Canada and the World
Current Events with a Canadian Perspective
Last update
19 November 2010
Hangman Albert Pierrepoint
For more than 20 years, Albert Pierrepoint was
the U.K.’s official executioner carrying out
the ultimate sentence more than 400 times
Along with all other Western democracies except the United States, Britain no longer uses the death penalty; it was abolished for all crimes except treason in 1971.
It seems likely that Albert Pierrepoint, the man who executed more criminals in Britain
than any other hangman, would not mind losing his part-
The world community is also moving to abolish state-
The first World Congress against the Death Penalty was held in Strasbourg in June 2001. The World Coalition against the Death Penalty was created in Rome in 2002.
Execution was
a Family Business
Albert Pierrepoint followed in the footsteps of his father Henry and his uncle Tom, both of whom held the post of Official Executioner in Britain.
In his 1974 autobiography, Executioner: Pierrepoint, he wrote that he believed “I was chosen by a higher power for the task which I took up, that I was put on this earth especially to do it.”
In 1932, he applied for and was appointed to the position of Assistant Executioner.
Pierrepoint made his living as a delivery man being paid about three dollars to assist at an execution. He became Chief Executioner in 1940.
Execution of Nazi War Criminals
At the end of the Second World War Pierrepoint was called upon to perform his duties in Germany.
The Pierrepoint Collection says “he was responsible for executing around two hundred Nazi war criminals including the ‘Beast of Belsen,’ Josef Kramer.”
In a report in The Guardian (March 2006) Marcel Berlins writes that Pierrepoint hanged
“Irma Grese (right), the cruellest woman concentration camp guard of them all.” One
of 13 Nazis he executed on the same day.
It was Pierrepoint who ended the life of William Joyce, the British traitor whose
propaganda broadcasts in English on behalf of Hitler earned him the nickname Lord
Haw-
Pierrepoint a Quiet and Unassuming Man
Pierrepoint gave up the delivery business in favour of running a pub called The Poor Struggler close to Manchester.
His reputation was of a man who took his work as an executioner very seriously. His hangings were described as quick, humane, and dignified.
The Pierrepoint Collection comments: “Never the showman he refused all offers of TV appearances and viewed his role as a necessary part in the machinery of justice but one that should be performed with dispassionate respect.”
He rarely spoke about his part-
Hangman Thought Death Penalty Pointless
While he practiced his craft, Pierrepoint never made any comment about his views on the appropriateness of the death penalty.
However, in his autobiography which came out after capital punishment was abolished in Britain, he commented on its use.
As someone who had been with the condemned at their last moments he said that the prospect of being executed “did not deter them then, and it had not deterred them when they committed what they were convicted for. All the men and women whom I have faced at that final moment convince me that in what I have done I have not prevented a single murder.”
He, thereby, self-
Image credit
Keith Williamson
Sources
“World, U.S., and China, Back Death Penalty.” BBC News, April 28, 1999.
“The Secret Executioner.”`Marcel Berlins, The Guardian, March 31, 2006.
© Canada and the World, October 2010
All rights reserved
THE QUICK EXECUTION
Albert Pierrepoint perfected the speedy despatch of those he was engaged to execute. He felt it was more humane to deal with the business in a matter of seconds than to let the prisoner ponder his or her fate too long.
Of course, the condemned person knew the time that the execution would take place, but the actual hanging was done with great speed and is graphically described in the opening sequence of the 2006 movie Pierrepoint.
This is the front of the Manchester Prison formerly known as Strangeways.
Geoograph.org points out that “The fastest hanging on record took place here on May 8, 1951 when executioner Albert Pierrepoint executed James Inglis just seven seconds after leaving the condemned cell!”
Among the many people Pierrepoint executed at least two, Timothy John Evans and Derek Bentley, were later cleared of the crimes that sent them to the gallows.
Following World War II Albert Pierrepoint executed 202 convicted Nazi war criminals,
most of them second-
The big names such as Julius Streicher, Ernst Kaltenbrunner, and Wilhelm Frick were executed by U.S. Army Sergeant John Woods.
The American did not have Pierrepoint`s skill or experience and some of his executions were botched affairs.