1825: Tahvo Putkonen, Finland’s last peacetime execution
1 comment July 8th, 2018 Headsman
Finland’s last peacetime execution occurred on this date in 1825: the instrument was an axe.
Farmhand Tahvo Putkonen, deep in a blue gap celebrating both Christmas and his December 26 name day in 1822, went off his rocker at the party he was hosting because of a guest’s actual or imagined transgression against good manners.
The drunken Putkonen suddenly attacked that guest, farmer Lasse Hirvonen, until this ill-tempered host got kicked out of his own house by the rest of the celebrants. Once he’d convinced everyone that he’d calmed down, he got back in the house and mortally bashed Hirvonen over the head with a firewood log.
Putkonen spent a long-for-the-time 2.5 years appealing against the legal proceedings before they finally struck off his head. So pedants take note: although he has the distinction of being the last peacetime execution, his was not the last peacetime crime that led to execution: one Abraham Kaipainen managed to commit murder (July 31, 1823) and reach the headsman’s block (October 30, 1824) all while Tahvo Putkonen was still fighting his sentence.
The very last executions in Finnish history took place in 1944, during the Continuation War — Finland’s local installment of World War II, fought against the Soviet Union.
Capital punishment is today formally abolished in Finland.
On this day..
- 1797: Abraham Johnstone - 2020
- 1941: Alexandru Bessarab, fascist artist - 2019
- 1835: Dean and Donovan, white abolitionists - 2017
- 1617: Eleonora Galigai, Marie de' Medici favorite - 2016
- 1949: Antoun Saadeh - 2015
- 1814: Two War of 1812 deserters - 2014
- 1771: Henry Stroud and Robert Campbell, for revenge - 2013
- 1486: Humphrey Stafford of Grafton, no sanctuary - 2012
- 1938: Anthony Chebatoris, in death penalty-free Michigan - 2011
- 1538: Diego de Almagro, explorer of Chile - 2010
- 1839: William John Marchant - 2009
- 1999: Allen Lee "Tiny" Davis, the end of the road for Old Sparky - 2008
Entry Filed under: 19th Century,Beheaded,Capital Punishment,Common Criminals,Crime,Death Penalty,Execution,Finland,Milestones,Murder
Tags: 1820s, 1825, alcohol, july 8, tahvo putkonen
Recent Comments