Elm in his dominions, between Gisors and Trie, where frequently
conferences had been held in virtue of an ancient custom
instituted by his predecessors, between them and the Dukes of
Normandy.”[82]
Something of this symbolical character was retained by the elm in
France long after the name “The Elms” had been forgotten here.
Rabelais (1483?-1553) speaks of “juges sous l’orme,” and, later,
Loyseau (1556-1627) has a great deal to say of these “judges under the
elm-tree.”[83]
“The Elms” of Smithfield came by the name in the same way, as, there is
little doubt, did also “The Elms,” now Dean’s Yard, in the precincts
of Westminster Abbey; “The Elms” in the abbey lands at Covent Garden,
and “Homors” in the precincts of Canterbury Cathedral, derived, no doubt
correctly, by Professor Willis, from a corruption of Ormeaux, Ormayes,
Ormoies, or Ormerie, plantations of elms.[84] In like manner Elms Lane,
now Elms Mews, a turning out of the Bayswater or Uxbridge Road, probably
preserves the name given to the gallows which the abbat of Westminster
had at “Westburn” towards the end of the thirteenth century.[85]
It would not be surprising to find more of such names, in form more or
less corrupt, in connection with places in the precincts of old monastic
foundations. It may even be hoped that some of the gallows of the abbat
of Westminster, in addition to the gallows of “Westburn,” have bequeathed
place-names still surviving.
Before introducing further evidence as to the establishment of gallows
at Tyburn, reference must be made to the confusion existing between
“The Elms” of Tyburn and “The Elms” of Smithfield. Maitland, and after
him Parton,[86] maintained, in ignorance or oblivion of the facts, that
the gallows (presumably for Middlesex) formerly stood at “The Elms” of
Smithfield; that, at some date before 1413, the gallows was removed to
St. Giles’s, where it continued till its removal to Tyburn. But this
ignores the fact that a gallows did undoubtedly exist at Tyburn at the
end of the twelfth century. There is, besides, no evidence whatever that
a royal gallows ever existed at St. Giles’s, except when a gallows was
erected here for a special case.[87] There may possibly have been here a
local, manorial gallows, for, as has been shown, such gallows abounded.
There was even another gallows at Tyburn, set up by the Earl of Oxford,
who, when challenged, seems to have admitted that he had no right to
erect a gallows here.[88]
The confusion will cease if we keep firm hold of the fact that Smithfield
was within the liberty of the city, and that the civic gallows was
here erected. There is not, so far as I know, any evidence as to the
suppression of the civic gallows at Smithfield. There were in late times
executions here, but so there were in many other places. Smithfield comes
into notice in the second year of the fifteenth century as the place of
execution, by burning, for heresy, a character which it retained so long
as the punishment was inflicted.[89]
It is not at all probable that the first execution recorded as having
taken place at Tyburn in 1196 was actually the first execution there. I
have ventured to allot to Tyburn an execution which took place in London
in 1177, nineteen years before the execution of William Longbeard. There
is evidence of the existence of a gallows at Tyburn at an uncertain
date, but going in probability still further back. In 1220 the king,
Henry III., ordered the immediate erection of two good gibbets of the
best and strongest material, for hanging thieves and other malefactors,
in the place where gallows were formerly erected, namely, at “The Elms”
(ad Ulmellos).[90] Strype, in his edition of Stow’s “Survey,” and,
seemingly, Peter le Neve, whom he quotes in the margin, refer this order
to “The Elms” of Smithfield, but this is clearly a mistake, as the order
evidently concerns the royal gallows, not the gallows in the jurisdiction
of the City of London.[91]
The order refers to “the place where gallows were formerly erected,
namely, the Elms.” It must be taken to be an order to replace decayed
gallows. We may safely allow a life of at least fifty years to the old
gallows, and it results that gallows had been here from at least as early
as 1170.
There is no need to follow further in this place the course of executions
at Tyburn. We come now to the question of the site of the gallows.
In one of the most recent books in which reference is made to the site
we find this: “It was customary to vary the position of the gallows
of Tyburn from time to time, but we may roughly put its approximate
position where the Marble Arch now stands.” It is to be feared that
the writer would be sorely puzzled if he were asked to produce either
evidence that the gallows ever stood “where the Marble Arch now stands,”
or evidence of so much as a single change of position. But statements of
the kind, unsupported by evidence, are constantly found in books upon
London. Those who make these statements are probably misled by knowledge
of the fact that in our times a gallows is brought out for the purpose of
a rare execution, and then laid up against the time when it will be again
required. But of old the gallows—of Tyburn, at least—was in constant
requisition, and, till a date which is well known, was a permanent
structure—permanent, that is, having regard to its material. The gallows
of Tyburn was permanent, subject to renewal from time to time, till the
year 1759, when, as will be shown, the permanent gallows gave place to
a movable gallows. It is in no degree probable that the site of a fixed
gallows in frequent and continuous use should be changed without some
good reason.
The first information of the site of the gallows other than the vague
indication “Tyburn” is found in one of the old chronicles, which tells
that, in 1330, Mortimer was executed at “The Elms, about a league outside
the city.”[92] The distance thus vaguely stated would apply about equally
to any one of the conjectured sites from Marylebone Lane to the head of
the Serpentine, at which writers have severally placed the gallows.
At first sight it may seem strange that a site so remote from the prisons
of Newgate and the Tower should have been chosen. But it was usual,
for a reason which will appear, to place the gallows at a considerable
distance from the town. The gallows for the county of Surrey was at
St. Thomas-a-Waterings, near the second milestone on the Kent Road.
Loyseau shows that while the pillory, used for non-capital punishment,
was always set up in the principal place or street of a town, capital
punishments were carried out at a distance—“le gibet est tousiours emmy
les champs.”[93] He refers to Lipsius, who in his turn cites ancient
authors to prove the practice. There is, of course, good reason why the
place of execution should have been fixed far from the abodes of men. In
addition to its gallows, Tyburn had its gibbets, on which bodies of men
hanged alive were suffered to hang till they fell to pieces. In other
cases bodies were transferred, after hanging, to a gibbet—
“Waving with the weather while their neck will hold.”
[Illustration: PART OF A MAP OF MIDDLESEX, 1607, WITH THE FIRST KNOWN
REPRESENTATION OF THE TRIPLE TREE.]
In a lease granted by the Prior of the Knights Hospitallers mention is
made of Great Gibbet Field and Little Gibbet Field, parcel of the manor
of Lilleston.[94] Mr. Loftie says, “We cannot be far wrong in supposing
that the gibbets stood near the highway.” The word gibbet was formerly
used so loosely that we cannot be sure that the fields did not take their
name from the gallows. But Tyburn certainly had, as well as its gallows,
gibbets on which were exposed bodies. But this page in the early history
of Tyburn is almost a blank. The subjects on which it is most difficult
to find information are precisely those of occurrence so common that it
has not entered the head of contemporaries to notice them. That gibbets,
as distinct from gallows, did exist in early times, there is no doubt;
their use continued down to the eighteenth century or later. The old
writers do not clearly distinguish between gibbet and gallows, but there
is a passage in which Matthew Paris certainly means to speak of a gibbet.
In writing of the execution of William Marsh, Matthew Paris leaves it
doubtful whether Marsh was or was not at once fixed to a gibbet. But from
Gregory’s chronicle we learn that Marsh was first hanged; from Matthew
Paris we learn that the body was afterwards hung “on one of the hooks”
of a gibbet.[95] In 1306 the body of Simon Fraser was hung on a gibbet
for twenty days. In 1324 the king granted a petition of the prelates to
permit burial of the bodies of the six barons hanged (not at Tyburn)
in 1322.[96] Bodies would hang together for a much longer time. Jean
Marteilhe saw, hanging on a gibbet in 1713, the body of Captain Smith,
hanged at Execution Dock in 1708.[97]
Thus there must have been an accumulation of bodies swinging from the
gibbets of Tyburn and poisoning the air. The French have always been more
lavish in public monuments than we. The great gibbet of Montfaucon in
the outskirts of Paris was a solid stone structure, with provision for
hanging thereon—if we may trust the pictures given of it—at least sixty
bodies; it is said that the bodies not unfrequently numbered from sixty
to eighty. Under cover of the pestilential air, Maître François Villon,
poet of the gibbet, and the cut-purses, his friends, rioted in security
from intrusion.[98]
There is very good reason to suppose that a single gallows would not be
sufficient for the work to be done at Tyburn. A gallows in the ordinary
form, two uprights and a cross-beam, could hardly take more than ten
victims at a time. We must suppose that the equipment of Tyburn demanded
at least two such gallows. We have seen that in 1220 the king ordered two
gallows. But in 1571, just in time for Elizabeth’s penal laws, a great
improvement was made in the form of the gallows; a triangular gallows was
introduced, capable of hanging at one time at least twenty-four men. This
is the highest number recorded as being hanged at one time, but it does
not follow that the capacity of the gallows was exhausted by this number.
The evidence for the introduction of the triangular gallows at this time
is contained in the account of the execution of Dr. Story:—
“The first daye of June [1571] the saide Story was drawn upon
an herdell from the Tower of London unto Tiborn, wher was
prepared for him a newe payre of gallowes made in triangular
maner.”[99]
There is no earlier account of a triangular gallows. My friend, Mr. P. A.
Daniel, tells me that he knows of no reference in the old drama to the
triangular form of the gallows of date prior to 1571.
The earliest allusion to this form seems to be in 1589:—
“Theres one with a lame wit, which will not weare a foure
cornerd cap, then let him put on Tiburne, that hath but three
corners.”[100]
Of about the same date is an allusion in Tarlton’s “Newes out of
Purgatorie,” 1590:—
“It was made like the shape of Tiborne, three square.”[101]
[Illustration: THE TRIPLE TREE ABOUT 1614.
(In the uppermost lozenge on the left.)]
A third reference is found in Shakespeare’s “Love’s Labour Lost,” one of
his early plays:—
“Thou mak’st the triumviry, the corner-cap of society,
The shape of Love’s Tyburn, that hangs up simplicity.”[102]
These references are followed at a short distance in date by a
delineation showing not only the triangular form of the gallows but,
roughly, its position. This is in a map of Middlesex, engraved by John
Norden for Camden’s “Britannia.” It was first given in the folio edition
of 1607, and reappears in the editions of 1610 and 1637. In this last
it bears the number 17 in the left-hand corner. In the edition of 1695,
Norden’s map is replaced by one by Robert Morden.
In the three maps of the respective editions of 1607, 1610, and 1637, the
triangular gallows is shown impinging on the north-east corner of Hyde
Park, with the word “Tyborne” against it. Here, then, we have evidence
that thirty-six years after the introduction of the triangular gallows
it still remained here, clearly a permanent structure, probably the very
gallows erected in 1571.[103]
The next piece of evidence is furnished by a representation of the
gallows given in the frontispiece of “The Life and Death of Edmund
Geninges” published in 1614.
Twelve years later, in 1626, we find evidence fixing for the first time
the exact site of the gallows. On June 26th of this year, Henrietta
Maria, after a day spent in devotion, went with her attendants through
St. James’s Park to Hyde Park. Whether by accident or design she went
towards Tyburn. Charles hated the Queen’s French suite, secured to her by
treaty. Within six months of the marriage he had resolved to be rid of
them. The courtiers made the most of the visit to Tyburn; it was averred
that the Queen’s confessor had made her walk barefoot to the gallows,
“thereby to honour the saint of the day in visiting that holy place,
where so many martyrs (forsooth) had shed their blood in the Catholic
cause.” The incident, thus exaggerated, brought matters to a head. Sixty
of the Queen’s attendants were compelled to embark for France. The French
King was naturally indignant at this violation of his sister’s rights: a
war might have arisen out of the quarrel. This was averted by the skill
of Maréchal de Bassompierre, sent over as Ambassador Extraordinary.
Charles appointed Commissioners to discuss matters with the Marshal. The
Commissioners expressed the charge in these terms: The Queen’s attendants
abused the influence they had over the susceptible and religious mind of
the Queen to lead her by a long road, across a park, which the Comte de
Tilliers, her chamberlain, had taken measures to keep open, in order to
take her to the place where it is the custom to execute the most infamous
malefactors and criminals of all kinds, the place being at the entrance
of a high road; an act which tended to bring shame and ridicule not
only on the Queen herself, but also reproach and evil speaking against
former kings of glorious memory, as though accusing them of tyranny in
having put to death innocent persons that those people regard as martyrs,
whereas, on the contrary, not one of them was executed on account of
religion, but for treason in the highest degree.
Marshal de Bassompierre replied with remarkable frankness: “I know of
a surety,” he said, “that you do not believe that which you publish to
others.” He declared that the Queen had not been within fifty paces
of the gallows. He repeats the description of the place as at the
entrance of a high road. It is not necessary to follow the discussion
further.[104]
[Illustration: THE RUINS OF FARLEIGH CASTLE. [_p._ 124.]
[Illustration: THE TRIPLE TREE IN 1712.]
The words “the entrance of a high road” fix definitely the spot
indicated, approximately, by Norden’s map. Even without the map, then
unknown to me, I felt abundantly justified in writing that the words
applied to a road leading out of the road bounding Hyde Park: “This can
be no other than the road now known as Edgeware Road: along the whole
length of the park there is no other road to which the words could
apply.”[105]
In 1626 we have also the mention of “the three wooden stilts” of Tyburn,
in Shirley’s “The Wedding,” published in 1629.
In 1649, in an account of the hanging of a batch of twenty-four persons,
it is said that eight were hanged “unto each Triangle.”[106]
In 1660 the bodies of Cromwell, Ireton, and Bradshaw were “hanged at the
several angles of the Triple-tree.”[107]
1680. Seller’s map of Middlesex shows the gallows, its form not
recognisable, near the angle formed by the junction of the roads.
1697. Defoe, in his Essay upon Projects, refers to Watling Street: “The
same High Way or Street called Watling Street … went on West to that
spot where Tyburn now stands, and there turn’d North-West … to St.
Alban’s.”[108]
1712. Beginning with this date the accounts published by Lorrain, the
Ordinary of Newgate, of the behaviour of condemned criminals, show the
prison of Newgate at the top, on one side, and on the other the gallows
of Tyburn. The illustration is taken from the broadsheet of September 19,
1712.
1725. In this year a large map of the newly constituted parish of St.
George, Hanover Square, was drawn by John Mackay. We have in it the
first exact location of the gallows, shown as a triangular structure. In
detailed notes on the map, describing the first “beating the bounds” of
the parish on Ascension Day, 1725, it is stated that the parish boundary
to the west was marked “on the S.E. Leg of Tyburn,” fully proving the
permanence of the structure. The map was reproduced on a small scale in
the _Builder_ of July 6, 1901, and was described by Mr. Herbert Sieveking
in the _Daily Graphic_ of March 11, 1908.
1746 to 1757. In 1746 was published Rocque’s beautiful map of London in
twenty-four sheets; this was followed by his maps of Middlesex in 1754
and 1757. In all the gallows is shown in the open space formed by the
junction of the roads near the Marble Arch.
1747. In the last plate of Hogarth’s series of “Industry and Idleness,”
is shown an execution at Tyburn. The gallows, a triangular structure, is
in the same position (approximately) as in Rocque’s maps.
1756. In Seale’s map, published this year, the triangular gallows is
shown in the same position as in Rocque’s maps.[109]
[Illustration: THE TRIPLE TREE IN 1746, FROM ROCQUE’S MAP OF LONDON.]
Tyburn had ceased to be “emmy les champs”; the advance of the town is
shown by the inclusion of Tyburn in maps of London. So early as 1719 it
was proposed to move the gallows to Stamford Hill:—
“We hear the famous and ancient Engine of Justice called Tyburn
is going to be demolished: and we hear the Place of Execution
is to be removed to Stamford-Hill, beyond Newington, on the way
to Ware: the Reason given is said to be, because of the great
Buildings that are going to be erected in Maribone-Fields.”[110]
Strype, in his edition of Stow’s “Survey” (book iv. p. 120) mentions
another report, but Tyburn defied these threats for many years to
come.[111] Only in 1759, after an existence of near six hundred and
fifty years, did the permanent gallows of Tyburn give place to a movable
gallows, put up on the day of an execution and afterwards taken down.
It is not a little strange that a monument of great antiquity, so well
known, recalling so many tragedies, so intimately connected with the
history and life of the people, should have been allowed to disappear
without a word or a curse. I have not been able to find any direct
reference to the removal of the triple-tree. The date of its removal must
fall between June 18 and October 3, 1759. Under the earlier date we find,
in the usual terms, the record of an execution at Tyburn. The _Whitehall
Evening Post_ of October 4, 1759, has the following:—
“Yesterday morning, about Half an Hour after Nine o’clock, the
four malefactors were carried in two carts from Newgate, and
executed on the new Moving Gallows at Tyburn.… The Gallows,
after the Bodies were cut down, was carried off in a cart.”
The same account is given in other newspapers. The _Gentleman’s Magazine_
states that “the gallows, which is a movable one, was carried there
before them and fixed up for that purpose.”
The removal of the gallows was followed by the occupation of its site
by the toll-house of the turnpike, shifted from the east corner of Park
Lane, then called Tyburn Lane, to the corner of Edgeware Road.
The new movable gallows was ordinarily fixed near the corner of
Bryanston Street and Edgeware Road (Thomas Smith, “A Topographical and
Historical Account of the Parish of St. Marylebone,” 1833); but the
place of erection was not always exactly the same. Thus we read in the
_Gentleman’s Magazine_ under date August 29, 1783, “The gallows was fixed
about 50 yards nearer the Park wall than usual.” Tyburn ceased to be
the place of execution in 1783, the last execution here taking place on
November 7th of that year.
When the turnpike was in its turn removed, its position was recorded by
a monument placed on the south side of the road, somewhat to the west of
the Marble Arch. It is a slab of cast iron, with a gable top, bearing
on both sides the words, “HERE STOOD TYBURN GATE 1829,” that being the
date of the abolition of the turnpike. This monument correctly indicated
the position of the gate, which stretched across the road: it was not
intended to show the position of the gallows, which, however, it did
indicate approximately. It was necessarily removed in the improvements
carried out near the Marble Arch in the spring of 1908.
[Illustration: THE SITE OF TYBURN TREE, FROM THE ORDNANCE MAP OF 1895.]
It may be well, at the risk of repetition, to summarise the foregoing
account in the form of—
THE CHRONOLOGY OF TYBURN.
=1108.= Earliest date to which the establishment of Tyburn as a place of
execution can with probability be assigned.
=1177.= First record of an execution in London, probably at Tyburn.
=1196.= First record of an execution, Tyburn being named as the place.
=1220.= Two new gallows ordered for Tyburn.
=1222-1570.= Executions at Tyburn recorded at the following dates: 1222,
1242, 1305, 1330 (position indicated, “about a league outside the City
of London”), 1386, 1388, 1399, 1400, 1402, 1404, 1424, 1427, 1437, 1441,
1446, 1447, 1455, 1467, 1468, 1483, 1495, 1497, 1499, 1502, 1523, 1525,
1531, 1534, 1535, 1536,* 1537, and each year to 1544, 1549, 1550, 1552,
and each year to 1557, 1560,* 1561,* 1562,* 1563,* 1569,* 1570.
(The list shows how continuous were executions here.)
The years marked * will not be found in the Annals following
this. The records are uninteresting and have therefore been
omitted. Tyburn is mentioned as to 1536 in Wriothesley’s
Chronicle, as to 1560, 1, 2, and 3, in Machyn’s Diary. Stow
mentions Tyburn in 1569.
=1571.= Erection of the permanent triangular gallows.
=1607.= Site of triangular gallows shown by map to be to the N. of the
N.E. corner of Hyde Park.
=1614.= Representation of the triangular gallows.
=1626.= Exact site of gallows proved by accounts of the visit of
Henrietta Maria. To the same year must be referred mention of “the three
wooden stilts” in Shirley’s “The Wedding,” printed in 1629.
=1649.= Eight persons hanged on each of the three beams.
=1660.= Bodies of Cromwell, Ireton, and Bradshaw “hanged at the several
angles of the Triple-tree.”
=1680.= Seller’s map of Middlesex shows the gallows (form not
recognisable) near the angle formed by the junction of the roads E., W.,
and N.
=1697.= “Watling Street … went on West to that spot where Tyburn now
stands, and there turned North-West.” (Defoe.)
=1712.= Triangular gallows figured in Lorrain’s broadsheet.
=1725.= Triangular gallows shown in Mackay’s map, in the space formed by
the junction of the roads.
=1746-1757.= Triangular gallows shown in the same position in Rocque’s
maps, London, 1746, Middlesex, 1754, and 1757.
=1747.= Triangular gallows shown in the same position (approximately) in
the last plate of Hogarth’s “Industry and Idleness.”
=1756.= Triangular gallows shown as in Rocque’s maps, in Seale’s map.
=1759.= Triangular gallows gives place to movable gallows.
=1783.= Last execution at Tyburn.
ANNALS
ON TYBURN
Oh Tyburn! coud’st thou Reason and Dispute;
Coud’st thou but Judge as well as Execute;
How often would’st thou change the Felon’s Doom,
And truss some stern Chief-Justice in his room?
Then should thy sturdy Posts support the Laws,
No Promise, Frown, nor popular Applause,
Shou’d sway the Bench to favour a bad Cause.
Nor Scarlet Gown, swell’d with Poetick Fury,
Scare a false Verdict from a trembling Jury.
Justice, with steady Hand and even Scales,
Should stand upright, as if sustain’d by Hales.
Yet still, in Matters doubtful to decide,
A little bearing tow’rds the milder side.
DRYDEN, _Miscellany Poems_, 5th ed., 1727, v. 126.
ANNALS