Got a weak stomach?
So many stories from London’s past are definitely not for the squeamish. Torture, beheadings and worse – there didn’t seem to be any length they wouldn’t go to inflict pain and suffering on victims.
But there was one execution site in London that could surpass all others in its severity and humiliation heaped on the guilty party.
Head to the Town of Ramsgate pub in Wapping. By the side of the pub there are stairs that lead down to the river’s edge. Careful though, the lower steps are covered in seaweed as the tide washes in here twice a day and can leave them slippery.
This is the site of Execution Dock.
It was reserved for anyone on the high seas who had committed what was considered by the British Admiralty, who were very much the last word on all thigs naval, an offence punishable by death.
This included sailors who had mutinied, seaman who committed murder, and pirates of course.
Convicted prisoners were taken by cart across London Bridge and past the Tower of London in a macabre procession, led by the High Court Marshall on horseback who represented the Admiralty.
At Wapping, gallows awaited them. Those convicted of piracy had a particularly nasty end in store. They were hung, but with a shortened rope, which meant a slow death from strangulation as the drop was insufficient to break their necks. Slow asphyxiation caused their limbs to twitch uncontrollably which was called the Marshall’s dance.
Then instead of being cut down, they were left hanging for all to see, until three river tides had washed over them. In an act of unlikely charity it was said that if three tides washed over them and they were still alive, they were given clemency. This was called the Wapping Grace. Needless to say, there weren’t too many takers.
And finally, for the most notorious offenders, their bodies were tarred and gibbeted or hung in chains further east along the river, as a warning of the fate for those who turned to piracy.
Image courtesy of Wikipedea. Hanging of a buccaneer at Execution Dock. Execution Dock.
(Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons by The Man in Question.)