Author Archives: Headsman

1802: Robert Snooks, “They can’t start the fun until I get there!”

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James Snook(s), who is remembered as Robert Snooks — a possible corruption of “Robber Snook” — was a career robber with a record. He hanged on this date in 1802 for mugging the Tring Mail postboy, an adventure that grossed 80 quid worth of notes ransacked from correspondence he left strewn on Boxmoor.

His decision to discard a distinctive saddle with a broken strap cracked the case for authorities and a reward for his capture went abroad — a reward claimed by “William Salt, a postboy of Hungerford, in Berkshire” who “was born in the same town as the prisoner, where they were play-fellows” and so recognized him immediately on Saturday night driving his chaise through Marlborough Forest and chased down and overpowered Snook whose resistance to his old chum did not extend to use of the “two loaded pistols … in his coat pocket.” (all quotes from the London Morning Chronicle of December 9, 1801)

Tried at the Hertford assizes, he was found to have spent notes known to be in the Tring Mail and on that basis* condemned on a Tuesday … to be dispatched with dispatch that Thursday morning on Boxmoor, near the site of the robbery. “It’s no good hurrying,” he allegedly quipped to gawkers while enjoying a last drink at a nearby pub. “They can’t start the fun until I get there!”

A weathered stone erected a century later marks the supposed place of his burial, and can be visited at Hemel Hempstead. For reasons that elude my understanding, a number of sites including Wikipedia as of this writing claim that this gentleman was the last person executed in England for highway robbery. That’s not even close to accurate.

* The postboy he attacked could not identify him positively, since the crime occurred at night.

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1431: Thomas Bagley, Lollard martyr

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On this date in 1431, an Essex priest named Thomas Bagley — “a valiant disciple and adherent of Wicliffe,” which is to say a Lollard heretic — was put to the torch at St. Paul’s Cross, London, while the Archbishop of Canterbury denounced his heresies.

He was prey to a crackdown on his seditiously egalitarian sect launched in 1428 by the said archbishop, Henry Chicele. That outlawed movement still persisted despite the defeat of its most famous rebellion more than a decade before.

Lollards had a low opinion of both the perquisites and the ritual trappings of the institutional church, so Bagley “was accused of declaring that if in the sacrament a priest made bread into God, he made a God that can be eaten by rats and mice; that the pharisees of the day, the monks, and the nuns, and the friars and all the other privileged persons recognized by the church were limbs of Satan; and that auricular confession to the priest was the will not of God but of the devil. And others [other Lollards] held that any priest who took salary was excommunicate; and that boys could bless the bread as well as priests.”

Pressed by their persecutors, the Lollard movement mounted its last major armed rebellion weeks later, in May of 1431 — storming Abindgon Abbey and Salisbury Cathedral. The attacks came to nothing save the execution of its leadership.

For many years thereafter, until its remnants swept into the Reformation, Lollardy haunted English elites from the shadows and the underground — “a persistent, covert tradition of radical thinking” whose reach in the English population is unknowable. It was never again strong enough to mount a rising in its own name but surfaced martyrs here and there and might have contributed inspiration and simpatico to other challenges that shook the masters in the 15th century, like (speculatively) 1450’s Jack Cade rebellion out of Lollard-rich Kent.

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1803: Jillis Bruggeman, the last executed for sodomy in the Netherlands

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The last person executed in the Netherlands for homosexuality was Jillis Bruggeman, on March 9, 1803.

Bruggeman ‘s long career in “the horrible sin of sodomy” — for which he had been paying blackmail to one former partner for many years before a different confidante betrayed him — so shocked the court that the evidence of his activities was sequestered in a special pouch. He was flogged and hanged at the grand market of the southern city Schiedam.

There’s an annual Jillis Bruggeman Medal awarded to a someone who has made a signal contribution to defending LGBTQ people.

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1679: Four at Tyburn

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One of the oldest extant publications of the Newgate Ordinary gives us …

THE Behaviour, last Speeches, Confessions, AND EXECUTION Of the Prisoners that Suffered at TYBURN On Fryday the 7th of March 1678/9

VIZ.

Thomas Coxe, and Charles Smith, Who were drawn thither on a Hurdle, for TREASON.

Mary Augur,For Murther.

AND

Anne Atkins, For a Burglary, her Husband being hang’d for the like Offence but the very last Sessions before.

With a true Account of their Carriage, and Discourses to Mr. Ordinary and others, both in Prison and at the place of Execution.

AT the last Sessions there were in all Nine persons received sentence of Death; Three men and Six women. (Not Six men and Three women, as a false and surreptitious Pamphlet, printed with the Letters D.M. did lately mention; which also said, there was Fourteen to be Transported: and several other notorious Untruths almost in every Line.) Of these unhappy Criminals one was respited for the present from Execution, being found by a Jury of Matrons to be quick with Childe: three other women and one man, the nature of whose Offences and Conversation had rendred them fitter Objects of Royal Mercy, obtain’d the favour of his Majesties gratious Reprieve after Judgment.

The other Four came now to suffer; their Names and Crimes being as follows.

Thomas Coxe and Charles Smith, each of them found guilty of Treason on several Indictments, both for Coyning and Counterfeiting, and also for Clipping of Money.

Mary Augur, for Murthering her Bastard Child; and Anne Atkins, for a Burglary, whose Husband, for the like Offence, was Executed, but the very last Sessions, and she then turn’d out of Newgate on the account of her Poverty, having several Children; but was no sooner at liberty, but she sell to her told wickedness; and ’tis believ’d seduc’d a person, now Condemn’d with her, but Reprieved, into this Burglary, for which she suffered. So difficult it is for people, when they are once come to make a Trade of sin, to forsake, it though they have the saddest and most near related Warnings in the world to reclaim them.

Coxe, in the hearing of the Ordinary, prayed very pathetically for himself; and being askt concerning what hopes he had of a future happy Estate, he declared, That the fear of Death was much abated, and as he trusted on a sound and firm foundation, because his sorrow for sin was more for offending God, and grieving his Holy Spirit, than for the dread either of that momentary Punishment he was justly to suffer here, or even for the fear of Hell and wrath to come. Adding, that if he were to live, he resolv’d and hopes in God’s strength that he should never run into such Extravagances as he had formerly been guilty of. For he did not onely freely acknowledge the Crime for which he was Condemned, but said, there was scarce any Immorality or Sin (except Murther) which in the debauch’d Course of his Life he had not stain’d and polluted his Soul with.

The Ordinary urg’d, that his Coyning counterfeit Money, was not onely a great Crime against the Kings Majesty, but an abuse to the whole Nation, especially the poor, whose wants could not be supplyed if they offered such bad Money in buying; so that the ill influence and consequences of his sin in this kind, would survive when he was dead, and the fraud he had knowingly put upon others, must needs in the loss or deceit, circulate to the prejudice of many innocent people. He replyed, that for that very consideration, his penitent grief was so much the greater; and being told, that he could not repent sincerely, if he made not restitution to his power, to such whom he had defrauded, He professed he would do all he could possibly on that account. by making distribution as far as able to the poor, because he knew not whom he had wronged in particular, nor now to send to any such. He expressed much grief, that he had omitted to observe the Lords day, and that he went not to the publick Worship, as also, that he neglected to pray Morning and Evening, for which remisness, he conceived the Lord justly left him to the temptations of bad Company, and in particular to be acquainted with a person, who drew him to the crime of Coyning, which he closed with, on a lwed principle, not being content with an honest Trade, viz. a Gun-smith , which he well subsisted by, being a single Man, but made hast to snatch at unlawful gain, that he might be at higher expences to gratifie his Lusts, which he the rather acknowledged, that it might be a warning to all others.

Smith, the other Coyner of false Money, was well educated, and it grieved him that he had not answered those good Instructions which his Parents gave him. He was put forth in Apprentiship to a Chandler , after he came to his own disposal, he lost the government of himself, for he profan’d the Lords day, which he said was occasioned by neglecting to repair to Gods publick Service, because he thought out of the pride of his heart, that his cloaths were not fine enough, so natural it is for one sin to beget another.

He bewail’d himself as a great sinner, and in particular very much lamented the Crime for which he was Condemned, which he said he ingaged in, out of a covetous disposition, but made not so much gain by it as some others; and that he had a resolution to desist from that wicked practise, not because it answered not his expectation of profit, but rather for the regret and trouble which he had in his Conscience concerning proceeding in it. He said that bad acquaintance first inticed him into it, and that he was justly by God left to the temptation, since he had neglected daily to guard himself by Prayer. He wisht had took the meanest lawful imployments, rather than so hainously transgresed against the Kings Majesty, and the Law of the Nation. But the Lord he said was righteous, in discovering his Crime, because he had lived securely in committing other sins; for had he not been apprehended as he was, there was provided for him an honest and creditable imployment. But (said he) the Lord in just in cutting me off in the prime of my years, that I might not proceed in a course of Iniquity; and if his Divine Majesty shall be gratiously pleased to sanctifie this stroke of death on my body, to bring me thereby to Repentance, I shall not dread to drink of that bitter cup, as believing the Lord will order it to my eternal happiness. He praid for himself very well in the Ordinaries hearing, and being questioned what hopes he had of Salvation, and on what foundation the same were grounded, he made such judicious answers, in a distinct difference of true Faith and Repentance from the false, as the Ordinary was well satisfied with the same, and doth verily believe, that his endeavours with him were blessed, to bring him as a Convert to God.

As for Mary Augur, she was very weak in body, not able to come on the Lords day in the afternoon into the Chappel; but the Ordinary several times attended her in her Chamber, and gave her many serious Exhortations: but her condition Etc. very much obstructed the good effects he hoped for from such his pains, so that we can give little farther account of her.

The other Woman wept bitterly, and very often, and seemed to be penitent for her sins, not denying the Crime for which he suffered, but seemed to have been bred up in a loose course of life, and very ignorant of the Mysteries of Religion, but the Ordinary took considerable, pains to instruct her therein, and it is charitably hoped God might bless his endeavours towards her.

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1855: Manuel da Mota Coquiero, the Beast of Macabu

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On this date in 1855 a wealthy farmer named Manuel da Mota Coqueiro — “the Beast of Macabu” in the popular nomenclature — was hanged for orchestrating the slaughter of a tenant farmer and his entire family.

Mota Coqueiro — that’s a Portuguese link, as are almost all sources about this gentleman — ticked the “motive” box thanks to his running conflict with the victim, Francisco Benedito da Silva. Mota Coqueiro had had an affair with Benedito’s daughter Francisca and the two men quarreled thereafter over compensation for Francisca’s resulting pregnancy — quarrels that broadened over the course of 1852 into the more conventional vectors of landlord-tenant conflict. In a relationship there’s having hand, and then there’s being able to evict your significant other’s entire family.

On a literal dark and stormy night that September, a machete-wielding gang of Black men invaded Francisco’s home, beating and slashing to death the man, his wife, and six children ranging in age from three years to teenagers. The only survivor, fleeing into the woods as the murderers made a pyre of their house, was Mota Coquiero’s former lover Francisca. Naturally the volatile landlord with the grudge against the victim was an immediate suspect, and he compounded the suspicion by fleeing in disguise as the investigation unfolded. In a climate of mounting public outrage, Mota Coquiero quickly became fixed in the eyes of police and public alike as the man who had surely ordered his slaves to commit the crime; a slave and two free Black servants in his household would likewise be executed for the crime. However, the evidence ultimately comprised a tissue of self-confirming inference and hearsay with no direct indicia of Mota Coqueiro’s guilt.

Today, he’s commonly remembered as the victim of a miscarriage of justice,* although there’s a dissatisfying want of firm evidence to implicate anyone in particular in his place. The 1877 historical novel Mota Coqueiro, au A Pena de Morte even resorted to inventing an ahistorical character to carry the blame.

The man himself denied guilt all the way to the end. There’s a rumor that he laid a 100-year curse on the city of Macae that lagged economic development … until the discovery of oil there broke the spell in the 1950s, a century later.

* Mota Coquiero is also widely associated in the popular imagination with the end of capital punishment in Brazil. However, he was not nearly the last executed in Brazil nor even the last free man executed in Brazil. What is certain is that Emperor Pedro II who failed to spare Mota Coquiero would gradually turn against the death penalty over the years to come — although any causation by this particular case remains purely speculative.

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1749: Fontauban, spy

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A spy named Fontauban was hanged at the northern city of Lille on this date in 1749.

From the scanty information to be had he appears among the more pathetic traitors. Disinherited by his father he had gone into his peculiar trade to great effect during the continent-spanning War of Austrian Succession.

Demobilization was a tough transition for spooks as for everyday soldiers; needing to maintain his income, he made an fatally unsuccessful attempt to engage service with the British — and not for any mere document-copying, but for betraying the king himself.

Despite having been open to outright regicide in exchange for a few grotes, Fontauban’s sentence was commuted to hanging (from the proposed burning and quartering) as a gesture of mercy.

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1859: Pleasant M. Mask, wreck and ruin

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This guy goes right into the roster of all-time great gallows names, for it was said (per the New Orleans Daily True Delta of March 15, 1859, rhapsodically channeling a report from the Oxford (Mississippi) Mercury) that “the name of Pleasant M. Mask is only pronounced with a shudder” and that doesn’t seem right at all.

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1562: Sophie Harmansdochter, “Gele Fye”

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Sophie Harmansdochter, aka Gele Fye, a notorious fink, was executed at The Hague on this date in 1562.

She was the daughter of an Anabaptist martyr, but where she might have taken her heritance in zeal for the evangelium she settled instead for for taking the contact list. By 1537, three years after her father lost her head for the faith, Harmansdochter was informing on his ex-associates; resulting in several more executions and several hundred guilders’ worth of rewards. As late as 1552-53 her information triggered Mennonite hunts across the Low Countries touching not only Amsterdam but Leiden, Friesland, and Antwerp.

This was also about the time when her husband died and left her with four whelps to raise, and the need for her pieces of silver became extremely pressing. But in a pattern similar to many witch hunt informers, Gele Fye’s snitching was abruptly terminated by attempting to point the finger at a person of actual power — namely the former mayor of Amsterdam, who had also once been her paymaster. She was arrested as a perjurer in 1556 and spent six years in prison in The Hague, giving birth to her fifth child while behind bars.*

On March 3, 1662, Sophie Harmansdochter had her tongue — the source of her false witness — cut out, then her scaffold put to the torch.

She survives in Dutch literature as an emblematic deceitful mole.

* A collaborator, Volckje Willems, was also arrested but died in her dungeon before she could qualify for Executed Today treatment.

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1950: Rosli Dhobi, Sarawak patriot

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On this date in 1950, Rosli Dhobi or Dhoby was hanged by the British for assassinating the governor of Sarawak.

The scene of events lies in the present-day state of Malaysia, which gained independence in 1957. As a glance at the atlas will show, Malaysia oddly comprises two principal chunks of territory lying hundreds of kilometers apart across the southern reaches of the South China Sea: the end of the Malay Peninsula, reaching south from Thailand and the Eurasian landmass — and the northern third of the island of Borneo, which Malaysia shares with Indonesia and Brunei.

Dhobi’s passion is a story of the Borneo side — from what is today the largest of Malaysia’s 13 constituent states, Sarawak.

The British presence at Sarawak dated to the mid-19th century when the Kingdom of Sarawak began as a series of personal concessions extracted from the Sultan of Brunei by an ex-Raj officer turned adventurer named James Brooke. Casting about for a vocation in the mother country back in the 1830s after resigning his commission, Brooke had plunked his £30,000 inheritance down on a schooner, sailed it to southeast Asia, and made such a timely and effective intervention against pirates plaguing Borneo that the Sultan put him in charge of parts of Sarawak.*

The man proved to have a deft hand for diplomacy and governance and steadily grew his fiefdom, eventually establishing his own dynastic monarchy, the White Rajahs.

In 1946, the third and last of Brooke’s dynasty, Vyner Brooke,** ceded his family’s interest in Sarawak to the British Colonial Office — changing it from a crown protectorate to a crown colony and setting Sarawak on the path to transit the era of decolonization tied to the British colony of Malaysia instead of, say, independent statehood. No surprise, this backroom arrangement among Anglo suits played to many in Sarawak as a wanton abnegation of self-determination, spurring a widespread anti-cession movement.

Thus aggrieved, our man Rosli Dhobi (English Wikipedia page | Malaysian) became deeply involved with an anti-cession group called the Sibu Malay Youth Movement.

Out of this body, 13 particularly radical members eventually formed a secret terrorist cell called Rukun 13 (“13 Pillars”). Balked of their plan to murder the British governor Charles Arden-Clarke by the latter’s timely transfer to Ghana, they instead greeted his successor Duncan Stewart just days after arrival — with Dhobi fatally daggering the new guy when he appeared at a photo op at the town of Sibu. Dhobi was only 17 years old at the time.

In time the British successfully suppressed the anti-cession movement, but Dhobi’s execution was so politically sensitive when it occurred that he was buried in an unmarked grave within the walls of Kuching Central Prison. The judgment of posterity in Sarawak has been quite a bit more generous: on March 2, 1996, the forty-sixth anniversary of his hanging, he was reburied in the Sarawak Heroes’ Mausoleum in Sibu. A school in that town is also named for him.

* Another noteworthy example of an intrepid private individual redrawing the colonial map for his mother country occurred decades later with Germany’s presence in Tanzania.

** Vyner Brooke’s nephew and his heir apparent as the prospective next White Rajah, Anthony Brooke, bitterly opposed the cession, so much so that British intelligence initially considered him a possible suspect in Duncan’s murder. Anthony Brooke formally ceded all his own potential claims to the rule of Sarawak in 1951.

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1771: Edmund James and Joseph Jordan, runaway slave aides

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From this doctoral dissertation (pdf) by Gabriele Gottlieb:

The early 1770s in Charleston also saw the largest number of executions of whites who had been convicted of crimes connected with slavery. On March 1, 1771, Edmund James and Joseph Jordan were hanged for “aiding runaway slaves.” Jones [sic], the master of the schooner Two Josephs, and Jordan, a sailor, allegedly had stolen the schooner, taking with them several slaves. Thomas Dannails, a third condemned defendant, was pardoned after he was “recommended to Mercy by the Jury.” Several slaves, likely some of those who had run away on the Two Josephs, were hanged together with Jordan and Jones.

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