Female Executions: Martyrs, Murderesses and Madwomen

by Abbott, Geoffrey

  Dominant by nature, Roxalana ruled the roost. With their teenaged daughter Mary she entertained men after William had gone to bed, giving rise to much gossip among the neighbours, as did the commotion caused by the couple’s repeated rows. Matters came to a head, in more ways than one, when, during a furious argument, Roxalana handed a revolver to her 14-year-old nephew, Frank Gates, and told him to shoot his uncle. Whether too scared to disobey, or in order to protect her from being attacked by her husband, he did so, both shots only inflicting flesh wounds. William collapsed on the floor, but Roxalana, seeing he was still alive, picked up the axe from where it lay by the stove and struck him on the head. Not content with that, she then aimed at his neck with such force that she severed his head completely.

  Where any other woman would have been aghast at what she had done, or sought medical assistance, Roxalana calmly picked up the head and, rolling it up in her apron, she put it to one side. Then she and Mary proceeded to dismember the decapitated corpse, using the axe and a kitchen knife, throwing the body parts and limbs into the already lighted stove. Apparently loath to part with what was left of her dearly beloved, she dumped the head in a sack of wheat which was stored in the corner of the room, after which she and nephew Frank disposed of the weapons in a nearby pond.

  However, the young boy could not keep silent about what had happened that awful night, and word reached the authorities. Roxalana was arrested but, under questioning, remained silent, as did Mary. The testimony submitted by Frank, the presence of ashes and charred bones in the stove, and the discovery of William’s head, were so overwhelming that defence in court was futile and she was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death.

  As the following months went by, appeal after appeal was heard and rejected. The media had a field day, some being against capital punishment per se, others calling for the execution of the perpetrator of such cold-blooded slaughter. Meanwhile, in the condemned cell, Roxalana had outbursts of bad temper, even ordering the priest, there to give her spiritual support, to leave her alone.

  It was not until 28 February 1887 that the scaffold was made ready in the grounds of the gaol and the executioner detailed to attend. Hardly surprisingly the prisoner had slept but little, and on rising, dressed herself in what was described in the newspapers as ‘a narrow satin skirt, having a tight fitting basque. The hem of the skirt was ruffled, her sleeves having white ruching at the cuffs, repeated at the neckline, where she had pinned a bunch of roses’.

  As she was led out to the yard it became obvious to the official witnesses and large number of reporters that her cold, almost remote attitude had finally been overcome, for tears ran down her cheeks and she trembled almost uncontrollably. Mounting the scaffold steps she paused and, as the priest said his final words of support, two deputies advanced, one of them swiftly slipping the black hood over her head. Even as muffled shrieks commenced beneath the tightly drawn fabric, the signal was given and as the noose tightened its stranglehold ‘there was a rattle, a jar and a strangled cry’, and Roxalana’s lifeless body swayed from side to side in the cold winter’s wind.

  Obsessed with jealousy, Mary Bolton suspected that her meek, ordinary-looking husband was having secret affairs with other women, and she attacked him on several occasions, but eventually her uncontrollable emotions got the better of her. Going into his office one day in June 1936 she pointed a revolver at him, then proceeded to fire every round into his body. Somehow he managed to drag himself out into the corridor and exclaimed to horrified colleagues: ‘Keep that woman away from me!’ Totally unconcerned, his wife walked past him saying scornfully as she did so, ‘Take no notice of him – he’s just putting on an act!’

  Found guilty of murder, Mary Bolton was given a life sentence and committed suicide in prison some years later.

  Du Barry, Marie (France)

  What must it have felt like to have to behead a woman you loved, knowing that if you refused you would be replaced by someone much more brutal? That was the appalling dilemma that faced Charles-Henri Sanson, the Paris executioner, on 6 December 1793.

  Sanson had first met Marie in 1766 when a close friend, Abbé Gomart, who happened to be dining with him, expressed his fears regarding a young lady he described as his niece, although in actual fact she was his daughter. Her name was Marie Jeanne de Vaubernier, and, he said sadly, her morals were causing him increasing concern. Convent educated, she had left to become apprenticed to a famous costumier in Paris, and whilst working there, had become acquainted with some of the elegant ladies of the court, their somewhat wayward lifestyle encouraging her to act likewise. Ravishingly beautiful, his friend explained, she had begun to lead a life of sin and dissipation.

  Charles-Henri agreed to help and so met Marie, instantly conceding that the young lady was indeed overwhelmingly alluring. Despite having no motive in mind other than to help her mend her ways, he was nevertheless deeply attracted to her; his attentions, however, were not reciprocated, for the lady was aiming far higher than a liaison with the public executioner.

  They parted, and she soon ingratiated her way into fashionable society where she won the attention of Louis XV who, in order to elevate her status, arranged that she should marry the Comte Guillaume du Barry. And it was as Jeanne Gomard de Vaubernier, Comtesse du Barry, that she achieved what was undoubtedly the pinnacle of her life’s ambition, that of being the King’s mistress.

  The years passed, and Marie’s lifestyle and those of thousands of others were to change forever with the advent of the French Revolution. The main targets of the revolutionaries were of course the King and Queen, together with the members of the royal family and all those who associated with them. After the death of Louis XV, du Barry went to live in England, but following the Revolution she returned to her home country, believing that no harm would come to her; being the daughter of a priest and a dressmaker, she could not be condemned as a hated aristocrat. But the Tribunal thought otherwise; as a royal mistress she had squandered the treasures of the State, and was known to have mourned the late, guillotined, King Louis XVI.

  In Charles-Henri’s diary for 6 December 1793 he described the harrowing scenes in heartfelt detail:

  Madame du Barry was sentenced to death last night and executed this morning. We arrived at the Hall of Justice punctually but had to wait as the convict [du Barry] was with the judges who were taking down her confession. Then she was brought in; her legs could hardly carry her. It was some twenty years since I had seen her, and I could hardly have known her. Her features had become coarse. When she saw me she shrieked, covered her eyes with her hands and sank down on her knees, crying, ‘Do not kill me!’

  She rose to her feet again. ‘Where are the judges?’ she exclaimed. ‘I have not confessed everything; I want to see them.’ The judge and his clerk were sent for, and she said she had concealed several objects of value in her country house, but she broke down and sobbed at every word. The clerk kept saying, ‘Is that all?’ and tried to make her sign the confession, but she pushed the paper away, saying that she had something more to add. She perhaps thought that, in reason of the immense wealth she was giving up, she might be reprieved.

  At last the judge said she must submit to the court’s decision and make up by her courage for the ignominy of her past life as a member of the royal court. One of my assistants approached and attempted to cut her hair, but she resisted, and the other assistants had great difficulty in binding her hands. She at last submitted, but she cried as I never saw a woman cry before.

  Vast crowds had assembled, and many cries were raised, but her shrieks were louder than any. She exclaimed: ‘Good citizens, free me! I am innocent; I am of the people, good citizens, do not let them kill me!’ No one moved, but men and women hung their heads and silence prevailed at last.

  Du Barry was so faint that my son Henri had to support her. She often spoke to me, begging for mercy. I was more moved than anyone, for this unfortunate woman reminded me of my younger days, of the time when I
knew her . . . When she saw the guillotine she became overwrought and struggled with my assistants and tried to bite them. She was very strong, and three minutes elapsed before they could carry her up on to the platform. She was frightful to look at, and to the very last moment she struggled.

  Although most French aristocrats retained their dignity on the scaffold and went to their deaths without flinching, one can understand Marie’s frenzied emotions, and feel for the man who once loved her, but also had to behead her.

  Before Queen Marie Antoinette was guillotined she wrote a farewell letter to her sister-in-law Princess Elizabeth, which found its way into the hands of Robespierre, then Leader of the Revolutionary Assembly. Rather than take any humane action by giving it to the Princess, he concealed it under his mattress. When later he, in turn, was guillotined, the letter was found by a revolutionary deputy, M. Curtois, who kept it as a souvenir, the Princess already having been beheaded.

  Twenty years later, hopeful to exchange it for a pardon for his revolutionary past, he handed it, together with a lock of the late Queen’s hair, to the then King, Louis XVIII, only to be promptly arrested. The relics were seized, and Curtois was banished for life to Belgium. The letter was then given to Mme Royale, the late Queen’s daughter, and on seeing the pitiful, tear-stained pages written by her mother under such tragic circumstances, she fainted.

  Dugan, Eva (USA)

  In England, the year 1874 heralded a new era in execution technique when, having just taken over the scaffold, hangman William Marwood realised that breaking the felon’s spinal column would bring death faster than the current slow strangulation method brought about by using the ‘one length of rope fits all’ method. To achieve this, and thereby alleviate the victim’s suffering, it would be necessary to vary the distance he or she dropped, having first taken into consideration their age, weight, physical development and similar factors. This method of calculation was refined and improved by subsequent hangmen, and was in fact the basic measure used until capital punishment was eventually abolished.

  However, it would seem that Marwood’s ideas were not embraced in America until much later, many states in the USA still adhering to the original system until well into the following century, much to the horror and distress of the spectators attending the execution of Eva Dugan.

  Eva had been found guilty of the brutal murder of her employer, A. J. Mathis. At her trial she accused another alleged ‘employee’ named Jack, of the murder, letters signed by Jack later coming from Mexico, confessing to the crime; no explanation of how Eva arranged for these missives was forthcoming, if indeed she was responsible in any way for them. They had no effect on the jury’s deliberations, the verdict being one of guilty.

  The inevitable petitions were submitted to the Arizona state governor, Eva even claiming to be insane in order to be granted a reprieve, but to no avail. In gaol she was reported as being full of bravado, one journalist quoting her as saying that she was going to die as she had lived, and that people loved a good sport but hated a bad loser.

  On 21 February 1930 Eva stood on the scaffold, hooded and bound. The executioner positioned the noose around her neck and operated the drop. The trapdoors opened, the body dropped, but then the rope swung back up again – empty. Witnesses saw Eva’s torso sprawled in the pit, her hooded head lying some distance away. And as her heart had continued beating for some little time, copiously flowing blood was very much in evidence.

  Eva had been given too long a drop, due regard not having been given to her physical condition, for subsequent examination revealed that the debacle had been caused by her having a flabby neck. Had prior checks such as those advocated by Marwood and further improved by a successor, James Berry, been in force, a shorter drop would have resulted in a ‘normal’ execution. However, the severance of her head would have been so rapid that Eva would have suffered for only an infinitesimal length of time. Bearing that fact in mind, it is ironic to note that mainly due to that catastrophe, the Arizona authorities decided to dispatch victims by the gas chamber instead – a method in which victims usually attempt to hold their breath for as long as possible, and so suffer visibly for a number of seconds before and while inhaling the toxic fumes.

  Inviting friends into one’s cell while awaiting execution seemed to be the norm in some American prisons in the 1930s, for Eva held a veritable soirée, it being reported in the gossip columns of the more popular papers that ‘she was gracious as a society woman entertaining at a tea, the conversation positively sparkling with the repartee’.

  Durgan, Bridget (USA)

  Eva Dugan, whose tragic end is described above, slew her employer and fell to her death from the scaffold; Bridget murdered her employer’s wife and met her death by rising!

  Bridget was a servant in the New Jersey residence of a Dr William Coriell and his wife Ellen. Among the possible reasons which later emerged as to why she should have repeatedly and savagely stabbed the doctor’s wife to death and then attempted to burn the house down, was that she had been reprimanded for not doing her job satisfactorily, or that she had been secretly in love with the doctor. What credence was given at the trial to the fact that she suffered from epilepsy, and whether this might have had any bearing on the crime, is not known, but the jury did not hesitate to bring in a verdict of guilty; nor did the judge hesitate to sentence her to death by hanging, his words being greeted with applause by those in the public gallery, their cheers being drowned by the condemned woman’s hysterical screams, which could be heard by passers-by outside the building.

  Media attention was widespread and intensive, it being reported that hundreds of applications were received from those who wanted to be present at her execution, and on the actual day, 30 August 1867, scenes resembling those at Tyburn, London, two centuries earlier, were very evident. The area surrounding the gaol was packed with spectators, some clambering on roofs and clinging on to ledges, hoping to get a glimpse of the condemned woman as she was led out of the prison block. Inside the yard mayhem reigned, for a further thousand or more had managed to gain admittance, cheering, pushing, even fighting to get a better viewpoint; a mob totally out of control of the officers who were attempting to preserve some sort of order.

  The execution mechanism was of unusual design in that, after being hooded and noosed, Bridget, instead of falling through the drop trapdoors, was jerked violently upwards, the other end of the rope being attached to a heavy weight that was suddenly released (for greater detail see Appendix 2). As that happened, onlookers variously described her as having her neck instantly broken, others claiming that she struggled madly, panting for breath, her writhing hands becoming discoloured. That the execution method left much to be desired was evidenced by a report that she took nearly thirteen minutes to die, although the movements seen could have been attributed to muscular spasms after death.

  When eventually the weight was released and her body slowly lowered, it was noticed that her eyes were protruding and, to be expected, her face was suffused with blood. Having earlier expressed a wish that a post-mortem should not take place – she feared being dissected – her body was placed in a coffin and she was interred in a nearby Catholic cemetery.

  Bridget’s choice of clothes for her final appearance was as modest as could be imagined, consisting as it did of a plain brown long-sleeved frock with a lace collar, white gloves and matching stockings. The one incongruous note was that she had decided to wear what were known as ‘lasting’ slippers – hardly necessary, one would have thought!

  Dyer, Amelia Elizabeth (England)

  That a man should kill a child is appalling; that a woman should kill a child is unthinkable; but a woman who kills eight children and perhaps many more . . .

  Amelia Dyer was known as the Reading Baby-farmer; having once been a member of the Salvation Army, she was a figure of trust to those parents or guardians who, over the years, accepted her offer to adopt unwanted children, and were more than happy to pay her the regular boarding fees for t
heir upkeep. But their trust was badly shaken when in 1885 a boatman on the Thames noticed something unusual floating in the water. Rescuing it, he was shocked to find that, wrapped in a brown paper parcel, was a dead baby, with a tape tied tightly round its neck. The parcel bore an address: Mrs Thomas, Piggotts Road, Lower Caversham.

  The police immediately went to the address, only to discover that their quarry had moved away and had, moreover, changed her name. Worse was to follow, for within the next few days two more bodies were found floating in the river, each in a separate parcel, each having been strangled by the tape around its throat.

  In the widespread hunt that ensued, Mrs Dyer, alias Thomas, alias Harding, alias Stanfield, was found, and when arrested on a charge of murdering a little girl named Fry, admitted her guilt, adding, ‘You’ll know all mine by the tapes around their necks.’ That statement was tragically borne out when no fewer than a further four small corpses were fished out of the Thames, and it was suspected that there could have been many more similarly strangled over the years during which she had been a baby-farmer, four more children having recently disappeared.

  It would appear that she would place an advertisement in local papers, worded as follows:

  I should be glad to have a dear little baby girl, one I could bring up and call my own. First I must tell you we are plain, homely people, in fairly good circumstances. We live in our own house. I have a good and comfortable home. We are out in the country and sometimes I am alone a good deal. I do not want a child for money’s sake but for company and home comfort. Myself and my husband are dearly fond of children. I have no child of my own. A child with me will have a good home and a mother’s love and care. We belong to the Church of England. Although I want to bring the child up as my own, I should not mind the mother or any other person coming to see the child at any time. It would be a satisfaction to see and know the child was getting on all right. I only hope we can come to terms.