Another correspondent (4 S. xi. 98) practically endorses this site. He
says: “The _potence_ itself was in Upper Bryanston Street, a few doors
from Edgware Road, on the northern side. The whole of this side of the
street is occupied by squalid tenements and sheds, now (Feb. 1, 1873) in
the course of demolition, and on the site of one of these, under the
level of the present street, is to be seen a massive brickwork pillar,
in the centre of which is a large socket, evidently for one of the
pillars of the old gallows. An ancient house at the corner of Upper
Bryanston Street and Edgware Road, which has been pulled down within the
last few weeks was described to me as the only one existing in the
neighbourhood when executions took place at Tyburn, and from the balcony
in front of which the Sheriffs of London used to take their official
view of the proceedings.”
The date of the last hanging at Tyburn was Nov. 7, 1783.
A curious thing connected with Tyburn was the “Tyburn Ticket.” In the
_Morning Herald_, March 17, 1802, is this advertisement: “Wanted, one or
two Tyburn Tickets, for the Parish of St. George’s, Hanover Square. Any
person or persons having the same to dispose of may hear of a
purchaser,” etc. These tickets were granted to a prosecutor who
succeeded in getting a felon convicted, and they carried with them the
privilege of immunity from serving all parochial offices. They were
transferable by sale (but only once), and the purchaser enjoyed its
privileges. They were abolished in 1818. They had a considerable
pecuniary value, and, in the year of their abolition, one was sold for
£280.
Tyburnia is that part of London bounded south by the Bayswater Road,
east by the Edgware Road, and the west includes Lancaster Gate.
There was a Turnpike called Tyburn Gate which commanded the Edgware and
Uxbridge Roads; and close by, on the north side of the Bayswater
Road--from the corner of the Edgware Road--is Connaught Terrace; No. 7
of which was, in 1814, the residence of Queen Caroline--wife of George
IV. It was here, and to her mother, that the Princess Charlotte ran,
rather than live at Carlton House, or marry the Prince of Orange. Then
there was great consternation, and the Lord Chancellor, the Chancellor
of the Duchy of Lancaster, and others, came to reason with her, but she
would none of them, and not even her kind uncle, the Duke of Sussex,
could prevail with her to go back.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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