‘Receive this as a voice from the dead ’: The final words of the English Hanged, 1840-68

Abstract

This article explores the final words of condemned prisoners who were executed in England between 1840 and 1868. Drawing on a sample of just over a hundred accounts of executions from the provincial press, we show how, although the majority of those sentenced to death died penitent, appearing resigned to their fate and offering warnings to others should they risk a similar demise, there was some deviation from this script. In particular, we focus on the role of chaplains in encouraging, if not cajoling, suitable contrition and penitence from the prisoners from the condemned cell to the gallows.

Last meals and final statements: Social science research on America's death row

“…This, would, of course, not be a straightforward endeavour – statements, where they are made, may be harder to access and would also require translation for English‐language researchers to utilise – but would provide a much broader perspective on the topic. Bridges could also be built between social scientists and historians writing on the final speeches of condemned inmates in England from the seventeenth‐through to the nineteenth century (see, for example, McKenzie, 2007; Sharpe, 1985; Walliss et al., 2022). This would, again, provide a broader, more historically‐contextualised perspective, on how human beings, not just North Americans in the late twentieth‐ and early‐21st century, meet their death at the hands of the state.…”