Chronicles of Newgate, Vol. 1: From the twelfth to the eighteenth centuryGriffiths, Arthur
History
Chronicles of Newgate, Vol. 1: From the twelfth to the eighteenth century
Griffiths, Arthur
Criminals -- Great Britain; Newgate (Prison : London, England); Prisons -- England; Punishment -- Great Britain
"Ye sons of Wilkes and Liberty,
Who hate despotic sway,
The glorious Forty-Five now crowns
This memorable day.
And to New Palace Yard let us go, let us go."
Lord Dundonald in 1814 was actually sentenced to the pillory, but the
Government shrank from inflicting the punishment upon that much wronged
naval hero. The pillory ceased to be a punishment, except for perjury,
in 1815, but was not finally abolished until 1837, and as late as 1830
one Doctor Bossy suffered on it for perjury.
The earliest form of pillory was simply a post erected in a cross-road
by the lord of the manor, as a mark of his seigneury.[164:1] It bore
his arms, and on it was a collar, the _carcan_ already mentioned, by
which culprits were secured. This was in course of time developed,
and the pillory became a cross-piece of wood fixed like a sign-board
at the top of a pole, and placed upon an elevated platform. In this
cross were three holes, one for the head, the other two for the wrists.
The cross-piece was in two halves, the upper turning on a hinge to
admit the culprit's head and hands, and closed with a padlock when the
operation of insertion was completed. A more elaborate affair, capable
of accommodating a number of persons, is figured in mediæval woodcuts,
but this sort of pillory does not appear to have been very generally
used. The curious observer may still see specimens in England of this
well-known instrument of penal discipline: one is preserved in the
parish church of Rye, Sussex, another is in the museum at Brighton.
The stocks served like the pillory to hold up offenders to public
infamy. The first authentic mention of them is in a statute of Edward
III, by which they were to be applied to unruly labourers. Soon after
this they were established by law in every village, often near the
parish church. They were the punishment for brawling, drunkenness,
vagrancy, and all disorderly conduct. Wood-stealers or "hedge-tearers"
were set in the stocks, about the year 1584, for a couple of days with
the stolen wood in front of them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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