pieces of timber that are
framed and set up right, of five yards in height.
In the nether end of a sliding block is an axe,
keyed or fastened with an iron into the wood,
which, being drawn up to the top of the frame,
is there fastened by a wooden pin (with a notch
made in the same, after the manner of a Samson’s
post), unto the middest of which pin also there is
a long rope fastened, that cometh down among
the people ; so that when the offender hath made
his confession, and hath laid his neck over the
nethermost block, every man there present doth
either take hold of the rope (or putteth forth his
arm so near to the same as he can get, in token
that he is willing to see justice executed), and
pulling out the pin in this manner, the head-
block wherein the axe is fastened doth fall down
with such a violence, that if the neck of the
transgressor were so big as that of a bull, it
should be cut in sunder at a stroke, and roll from
the body by an huge distance. If it be so that
the offender be apprehended for an ox, sheep,

kine, horse, or any such cattle, the self beast or
 

 

 

 

HALIFAX GIBBET.
HALIFAX GIBBET. 235

other of its kind shall have the end of the rope
tied somewhere unto them, so that they being
driven, do draw out the pin whereby the offender
1s executed.”

In the picture which we give, which is a re-
production of an old illustration, it will be
observed that a horse is drawing the rope to
loosen the pin, and allow the axe to fall and cut
off the head of the victim. The doomed man had
doubtless stolen the horse. Near the gibbet are
assembled ‘the jurymen, and the parish priest is
engaged in prayer.

Before a felon was condemned to suffer, the
proof of certain facts appear to have been
essentially necessary. In the first place, he was
to be taken in the liberty of the forest of Hard-
wick, and if he escaped out of it, even after con-
demnation, he could not be brought back to be
executed ; but if he ever returned into the liberty
again, and was taken, he was sure to suffer. It
is recorded that a man named Lacy escaped, and
resided seven years out of the forest, but return-
ing, was beheaded on the former verdict. This
person was not so wise as one Dinnis, who, having
been condemned to die, escaped out of the liberty
on the day fixed for his execution (which might be
236 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

done by running in one direction about five
hundred yards), and never returned. Meeting
several people that asked if Dinnis was not to be
beheaded on that day, his answer was, “1 trow
not,” which, having some humour in it, became a
proverbial saying in the district, and is used to
this day—“ ‘I trow not,” quoth Dinnis.” In the
next place, the fact was to be proved in the
clearest manner. The offender had to be taken
either hand-habend or back-berand, that is, having
the stolen goods in his hand, or bearing them on
his back, or, lastly, confessing that he took them.

The value of the goods stolen had to be worth
at least thirteenpence-halfpenny, or more. Taylor,

the water-poet, refers to the subject as follows :

“ At Halifax the law so sharpe doth deale,
That whoso more than thirteenpence doth steale,
They have a jyn that wondrous quick and well
Sends thieves all headless into heaven or hell.”

A further condition of the Halifax gibbet law
is scarcely so clear as the preceding. The
accused was, after three market or meeting days,
within the town of Halifax, next after his
apprehension and being condemned, taken to the
gibbet. This probably means that after he was
delivered to the bailiff, no time further than was
HALIFAX GIBBET. 237

necessary was to elapse before proceeding to the
trial, and that the bailiff was to send speedy
summons to those who were to try him, ‘which
might be done in two or three days. If he were
found guilty, the day of his execution depended up-
on that of his sentence, for he was to be beheaded
on no other day than Saturday, which was the great
meeting. Thus, if condemned on Monday, he
would be kept three market days ; but if con- :
demned on Saturday, as some assert, he would be
conducted straightway to the gibbet. The two
last persons who suffered death by this engine
were condemned and executed on the same day.

The final ordinance of the law directs that on
being led to the gibbet the malefactor is to have
his head cut off from his body. That the
machine was fully capable of this is evident both
from Holinshed’s remarks and from the following
anecdote given by Wright, the historian of Hali-
fax, as an extract from “ A Tour through the
Whole Island of Great Britain.” A country
woman, who was riding by the gibbet at the time
of the execution of a criminal, had hampers at
her sides, and the head, bounding to a consider-
able distance from the force of the descending

axe, “jumped into one of the hampers, or, as
238 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

others say, seized her apron with its teeth, and
there stuck for some time.”

The parish register at Halifax contains a list of
forty-nine persons who suffered by the gibbet,
commencing on the 20th day of March, 1541, the
earliest date of which there is a recorded execu-
tion, and terminating on the 30th day of April,
1650, after which last execution the bailiff of the
town received an intimation that should another
case occur, he would be called to public account.
The number of beheadals in each of the reigns
comprised in the above dates are : five in the last
six years of the reign of Henry VIII. ; twenty-
five in the reign of Elizabeth ; seven in the reign
of James I. ; ten in the reign of Charles I. ; two
during the Commonwealth.

In the year 1650, John Hoyle made a drawing
of the Halifax gibbet, which is regarded as a
faithful representation of it. On the crown of
the hill will be noticed a sketch of the ancient
beacon.

An account of the last occasion upon which the
services of the Halifax gibbet were called into
requisition is interesting; it is contained in a
rare book. ¢ Halifax and its Gibbet Law placed
in a True Light.” It was written by Dr. Samuel
HALIFAX GIBBET. 239

Midgley, during an imprisonment for debt, and
was published in 1708. “ About the latter end
of April, a.p. 1650, Abraham Wilkinson, John
Wilkinson, and Anthony Mitchel were appre-
hended within the Manor of Wakefield and the

liberties of Halifax, for divers felonious practices,

 

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HALIFAX GIBBET, BY HOYLE.

and brought or caused to be brought into the
custody of the chief bailiff of Halifax, in order to
have their trials for acquittal or condemnation,
according to the custom of the Forest of Hard-
wick, at the complaint and prosecution of Samuel
Colbeck of Wardley, within the liberty of
Halifax ; John Fielden of Stansfield, within the
240 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

said liberty ; and John Cusforth of Durker, in
the parish of Sandall, within the Manor of Wake-
field.” The Bailiff, according to the ancient
custom, issued a summons to the “several con-
stables of Halifax, Sowerby, Warley, and Skir-
coat,” charging them to appear at his house on
the 27th day of April, 1650, each accompanied by
four men, “the most ancient, intelligent, and of
the best ability” within his constabulary, to
determine the cases. The constables were
merely the law officers, the jurors being the
sixteen ‘most ancient men,” and whose names
are given at length. They were empannelled in
a convenient room at the Bailiff’s house, where
the accused and their prosecutors were brought
“face to face” before them, as also the stolen
goods, to be by them viewed, examined, and
appraised. The court was opened by the follow-
ing address from the Bailiff: ¢ Neighbours and
friends,— You are summoned hither and em-
pannelled according to the ancient custom of the
Forest of Hardwick, and by virtue you are
required to make diligent search and inquiry
into such complaints as are brought against the
felons, concerning the goods that are set before

you, and to make such just, equitable, and faith-
HALIFAX GIBBET. 241

ful determination betwixt party and party, as
you will answer between God and your own
conscience.” He then addressed them on the
separate charges against the prisoners. From
Samuel Colbeck, of Warley, they were alleged to
have stolen sixteen yards of russet-coloured
kersey, which the jury valued at 1s. per yard.
Two of the prisoners were alleged to have stolen
from Durker Green, two colts, which were
produced in court, one of which was appraised at
a and the other at 48s. Also, Abraham
Wilkinson was charged by John Fielden with
stealing six yards of cinnamon-coloured kersey,
and eight yards of white ¢frized, for blankets.”
After some debate concerning certain evidence
against the above, and “after some mature con-
sideration, the jury, as is customary in such
cases,” adjourned to the 30th day of April
Upon this day they met, and after further full
examination gave their verdict in writing, and
directed that the prisoners Abraham Wilkinson
and Anthony Mitchel, “by ancient custom, and
liberty of Halifax, whereof the memory of man is
not to the contrary, the said Abraham Wilkinson
and Anthony Mitchel are to suffer death by

having their heads severed and cut off from their
Rr
242 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

bodies at the Halifax gibbet, unto which verdict
we subscribe our names.” The felons were
executed upon the same day.

The stone scaffold or pedestal upon which the
gibbet was erected was discovered by the Town
Trustees in 1840, in attempting to reduce what
was known as Gibbet Hill to the level of the
neighbouring ground ; and except some decay of
the top and one of the steps, it is in a perfect
state. It is carefully fenced round, and an
inscription affixed, which was done at the cost of
Samuel Waterhouse, Mayor, in 1852. The gibbet
axe, formerly in the possession of the Lord of the
Manor of Wakefield, is now preserved at the
Rolls Office of that town. It weighs seven
pounds twelve ounces; its length is ten inches
and a half; it is seven inches broad at the top,
and nearly nine at the bottom, and at the centre

about seven and a half.

The Scottish abaiden.

Towards the middle of the sixteenth century
the Earl of Morton, Regent of Scotland, during a
visit to England, witnessed an execution at the
Halifax gibbet. He appears to have been

impressed in a favourable manner with the
THE SCOTTISH MAIDEN. 243

ingenuity of the machine, and gave directions
for a model of it to be made. On his return
home, in the year 1565, he had an instrument
similar to the Halifax gibbet constructed. On
account of remaining so long before it was used,
so runs the popular story, it was known as “The
Maiden.” Rogers says that its appellation is
from the Celtic mod-dun, originally signifying
the place where justice was administrated. There
is a popular notion that the first victim beheaded
at the Maiden was the Earl of Morton. Such,
however, was not the case, for he did not suffer
death at it until June 2nd, 1581. « After ruling
Scotland under favour of Elizabeth for nearly ten
years,” says a contributor to Chambers’s “ Book
of Days,” “ Morton fell a victim to court faction,
which probably could not have availed against
him if he had not forfeited public esteem by his
greed and cruelty. It must have been a striking
sight when the proud, stern, resolute face, which
had frowned so many better men down, came to
speak from the scaffold, protesting his innocence
of the crime for which he had been condemned,
but owning sins enough to justify God for his
fate.” He died by the side of the City Cross, in
High Street, Edinburgh, and for the next twelve
244 OLD-TIME PUNISHMENTS.

months his head garnished a pinnacle on the
neighbouring Tolbooth. It is generally agreed
that the first time the Maiden was used was in
the execution of the inferior agents in the
assassination of Rizzio, which occurred at Holy-
rood Palace, on the 9th March, 1566. Some of

 

THE SCOTTISH MAIDEN.

the noblest men of Scotland suffered death by
this instrument, and the long list of at least one
hundred and twenty names includes those of Sir
John Gordon of Haddo; President Spottis-
woode ; the Marquis and Earl of Argyle. The
THE SCOTTISH MAIDEN. 245

latter nobleman, “when stepping on the scaffold,”
says Daniel Wilson, “and preparing to lay his
head on the block, is reported to have said, with
grave humour worthy of Sir Thomas More: ‘It
was the sweetest maiden he had ever kissed.”
In the year 1710, the use of the maiden was
discontinued. It may now be seen in the
Museum of the Society of Antiquaries of Scot-
land, at Edinburgh.

 
 
Inoer.

Aberdeen, banished from, 113, 114
Adultery, punishment for, 17, 69,
176

Aldbury stocks, 137

Ale, brewing bad, at Chester, 2 ;
at Beverley, 18

Alfrie, 211

Alfreton gallows, tumbrel, pillory,

Altrincham brank, 47

Annual Register, 83, 85

Applegirth jougs, 116

Ardsley, East, ducking-stool, 20

Ascham, Roger, 110

Ashby-de-la-Zouch finger-pillory,
104, 105

Ashmolean Museum brank, 58, 59

Ashton-under-Lyne, 107

Attwood, William, 101

Authors, punishing, 90-103

Axon, W. E. A., 48, 78

Aynhoe stocks, 131

Bakers, 69,

Banishing, 11, 63, 113, 114

Barnsley whipping, 151

Barrock, 224

Beaudesart, 50, 106

Beaumont and Fletcher, 6

Becket, murder of, 164

Bede, Cuthbert, 33

Beggars’ Litany, 231

Beheading, 200-201

Beverley ducking-stool, 18 ; stocks
128, 129

Bible burnt, 91

Black Isle, 178

Blackstone, Sir W., 192, 221]

Blasphemy, punishment for, 63,
87, 152

Blednoch, drowning at, 190

Boiling to death, 198-199

 

Bolton-le-Moors brank, 49

‘“ Book of Days,” 74, 88, 243

Bourne, Vincent, 7

Boveney, 155

Bowman, last woman burnt, 198

Boyle, Rev. J. R., 141

Bradford ducking-stool, 20

Brand, Rev. Jno., 141

Brank, or scold’s bridle, 38-49

Bramhall stocks, 136

Bridlington pillory, 78; jougs,
117

)

Briscoe, J. P., 26, 56

Bristol ducking-stool, 30

Broadwater ducking-stool, 15, 16

Brooks, Henry M., 36

Brushfield, Dr. T. N., 25, 41, 44,
47, 143, 154

Bullingham Court, 162

Burdett, Sir F., 87

Burning books, 90-103

Burning to death, 191, 198

Burnley ducking-stool, 31

Burton, Alfred, 46, 136, 227

Bury St. Edmonds, 189

Calverley ducking-stool, 20

Cambridge ducking-stool, 8, 9, 10

Canterbury pillory, 75; Cathedral,
164

Canute, 211

Card-sharpers, 131

Carrington, F. A., 58

Cart’s-tail, whipping at, 156, 157

Chaucer, 53

Cheapside pillory, 70, 71

Chelmsford, burning at, 195, 196

Chester cucking-stool, 2; brewing
bad ale, 2

Chesterfield brank, 54, 55, 56

Chettle, Hy., 223

Chevin gibbet, 226
248

Cobham, Eleanor, 165

Cochrane, Lord, 87

Coining, burnt for, 196

Cole onCambridgeducking-stool,8

Coleshill whipping-post, 160, 161

Collingbourne, 92

Congleton brank, 42, 43, 44;
whipping, 151, 152

Cooper, Rev. W., 160

Cornhill pillory, cage, stocks, 71

Cornwall, 2

Cotton, Jno. 135

Cova jougs, 119

Coventry ducking-stool, 12, 13

Cowper, Wm., 158

Cox, Dr. J. C., 80, 170, 228

Cruikshank, George, 163, 218

Cutting off nose and ears, 17.

Cutty-stool, 179

Dawson, W. H., 21, 22

Defoe, D., 99, 100, 101

Derby ducking-stool, 23 ; pillory,
80; gibbet, 224

Derbyshire women, 53

Dickens, Chas., 188

Ditton, penance at, 175

Dobson, W., 49

Dodcot Union brank, 62

Doddington Park brank, 58

Domesday Book, 2

Doncaster whipping-post, 150

Dorset, Lord, 5

Douce, 186

““Douress, The,” 8

Driffield pillory, 78

Drowning, 189-191

Drunkard’s cloak, 138-145

Drunkenness, 126, 133

Ducking-stool, 1-37

Duddingston jougs, 119

Dumfries jougs, 112

Durham, whipping at, 156; pen-
ance, 169

Edinburgh branks, 63, 64; re-
pentance-stool, 176; drown-
ing, 190

Ellesmere stocks, whipping-post,
and pillory, 130

Ethelred, King, 146

Evelyn, Jno., 142

Evesham, 6

Execution, last public, 221; first
private, 221

 

INDEX.

Fenwick jougs, 117
Finger-pillory, 104-107

Floyd, E., severe sentence, 72
Foote, 93

Fornication, punishment for, 63
Fortune-tellers punished, 78

Galashiels jougs, 116

Galston jougs, 116

Gardener, Ralph, 138

Gay, 7

German Emperor, penance of, 165

Gibbeted, last man, 231

Gibbeting alive, 222

Gibbet-lore, 188-245

Glasgow brank, 39; jougs, 111;
whipping, 160

Gordonston, drowning at, 190

Great Stanghtan, whipping at,
156

5
Gretton stocks, 131

Haddon Hall, 145

Hakford, John de, 69

Halifax gibbet, 231-242

Hall, Samuel Carter, 159

Hamilton, A. H. A., 126, 150

Hamilton, Walter, 220

Hampstall Ridware, 50

Hand cut off, 92

Hanging, 210-221

Hanging, drawing, and quarter-
ing, 201-203

Hanging in chains, 221-231

Harvest regulations, 137

Haworth ducking-stool, 20

-Hedges, J. Kirby, 67

Hedon, riding stang at, 184

Heginbotham, Dr. Hy., 45

Henry IL, penance of, 164

Henry VI., waxen image of, 166

Hereford, hanging at, 217

Highwaymen, 40

Holinshed on Halifax gibbet, 232

‘“ Homer a la mode,” 6

Hone, Wm., 219

Houlston, 123

Hoyle’s picture of Halifax gibbet,
239

‘“ Hudibras,” 6, 124, 186

Hull, profligacy at, 16; ducking-
stool, 17 ; Literary Club, 18;
pillory, 77 ; books burnt, 95 ;
penance, 169 ; hanging, 212;
old saying, 231
INDEX. 249

Ilkley, ducking scolds at, 20

Illegitimate children, 150

Ipswich motar, 11; ducking-
stool, 25, 26, 27

Isle of Man, 200

Jackson, Rev. Thos. 174
Jeffrey’s Judge, 154

Jewitt, Llewellynn, 14, 23, 54, 81
Johnson, Saml., 2

Jougs, 108-119

Keach, B., 96, 97, 98

Kelly, Wm., 33

Killed in the pillory, 88

Kilmaurs jougs, 117

Kinder, Philip, 53

King, Dr., 186

Kinghorn stocks, 125

King’s Lynn ducking-stool, 28;
burning to death, 193; boil-
ing to death, 199

Kingston - on - Thames ducking-
stool, 32; whipping, 150

Kinross jougs, 117

Kirkby ducking-stool, 22

Kirkham ducking-stool, 31

Labienus, 91

Labourers, statute of, 122, 147

Leeds ducking-stool, 18; sessions,
18; brank, 40

Leicester ducking-stool, 2, 33;
scolding-cart, 33; brank, 56;
gibbet, 231

Leighton, Dr., 92

Leo 1., 91

Leominster ducking-stool, 33, 34,
35, 36

Lesmahago jougs, 115

Lichfield brank, 50

Lilburn, 95

Lincoln, burning at, 193

Lingard, Anthony, 227

Littlecote Hall finger-pillory, 105,
106 ;

Liverpool ducking-stool, 30

Lovat, Lord, 201

Ludlow Castle, 7; Museum, 59

Luther, Martin, 92

Lymington stocks, 127

Macclesfield records, 38 ; brank,47
Machyn’s diary, 72, 109
Madeley, Charles, 229

 

 

Manchester ducking-stool, 30;
brank, 48; pillory, 78, 79, 80

Market Drayton brank, 62; stocks
130

Markham, C. A., 131

Marlow, C., 92

Mauchline jougs, 115

Mayer, Jos., 52

Merton jougs, 116

Methven, Paul, 177

Milton, Jno., 93

Misson on the ducking-stool, 4

Morley ducking-stool, 20 ; brank,
40

Morpeth brank, 49, 50
Morris, S. M., 61, 123 130
Mortar, carrying, 11
Morton, Earl, 242, 243

Nayler, James, 152, 153, 154

Nesbit, Charlton, 125

Newbury stocks, 132

Newcastle-on-Tyne pillory, 76 ;
drunkard’s cloak, 138; brank
139

Newecastle-under-Lyme brank, 51,
52

New Testament burnt, 91

Nicholson, Jno., 77

Northallerton, riding stang at,
184

Northampton, burning at, 195

North Aston, penance at, 171

North Briton, 102 ?

North Cave, Vicar of, 169

Norwich ducking-stool, 26

Nostril-slitting, 83

Nottingham ducking-stool, 26,27;
brank, 56; whipping, 157

Numa, 90

Oates, Titus, 74, 75
Ockam, Robt., 67
Olney, 158
Oswestry brank, 62
Otter, Tom, 230

Paris, 103

Paulmy pillory, 68

Pepys, S., 73, 142, 161

Pillory, 65-89

Plot, Dr., 51, 52, 53,106
Plymouth ducking-stool, 29, 30
Poulett, Sir Amias, 128
Poulton, penance, 174
250

Pressing to death, 203-210
Preston ducking-stool, 31; pil-
lory, 77 .

Prynne, Wm., 95

Public penance, 164-175

Punishing authors and burning
books, 90-103

Pythagoras, 90

Quakers, 152

Ramsay, Allan, 185
Rateliff Highway ducking-stool,
4

Repentance-stool, 176-179

Retford ducking-stool, 28

Riding the stang, 180-187

Roberts, George, 126, 185

Rochester, Bishop, 92

Rogers, Charles, LL.D., 63, 110,
176, 243

Romilly, Sir S., 203

Rothesay jougs, 112

Roxby, penance at, 170

Rugby ducking-stool, 14, 15

Rushmere Heath, burning at,
196

Rye pillory, 81, 82; gibbet, 22

Sackeloth, 176

Sancton, 174

Sandwich ducking - stool,
drowning, 191

Sanquhar, banishing from, 114

Saxon Laws, 17, 121, 146, 189,
192, 211

Scarborough ducking-stool, 24, 25

Scolding-cart, 53

Scotch pedlars whipped, 151

Scott, Sir Walter, 185

Scottish Maiden, 242-245

Selby, 19

Servants, whipping, 161, 162, 163,

210

10;

Shakespeare on stocks, 123, 124

Sharp, Archbishop, 64

Sheffield stocks, 127

Shore, Jane, penance of, 167, 168

Shrewsbury brank, 61

Skimmington-riding, 185

Skipton ducking-stool,
stocks, 134

Small-pox, 156

Soldiers, whipping, 157

Southam ducking-stool, 11

21, 22;

3 iy

 
    
 

 

| Tyburn, burning at, 194

 

INDEX.

Southwell ducking-stool, 28

Stanningley stocks, 132

St. Andrews brank, 64; jougs,
111

Stocks, 120-137

Stokesley, Bishop, 91

Stokesley stocks, 133; penance,
172. 173

Stockport brank, 45, 46

Stow, 178

Stow, John, 71

Spurgeon, C. H., 95

Strangeways, Major, 208

Strome Ferry, riots at, 179

Sunday gambling, 132, 169; tip-
pling, 127, 134, 135

Sutton, riding stang at, 183

Taylor, Jno., 148, 236
Thomson, James S., 112
Thurlow, Lord, on pillory, 87
Tindal, 91

Tooke, Horne, 87

Townsend, Rev. G. F., 6, 33, 34
Trees, destroying, 156

Tudors, formal manners under,110
Tumbrel, 31, 32

Turner, J. H., 40

Tweddell, G. M., 133, 172

NUnited States, ducking stool in,

36, 37 ; drunkard’s cloak, 143

Vagrants, 126, 147
Voltaire, 103

Wakefield Sessions, 19; jougs,
118; whipping, 157, 158;
penance, 171, 172

Walker, Jno. W., 118

Wallace, Sir Wm., 200

Wallingford pillory, whipping-
post, stocks, 66

Walsall brank, 50, 51

Walton-on-Thames brank, 41

Warrington brank, 48, 49 ; gibbet,
229

‘Warton, 95

Weeden Beck, 13

‘Welsh custom, 187

West Calder, 176

West’s Poems, 13

‘Wharfedale, 182

Whipping, 146-163
INDEX.

Whipping-post, 148

Whiston stocks, 127

Whitchurch brank, 62

Wicklow, farewell address at, 216

Wigtown jougs, 111 ; last hang-
man, 214

Wildridge, T. Tindall, 16, 18, 40

Wilkinson, Joseph, 21

Williams, bookseller, 102

Wilson, Alexander, 102-103

Wilson, Daniel, 64, 116

Wilson, Wm., 114

Wirksworth, 170

 

251

Witchcraft, 193

Wolsey, Cardinal, 127

Wootton Bassett tumbrel, 31
Worcester whipping-post, 155
Worsborough ducking-stool, 20,

21
Worth, R. N., 28
Wright, Thomas, 3, 105
Wright, W. H. K., 29

York, Archbishop of, 16
York Castle, 40
¢“ Yorkshire in Olden Times,” 152
 
 
 
 
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