Nuremberg executioner Franz Schmidt on this date in 1584 hanged a gang of five young — very young — thieves. He marked the occasion in his diary:
February 12th. Hennsa of Geyselwind, alias the fat lad; Hennsa Pallauf of Hernda; Killian Wurmb of Virnspach, alias Backendt; Hans Schober of Weher, alias Pulfferla; and Hennssla Klopffer of Reigelsdorff; five thieves who, with the previously executed ‘Silly Mary’ and ‘Country Kate,’ had burgled and stolen (they had also formerly been whipped out and put in the stocks ten times). They had to be clothed, for they were naked and bare; some of them knew no prayers and had never been in a church; the eldest were 22, 17, 16 and 15 years old, the youngest 13 years. All five hanged here in Nuremberg.
On this day..
- 1728: Joseph Barret
- 1945: Walraven van Hall, banker to the Resistance
- 1584: Five Catholic priests
- 1661: Maeyken de Smet, Olsene witch
- 1858: Henry Fife and Charlotte Jones, exonerating Monroe Stewart
- 1943: France Bloch-Serazin, bombmaker
- 2012: Three drone strike spies in Yemen
- 1937: Tom Steinbock and Juan Mirbol in Sartre's The Wall
- 2004: Former vice-governor Wang Huaizhong
- 1554: Lady Jane Grey, the Nine Days' Queen
- 2003: Richard Edwin Fox, bogus job interviewer
- 1942: Avraham Stern, a strange bedfellow
- Themed Set: Unruly Britannia