Female executions 1735 – 1799.

With special thanks to Mr. Dave Mossop for allowing me to publish the results of his years of painstaking research that has enabled this unique insight into 18th century female crime and punishment.

Over this 65 year period, around 1,600 women and girls were sentenced to death in England and Wales.  Of these, a minimum of 356 can be confirmed as having been executed, 324 by hanging and 32 by burning at the stake.  At least 1,230 were reprieved, giving an overall reprieve rate in the order of 78%.  A few died in prison prior to execution/reprieve and in around 50 cases, it is not possible to be certain what the final outcome of their case was, although some of them may well have been executed.  Prior to 1760, those not listed as definitely reprieved were usually hanged, after that date the reverse is true.

Period	1735 - 44	1745 - 54	1755 - 64	1765 - 74	1775 - 84	1785 - 94	1795 - 99	Totals
Sentenced to death	258	186	155	202	320	325	150	1596
Reprieved	190	132	98	164	254	276	129	1243
% reprieved	74%	71%	63%	81%	79%	85%	86%	78%
Hanged	60	49	53	33	60	46	21	324
Burned	8	5	5	5	6	3	0	32
Total executed	68	54	57	38	66	49	21	356

Click here for a graph showing the trends for executions and reprieves.

187 of the confirmed executions were for murder, representing 52.7% of the total. Eighty of these were hanged for the crime of murder of their bastard. They were typically young mothers who had got pregnant outside wedlock and killed their new born babies to avoid the stigma of single parenthood that was completely unacceptable at the time and/or the problems of bringing up a baby without any financial support whatsoever.  It wasn’t until the Infanticide Act of 1922 that the killing of a newborn baby by its mother was no longer classed as a capital crime. Sadly, it is quite possible that some of these children may have been stillborn or died of natural causes in the hours immediately after birth. 
Seventy six women were to be executed for other murders and 31 for the crime of Petty Treason (noted as P/T below), which was the murder by a woman of her husband or mistress (her superiors in law), and carried a mandatory sentence of burning at the stake up to 1789.  Twenty seven of these women were burned and 4 hanged.
The law decreed that women convicted of coining or otherwise counterfeiting money or possessing the equipment with which to do so, were guilty of High Treason (noted as H/T below) and were also to be burnt at the stake. (Men were hanged in the normal way for both crimes.)  Both men and women convicted of these crimes were drawn to the place of execution on a hurdle or sledge. Eight women suffered this fate either at Tyburn or Newgate up to 1798. From 1790, both High Treason and Petty Treason committed by women became punishable by normal hanging, although the drawing to the gallows on a sledge still persisted.

Age was no bar to execution and teenage girls were regularly put to death. Eighteen year old Mary Stracey was hanged at Tyburn for highway robbery on the 15th of March 1745 and 15 year old Elizabeth Morton suffered at Nottingham on Wednesday, the 6th of April 1763, for the murder of her master’s two year old daughter. On the 16th of October 1771, Mary Jones (aged 18) was hanged at Tyburn for stealing 4 pieces of muslin valued at £5. 10s (quite a substantial sum at the time). Eighteen year old Sarah Shenston went to the gallows in Shrewsbury on Thursday, the 22nd of March 1792, for the murder of her bastard child.  Susannah Minton, aged 17, was hanged at Hereford for arson on Saturday, the 16th of September 1786.  At Dorchester Assizes in March 1794, 15 year old Elizabeth Marsh was convicted of the murder of her grandfather, for which she was to hang on Monday, the 17th of March.
At least 3 teenage girls were burned for Petty Treason. Mary Grote, aged 16, suffered at Winchester for the murder of her mistress on the 18th of March 1738 and two 19 year olds, Mary Fawson and Susannah Bruford, were burned for the murder of their husbands.

Crimes against property were also dealt with severely. Privately stealing (picking pockets), highway robbery (also picking pockets, in most cases, but committed on the King’s highway), burglary, stealing or robbing in a dwelling house, housebreaking, stealing from a shop and theft of horses and sheep all carried a mandatory death sentence.  Some 125 women were to hang for these offences (35% of the total). However, it should be noted that the vast number of reprieves granted were also for offences against property.  There are a few instances of reprieves for the more serious offences of arson, coining and even murder, but these are quite rare.
Where people were reprieved, they were typically sentenced to transportation for a period of not less than 4 years, up to a maximum of life.  They were sent to either America (up to the Civil War there) or later to Australia.  Returning from transportation before the completion of one’s sentence or being on the run having broken out of jail constituted the capital crime of being at large in the Kingdom, and 3 women were executed for this.

Arson was a capital crime, as the destruction of property and the attendant risk to life and limb made it a very serious offence. Sixteen women were to go to the gallows for this.
The anti-Catholic Gordon Riots of 1780 led to a large number of executions for those convicted of assisting in the destruction of property (including Newgate prison). At least 25 people, including 6 women were hanged for offences committed during these riots. One of these was Charlotte Gardiner, a 19 year old black girl. Most of the Gordon Rioters were young people.

Forgery, uttering forged bank notes, wills, Letters of Attorney, etc. and personating (impersonating another person to gain pecuniary advantage) almost always resulted in execution and 7 women were to die for these crimes.

Crime	Total
Murder bastard child	80
Murder	76
Highway robbery	42
Robbery in dwelling house	35
Petty Treason  (murder of  husband/master/mistress)	31
Burglary	25
Arson	16
Housebreaking	9
High Treason Coining	8
Forgery/Uttering/Personating	7
Riot/destroying property	7
Stealing in a shop	6
Horse/sheep theft	5
Pick pocket	5
Returning from transportation	3
Sacrilege	1
Totals	356

Click here for a graph showing the breakdown by the most common crimes, for which a total of 10 or more executions were carried out.

Prior to 1789, the place of execution would be typically a convenient open space outside the town to which the condemned would be taken in a procession consisting of the Sheriff or Under Sheriff, a minister, the hangman and a troop of Javelin men to guard them.  From 1789 to around 1820, there was a steady migration of executions away from these open spaces to places either directly in front of or on the roof of County gaols.
All of the women listed as hanged prior to 1783, would have been either “turned off” from a ladder or the back of a cart thus subjecting them to a short drop and therefore painful execution.  It was not until 1783 that the “New Drop” gallows, with a falling trap, was erected outside Newgate which may have led to a slightly easier death, although the drop given was still only 12–18 inches.  Prior to 1752, women who had been hanged were able to have their bodies reclaimed by family and friends and given a decent burial.  After this, women executed for murder had their bodies dissected after death and not returned to their families.
Those listed as burned would typically have been strangled with a “halter” before the fire was lit although this did not always happen.  Later they were, in effect, hanged at the stake prior to the fire being lit, as happened with the last 3 executions at Newgate.

The Murder Act of July 1752 required that murderers be hanged within two days of sentence, or the next “working day” if the second day was a Sunday, which was a “dies non” or non hanging day.  After this date, murderers were often hanged alone to comply with requirements of the Act.  As part of their punishment, they were only allowed bread and water between sentence and execution.

Women convicted of other crimes at the Old Bailey in London were usually executed several weeks after sentence when the Recorder had submitted his report indicating which prisoners sentenced to death should be reprieved and which were to be “left for execution” and were typically hanged alongside men, who had been sentenced to death at the same Sessions.  This was frequently the case at Tyburn and later at Newgate where quite large batches of prisoners were executed together.
Those sentenced to die at County Assizes had a report on their case forwarded by the trial judge to the Secretary of State for consideration for reprieve, containing his recommendation.  Many Assize towns in the Shire counties carried out executions on market day to ensure the biggest crowd, who were supposed to be deterred by the spectacle of the execution.

Where women were to be burned at the stake, their execution would usually take place a few minutes after the other condemned prisoners had been hanged, and they would be led to the stake past the hanging bodies of the other prisoners.

When a woman was convicted of a capital crime, she would be asked if there was any reason why sentence of death should not be passed upon her.  She could at this point “plead her belly,” i.e. that she was pregnant.  She was often not sentenced to death at this point but kept in prison and examined by matrons to see if she really was pregnant.  Many of the claims of pregnancy were entirely baseless.  If she was found to be “quick with child,” her execution was delayed until after she had given birth or her sentence was commuted to transportation. If not, she was returned to court to be formally sentenced to death and then included in the next batch of executions.  Anecdotal evidence suggests that women prisoners would sometimes try to get pregnant whilst in prison to save themselves from the gallows.  They would offer sex to their jailers or to visitors for this purpose, as the law did not permit the execution of a pregnant women.

By the mid 1700’s, newspapers were being widely produced, particularly in London and crimes, trials and executions were well reported.  Additionally, execution broadsides were sold, purporting to give the confessions and last dying speeches of some of these women.  Some of these still survive, but having read them one wonders how much of their content is pure fiction, especially as they were written several days before the execution.  In some cases, the prisoners were reprieved and in some cases there is no record of them having even existed!

Predictably, London and Middlesex had the most female executions with 72 at Tyburn between 1735 and 1783 and a further 19 outside Newgate between 1783 and 1799 (16 hanged and 3 burned).  The counties of Kent, Essex and Surrey also had large numbers of executions as crime moved out of the city of London into what are now the suburbs, but which at this time, were within the boundaries of these counties. It will be seen that there is a distinct North-South divide in favour of Northern women in the early years.

Below are the details of each of the confirmed executions from 1735–1799. In the early part of the period, it is sometimes difficult to ascertain whether prisoners who were sentenced to death were actually executed, as the records for some court circuits are very sketchy, so only the names of those whose executions can be verified are included.

1735 29 or 30 females sentenced to death, 13 confirmed executions - 11 hanged and 2 burned. There may have been one other woman sentenced to death in Nottingham.
Date	Name	Place	Method	Crime
Monday 10th March	Elizabeth Ambrook	Tyburn	Hanged with 10 men	Murder of her male bastard
	Jane Heybourn			Burglary
	Elizabeth Stevens			Highway robbery
Friday 8th May	Mary Warren	Exeter	Hanged	Murder of her male bastard
August - date unclear	Margaret Jones	Manafon Montgomery	Hanged with her husband	Murder of John Rea (Both may have been hanged in chains after execution)
Saturday 2nd August	Ann Virgin	Bedford	Hanged with her boyfriend	Murder of their bastard child. He was her late sister’s husband
Friday 1st or 8th August	Jane Hornblower	Worcester with 1 man	Hanged	Murder of her female bastard Hanged on a new gallows that cost £5 to construct.
Friday 8th August	Mary Fawson (20)	Northampton	Burned	P/T murder of her husband (poison)
	Elizabeth Wilkinson		Hanged	Picking pockets
Friday 8th August	Margaret Onion	Chelmsford 4 men hanged	Burned	P/T murder of her husband, Samuel (poison)
Friday 22nd August	Sarah Baylis	Over (Gloucester )	Hanged with 3 men	Murder of her male bastard
Friday 29th August	Mary Dulen	Exeter	Hanged	Murder of her male bastard
Monday 10th November	Elizabeth Armstrong	Tyburn with 1 man	Hanged	Murder of Patrick Darling

1736 20 females sentenced to death, 4 hanged and none burned.
Date	Name	Place	Method	Crime
Wednesday 9th June	Elizabeth Thompson	Gt. Yarmouth	Hanged	Murder of unnamed Dutchman
Friday 20th August	Mary Haddon	Northampton	Hanged	Murder of her mother
Thursday 26th August	Elizabeth Gillian	Kingston Surrey	Hanged with 1 man	Privately stealing (pickpocket)
Saturday 4th or 11th Sept.	Martha Colston	Cambridge	Hanged	Arson

1737 26 females sentenced to death, 2 hanged and 2 burned.
Date	Name	Place	Method	Crime
Thursday 3rd March	Mary Shrewsbury	Tyburn with 11 men	Hanged	Murder of her male bastard
Wednesday 29th June	Ann Mudd	Tyburn with 6 men	Burned	P/T murder husband, Thomas (stabbing)
Friday 1st July	Mary Bird	Ely	Burned	P/T murder husband, John (poison)
Thursday 18th August	Margaret Wickes or Wicker	Maidstone