“I made up my mind to do away with myself and bought a tin of rat poison, but hadn’t the courage to do it. When I saw the man in the public house I got the idea that if I killed him I would be hanged. I’m not a bit sorry for myself, but I am sorry for him and I wish I’d known before this that he was married.”
–Frederick Arthur Cross, depressed after his wife left him, insisting to his judge on pleading guilty to the capital murder of a stranger in a ‘suicide by executioner’ case. Cross was hanged on July 26, 1955.
On this day..
- 1644: Andrew of Phu Yen, Christian protomartyr of Vietnam
- 1961: Rokotov and Faibishenko, black marketeers
- 1817: Eleanor Gillespie
- 1912: George Shelton and John Bailey
- 1815: Eliza Fenning, for the dumplings
- 1847: Manuel Antonio Ay, Caste War harbinger
- 1578: Thee Bruges Minnenbroder
- 1768: Seven coal-heavers to crush the London port strike
- 1992: 42 Iraqi merchants
- 1872: Jose Balta, former President of Peru
- 1941: Paul Ogorzow, the S-Bahn Murderer
- 1794: Loizerolles and others for the Conspiracy of the Prisons