1789: Catherine Murphy, Britain’s last burning at the stake
March 18th, 2009 Headsman
On this date in 1789, Catherine Murphy was led past the hanging bodies of her husband and their other male codefendants at Newgate Prison, secured to a stake, and put to the last burning at the stake in English history.
The convicted coiners — counterfeiting rated as high treason at the time — were the last heirs to gender-specific execution methods before the Treason Act of 1790 gave coin-shaving ladies equal access to the halter.
Though Murphy thereby earned an unenviable historical footnote, the de factopractice on the scaffold had long since been changed to spare lawmen the spectacle of a woman roasting to death. Murphy, in fact, was killed by hanging — and the “burning” part of the sentence only imposed upon her corpse. (This, however, was still more than enough: NIMBYing prison neighbors appalled by the stench of burning flesh had lent their support to the Treason Act’s reforms.)
Also On This Date
Possibly Related Executions
- 1726: Mary Standford, shunning convict transportation
- 1551: Alice Arden, husband killer
- 1725: Jonathan Wild, Thief-Taker General and Receiver of Stolen Goods
Entry Filed under: 18th Century, Burned, Capital Punishment, Common Criminals, Counterfeiting, Crime, Death Penalty, England, Execution, Hanged, History, Milestones, Pelf, Public Executions, Treason, Women
Tags: 1780s, 1789, catherine murphy, march 18, newgate prison, treason act of 1790
March 22nd, 2009 at 9:18 am
[...] to be hung, lest their twitching at rope’s-end seem lewd. So they were burnt instead – though by the eighteenth century it was common to strangle them to death before lighting the pyre. Mercy, after the fashion of the [...]
March 28th, 2009 at 7:45 pm
Hello!
Very Interesting post! Thank you for such interesting resource!
PS: Sorry for my bad english, I’v just started to learn this language
See you!
Your, Raiul Baztepo
October 10th, 2009 at 2:06 am
[...] have noticed too how remarkably women’s crimes and women criminals and women’s sentences are [...]
October 22nd, 2009 at 3:33 am
[...] executed by burning at the stake, Catherine Murphy’s counterfeiting is well worth mentioning. ExecutedToday.com explains that as a convicted coiner (tantamount to high treason in 1789), Murphy ranked among the [...]