by Phil Clarke
Q:‘If Pa killed Ma, who’d kill Pa?’
A: ‘Marwood’.
William Marwood was born in 1818, in the village of Goulceby, Lincolnshire. He was the fifth of ten children of William and Elizabeth Marwood. William’s father was a shoemaker, and following a brief apprenticeship to a miller, young William followed him into the family business. It was perhaps during his time as a fledgling cobbler that he aquired the passion for excellence of a master craftsman.
Marwood was a devout Methodist (although partial to gin) and saw himself as a servant of the world. It was in this spirit of servitude that, as he approached middle age, Marwood began to petition the High Sheriff of Lincoln for an opportunity to perform an execution. It was an extremely odd thing for a man of his age to do, especially for one with no experience even of the penal system, let alone the scaffold. It was extraordinary, therefore, that his request was ever granted, but granted it was, and on 1 April 1872 he was invited to Lincoln Prison to execute William Frederick Harry. It was to be the first time that the long-drop method of hanging had been used in England. He dispatched with Harry cleanly and efficiently and impressed everybody present (apart from the condemned, obviously) with the smoothness of his new method.
Marwood was a public executioner for a total of eleven years, and managed to accumilate a fair amount of wealth, owning several properties and other investments. Initially, he was highly regarded by his colleagues in the prison system, and is well-remembered for introducing a number of important reforms to the British execution process. He not only introduced the long-drop method, he also devised the table calculating the relationship between the victim’s weight and the length of drop needed to efficiently break his or her neck. Up until this point, the short-drop method meant that the victim was often strangled to death slowly, and the process was deeply unpleasant from beginning to end, not only for the victim but also for the witnesses who were forced to watch. Marwood revolutionised hanging in England, and while it would never be a comfortable experience for anyone present, he at least rendered it quick and relatively efficient. Marwood had always been a keen student of anatomy, and this must have informed his craft to a large extent.
Charles Peace
In some ways at least Charles Peace could be seen as Marwood’s ultimate archcriminal counterpart. There were certainly similarities between the two men. Each saw their profession as an art form, and were regarded as talented craftsmen by their contemporaries. It just so happened that, where Marwood’s chosen art form involved dispatching of criminals in the name of the crown, Peace chose burglary.
His great skill as a thief, and his almost supernatural ability to escape from the clutches of the law meant that he, like Marwood, made it into the collective public conciousness. He was even immortalised in literature by the writer Arthor Conan Doyle, becoming one of the few real-life criminals ever to feature in a Sherlock Holmes story.
By the time of his execution, Charles Peace was as famous a criminal in England as the American Jesse James on the other side of the Atlantic. On the surface, he appeared to be a well-dressed, violin playing, respectable man who travelled the streets by day, selling musical instruments and bric-a-brac. But by night he was a clever and prolific cat burglar and double murderer, whose many crimes struck terror into the heart of the nation.
Over the years, Charles Peace has become the inspiration for a whole host of archcriminal characters for artists, writers and dramatists alike: part artist, part scoundrel. Peace finally came face to face with Marwood at Armley Gaol on 25 February 1879 – a bitterly cold day. He went to his death in the conviction that he had been forgiven for his many sins, having set about atoning for them upon his capture and incarceration for burglary and murder.
Towards the end of Marwood’s career it was noted that he was frequently drunk. In the beginning, he had taken great pride in his chosen vocation, even going to the lengths of having business cards printed with the words:
William Marwood: Public Executioner, Horncastle, Lincolnshire
He also had a sign installed above the door of his shoe shop which read ‘Marwood Crown Office’, and his customers often came specifically to buy bootlaces from him, fascinated and amused by his other life. These were not the actions of a man ashamed of his work. However, it seems that the real nature of the job did cause him some agitation. In one conversation with the young James Berry, he said ‘My position is not a pleasant one. No, it is not a pleasant one!’
The pressure of the executioner’s job often means that they become heavy drinkers, and more than a few develop problems with alcohol. Hangmen such as Bartholemew Binns and Henry Pierrepoint used alcohol to steady their nerves before an execution, and to help with the guilt they felt afterwards. It is debatable whether Marwood drank for the same reasons, but it certainly indicates that his enthusiasm for execution had died a death.
James Berry
James Berry is perhaps one of the more likable characters on our list of British hangmen, but a lot of the information we have about him comes directly from his own diaries, so we have to take it with a pinch of salt. He became an executioner at a time when the Victorian public were generally fascinated with all aspects of death and crime. Therefore, at the height of his career, Berry became a household name, his notoriety even providing him with an effigy in Madame Tussaud’s Chamber of Horrors.
A Passion for Adventure
James Berry was born in Heckmondwicke, Yorkshire in February 1852 to Daniel Berry, a respectable wool-stapler and his wife Mary Ann, formerly Kelley. As a young man he established himself as a passionate, headstrong and adventurous boy, who was quick thinking and imaginative, but also rather wayward.
At nine years old he was kicked in the face by a horse while ‘playing hookey’ from Sunday school. This nasty accident left him with a permanent scar on his cheek, but it did little or nothing to quash his impulsive, boisterous nature, and he seemed constantly to be getting mixed-up in schemes and scrapes. He was expelled from school after school for truancy and general cheekiness, and his frustrated parents, having run out of options, set him to work in the family business.
At sixteen years old, young, brave and still hungry for adventure, Berry ran away from home with a friend. The two young men made their way to Goole, intent on becoming cabin boys on a ship. Berry found himself engaged upon an old three-masted, fully rigged, wooden vessel whereby the captain, sceptical as to whether young Berry would cope with the life of a sailor, gave him a job. Within a few hours, Berry had discovered that a seamen’s life was not all it was cut-out to be, so he borrowed five shillings from his captain (to by some clothes for sailing in) and set off for home.
James the Craftsman
For all his faults, James did show some talent. He was cunning and quick-witted, practical and enjoyed designing and constructing things. In his diary he writes fondly about making a monster kite with two plasterer’s lathes and a calico front, and he describes the joy of seeing something he made actually work, a feeling only a true craftsperson can experience.
Berry eventually became a police officer in the Wakefield West Riding Depot. By this time, he had met, fallen in love with and married Sarah Ann Ackroyd. The police force was able to offer the man and his young family a rare chance for job security. He was effective in his new job, and ‘had the fortune of bringing to justice several notorious criminals.’ Berry was a brave officer, and often found himself right in the thick of the action, but he was also quick tempered. His impatience did not sit well with his seniors in the force. Berry was taken before his Chief Constable for insubordination, and although he was cleared of any actual blame, he had lost respect for the police force and resigned soon afterwards.
Position Vacant
On 4 September 1883, the English pioneer of the long-drop hanging method, executioner William Marwood, died. He had been instrumental in transforming the hanging process from the gory public spectacle of Calcraft’s short drop, to a sombre, private and relat
ively efficient event governed by science rather than emotion. He was also an aquaintance of Berry’s. By this time, James had left the police and become a boot salesman, but he was not making enough money to comfortably support his wife and their four children. He decided to follow in the footsteps of Calcraft and Marwood, who were both cobblers by trade, and applied for the vacant position. The work seemed to him ‘distasteful’ and he had no personal desire to kill for a living, but at least he would be able to feed and clothe his family.
Upon the death of Marwood, there were as many as 1,400 applications for the post of hangman. James Berry was among twenty individuals selected for interview at the Old Bailey. He assumed he’d got the job, and wrote a telegram to his family to this effect. Unfortunately for him, his potential employers had discovered that Berry suffered from occasional epileptic fits, and so they employed Bartholemew Binns instead.
Berry was disappointed at the news, but his family and friends had done everything within their power to stop him from getting the job. They even petitioned the home secretary to have his application dismissed, believing that his appointment as executioner would bring the family into disrepute.
Fortunately for Berry, Binns was quickly found to be both a bungler and a drunkard, and having subjected a number of his victims to a long, painful and desperate death by strangulation, he was duly removed from the job. Berry’s day had finally come.
Cold Feet
James Berry’s first execution took place on 31 March 1884 in Edinburgh. The prisoners in question were poachers Robert Flockart Vickers and William Innes, who had been charged with the murders of two assistant game keepers John Fortune and John McDiarmid at the Roseby estate in the Moorfoot hills.
On the morning of the 28 March, he paid a visit to the scaffold, where builders were still constructing the shed provided to render the execution private. He tested the gallows using bags of cement which were the same weight as Vickers and Innes respectively. He calculated the length of the drop required, using Marwood’s long-drop table, and when his preparations were complete he spent some time pacing around the prison grounds in contemplation of the poor men who were ‘nearing their end, full of life, and knowing the fatal hour, which made me quite ill to think about.’
Berry was beginning to feel uncomfortable with his responsibilities and he lost his appetite:
Nothing felt good to me, everything that I put into my mouth felt like sand, and I felt as if I wished I had never undertaken such an awful calling. I regretted for a while, and then I thought the public would only think I had not the pluck, and I would not allow my feelings to overthrow me, so I never gave way to such thoughts again.
When the time came for Berry to launch Vickers and Innes into eternity, the executions were done ‘quick as lightning’. The magistrates, doctors and members of the press all admitted that James had done a stirling job, carrying out the sentence in a humane and efficient manner. It appeared James Berry had finally found his calling.
Executioner Number 1
In his long career as hangman, Berry’s most important contribution to the science of execution were the many refinements he made to Marwood’s long-drop method. He is responsible for giving us the sub-aural positioned knot, placed under the left ear instead of the chin, which meant that the victim’s neck was more likely to snap cleanly and quickly, shortening the victim’s physical and emotional distress. Indeed, some of the practices introduced by him remained official procedure until the death penalty was finally abolished in Britain.
Berry carried out a total of 131 hangings during his career, with five of his victims being female – a fact which sometimes gave his concience more grief than he could manage. For the most part he proved himself more than capable of the job at hand, but there were occassions where circumstance let him down. One of these rare occasions was the astonishing execution of John Lee, who became known as ‘the man they couldn’t hang’.
The Man they Couldn’t Hang
In the days following his ‘execution’, John Henry George Lee became a national hero, the first man to cheat the gallows, not just once but over and over again! Lee had been a servant in the house of an elderly lady, Miss Emma Anne Whitehead Keyse, from Babbacombe, Dorset. John was already a known criminal and Miss Keyse saw his employment as a merciful act.
On the night of 14 November 1884, a housemaid was woken by the smell of smoke and went downstairs to investigate. She was extremely distraught to find the partially charred remains of Miss Keyse lying on the dining room floor. She had been hit over the head with a heavy object and had her throat cut before the killer doused the surrounding carpets and furniture with paraffin and set them alight. There had been no forced entry.
Unsurprisingly, John Lee’s criminal record immediately made him the prime suspect, and the fact that hairs from the dead woman were found on his socks, convicted him. He was sentenced to hang at Exeter Gaol.
On the allocated day of his death, Lee was accompanied from his cell to the coach house by the chaplain, the governor and other officials. Berry strapped the prisoner’s legs together, pulled the white cap down over his head, put on the noose, took a step back and operated the drop. Nothing happened. Berry jerked the lever once more, harder this time. Again nothing happened. He stamped hard on the trapdoor, but even when the wardens added their own weight, the trapdoor still would not budge. Berry removed Lee’s morbid regalia and went to inspect the gallows. There was nothing obviously the matter and the contraption seemed to be working perfectly. Berry once more ascended the scaffold, pulled the white cap down over Lee’s head, put on the noose and pulled the lever so hard it bent in his hand. Again, the trapdoor stayed put.
By this time, the execution party were becoming seriously spooked. What could be causing the mysterious hold-up? Was John Lee in possession of psychic powers and controlling the scaffold with the strength of his mind? Or was there some satanic force at work? Lee kept his composure throughout this ordeal and he remained calm and quite in control, which must have disturbed Berry, the chaplain, the officials and the witnesses still further. In the end, they decided to call off the execution and inform the home secretary of the problem.
A New Lease of Life
Lee was led back to his cell and given a large meal of chicken, potatoes, muffins and cake. One can’t help but wonder what ran through his mind while tucking into his dinner. In that position, most of us would feel like the luckiest person alive, but still Lee seemed unruffled, as if he knew the outcome all along. He was apparently surprised to learn that Berry, who’d been extremely disturbed by the day’s events, had lost his appetite. Eventually, John Lee’s sentence was commuted from death to twenty years in prison. He was eventually released in 1907 at the age of forty-three, and began a new life in America.
James the Preacher
Berry continued to work as an executioner until 1891, when he hung up his noose for the last time. His years on the scaffold had taken their toll. He was drinking a great deal and had become more short tempered than at any other time in his life. He was also haunted by nightmares, prompting some contemporary historians to conclude that he suffered from some kind of post-traumatic stress disorder. In the years following his resignation, he toured the New World as an evangelist and gave lectures on phrenology (the science of determining a person’s character and criminality by the shape of his head). He changed his mind about his belief in the death penalty, concluding in his diary that:
The law of capital punishment falls with terrible weight upon the hangman and that to allow a man to follow such an occupation is doing him a deadly wrong.
Berry continued his evangelist teaching until his death in October 1913. It would have surprised the former executioner to learn that executions continued in Britain until 1964, convinced as he was that ‘we shall never be a civilised nation while executions are carried out in prison.’
The Billingtons
One of the best known family of twentieth-century executioners
were the Billingtons – James and his sons Thomas, William and John. As with many now obsolete trades, the fascinating skill of execution was often passed down from father to son, with each individual stamping his own unique style on the trade. Mind you it took more than family connections to secure the position of executioner, and the candidate had to have a good character and a clean slate. Even if the applicant got past the first interview, they still had to pass a written examination and take part in training courses. Despite being a depressing job with meagre remunerations, for many it still held a fascination and James Billington had always dreamed of becoming a hangman.
From an early age, James Billington was fascinated by the art of execution and experimented using a dummy on a homemade scaffold in his back garden in Bolton. He was of medium height and slight build, but was exceptionally strong. After completing his education, he dabbled in various jobs including working in a cotton mill, being a collier and also trying his hand at being a wrestler, but he could settle at none. In the late 1860s, James moved to Farnworth, where he set up in business as a barber. He started to frequent public houses and became renowned for his singing and outlandish drunken behaviour. However, meeting his future wife, Alice Pennington, made him see the light and he pledged to give up the drink. He even went as far as wearing the blue ribbon indicating that he was a teetotaller.