Execution at Chester

Category : Article

At what is now Barrel Well Hill and was once Gallows Hill in Boughton, stands the obelisk to George Marsh, an outspoken puritan preacher, from Bolton, who was burned at the stake (24 April 1555) on the north side of the road, after being questioned by the Bishop of Chester. The gallows which once stood here, close to the site of St Giles Cemetery is shown in both the Lavaux Map (1745) and earlier maps of Chester  going back to that of Braun and Hogenberg (1581).



The Museum of Policing in Cheshire records that on May 9th 1801 "Thompson, Morgan and Clare" were the last felons to be executed at Gallows hill. Accoring to the Museum site, they were executed for burglary. However "Infamous Cheshire" records that while Thompson and Morgan were unpopular forgers who had "cheated and ruined the lives of a number of local people", John Clare had some sympathy because he had committed a relatively minor crime. At his trial, John Clare had shouted that "he would never hang" - technically he did hang, although he drowned first.

After 1801, condemned men (and women) were sent to Northgate Gaol for execution, and later, to the City Gaol. In 1868 public execution was abolished in the UK. In 1866, the County Gaol moved to Knutsford and further executions occurred there until 1912. However there was at least one private execution in Chester, that of James Banister 4th April, 1877. Others, as mentioned in various newspaper sources are listed below.

When Knutsford was commandeered by the military in 1914, condemned criminals were sent to Walton (Liverpool) or Strangeways (Manchester) for execution. The death penalty was finally, effectively abolished on 9th November 1964.

Executions at Gallows Hill
The standard execution procedure at Chester was that a clergyman was appointed to accompany the condemned to the hanging-tree. A spiritual counsellor was supposed to keep the convicted man or woman calm. They were also there to reassure the crowd that any repentance speech was genuine. The clergy had to attempt to bring about a final confession, being duty-bound to persuade the prisoner to atone for murder to cleanse their soul. That confessional was written down and then printed as an intended moral lesson. Due legal process had to be seen to attend to the prisoner’s spiritual needs and protect the well-being of provincial society.



Some early executions were:

1554: George Marsh burnt at Spital, Boughton;

1558: Sept. 8th. A woman burnt at Boughton for poisoning her husband;

1589: John Taylor – Gaoler of Chester Castle;

1592: William Geaton – servant to the Bishop of Chester – his body hung on chains on Grappenhall Heath;

1602: Elizabeth Duncalfe

1602: Arnet servant of Saltney Side hung

1673: John Plessington

1771: John Chapman
The courtroom facts were that Chapman was a sailor. He was convicted of homicide after a port brawl. Throughout the capital hearing he protested his innocence. It was rumoured that the trial evidence that convicted him was decidedly circumstantial. His fellow sailors thought him innocent and were angry at the death-sentence verdict. Chapman refused to be consoled or counselled. On getting into the csrt with the appointed clergyman to travel to the gallows, the convicted man charged at his confessor’s belly. The churchman was thrown violently out of the conveyance. The sheriff’s officers seized the prisoner and ‘tied him with ropes to the cart’. Still he struggled. On arrival at the hanging-tree he had to be strapped round the base of the gallows. Then the execution rope was prepared. The hangman ‘had to try to lift him up to tie the rope about his neck’. Chapman reacted even more forcefully and lurching forward again "got the hangman’s thumb in his  mouth, which he almost separated from the hand; he was at last tied up, but with great difficulty".

Gallows Hill, as its name suggests, was the Tyburn of Chester and the exact location may well be the small park near the house "Edgeley". A wealth of gory detail can be found in Roy Wilding's book 'Death in Chester'. The following tale about the gallows is found in Joseph Hemingway's History of the City of Chester - written in 1831:


 * "About the centre of this elegant group of buildings, thirty years ago, stood that memento mori to the passing traveller, vulgarly called the gallows, where many of our unfortunate fellow creatures have forfeited their lives to the violated laws of their country. A short time prior to this period, this terrific engine of death had its station exactly on the opposite side of the road, which, on account of its elevated situation, received the appellation of Gallows Hill, which, hy a precipitate descent, and without an inclosure, went down to the Dee. There is an incident connected with this place of execution worthy of recording. In May, 1801, as three malefactors, convicted of burglary at the spring assizes, were conveying to execution in a cart, one of them, named Clare, when opposite the gallows, and just when the vehicle was turning, gave a sudden spring, and threw himself upon the top of the precipice descending to the river, and jumped, rolled, and tumbled along till he was precipitated into it. The weight of his irons sunk him to the bottom, and before he could be brought up, life was entirely extinct. Although the unfortunate fellow thus evaded the letter of his sentence, in escaping being hanged by the neck till he was dead, yet the finisher of the law was unwilling to forego his official duty, and the dead body of the criminal was tied up after his breath had departed. The most afflictive part of the tragedy was, that the two poor men who were in a like condemnation, were kept in a state of awful suspense until the dead carcase of the drowned man was tied up beside them."

The Museum of Policing in Cheshire records that on May 9th 1801 "Thompson, Morgan and Clare" were indeed executed for burglary. However "Infamous Cheshire" records that while Thompson and Morgan were unpopular forgers who had "cheated and ruined the lives of a number of local people", John Clare had some sympathy because he had committed a relatively minor crime. At his trial, John Clare had shouted that "he would never hang" - technically he did hang, although he drowned first.

"Thompson, Morgan and Clare" was the last public execution at Gallows Hill.



Executions at Northgate
After 1801, condemned men (and women) were sent to Northgate Gaol for execution. Hemingway describes the older Northgate as follows:


 * This ancient gate adjoining which was a mean and ruinous gaol was an inconvenient and unseemly pile of building It consisted of a dark narrow passage under a pointed arch with a postern on the east side and the entrance to the prison Immediately under the gate way at the depth of some thirty feet from the level of the street was a horrible dungeon to which the only access of air was through pipes which communicated with the street In this frightful hole prisoners under sentence of death were confined itself a living death.

Very few executions took place at Northgate. On October 3rd 1801 Aaron Gee and Thomas Gibson were hung out of a temporary window on the south side of the old Northgate. It was a somewhat makeshift gallows, they were "propelled from the window about 5 feet and dropped near 40 inches", then proceeded to annoy the jaillor by rattling against his window. Thereafter, executions moved to the City Gaol (where the Queen's School is).

In the early nineteenth century, much of the news of England's murders and executions was brought to the masses through penny and half-penny "broadsides". As one of the most popular forms of street literature, broadsides were the tabloid newspapers of their day, selling near the gallows on execution days. A single sheet of paper printed on one side, the broadside usually included an account of the crime, a woodcut illustration (often a scene depicting the execution), a description of the convict’s final hours and his last dying confession. The latter was often given in the form of a cautionary verse, emphasising the sorrow of the convict and warning readers of the dangers of drink and bad company. The broadsides were printed in advance of executions and so were often innaccurate. Many, if not all, of the gallows speeches and confessions reported were completely fictional, while some printers even reused entire texts, changing only the names. Woodcuts could be reused as the occasion demanded, and stock illustrations of the gallows even had a removable section designed to accommodate the required number of hanging bodies!

Executions at City Gaol
The gaol was one of the first to install a 'drop', or mechanical gallows. The gallows stood high on the front of the building where they were used for the public hangings of Chester criminals. The grisly scenes of death attracted large, ghoulish crowds. The City Gaol was erected in 1807. It ceased to be a gaol in 1871 and prisoners moved to the County Gaol at the Castle. The first execution here was on 6th May 1809 when George Glover and William Proudlove were hung for shooting at (and missing) an excise officer. The drop was used for the first time and the ropes broke, leaving the two still alive. New ropes were procured and the sentence carried out about 1 hour later. Apparently, the two condemned men remained remarkably calm during their wait for their repeat performance, and did not pretend innocence proven by "divine intervention" (the present author would have!). Contrary to popular belief, there is no actual provision in English law that if the rope breaks or the trap jams you get set free. However there were a very few cases where a sentence was commuted after a failed hanging - but none in Chester.

One of the provisions of the Murder Act of 1752 begins with the mandate that “in no case whatsoever shall the body of any murderer be suffered to be buried,” resulting in a strange period of posthumous punishment during which the bodies of murderers were to be hung in chains or dissected after execution. Following the passage of the Anatomy Act 1832, which was intended to curb the activity of "body snatchers", it was confirmed that not only were the convicted hung, but they were also disected - often in public.

1812: John Lomas


Edith Morrey was born Edith Coomer and married George Morrey, a farmer’s son on Tuesday the 18th of April 1797 at St. Chad’s Church in Wybunbury in southern Cheshire. She was then about nineteen years old and the daughter of a well to do farmer. Initially the marriage was happy and they settled in the Cheshire town of Nantwich. George opened a grocery store there and the couple made a reasonable living over the next four years. In early 1801 they returned to the village of Hankelow, near Audlem to take over George’s father’s farm when he retired. They were blessed with seven children, three boys and four girls, although one of the girls died in infancy. George tended the farm whilst Edith made cheese for sale locally and looked after the family. They had a maid, Hannah Evans who had been with them nearly a year and a twenty year old farmhand called John Lomas who had just joined them. At this time Edith was once again pregnant but was to have a miscarriage in February 1812. We have no means of knowing Edith’s emotional state at the time, so soon after a miscarriage, but it was quite possibly rather fragile. For whatever reason Edith quickly fell for John and they began having an affair. Over the next two months or so Edith started to think in terms of marrying this young man, some fifteen years her junior, however there was one obvious impediment, George. No doubt Edith was not prepared to give up her children and comfortable life style by simply running away with John, nor was she willing to face the social disgrace that this course of action entailed at the time. So another way had to be found to keep John’s affections and rid themselves of George. Edith determined that John should kill George and afterwards they could be together. On Saturday the 11th of April 1812 George had been to Witton Wakes, a major fair in Northwich and did not return home until midnight. Edith and Hannah Evans were still up at this time and George had supper before he and Edith retired to bed. Hannah went a little later after she had cleared away the supper. Hannah was soon awakened though, by the sounds of a commotion from inside the house. She and John Lomas ran to the house of a neighbour to raise the alarm. The pair then returned to the farm with a couple of neighbours, Thomas Timmis and John Moores. The two men found Edith sitting by the fireplace and then opened the door into George’s bedroom where they made a grim discovery. George was laying face down on the floor with an axe handle projecting from underneath him. He had several axe wounds and in addition had had his throat cut, so there was blood everywhere.

Edith and John stood trial on Friday August the 21st before Chief Justice Robert Dallas and Francis Burton, a more junior judge. They were both charged with Petty Treason rather than murder, as the deceased was the husband of one defendant and the master of the other. The jury returned a verdict of guilty against both prisoners after just a few minutes discussion. Judge Dallas then addressed both of them, suggesting that although he believed that John had actually carried out the killing it was Edith whose guilt was the greater for planning and organising the destruction of her husband. Asked if had anything further to say before he was sentenced John told the court that he deserved his execution and hoped to be quickly forgotten. On Edith’s behalf John Cross told the court that she was pregnant and thus could not be sentenced to death at this time.

John’s hanging took place on Monday the 24th of August 1812. He spent sometime with the chaplain, the Reverend William Fish, before being led out up to the roof for his appointment with Cheshire’s hangman, Samuel Burrows. A large crowd had gathered to witness the event and the usual broadsides were sold. John made a short speech from the gallows warning others not to follow his example. His body was dissected after death by Owen Titley at the Infirmary next door to the gaol.


 * The Newgate Calendar;
 * The Murder of George Morrey;



1812: Edith Morrey
Four months after John Lomas's execution Edith Morrey gave birth in Chester City Gaol to a healthy boy on 21 December 1812. Local newspapers reported that she hoped for a pardon so her seven children would not be orphaned. Samuel Burrows the Cheshire hangman was not minded to be merciful to a murderess. As instructed, he executed Edith at the spring Assizes of 1813 and sent her baby for adoption. The Times newspaper described how ‘ten thousand people’ assembled for her execution and "post‐mortem punishments", timetabled in tandem:


 * "On Friday morning at 12 o'clock this wretched woman was delivered by Mr Hudson, constable of Chester Castle into the hands of Messrs Thomas and Bennett, the City Sheriff for execution …; she got into the cart, and immediately laid down on one side, concealing her face with her handkerchief, which she had invariably done in public … She was very much convulsed for a few minutes when her pangs ceased in this world. After hanging the usual time, her body was delivered to the surgeons for dissection, and was open to public inspection during all Saturday."

In this case, Edith Morrey's body was hanged at Chester Gaol and then sent next door to Chester Infirmary. Owen Titley initially opened ‘her [Edith's] thorax and abdomen and removed her heart for preservation’ (he had done the same for Lomas). The penal surgeon was effectively checking that the prisoner was dead and had not survived the gallows. Then he sewed the body back up and sent it back to the Shire Hall courthouse. On the way it was accompanied by a huge parade of local people. Edith's body was brought inside the main entrance and placed on a portable dissection table. The public space was carefully chosen in the community both for its legal symbolism and for the practical reason that it could accommodate the large audience assembled to see the post‐mortem cuts. In the main hall, the body was left open for public consumption over the next twenty‐four hours. Local people filed past the criminal corpse in two orderly queues. The throughput of audience members was calculated by local newspaper reporters to be ‘four hundred and sixteen people per hour’ – on average seven spectators a minute – to ensure that ‘all ten thousand spectators’ had a chance to view the criminal corpse. They were permitted to look but not touch, and were directed to keep moving along Edith's cadaver, down two sides of the dissection table. The next day, the Shire Hall doors were closed, and the criminal corpse was moved back to Chester Infirmary to complete a full‐scale dissection conducted by Owen Titley.


 * "Edith Morrey – A Cheshire love triangle"

1813: William Wilkinson, John Burgess, William Yarwood
All from Northwich in Cheshire, they were hanged together for the rape of Mary Porter at Runcorn in Cheshire. The crime was committed on the 15th of January 1813. One George Randles was on the shore line when he heard a woman scream “Murder” and “O Lord help me.” He went before a justice and made a deposition of what he had seen and heard. The trio were arrested and duly came to trial at the Shire Hall in the outer bailey of Chester Castle. They were loaded into a cart and arrived at the City Gaol around 12.20 pm. The New Drop gallows was erected on the flat roof of the gatehouse. At 1.10 pm. they ascended the scaffold, Wilkinson first. Samuel Burrows, Chester’s hangman applied the noose to him as he addressed the crowd. Burgess was next but he was reportedly quiet and reserved. Finally Yarwood joined them and exhorted the crowd not to mix with bad women. It seems, as is so often still the case, that they blamed the victim, Mary Porter, for their crime. The Rev. Mr. Willan prayed with the men for some time until Yarwood gave the signal by dropping a handkerchief and Samuel Burrows released the trap, launching them into eternity, as was the parlance of the time. As they were not murderers their bodies were returned to their families after hanging for an hour.

1824: Joseph Dale


19-year-old Joseph Dale, a man described in court as “a very peaceable, quite lad, always good tempered, and kind to his parents”, was executed according to the custom that he was handed over from the county jail to the city jail for execution. Early as was his removal from the County gaol to the city, many persons were there to witness his transit, and with as many as came within his reach he cordially shook hands, bidding them an affectionate farewell. He did not appear so badly in health as was generally expected. Dale always claimed innocence having met two others while travelling, Taylor and Platt, who he claimed were the actual murderers of a fourth man they met on the road. After hanging one hour, the body was cut down, and subsequently delivered to the surgeons for dissection.

1841: Bartholomew Murray
Bartholomew Murray was found guilty of killing a retired farmer and his wife with an axe following a lengthy trial at Chester's court. Joseph Cooke and his wife Mary Cooke, described as an "aged couple", lived in Over Peover, near Knutsford. During one harvest Mr Cooke employed labourers to work the farm - one of which was Murray, who was reportedly only 18 at the time of the murder. The labourers worked in a meadow near the couple's home, and one witness told the court that while working, Murray had asked him: "Are these old people rich?," to which the worker replied yes. Following his work at the Cookes', Murray travelled in search of further work. Around a fortnight later he made his way back to Knutsford. One night later Joseph and Mary Cooke were murdered with an axe under mysterious circumstances.

A 15-year-old girl had been sleeping upstairs when the Cookes were murdered, and woke after hearing their screams. She then heard the murderer come into her room and watch her in bed, to make sure she had not woken. After staring at her he then left her room, satisfied that she had not been disturbed. Unsurprisingly, the girl couldn't go back to sleep due to the moans of the couple downstairs. Going downstairs, she saw before her the couple lying on the floor in their own blood - and an axe left on the table. Murray was connected to the murder when bits of burned paper were discovered later that day, implicating his name in the incident. A sudden improvement in Murray's finances following the murder sealed his fate in the eyes of the jury, who provided a swift guilty verdict. The 18-year-old was executed at Chester on April 24, 1841, to a crowd made up mostly of "respectably-attired females".

1843: James Ratcliffe
James Ratcliffe, who was around 58, was a tobacconist by trade and became an alcoholic. In an attempt to flee from her drunkard husband, his wife then moved away from Ratcliffe, with help from their son. Elizabeth, Ratcliffe's wife, took up residence in Stockport but did not tell her husband where she lived. Ratclliffe soon discovered the address, and waited outside the home of a neighbour until he saw his wife enter her property. He then feigned illness so that she would take him some water. When she did bring the water to him, he sprung up and stabbed her with a knife he had hidden in his sleeve. The woman's injuries were so severe that she died from them the next day. Ratcliffe was executed for the murder of his wife on September 2, 1843.



1844: Mary Gallop
Mary was a Sunday School teacher from Monk’s Coppenhall near Crewe, who’s father disapproved of the man she loved. Following an angry argument, she bought some arsenic and poisoned her father. Between October 21 and November 2, 1844 Mary Gallop bought numerous amounts of arsenic from someone named only as Thomas, with the alleged purpose of being used to destroy rats. Arsenic was a favourite of Victorian poisoners. Because the symptoms are similar to those of cholera, which was common at the time, arsenic poisoning often went undetected. By the 19th century, it had acquired the nickname "inheritance powder," perhaps because impatient heirs were known or suspected to use it to ensure or accelerate their inheritances. Arsenic was widely available and is reputed to have a slightly sweet taste meaning its presence could be disguised with sugar. The chemist James Marsh developed an improved test for it in 1836. So sensitive was the test that it could detect as little as one-fiftieth of a milligram of arsenic.



Reportedly, her father (Richard Gallop) was something of a bully, according to one theory resulting in his wife and the mother of Mary taking her own life. Upon the death pf her mother Maty herself apparently became the focus of her father's cruelty. A part of her defence at trial was that Mary's mother had been deemed 'insane' while she was pregnant with her. As insanity was thought to be hereditary it was believed that this could be a possible cause for the woman's actions.

The jury deliberated for five minutes, finding her guiltly but recommending clemency. A petition, an abridged version of which was published in The Welshman, was put forward and signed by the Bishop of Chester along with other members of the clergy. Among the reasons put forward for Gallop's sentence to be reconsidered were that it "does not appear to have been long premeditated" but "accidentally suggested to her mind" by someone in her company. The judge dismissed any calls for mercy and pronounced a death sentence.

She confessed before her execution to having tried once to poison her father by putting arsenic in a cake, which was unsuccessful, and then putting it with arrowroot, which her father himself mixed with milk and drank. She had to be carried to the gallows in a chair, as she was so distressed she was unable to walk, and as a result, the drop was too short, and she "died hard".

1856: William Jackson
As reported in the Wrexham Advertiser, William Jackson was executed at the City Gaol after:


 * "numbers of idlers were lounging in front of the prison, watching the erection of the terrible apparatus of death".

Jackson, who was staying at the Coach and Horses in Handbridge had been sent his sister's children to look after, decided they would be better off dead and murdered them at "Holden's Field" off Eaton Road, hiding the bodies in a pit. He confessed that:


 * "And many times did I eat my dinner with the same knife afterwards. I could not rest day nor night. I have been to the pit many times at 10 and 11 O'clock at night, and three or four times a-day"

1861: Martin Doyle


The Aberdare Times reported that:


 * "..the fact that the extreme penalty of the law has not been carried into effect for many years in the case of a criminal convicted of the offence for which Doyle has suffered, the crowd was more than usually great."

They add that:


 * "The day was somewhat cloudy, but, notwithstanding the threatening aspect of the weather, the crowd was tremendous."

The Doyle case is interesting because he was executed for "intent to murder". The "Pembrokeshire Herald and General Advertiser" recounts in detail the story of Doyle's trial, at which the victim (Jane Brogine) appeared in order to testify against him despite her unwell state. It was reported that she did not seem fit to give evidence, with her face "seamed and scarred in the most dreadful manner", the sight of which invoked a "perfect thrill of horror" in the court. Brogine had apparently left her husband to live with Doyle and he had attacked her with a rock. Martin Doyle was the last person to be executed at Chester for attempted murder.

1863: Alice Holt
On Monday the 28th of December 1863 Alice Holt became the last woman to be executed at Chester. 27 year old widow, Alice Hewitt, was co-habiting with her boyfriend, George Holt in a two up, two down slum house in Great Egerton Street in Stockport in Cheshire. She had adopted his surname and called herself Mrs. Holt. Also in the house was Alice’s mother, 51 year old Mary Bailey and four lodgers, George Bailey (no relation to Mary), his wife, Ann and their two children. In the winter of 1862/3 Mary became ill with bronchitis and complained that “her daughter would not work and did not use her well.” In early 1863 Alice became pregnant by George Holt.

Alice, then 27, hit on the idea of insuring her mothers life for £25. She realised that Mrs. Bailey would never pass a medical test, so she persuaded a friend to impersonate her for the medical. The scam worked, the insurance policy was accepted, and Alice and the woman lodger then went off to buy some arsenic. On March 27th, 1863, Mrs. Bailey died, the doctor certified natural causes, and the insurers paid up. However the lodger was heard to remark that she was not sure quite what the arsenic was for.. Having been buried, it was found that Mary Bailey had all the symptoms of arsenic poisoning - and after her body was disinterred it was found to have been 'saturated' with arsenic.

As reported in the Usk Observer Alice was hanged by William Calcraft in front of Chester City Gaol on Monday, December 28th, 1863, wearing a thin, print dress and chewing peppermints, which she had specially requested. A crowd, estimated at between 1,000 and 2,000, a majority of whom were women had come to watch her hang. As she approached the gallows she partially collapsed and she had to be dragged on to the trap-door. Executioner Calcraft made the usual preparations but when he withdrew the bolt the trap doors stuck. Alice was by now wailing piteously. It took two further attempts before the trap doors finally opened. She dropped no more than two feet through them convulsing for two to three minutes before becoming still. Calcraft blamed the weather and the equipment.


 * Classic British Murder;

1866: Samuel Griffiths
Isaac Newport, a 65-year-old labourer living at Long Green, near Barrow outside of Chester, was found dead after having been drinking at the Railway Inn pub in Helsby. A court found Samuel Griffiths, who the man had been drinking with a short time before his death, guilty for his murder. This was reported as follows in the Aberystwith Observer:


 * "The criminal Griffiths, sentenced to death at the Cheshire assizes for the murder of Isaac Newport at Dunham o' the Hiil, Cheshire, on the 26th of February, was executed at eight o'clock on Monday morning at the city gaol of Chester. There were about 2,000 people present, and their behaviour was exceedingly orderly. The prisoner was extremely humble and penitent, and in the press-room stated that he was convinced that his sins were pardoned, and deeply regretted not having followed religion during the whole of his life. He prayed for his family, as also for the widow of the murdered man. He was attended to the scaffold by the Rev. Mr. Rowe, who administered religious consolations to him but no Church service was held. The drop fell at the second stroke of eight o'clock. He struggled a little, but was soon dead. After hanging the usual time, the body was buried in the precincts of the City Gaol."

In 1867 what had become an odious duty to the City and its Officials was finally transferred by Act of Parliament to the Sheriff of the County.

Chester Castle
"Criminals" also died was Chester Castle. It is generally supposed that he punishment of loading a prisoner who refused to plead with weights or "pressing" (often called "Peine forte et dure") and crushing them (to death if necessary) was introduced in the time of Edward III. However, T. A. Coward, in his "Picturesque Cheshire", suggests that the practice actually originated in the time of Edward II at Chester:


 * "Adam of the Woodhouses, having burnt the said houses and carried away his goods, was one of the stubborn men they gave him three morsels of bread one day, and three sups from the nearest puddle the next; but Adam lingered long on this sumptuous diet, so Edward II, then king, in order to accelerate the man’s decision, originated the idea of putting heavy weights upon the chest. Thus at Chester was instituted that barbarous punishment, if punishment it can be called, of pressing to death."

In 1601 a woman named Candy was pressed to death at the Castle. In 1435 "pressing" seems to have been used simply as a means of execution. Peine forte et dure was abolished in the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1772, with the last known actual use of the practice having been in 1741. From 1772 refusing to plead was deemed to be equivalent to pleading guilty, but this was changed in 1827 to being deemed a plea of not guilty – which is now the case in all common law jurisdictions.

As of 1810, 222 capital penalties could result in a verdict of execution, but by 1861, only four offences carried the death penalty - murder, high treason, arson in a royal dockyard, and piracy. However, in practice, from 1836, only crimes of murder or attempted murder resulted in execution. Before then, murder was still the offence most likely to result in the death penalty - but that was closely followed by burglary. In England and Wales between 1800 and 1836, 497 people were put to death for murder, 467 for burglary, 314 for highway robbery, 217 for forgery and 162 for uttering (using forged money). There were also more people executed for horse theft (159) and sheep theft (138) than there were for far more horrific crime of rape (124). Some 48 people were killed by the state for 'sodomy', 30 for offences linked to rioting, 21 for high treason, and 10 for bestiality. The gallows at the castle was built at the point inside the gaol opposite the Shipgate, which would place it below St Mary on the Hill.

William Bates was executed at Chester Castle in 1848. The Monmouthshire Merlin recorded the case. Bates was a highwayman. One curious fact about the case Bates was arrected together with an accomplice named Walmsley - but Walmsley was released after intervention from the governor of Chester Castle - although it's not exactly clear why. Bates insisted that Walmsley was not innocent and that the pair were responsible for another highway attack (on a priest) for which two other men had been sentenced to transportation.

John Blagg was executed at Chester Castle in 1857. The case was reported as follows in the North Wales Chronicle:


 * "On Friday morning John Blagg, convicted at the late assizes at Chester for the murder of John Bebbington, game keeper to Alr. Corbett, of Tilstone, was executed at Chester Castle. Exertions were made to procure a reprieve on the ground that the evidence was only circumstantial but the Home Secretary, ia reply to the communications made to him, stated that he did not see any feature in the case to justify him in interfering with the course of the law. When the unhappy man was informed that all efforts to save his life had failed he became very much depressed, and the full extent of his awful position and the fate which awaited him seemed to come with great force upon him. The untiring efforts of the rev. chaplain to bring the unhappy man to a proper sense of Imposition were in a great measure crowned with success. During the past few days the convict paid marked attention to the exhortations of the rev. gentleman, joined in prayer with apparent earnestness, and passed much of his time, when left alone with his attendant, in reading passages of Scriputre selected for his perusal. Although he had at times disputed the truth of portions of the evidence adduced against him, he never denied his crime or attempted to account for himself at the time of its commission. His sorrowing wife saw him several times after his conviction. In his interview with her on Tuesday Blagg displayed much more feeling than he had done on former occasions. A few minutes before eight o'clock the convict was visited in the condemned cell by Mr. Dunstan, the governor, the rev. chaplain, and others, who remained with him a short time, when he went through the process of being pinioned by the executioner. The bell then commenced to toll, and the mournful procession having been formed, proceeded to the scaffold. There, in a few moments, the solemn preparations were completed, the rope was adjusted, and, the bolt being withdrawn, the drop fell, and, almost momentarily, the convict was dead. A large crowd of persons, composed of all classes assembled to witness the painful spectacle."

Public executions in England were outlawed as the Capital Punishment Amendment Act 1868 came into force. The act required all executions to take place within the walls of the prison where they were held, with their bodies buried within the grounds of the prison. Its enforcement came as a public call from reformers to put an end to execution as a spectacle, which they believed the national press was turning it into. There are few records of the actual facilities for hanging at the Castle in Chester, but there are cases reported in the press:



1877: James Bannister
James Bannister, age unknown, was executed at the County Gaol of Chester Castle after a gruesomely murdering his wife at their home on Russel Street, in Hyde. On December 15 1876, Bannister was heard by fellow lodgers speaking to his wife in friendly conversation during the evening while in bed. However, it seems a change of mood soon followed as Bannister was heard by his landlord - a Mr Grayson - at two o'clock in the morning shouting "Elijah!". On rushing to their room Mr Grayson found a grisly sight - Mrs. Bannister lying on the bed with her head crushed by a hatchet and her husband with his throat cut and a razor nearby, at least according to The Flintshire Observer. According to a variety of different newspaper sources it seems that Mrs Bannister died from her injuries a few days later, and Bannister was admitted to Manchester Infirmary in a 'dangerous condition'.

Following his recovery Bannister was tried and sentenced to death in Chester by Mr Justice Lush, in what would be the city's first private execution. During his time at Chester Castle Bannister appeared to show remorse for his actions and wrote a poem titled 'The Curse of Drink'. He was however hanged by William Marwood on the 2nd April 1877 in Chester. A rather gory detail is reported in the press:


 * "The proceesion left the condemned cell a few minutes before eight o'clock. The condemned man walked with remark- able firmness of nerve, and placed himself under the drop without faltering or uttering a word, and he died without a struggle. After the drop, which was a very long one, the cord was seen to have penetrated into the old wound caused by attempted suicide. "

The case was also reported in the The North Wales Chronicle and Advertiser for the Principality (7th April 1877).

1877: Henry Leigh
Henry Leigh, a labourer from Macclesfield, was found guilty of the planned murder of a young girl after he had overheard the girl's mother telling her to go to the mill where she worked and retrieve her wages. As the girl was returning from the mill, Leigh lured her away from the footpath towards the side of a canal. A few hours later Alice Ann Halton's body was found floating in the water - and her money was gone. The money was found in Leigh's possession and a jury found the man guilty of a "deliberate and brutal murder". Leigh was sentenced by Justice Bramwell and was executed at Chester on August 13, 1877. The Aberdare Times reported as follows:


 * "On Monday morning, at eight o'clock, Harry Leigh, weaver, of Macclesfield, was hanged within the precincts of Chester Castle, for the murder of Alice Ann Hatton, eight years of age at Sutton, near Macclesfield, on the 31st of March. It will be remembered that the child's corpse was found floating in the canal at Sutton. She had been sent by her mother to the mill for her wages, and it was clearly proved that on her way home she was met by the prisoner, who led her to the canal side and robbed her, then threw her into the water and, as he states in his confession, left her to drown. Since his condemnation he has been very penitent, and thoroughly resigned to his fate. The procession from the cell started a few minutes after eight o'clock, the prisoner walking very firmly, and placing himself nnder the drop without a tremor. Marwood adjusted the rope, stepped behind the culprit, pulled a lever, and the wretched man, who was given a drop of seven feet, died almost instantaneously."

The North Wales Chronicle adds some further detail: that he was described as "a dwarf" and "degraded by drink and vicious conduct". Apparently, he had previously tried to steal the girls wages by forging a note and sending a messenger with it to the mill, an attempt which failed. The newspaper also adds that while awaiting execution he attemped to strangle himself with a handkerchief. Executioner Marwood apparently lodged at the "Red Lion" in Bridge Street and on the night before the execution was persuaded - by buying him drinks - to entertain those present by recounting tales of previous executions.

1881: William Stanway
A native of Newcastle-under-Lyme, who earned a living as a broom maker and hawker, convicted at Chester Assizes of the murder of Ann Mellor at Macclesfield, where they lived with their nine year old daughter. Both were addicted to drink and frequently quarrelled, which usually ended with him giving her a beating. Shortly after Christmas 1880, they went out drinking one afternoon and later when they returned home, he beat her up. Stanway went out again that evening, leaving her in bed; when he returned he called for her to come and fix him some supper. She at first refused to come down but he eventually persuaded her. When she reached the foot of the stairs he stabbed her "in the chest" (although reports vary) with a red hot poker. He didn't call a doctor for two days, during which time she lay in extreme agony and by the time help arrived, she had died. His defence that the crime was not premeditated was rejected and he was hanged by William Marwood on the 21st February 1881 in Chester.

The Flintshire Observer informs us that:


 * "At eight o'clock on Monday morning, William Stamway, aged 31, was executed at Chester Castle for murdering Ann Mellor, at Macclesfield, by stabbing her in the abdomen with a red-hot poker. Reporters were not admitted to the execution. The condemned man had paid the utmost attention to his religious duties since his condemnation. When the time came he walked with a firm step to the gallows. The drop was eight feet six inches. Death was instantaneous. Some hundreds watched the hoisting of the black flag. The executioner was Marwood. Several petitions had been presented to the Home Secretary for a commutation of the sentence, on the ground that the prisoner did not premeditate murder, and that he was drunk when he committed the crime."

In fact, other reports show that there was a degree of premeditation: Merthyr Telegraph reported that:


 * "The prisoner had been drinking, and returned at night very drunk. He appears to have brutally beaten deceased, with whom he lived, and then to haw gone out to procure more liquor. On his return, finding the woman in bed, he told her to come down, and tlueatened if she did not he would bring a red-hot poker to her. She then came down- stairs into the kitchen, when he took the red-hot poker out of the fire and plunged it into her bowels, inflicting such terrible injuries that she died in great agony two days afterwards."

1883: Patrick Carey
Samuel Carlam and his common-law wife Mary Mohan, kept a lodging house at Smallwood, a village just outside Congleton, Cheshire. On 9th February they were found battered to death at the house, which had also been robbed. A hammer was found beside the bodies. The police soon learned that a tramp had been seen in the area carrying a large bundle shortly after the robbery was discovered. Police arrested Patrick Carey who was a father of four, and also known as John (or Jack) White. He was tried and convicted at Chester Assizes and sentenced to death. He was hanged by William Marwood in Chester on the 8th May 1883. As reported in the Weekly Mail on 12th May 1883:


 * "On Tuesday morning at eight o'clock Patrick Carey, alias Jack White, was hung at Chester Castle for murdering Thomas Earlam and Mary Moran at Smallwood. Marwood was the executioner. The drop waa 8ft 6in. Death was instantaneous. Reporters were not admitted. Father Pacincus, Roman Catholic chaplain, says the man told him be was not afraid he repeated prayers after him, and died imploring mercy from above. The drawing of the bolt could be heard outside the prison."

The Aberdare Times gives a fuller report:


 * '''"On Tuesday morning, at eight o'clock, Patrick Carey, alias John White, was executed at Chester Castle Prison, for the murder of Thomas Earlam, a lodging-house keeper at Smallwood, and Mary Moran, his housekeeper. Marwood who had arrived in Chester on the previous night from Lincoln, visited the Castle at an early hour in the morning, and inspected the scaffold on which the condemned man was to be hanged. There was a considerable crowd outside the prison walls from about half-past seven o'clock. At about ten minutea to eight the bell of St. Mary's Church, which adjoins the prison, tolled, and remained tolling until after the execution. The black fiag was hoisted over the gate of the prison one minute after eight o'clock. The condemned man went to bed at his usual hour on Monday night, and slept very soundly. He rose and dressed at five o'clock, and at half-past five was visited by Father Pacificus, Roman Catholic chaplain, who has been ministerially attending the prisoner since his condemnation. The rev. father celebrated mass in a cell, and Carey received the Eucharist. At a few minutes to eight o'clock Marwood and the officials appeared at the condemned cell, and Carey was pinioned and led to the scaffold. The condemned man did not betray any trepidation, but walked firmly to the Beaffold. He submitted his hands to be pinioned and his head to be covered by the hangman with the greatest coolness. The bolt was immediately drawn, and the drop being 8 feet, death appeared to be instantaneous. Reporters were not admitted to witness the execution, but immediately afterwards Father Pacificus volunteered the following informa* tion to the representatives of the press :— "I have just to say that Carey was resigned to the will of God and to his fate. He hoped that the Lord would have mercy upon him. and pardon all his past sics and crimes. He acknowledged the jnstice of the law, ard that he deserved death. I cannot but speak very highly of him. He died really penitent. He was very grateful to the governor and the officers of the gaol for their kindness to him. He submitted quietly to the process of pinioning, and when I, fearing that he might be alarmed, endeavoured to comfort him, be said, 'Don't trouble yourself farther. I am not afraid.' He said prayers for the recommendation of his soul to God as far as the scaffold, and then he repeated every prayer I was sug- gesting to him. At the last moment he requested to be allowed to kiss the crucifix I had in my hands. He did so, and then I kissed him, and we parted. His last words were a prayer for mercy, and he then went down without a struggle." Three masses, beginning at seven o'clock, were offered up for Carey at the Franciscan Church at Chester, and there was also an exposition of the Blessed Sacrament, which commenced about eight o'clock. An inquest was afterwards held at the Castle,"'''

Hoole Heath
Watkin, in his Roman Chester, identifies a "Gibbet Piece" in Hoole, which was probably not a place of execution, but a location where the bodies of executed criminals were put on display. He writes:


 * "The road, which is perfectly straight, is only shewn for about half a mile on the Ordnance Map, which makes its direct line terminate soon after "Salter's Lane" is passed, but we found its course plainly traceable across the fields into Tyre's (or Tyrer's) Lane (which leads down to some low meadows) and into the "Gibbet Piece" where executions (and I believe interments) took place in the last and beginning of the present century, a clump of trees marking the spot."

Abbey Gateway
There was also at least one beheading by the Abbey Gate: that of the Royalist Sir Timothy Fetherstonhaugh who liberally contributed money to the royal cause, raised troops at his own expense, and served in the field. At the Battle of Wigan Lane, Lancashire, 26 August 1651, he was taken prisoner, and imprisoned at Chester Castle (from where he wrote a farewell letter to his wife). After trial by court-martial at Chester for "corresponding with Charles Stuart or his Party" he was beheaded and/or shot (versions vary) outside the Abbey Gate, 22 October 1651, despite his plea that he had quarter for life given him.

Samuel Burrows
33-37 Clwyd Street, Ruthin was once a public house called the Red Lion, where an executioner almost met an untimely death. A man named John Connor was executed in Ruthin for highway robbery on 15th April 1822. The executioner was Samuel Burrows, the hangman for Chester. The evening before the execution he was staying in the Red Lion where his fellow patrons convinced him to demonstrate the process of hanging a person. Attaching his rope to the ceiling, he showed them how to tie the noose and put it around his own neck. A man named Henry Caddock kicked the stool from underneath the hangman and he would have strangled had Thomas Humphreys not swiftly cut the rope. Burrows performed 58 executions there between 1802 and 1834. He executed Edith Morrey on the 23rd of April 1813 for the murder of her husband. He had also hanged her boyfriend, John Lomas on the 24th of August 1812, for his part in the killing. His last job was also his biggest one, the quadruple hanging at Chester on the 19th of April 1834 when he hanged Thomas Riley for cutting and maiming, John Carr and William Naylor for shooting with intent to murder, and James Mason for procuring an abortion. He also worked at Shrewsbury and Hereford on occasions. He was born on the 28th of June 1772 and died on the 20th of October 1835.

William Calcraft
William Calcraft (11 October 1800 – 13 December 1879) was a 19th-century English hangman, one of the most prolific of British executioners. It is estimated in his 45-year career he carried out 450 executions. A cobbler by trade, Calcraft was initially recruited to flog juvenile offenders held in Newgate Prison. While selling meat pies on streets around the prison, Calcraft met the City of London's hangman, John Foxton. After Foxton's death in 1829 the government appointed Calcraft the official Executioner for the City of London and Middlesex. Following this, his executioner services were in great demand throughout England. Nevertheless, some considered Calcraft incompetent, in particular for his controversial use of the short-drop hanging method in which the condemned were slowly strangled to death. Because with Calcraft's methods the condemned took 10-20 minutes to die, to hasten death Calcraft would sometimes dramatically pull on legs or climb on shoulders in an effort to break a victim's neck. It has been speculated that Calcraft used these methods partly to entertain the crowds, sometimes numbering 30,000 spectators or more.

George Smith
Smith gravitated from petty criminal – he was once jailed for running naked through the streets – to England’s best-known hangmen. He hanged Mary Gallop at Chester Gaol on the 28th December 1844 for killing her father. George Smith was renowned for his long white coat and top hat which he wore at all his public hangings. George Smith hanged 20 men and 1 woman during his time as the Public hangman. After ceasing to be Public Hangman he hanged a further three men at Chester Gaol. These were then private hangings as by then the law was changed so that there were no further public hangings. George Smith’s most famous solo execution was that of the Rugeley poisoned, Dr. William Palmer for the murder of John Parsons Cook (and possibly many others), before a huge crowd outside the Stafford Gaol on the 14th June 1856.

William Marwood
William Marwood (1818 – 4 September 1883) was a hangman for the British government. He developed the technique of hanging known as the "long drop". At the age of 54 he persuaded the governor of Lincoln Castle Gaol to allow him to conduct an execution. The efficient way in which he conducted the hanging of William Frederick Horry without a hitch on 1 April 1872 assisted him in being appointed hangman by the Sheriffs of London and Middlesex in 1874, in succession to William Calcraft, at a retainer of £20 a year plus £10 per execution. Marwood developed the "long drop" technique of hanging, which ensured that the prisoner's neck was broken instantly at the end of the drop, resulting in the prisoner dying of asphyxia while unconscious. Instead of everyone falling the same standard distance, the person's height and weight were used to determine how much slack would be provided in the rope so that the distance dropped would be enough to ensure that the neck was broken, but not so much that the person was decapitated. This was considered more humane than the slow death by strangulation caused by the "short drop" method, which was particularly distressing to prison governors and staff who were required to witness executions at close quarters following the abolition of public executions by the Capital Punishment Amendment Act 1868. Marwood was one of two executioners to give their name to the character of the hangman in the British Punch and Judy puppet show (Jack Ketch being the better known one).

Related Pages

 * Boughton;
 * St Giles Cemetery;
 * Gloverstone;
 * Chester Castle;
 * Courts;

Online

 * The Execution of Criminals in Cheshire;


 * Classic British Murders: Cheshire Murder cases from history;


 * Public Executions In Chester From 16th Century as listed by the Museum of Policing in Cheshire;


 * Executions in Cheshire;


 * Cheshire Archives and Local Studies QAB/5/8: Death Warrants - Warrants directed to the sheriff and constable of Chester Castle by the clerk to the crown for the execution of criminals sentenced at the Court of Session, or Assizes.


 * 1837 - 1868 Public executions;


 * An Account of the Life, Conversion, and Death of Mary Gallop: Who was Executed at Chester, for Parricide, December 28th, 1844;


 * The Phrenological Journal and Magazine of Moral Science from the year 1846;


 * 'Obnoxious, drunk' George Smith;


 * Pigot on Chester Infirmary;