Canada and the World
Current Events with a Canadian Perspective
Last update
19 November 2010
Execution in the Electric Chair
The search for a humane way to kill convicted criminals leads to the invention of the electric chair
During the 19th century most executions were done by hanging. Unfortunately, many of the hangmen were unskilled in their craft leading to some gruesome decapitations or slow deaths by strangulation at the end of the rope.
An Accident Leads to the Electric Chair
Dr. Alfred P. Southwick was a dentist in Buffalo, New York. According to the 2002 book Executioner’s Current by Richard Moran Southwick witnessed the accidental electrocution of a drunkard who stumbled onto a live wire.
“Since the man appeared not to suffer,” wrote Moran, “it occurred to Southwick that electricity might prove to be a quick and painless method of putting criminals to death.” Southwick took his idea to influential friends in Albany, the state capital.
Soon, Thomas Edison enters the story as a consultant to politicians on how to build an electric chair.
Business Competition Ruthlessly Exploited by Edison
Thomas Edison was in a corporate struggle with George Westinghouse for the lion’s share of wiring up America for the delivery of electricity.
Edison wanted his direct current (DC) to be the standard and Westinghouse was pushing for his alternating current (AC) system.
Edison told the Albany politicians they should go with AC electricity because it was very dangerous and therefore an excellent way of bumping off criminals; he even carried out some grisly demonstrations to prove his point.
Through a shameless publicity campaign Edison AC was labelled “The Executioner’s Current,” planting in the public’s mind the notion that it was far too dangerous for domestic use.
William Kemmler Tries out the Electric Chair
In July 1888, the inventor Harold P. Brown started work at Edison’s laboratory and soon a prototype electric chair was built.
A law making its use legal was passed on January 1, 1889. Three months later, says the Canadian Coalition against the Death Penalty (CCADP), an illiterate thug named William Kemmler killed “his lover Matilda (‘Tille’) Ziegler with an axe in Buffalo, New York, which was then known as: the ‘Electric City of the Future.’ ”
By August 6, 1890, duly convicted and sentenced Kemmler was set to make history. CCADP writes that, “A group of doctors and reporters gathered for the historic occasion. Kemmler was jolted for seventeen seconds. It failed to kill him. Kemmler was unconscious but still breathing. The embarrassed prison officials electrocuted him again for seventy seconds.”
In all, it took eight minutes to kill the murderer as illustrated by an artist from the New York Herald.
Electrocution neither Quick nor Painless
The electric chair was promoted and quick and painless; it is neither and can be an extremely unpleasant way to go. The flesh often catches fire and the eyeballs may pop out. Sometimes, the subjects thrash against their restraints so violently that they break bones.
A doctor who studied the autopsy reports of 13 men executed in Florida and Alabama electric chairs concluded that “Execution by electrocution is intensely painful.”
Sometimes, the first jolt is not enough to send the person into unconsciousness, but enough to cause hideous injuries and suffering. In 1985, it took 17 minutes to kill William Vandiver in Indiana’s electric chair.
Cruel and Unusual Punishment
Despite mounting evidence that the electric chair is a horrible way to die, it has remained in use for more than 100 years, although in recent years it has largely given way to lethal injections in the United States.
The device has acquired many nicknames, such as: Old Sparky (below in Sing Sing Prison) Old Smokey, Yellow Mama, and Gruesome Gertie. And, no, the lights in prisons do not dim when the execution machine is turned on as happens in old movies. Electric chairs are fed by circuits separate from those that feed the wider prison.
Symptomatic of the decline in popularity is a decision of The Nebraska Supreme Court in February 2008. As reported by Associated Press the court “ruled Friday that electrocution is cruel and unusual punishment, outlawing the electric chair in the only state that still used it as its sole means of execution.”
Judge William Connolly wrote that “Condemned prisoners must not be tortured to death, regardless of their crimes.”
Electrocution now out of Favour
The most recent electric chair execution was of Paul warner Powell who was executed by the State of Virginia on March 18, 2010. The convicted murderer chose the electric chair over other methods of execution. The electric chair is offered as an option to those on death row in about ten U.S. States. Very few choose it.
It’s unlikely many more condemned people will opt to sit in “Old Sparky” to begin their last journey; it would be a very brave or demented prisoner who would chose it over lethal injection as their means of execution.
Sources
“Nebraska Court Outlaws Electric Chair.” Associated Press, February 8, 2008.
“Virginia Executes Man in 1999 Murder of Woman, Rape of her Sister,” Josh White, Washington Post, March 19, 2010.
© Canada and the World, November 2010
All rights reserved
HORRIFIED EYEWITNESS
A reporter for the New York Herald witnessed the execution of William Kemmler and
he described the stomach-
“The killing of Kemmler today marks, I fear, the beginning and the end of electrocution, and it wreathes in shame the ages of the great Empire State who, entrusted with the terrific responsibility of killing a man as a man was never killed before, brought to the task imperfect machinery and turned and execution into a horror.”
The eyewitness said it was as though Kemmler “slowly roasted to death.”
“The heaving of a chest which it had been promised would be stilled in an instant peace as soon as the circuit was completed, the foaming of the mouth, the bloody sweat, the writhing shoulders and all the other signs of life.
“Horrible as these were they were made infinitely more horrible by the premature removal of the electrodes and the subsequent replacing of them for not seconds but minutes, until the room was filled with the odour of burning flesh and strong men fainted and fell like logs upon the floor.”
According to capitalpunishmentuk.o rg “Between 1890 and March 2010, 4,442 people suffered death by electrocution in the USA.”
ELECTRIC
CHAIR PROCESS
The procedure starts with shaving the head of the condemned person, who is then strapped into the chair with restraints around arms, legs, and chest.
A moist sponge is placed on the head and covered by a skullcap-
Another electrode is attached to a shaved portion of the prisoner’s leg.
After blindfolding the condemned person, the execution team leaves the chamber and, when all is ready, the prison warden in the observation room signals for the power supply to be turned on.
Deathpenaltyinfo.org reports that “A jolt of between 500 and 2,000 volts, which lasts for about 30 seconds, is given. The current surges and is then turned off, at which time the body is seen to relax.”
After the body has cooled down a doctor checks to see if the heart is still beating; if it is more shocks are delivered until there is no heartbeat.