Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 34, Number 96, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 August 1902 — FAMOUS OLD PRISON. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

FAMOUS OLD PRISON.

NEWGATE, LONDON, AND ITS MEMORIAL HORRORS. Boon to Be Rased to the Ground— Shocking Scenes in the Days When Executions Were Public—The Populace Acted Like Demons. Grim, forbidding old Newgate prison, London, which in the course of its long period of existence has housed so many men and women condemned to destruction, and around which have occurred many remarkable scenes of horror, is at length to be tom down. Several times before the historic prison’s Impending doom was announced, but now the work of demolition has actually begun. Old Galley, the scarcely less famous court house, which adjoins

Newgate, will also be razed,, and upon the' whole site thus obtained new court 'buildings of a modern type will be erected. Newgate’s history is packed unusually full of horrors, even for a prison which did duty in such cold-blooded times as the early part of the eighteenth century in England. Then an execution was regarded as a sort of di-version-only that there no good humor about it When a hanging was due at Newgate—they were held In the open, just outside the walls—crowds used to camp out all night on the steps of the buildings round about Gin was sold even on the steps of the scaffold, and it was no uncommon thing when a criminal who had committed some particularly outrageous offense was led out for the mob to fling themselves on him and half murder him before the rope ’ could be put around his neck. Earlier, when the prisoners who were kept in Newgate were executed in Tyburn, there were even more revolting scenes. Men and women who were being hanged were howled at and pelted with stones and dirt. Others were set upon on the road to the gallows. Almost Cheated the Hangman. One of these was Mrs. Brownrigg. She was notorious for her brutality to her girl apprentices, but finally eclipsed even her own record by stripping one young girl to her waist, fastening her hands to a ring in the ceiling and flogging her so mercilessly that she died from the effects. While Mrs. Brownrigg, who was captured while trying to get out of the country, was being taken to Tyburn she was pounced upon by a mob of women who came within an ace of cheating the hangman of her. The scenes around the Newgate gallows grew more violent as time went on. In 1807 80,000 people gathered to see the execution of two men, and hi the crush twenty-eight were killed and seventy Injured. After the hangings were over the executioner used to sell the rope which he had used at a shilling or more the Inch. Jack Sheppard was confined at Newgate after his first capture, but soon escaped. He was recaptured, loaded with chains and made fast to a staple in the floor. Even then he got free, forced six doors, burrowed through a wall, and then went back to his cell to get a blanket by means of which he let himself down from the roof to the street. They captured him again, however, and he was hanged at Tyburn while over 200,000 jeering people looked on. In Newgate Mary Edmonson also was jailed. She was banged for the murder of her aunt, but many suspected that she was letting herself be destroyed in place of her lover, who was supposed to have done the deed. He was present at the execution and kissed the girl on the gallows. Afterward he confessed that he had killed the woman but was reprieved, as the authorities were afraid to let It be known that they had taken the life of an innocent person. Acted Like Demons. At this young woman’s execution, as well as those of Fauntleroy, the banker, and Greenacre, who murdered his sweetheart, surging crowds gathered and acted like demons. Finally these outbreaks got to be so serious that the public hangings were given up, and since then they have been held Inside Newgate, a black flag being hoisted on the roof at the moment when the drop falls. This is the custom still, and on execution days small evrowds collect, wait until the flag goes up and then disperse. As for old Tyburn, not only have all traces of the old execution ground been swept away, but its site is now one of the most fashionable parts of aristocratic Hyde Park. Every one of the handsome carriages passing the Marble Arch and entering the Long Drive rolls close to the spot where once Stood the busy gallows. 72,000 Hanged In One Reign. How old Newgate Is no one knows It was used as a prison as tar back as

1188, and prbably antedates that period by many years. Many times has It been rebuilt, the last time following the "no popery” riots of 1780, when the structure was plundered and burned, the prisoners being set free, to join the maddened mob. During the reign of Henry VIII. historians say that 72,000 executions took place at Newgate. SL’ Thomas More writes in his Utopia that twenty thieves might be seen hanging gibbet and bangings were almost of dally occurrence. In these good old days, which some of our misguided modemers would wish to recall, the theft of a loaf or the snaring of a hare on a game preserve was punished with death! ’Torture, too, was resorted to, and men and women, stripped naked, were put upon the rack uatil the bones and joints were tom asunder. There were many other methods of torture, and brandings and mutilation were of frequent occurrence. Executions at Newgate were carried out often in a bungling manner. Often the condemned would not be strangled and the executioner would catch hold of tbe victim and add bls own weight to that of the suspended unfortunate. This usually made the crowd hilarious. Nor was it the rabble alone who enjoyed the degrading spectacle. People of fashion would pay as high as $25 for a good vantage point in a window opposite and frequently would spend the night there so that no detail of the spectacle might escape. It was a ribald, reckless, combative, brutal mob who witnessed the executions. Fights were common and spectators often had their limbs broken and their teeth knocked out! These dreadful public executions were carried on until 1868.

NEWGATE PRISON.