1697: Godfrey McCulloch, on the maiden
Add comment March 26th, 2009 Headsman
On this date in 1697, Godfrey McCulloch was beheaded for murder.
A lesser Scotch noble, McCulloch was heir to a family that had seen better times. His forebears had built and laid their [attached] heads at cozy Cardoness Castle, but hard times had seen the Gordon clan foreclose a bum McCulloch mortgage, and that put the families at pistols drawn.*
A minor confrontation between Godfrey McCulloch and Sir William Gordon saw McCulloch plant in Gordon’s leg a bullet wound that festered into a fatal infection.
McCulloch fled to the continent, but eventually — there’s no place like home — returned, and was recognized in Edinburgh.
One boring scaffold speech later, and that was that … unless you credit the legend that his headless body sprang up and ran 100 yards.
McCulloch was beheaded on the Maiden, a guillotine precursor that automated the chopping process.
He seems to have the distinction of being the last person so executed. (Update: Perhaps not.)
* McCulloch, who was also a member of the Scottish Parliament, held a sheriff’s commission in Wigton. Although anti-Covenanter, he washed his hands of the Wigtown martyrs case.
On this day..
- 1689: Gabriel Milan, Danish West Indies governor - 2020
- 1907: Joseph Jones, no workhouse - 2019
- 1720: Antoine-Joseph de Horn, humanity from an executioner - 2018
- 1437: Walter Stewart, Earl of Atholl - 2017
- 1785: Three at Shrewsbury, in depraved times - 2016
- 1822: Hannah Halley, scalding infanticide - 2015
- 1913: Henry Lovell William Clark, Raj poisoner - 2014
- 1907: Emile Dubois, Valparaiso popular saint - 2013
- 1555: William Hunter, reader - 2012
- 1918: Emile Ferfaille, the last in Belgium - 2011
- 1910: Ahn Jung-geun, Korean nationalist - 2010
- 922: Mansur al-Hallaj, Sufi mystic - 2008
Entry Filed under: 17th Century,Beheaded,Capital Punishment,Common Criminals,Crime,Death Penalty,Execution,History,Maiden,Milestones,Murder,Nobility,Politicians,Public Executions,Scotland
Tags: 1690s, 1697, cardoness castle, death tech, edinburgh, godfrey mcculloch, march 26
Recent Comments