Henry M. Brooks - The Olden Time Series, Vol. 5: Some Strange and Curious Punishments
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Henry M. Brooks >> The Olden Time Series, Vol. 5: Some Strange and Curious Punishments
_THE OLDEN-TIME SERIES._
16mo. Per vol., 50 cents.
There appears to be, from year to year, a growing popular taste for
quaint and curious reminiscences of "Ye Olden Time," and to meet this,
Mr. Henry M. Brooks has prepared a series of interesting handbooks.
The materials have been gleaned chiefly from old newspapers of Boston
and Salem, sources not easily accessible, and while not professing to
be history, the volumes contain much material for history, so combined
and presented as to be both amusing and instructive. The titles of
some of the volumes indicate their scope and their promise of
entertainment:--
CURIOSITIES OF THE OLD LOTTERY.
DAYS OF THE SPINNING-WHEEL.
SOME STRANGE AND CURIOUS PUNISHMENTS.
QUAINT AND CURIOUS ADVERTISEMENTS.
LITERARY CURIOSITIES.
NEW-ENGLAND SUNDAY, ETC.
"It has been the good fortune of the writer to be allowed a peep at
the manuscript for this series, and he can assure the lovers of the
historical and the quaint in literature that something both valuable
and pleasant is in store for them. In the specialties treated of in
these books Mr. Brooks has been for many years a careful collector and
student, and it is gratifying to learn that the material is to be
committed to book form."--_Salem Gazette._
_For sale by all Booksellers. Sent, post-paid, upon receipt of price.
Catalogues of our books mailed free._
TICKNOR & CO., BOSTON.
THE OLDEN TIME SERIES
SOME STRANGE AND CURIOUS PUNISHMENTS
_Yet, taught by time, my heart has learned to glow
For others' good, and melt at others' woe._
POPE: Odyssey.
_But hushed be every thought that springs
From out the bitterness of things._
WORDSWORTH.
THE OLDEN TIME SERIES.
GLEANINGS CHIEFLY FROM OLD NEWSPAPERS OF BOSTON AND SALEM, MASSACHUSETTS
SELECTED AND ARRANGED, WITH BRIEF COMMENTS
BY
HENRY M. BROOKS
Some Strange and Curious Punishments
"Old and new make the warp and woof of every moment. There is
no thread that is not a twist of these two strands. By necessity, by
proclivity, and by delight, we all quote."--EMERSON
BOSTON
TICKNOR AND COMPANY
1886
_Copyright, 1886_,
BY TICKNOR AND COMPANY.
_All rights reserved._
University Press:
JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE.
PUNISHMENTS MENTIONED.
PAGE
ARREST of the dead 86
BACK "dress'd" 63
Banished 10
Books burned 15, 16
Bound and chained 8
Branded with a hot iron 2, 3, 43
Burned 83
CLEFT stick put on tongue 8
Confined at Castle Island 5, 48
EARS cropped 3, 10, 24
Eating one's own words 67
Executed (of frequent mention).
FINE and imprisonment (of frequent mention).
GAGGED and dipped or ducked (of frequent mention).
HUNG in chains 14, 15
IMPRISONMENT for debt 70, 71
In the bilboes 35
In the pillory (of frequent mention).
In the stocks 35
In the stocks on lecture-day 8
"KISSING the Yssrow" 44
LIMITS of the jail 70, 71
PAPER on the breast with the word _Cheat_ 33
Prisoners sold 21, 22, 47, 48, 49
Prosecution against animals 78
SENT back to England 51
Sent to Castle Island to make nails 65
Sewed up in bed-clothes and thrashed 68
TIED neck and heels and thrown into a pond 28
Tied to a gun and whipped 20
Tied to a tree and chastised 81
Tongue bored with a hot iron 20
Tread-mill 71 to 76
UPON the gallows with rope about the neck (of frequent mention).
WHIPPED at the cart's tail 1, 9
Whipping-post (of frequent mention).
SOME STRANGE AND CURIOUS PUNISHMENTS.
-------------------------
In the month of January, 1761, "Joseph Bennett, John Jenkins, Owen
McCarty, and John Wright were publickly whipt at the Cart's Tail thro'
the City of New York for petty Larceny,"--so the newspaper account
states,--"pursuant to Sentence inflicted on them by the Court of
Quarter Sessions held last Week for the Trial of Robbers," etc. In
March the same year "One Andrew Cayto received 49 Stripes at the
public Whipping Post" in Boston "for House-robbing; viz., 39 for
robbing one House, and 10 for robbing another." In 1762 "Jeremiah
Dexter, of Walpole, pursuant to Sentence, stood in the Pillory in that
Town the space of one Hour for uttering two Counterfeit Mill'd
Dollars, knowing them to be such." At Ipswich, Mass., June 16, 1763,
"one Francis Brown, for stealing a large quantity of Goods, was found
Guilty, and it being the second Conviction, he was sentenced by the
Court to sit on the Gallows an Hour with a Rope about his Neck, to be
whipt 30 Stripes, and pay treble Damages. He says he was born in
Lisbon, and has been a great Thief."
We extract the following from the "Boston Chronicle," Nov. 20, 1769:--
We hear from Worcester that on the eighth instant one Lindsay
stood in the Pillory there one hour, after which he received 30
stripes at the public whipping post, and was then branded in the
hand; his crime was forgery.
Lindsay was probably branded with the letter F, by means of a hot
iron, on the palm of his right hand; this was the custom in such
cases.
In Boston, in June, 1762, "the noted Dr. Seth Hudson and Joshua How
stood a second Time in the Pillory for the space of one Hour, and the
former received 20 and the latter 39 Stripes." In the same town in
February, 1764, "one David Powers for Stealing was sentenced to be
whip't 20 Stripes, to pay tripel Damages, being L30, and Costs. And
one John Gray, Cordwainer, for endeavouring to spread the Infection of
the Small Pox, was sentenced to pay a Fine of L6, to suffer three
months' Imprisonment, and to pay Costs." In New York in January, 1767,
"A Negro Wench was executed for stealing sundry Articles out of the
House of Mr. Forbes; and one John Douglass was burnt in the Hand for
Stealing a Copper Kettle." In the last half of the eighteenth century
it appears to have been a capital crime for negroes to steal. At
Springfield, Mass., in October, 1767, "one Elnathan Muggin was found
Guilty of passing Counterfeit Dollars, and sentenced to have his Ears
cropped," etc. On reading these quaint accounts we are led to inquire
whether the punishment for crime in "olden times" was more severe than
at the present time. Many people think it was, and justly so, and
argue that crime has consequently greatly increased of late years, on
account of the lightness of modern sentences or the uncertainty about
punishment. This may be true. Crime is said to increase with
population always. According to Mr. Buckle, it can be calculated with
a considerable degree of accuracy. We can estimate, for instance, the
probable number of murders which will take place in a year in a given
number of inhabitants. Whether this theory is true or not would
require a vast amount of study and observation to determine. We know
that population in our time crowds in cities; especially is this true
of the classes most likely to furnish criminals. Still, in spite of
this, do not most of us feel that it has of late years been rather
safer to reside in a city than in the country? Consider the numbers of
lawless and too often cruel tramps which have overrun the country
towns and villages for a few years past, making it so unsafe for women
to walk unattended in woods and highways, even in the quietest parts
of New England, where once they could go with perfect safety alone and
at all hours. No laws can be too severe against _cruel_ tramps. It has
been affirmed that people who live in cities are in reality more moral
than country people of the same class.
Is this state of things brought about by the infliction of light
sentences, or is it caused by the increase among us of a bad foreign
element? We have heard many serious and humane persons express
themselves as in favor of a restoration of the whipping-post and
stocks, really supposing that these things would lessen crime. But is
it likely that the old methods of punishment would be considered by
criminals themselves as severer than the present? Let us see what some
of the last century rogues thought about the matter. At a session of
the Supreme Judicial Court held at Salem, Mass., in December, 1788,
one James Ray was sentenced, for stealing goods from the shop of
Captain John Hathorne (a relative of Nathaniel Hawthorne), to sit upon
the gallows with a rope about his neck for an hour, to be whipped with
thirty-nine stripes, and to be confined to hard labor on Castle Island
(Boston Harbor) for three years. "It is observable of this man," the
account continues, "that he has been lately released from a two years'
service at the Castle, that during the trial he was very merry and
impudent, and continued in the same humor while his sentence was
reading, holding up his head and looking boldly at the Court, till the
three years' confinement was mentioned; when his countenance changed,
his head dropped on his breast, and he fetched a deep groan,--an
instance of how much more dreadful the idea of labor is to such
villains than that of Corporal punishment."
At a session of the Court of Oyer and Terminer held at Norristown,
Pa., for the county of Montgomery, Oct. 11, 1786, we are furnished
with a case in point. "A bill was presented against Philip Hoosnagle
for burglary, who was convicted by the traverse Jury on the clearest
testimony. He was, after a very pathetick and instructing admonition
from the bench, sentenced to five years' hard labour, under the _new_
act of Assembly. It was with some difficulty that this reprobate
was prevailed upon to make the election of labour instead of the
halter, ... a convincing proof," the report says, "that the punishments
directed by the new law are more terrifying to idle vagabonds than all
the horrors of an ignominious death."
Probably there are many more cases on record where criminals preferred
death to imprisonment. Burglary and forgery were once punished by
death. We have all noticed on the old Continental currency these
words: "Death to counterfeit this."
On the 17th June, 1791, Samuel Cook, in the eighty-fourth year of his
age, was executed at Johnstown, N.Y., for forgery. On the 6th
December, 1787, William Clarke was executed at Northampton for
burglary; the same day Charles Rose and Jonathan Bly were executed at
Lenox for robbery. On the 4th May, 1786, at Worcester, Johnson Green,
indicted for three burglaries committed in one night within the space
of about half a mile, was tried on one indictment, convicted, and
received sentence of death. The papers contain numerous similar cases.
It would be useless to enumerate them all; we give only a few in order
to show what the punishment formerly awarded to these crimes really
was. We do not, of course, know the circumstances attending all these
cases; but robbery and burglary are usually premeditated, and the
criminals are prepared to commit murder if it should be necessary for
their purpose, so that we can have no sympathy with the perpetrators.
Our sympathy ought, we think, to go to the victims.
-------------------------
OLD NEW ENGLAND.
Early in the settlement of New England, as is pretty generally known,
some of the laws and punishments were singular enough. A few extracts
from Felt's "Annals of Salem" may not be out of place here, as
illustrating our subject:--
"In 1637, Dorothy Talby, for beating her husband, is _ordered to
be bound and chained to a post_."
"In 1638, the Assistants order two Salem men to _sit in the
Stocks, on Lecture day_, for travelling on the Sabbath."
"In 1644, Mary, wife of Thomas Oliver, was sentenced _to be
publickly whipped_ for reproaching the Magistrates."
"In August, 1646, for slandering the Elders, she had a _cleft
stick put on her tongue for half an hour_." Felt says: "It is
evident that her standing out for what she considered 'woman's
rights' brought her into frequent and severe trouble. Mr.
Winthrop says that she excelled Mrs. Hutchinson in zeal and
eloquence."
She finally, in 1650, left the colony, after having caused much
trouble to the Church and the authorities.
"In 1649, women were prosecuted in Salem for scolding," and
probably in many cases whipped or ducked.
"May 15, 1672, the General Court of Massachusetts orders that
Scolds and Railers shall be gagged or set in a ducking-stool and
dipped over head and ears three times."
This treatment we should suppose would be likely to make the victims
_very pleasant_, especially in cold weather.
"May 3, 1669, Thomas Maule is ordered to be whipped for saying
that Mr. Higginson preached lies, and that his instruction was
'the doctrine of devils.'"
Josiah Southwick, Mrs. Wilson, Mrs. Buffum, and others, Quakers, for
making disturbances in the meeting-house, etc., were whipped at the
cart's tail through the town. Southwick, for returning after having
been banished, was whipped through the towns of Boston, Roxbury, and
Dedham. These are only a few of the cases of the punishments inflicted
upon the Quakers. Mr. Felt says in reference to the persecution of the
Quakers:
"Before any new denomination becomes consolidated, some of its
members are apt to show more zeal than discretion. No sect who are
regular and useful should have an ill name for the improprieties
committed by a few of them."
Our "pious forefathers," we must confess, were too apt to be a little
hard towards those who annoyed them with their tongue and pen upon
Church doctrine and discipline or the administration of the
government. As early as 1631, one Philip Ratclif is sentenced by the
Assistants to pay L40, to be whipped, to have his ears cropped, and
to be banished. What had he done to merit such a punishment as this?
He had made "hard speeches against Salem Church, as well as the
Government." "The execution of this decision," Mr. Felt says, "was
represented in England to the great disadvantage of Massachusetts."
Jeffries was not yet on the bench in England.
In 1652 a man was fined for excess of apparel "in bootes, rebonds,
gould and silver lace."
Mr. Charles W. Palfrey contributed in 1866 to the "Salem Register" the
following interesting item on the Salem witchcraft trials:
Among the many attempts to remedy the mischiefs caused by the
witchcraft delusion, the subjoined is not without interest. About
eighteen years after the memorable year, 1692, four members, a
committee of the Legislature, were sent to Salem to hear certain
parties and receive certain petitions, and the following is the
record, in the Journal, of their Report:--
October 26, 1711. Present in Council, His Excellency Joseph
Dudley, Esqr., Governor, John Hathorne, Samuel Sewall, Jonathan
Corwin, Joseph Lynde, Penn Townsend, John Higginson, Daniel Epes,
Andrew Belcher, etc., etc.
Report of the Committee appointed, Relating to the Affair of
Witchcraft in the year 1692; viz.--
We whose Names are subscribed in Obedience to your Honours' Act at
a Court held the last of May, 1710, for our inserting the Names of
the several Persons who were condemned for Witchcraft in the year
1692, & of the Damages they sustained by their prosecution; Being
met at Salem, for the Ends aforesaid, the 13th Septem., 1710, Upon
Examination of the Records of the several Persons condemned,
Humbly offer to your Honours the Names as follows, to be inserted
for the Reversing their Attainders: Elizabeth How, George Jacob,
Mary Easty, Mary Parker, Mr. George Burroughs, Gyles Cory & Wife,
Rebecca Nurse, John Willard, Sarah Good, Martha Carrier, Samuel
Wardel, John Procter, Sarah Wild, Mary Bradbury, Abigail Falkner,
Abigail Hobbs, Ann Foster, Rebecca Eams, Dorcas Hoar, Mary Post,
Mary Lacy:
And having heard the several Demands of the Damages of the
aforesaid Persons & those in their behalf; & upon Conference have
so moderated their respective Demands that We doubt not but they
will be readily complied with by your Honours.
Which respective Demands are as follows:--
Elizabeth How, Twelve Pounds; George Jacob, Seventy nine Pounds;
Mary Easty, Twenty Pounds; Mary Parker, Eight Pounds; Mr. George
Burroughs, Fifty Pounds; Gyles Core & Martha Core his Wife, Twenty
one Pounds; Rebecca Nurse, Twenty five Pounds; John Willard,
Twenty Pounds; Sarah Good, Thirty Pounds; Martha Carrier, Seven
Pounds six shillings; Samuel Wardell & Sarah his Wife, Thirty six
Pounds fifteen shillings; John Proctor & ---- Proctor his Wife,
One Hundred and fifty Pounds; Sarah Wilde, Fourteen Pounds; Mrs.
Mary Bradbury, Twenty Pounds; Abigail Faulkner, Twenty Pounds;
Abigail Hobbs, Ten Pounds; Ann Foster, Six Pounds ten shillings;
Rebecca Eams, Ten Pounds; Dorcas Hoar, Twenty one Pounds seventeen
shillings; Mary Post Eight Pounds fourteen shillings; Mary Lacey
Eight Pounds ten shillings. The Whole amounting unto Five Hundred
& seventy eight Pounds, & twelve shillings.
(Sign'd) Jno. Appleton, Thomas Noyes, John Burrill,
Nehem'a Jewett.
Salem, Septemr. 14, 1711.
Read & Accepted in the House of Represent'ves
Signed JOHN BURRILL Speak'r
Read & Concur'd in Council
Consented to J. DUDLEY.
The following quaint memorandum of the expenses of the commission
is minuted in the report, viz.:--
_Ye Acct of gr servts_
Charges 3 days a peis ourselves & horses 4.0.0.
Entertainment at Salem Mr. Pratts 1.3.0.
Major Sewals attendans & sendg notifications
to all Concerned 1.0.0.
-------
L6.3.0.
It is a grave error into which many modern writers have been drawn,
when alluding to Salem witchcraft, to lay the responsibility of that
dire delusion entirely upon Salem people, as if they alone were to
be held accountable for the dreadful occurrences of 1692. The laws
of England in those days, all the authorities of New England, and,
with but rare exceptions, all the people everywhere throughout the
civilized world, recognized witchcraft as a fact and believed it to
be a crime. The most learned men in England and in other countries
believed fully in witchcraft. Sir Matthew Hale had given a legal
opinion on the subject; Lord Bacon believed in witchcraft; and there
are strong reasons for thinking that Shakspeare and other great men
of the time of Queen Elizabeth and still later believed in it fully.
Cotton Mather, Judge Sewall, Peter Sargent, Lieutenant-Governor
Stoughton, all belonging to Boston, were the leaders in the
proceedings against the witches of 1692.
-------------------------
HUNG IN CHAINS.
In the papers that we have examined we have not found any instances
recorded of the old English law of hanging the remains of executed
criminals in chains as having been carried into effect in our country.
But from some investigations of Mr. James E. Mauran, of Newport, R.I.,
we learn that on March 12, 1715, one Mecum of that town was executed
for murder and his body was hung in chains on Miantonomy Hill, where
the remains of an Indian were then hanging, who had been executed
Sept. 12, 1712. Mecum was a Scotchman, and lived at the head of Broad
Street. A negro was hanged in Newport in 1679, and his remains were
exposed on the same hill.
-------------------------
A BOOK ORDERED TO BE BURNED BY THE COUNCIL IN 1695.
The "Salem Observer" of Feb. 14, 1829, quotes from the Rev. Dr.
Bentley's "Diary" as follows:--
Tho's Maule, shopkeeper of Salem, is brought before the Council
to answer for his printing and publishing a pamphlet of 260
pages, entitled "Truth held forth and maintained," owns the book
but will not own all, till he sees his copy which is at New-York
with Bradford, who printed it. Saith he writt to ye Gov'r of N.
York before he could get it printed. Book is ordered to be
burnt--being stuff'd with notorious lyes and scandals, and he
recognizes to answer it next Court of Assize and gen'l gaol
delivery to be held for the County of Essex. He acknowledges that
what was written concerning the circumstance of Major Gen.
Atherton's death was a mistake (p. 112 and 113), was chiefly
insisted on against him, which I believe was a surprize to him,
he expecting to be examined in some point of religion, as should
seem by his bringing his bible under his arm.
Thomas Maule was a Quaker who lived in Essex Street, Salem, on the
spot now occupied by James B. Curwen, Esq., as a residence.
Imported books were ordered to be burned in Boston as early as 1653,
by command of the General Court; but we believe this is the first
instance of burning an American book.
-------------------------
Punishment for wearing long hair in New England. From an old Salem
paper.
PURITANICAL ZEAL. It is known that there was one of the statutes
in our ancestors' code which imposed a penalty for the wearing of
long hair. At the time Endicott was the magistrate of this town
he caused the following order to be passed:--
"John Gatshell is fyened ten shillings for building upon the
town's ground without leave; and in case he shall cutt of his
loung hair of his head in to sevill frame (fewell flame?) in the
meane time, shall have abated five shillings his fine, to be
paid in to the Towne meeting within two months from this time,
and have leave to go in his building in the meantime."
Purchas says of long hair that--
"It is an ornament to the female sex, a token of subjection, an
ensign of modesty; but modesty grows short in men as their hair
grows long, and a neat perfumed, frizled, pouldered bush hangs
but as a token,--_vini non vendibilis_, of much wine, little wit,
of men weary of manhood, of civility, of christianity, which
would faine turn (as the least doe imitate) American salvages,
infidels, barbarians, or women at the least and best."
Prynne, who wrote in 1632, considers men who nourish their hair like
women, as an abomination to the Lord, and says--
"No wonder that the wearing of long haire should make men
abominable unto God himselfe, since it was an abomination even
among heathen men. Witnesse the examples of Heliogabalus,
Sardanapalus, Nero, Sporus, Caius Caligula, and others."
He refers to the opinions of the fathers and the decrees of the Old
Councils to prove that--
"Long hair and love locks are bushes of vanity whereby the Devil
leads and holds men captive."
-------------------------
In a Boston paper, Aug. 11, 1789, we find the following ludicrous
account of the unfaithfulness of an officer in the duty of whipping
a culprit:--
On Thursday, 11 culprits received the discipline of the
post in this town. The person obtained by the High Sheriff to
inflict the punishment, from sympathetick feeling for his
brother culprits, was very tender in dealing out his strokes,
and not adding weight to them, although repeatedly ordered; the
Sheriff, to his honour, took the whip from his hand, by an
application of it to his shoulders drove him from the stage,
and with the assistance of his Deputies inflicted the
punishment of the law on all the culprits. The citizens who
were assembled, complimented the Sheriff with three cheers for
the manly, determined manner in which he executed his duty.
-------------------------
In the "Boston Courier," September, 1825, is an account of the
conviction of a common drunkard at the age of 103! It seems hardly
possible that such a case could have occurred, and in New England,
too. This item is copied from the "Salem Observer." If it is true, it
can hardly be said that the man shortened his days by the use of
liquor. They had, however, good, pure rum in those days.
POLICE COURT. Donald McDonald, a Scotchman reported to be _one
hundred and three years of age_, was brought before the court
yesterday charged with being a common drunkard, of which he had
been convicted once before. Donald stated that he had been in
various battles of the Revolution, had sailed with Paul Jones,
and was at the taking of Quebec. He was found guilty and
sentenced to the House of Correction for three months.