To be hanged, drawn and quartered was a penalty in England, Wales, Ireland and the United Kingdom for several crimes, but mainly for high treason. This method was abolished in 1870.
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fc/BNMsFr2643FroissartFol97vExecHughDespenser.jpg/220px-BNMsFr2643FroissartFol97vExecHughDespenser.jpg)
Date executed | Name | Notes |
---|---|---|
3 October 1283 | Dafydd ap Gruffydd | The last independent ruler of Wales, and the first prominent person to be executed in this manner[1] |
23 August 1305 | William Wallace | Treason in the Wars of Scottish Independence |
1318 | Gilbert Middleton | Rebellion and treason[2] |
3 March 1323 | Andrew Harclay, 1st Earl of Carlisle | Treason in the Wars of Scottish Independence[3] |
24 November 1326 | Hugh Despenser the Younger | For sodomy; contemporary accounts differ on whether he died from the full sentence of being hanged, drawn, and quartered[citation needed] |
4 July 1381 | Thomas Baker (Peasants' Revolt leader) | Aftermath of the 1381 Peasants' Revolt[4][5] |
15 July 1381 | John Ball | Aftermath of the 1381 Peasants' Revolt[6] |
1381–1382 | John Buk | Aftermath of the 1381 Peasants' Revolt[7] |
1381–1382 | Richard de Leycester | Aftermath of the 1381 Peasants' Revolt[7] |
6 May 1382 | John Wrawe | Aftermath of the 1381 Peasants' Revolt[8] |
1388 | Thomas Usk | Accused of misleading King Richard II[9] |
1400 | Thomas Blount | Executed for plotting the overthrow of Henry IV of England in the Epiphany Rising |
1401 | Llywelyn ap Gruffydd Fychan | Allowed Owain Glyndŵr to escape capture, and therefore disemboweled and dismembered[10] |
1404 | John Cerle | Killed the Duke of Gloucester and therefore Johannes Cerle was hanged, drawn, and quartered[11] |
1459 | William Overy | Squire to James, Earl of Ormond and Wiltshire, leader of the Irish Lancastrians; Overy attempted to arrest Richard, Duke of York as a traitor to the (Lancastrian) King Henry VI but was arrested himself, tried before the Duke and hanged, drawn and quartered for treason, as the Duke of York was at the time calling himself Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and so an attack on his person was judged to be treason.[12][13][14] |
1539 | Richard Whiting (abbot) | The last Abbot of Glastonbury executed on Glastonbury Tor for treason, alongside two of his monks, John Thorne and Roger James who suffered the same fate. |
1541 | Francis Dereham | Executed for "Succeeding the King in the Queen's affections" [15] |
1550 | Humphrey Arundell | Executed for leading the Prayer Book Rebellion[16] |
1554 | Thomas Wyatt the younger | Sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered for Wyatt's rebellion, but the sentence was commuted to beheading[17] |
May 1554 | William Thomas (scholar) | Accused of planning to murder Mary I of England |
1577 | Cuthbert Mayne | One of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales executed under anti-Catholic laws[18][19] |
1577 | Edmund Campion | One of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales executed under anti-Catholic laws[18][19] |
5 July 1581 | Matthew Lambert | Miller, known as one of the Wexford Martyrs. Hanged, drawn and quartered in Wexford, Ireland as punishment for aiding the escape of James Eustace, 3rd Viscount Baltinglass and several Catholic priests from Ireland, and for refusing to take the Oath of Supremacy.[20][21] |
1 December 1581 | Alexander Briant | Catholic priest, one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales[22] |
20 September 1586 | Anthony Babington | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot[23] |
20 September 1586 | John Ballard (Jesuit) | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot[24] |
20 September 1586 | Chidiock Tichborne | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot |
20 September 1586 | Henry Donn | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot |
20 September 1586 | Robert Barnewell | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot |
20 September 1586 | John Savage | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot |
1586 | Edward Havington | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot, part of the second group which was required by Elizabeth I to hang until "quite dead" before disemboweling and quartering after public outcry at the horror of the drawing and quartering of 20 September 1586[23] |
1586 | Charles Tilney | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot, hung until "quite dead" before disemboweling and quartering[23] |
1586 | Edward Jones | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot, hung until "quite dead" before disemboweling and quartering[23] |
1586 | John Charnock | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot, hung until "quite dead" before disemboweling and quartering[23] |
1586 | John Travers | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot, hung until "quite dead" before disemboweling and quartering[23] |
1586 | Jerome Bellamy | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot, hung until "quite dead" before disemboweling and quartering[23] |
1586 | Robert Gage | Executed as one of many involved in the Babington plot, hung until "quite dead" before disemboweling and quartering[23] |
24 July 1594 | John Boste | Catholic priest, one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales[25][26] |
1595 | Roderigo Lopez | English doctor executed for allegedly poisoning Elizabeth I. Later believed to be innocent. |
7 June 1603 | Valentine Thomas | For plotting against Elizabeth I.[27] |
30 January 1606 | Everard Digby | For involvement in Gunpowder Plot |
30 January 1606 | Robert Wintour | For involvement in Gunpowder Plot |
30 January 1606 | John Grant | For involvement in Gunpowder Plot |
30 January 1606 | Thomas Bates | For involvement in Gunpowder Plot |
30 January 1606 | Thomas Wintour | For involvement in Gunpowder Plot |
30 January 1606 | Ambrose Rookwood | For involvement in Gunpowder Plot |
30 January 1606 | Robert Keyes | For involvement in Gunpowder Plot |
30 January 1606 | Guy Fawkes | For involvement in Gunpowder Plot, but he managed to cheat the executioner by jumping from the scaffold while his head was in the noose, breaking his neck.[28][29] His lifeless body was nevertheless drawn and quartered,[30][31] and his body parts distributed to "the four corners of the kingdom".[32] |
28 August 1628 | Edmund Arrowsmith | Catholic priest, one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales[33][34] |
10 September 1641 | Ambrose Barlow | Catholic priest, one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales[35][36][37] |
30 May 1643 | George Bouchier | For his activities in the English Civil War[38] |
30 May 1643 | Robert Yeamans | For his activities in the English Civil War[39] |
30 May 1643 | Philip Powell | For being a priest[40] |
1653 | Felim O'Neill of Kinard | Executed for his part in the Irish Rebellion of 1641[41][42] |
28 June 1654 | John Southworth | Cromwell ordered that surgeons sew the corpse back together so that it could be sent to Douai College for burial[43] |
7 July 1658 | Edward Ashton (colonel) | For the plot against the Lord Protector set on foot by agents of Charles II in 1658, and for complicity in which Sir Henry Slingsby and John Hewet were executed[44] |
13 October 1660 | Col. Thomas Harrison | For regicide of Charles I |
1663 | Thomas Oates | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot[45][46] |
1663 | Samuel Ellis | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | John Nettleton, sr. | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | John Nettleton, jr. | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | Robert Scott | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | William Tolson | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | John Forster | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | Robert Olroyd | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | John Asquith | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | Peregrine Corney | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | John Snowden | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | John Smith | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | William Ash | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | John Errington | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | Robert Atkins | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | William Colton | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | George Denham | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | Henry Watson | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | Richard Wilson | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | Ralph Rymer | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
1663 | Charles Carre | Executed for participating in the Farnley Wood Plot |
18 January 1676 | Joshua Tefft | Unlawfully fighting with Indians[47] |
1678 | William Staley | First victim of the Popish Plot[48] |
1 July 1681 | Oliver Plunkett | Last victim of the Popish Plot |
1685 | over 200 | Charged with treason following the Monmouth Rebellion, their remains were parboiled, tarred, and displayed on poles, trees and lampposts; only when James II conducted a progress through the area were they removed and buried[49] |
16 February 1788 | Robert Keon | Hanged, drawn, and quartered for murder in a private quarrel[50]
John and Henry Sheares, Irish patriots, were hanged on 14 July 1798, outside of Newgate Prison |
1766 | Nicholas Sheehy | an Irish Catholic Priest who was hung, drawn and quartered for supposedly aiding the murder of John Bridges(Though there are claims that Bridges survived) [51] |
20 September 1803 | Robert Emmet | Hanged and then beheaded once dead[52] for high treason in the Irish Rebellion of 1803.[53][54][55] He was also the last person to be executed in this way |
References
edit- ^ Rishanger, William, 1250?–1312? and Henry T. Riley, Willelmi Rishanger, Quondam Monachi S. Albani, Et Quorundam Anonymorum, Chronica Et Annales, Regnantibus Henrico Tertio Et Edwardo Primo, Rerum Britannicarum medii aevi scriptores (Rolls Series) 28.2, London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green, 1865, p. 104 "David judicialiter condemnatus, tractus et suspensus est, visceribusque combustis, corpus capite truncatum, et in quatuor partes est divisum." (Also at Google Books)
- ^ Prestwich, Michael (2004). "Middleton, Sir Gilbert". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/53089. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- ^ Henry Thomas Riley, Thomae Walsingham, Quondam Monachi S. Albani, Historia Anglicana. London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green, 1863, Vol 1. p. 169 [1] "Deinde tractus, suspensus, et in quartas divisus est; et partes quatuor principalibus civitatibus Angliae sunt transmissae; caput ejus super pontem Londoniarum fixum est, versus partes respiciens Scoticanas."
- ^ Aslet, Clive. "Fobbing" in Villages of Britain : The Five Hundred Villages That Made the Countryside. Bloomsbury, 2010.
- ^ Randal Bingley, Fobbing, Life and Landscape (Pheon Heritage in association with Thurrock Council Museum, 1997)
- ^ Prescott, Andrew (2008) [2004], "Ball, John (d. 1381)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.), Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/1214, retrieved 22 August 2010 (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- ^ a b Powell, Edgar (1896). The Rising of 1381 in East Anglia. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. OCLC 1404665. p. 48 [2]
- ^ Powell, Edgar (1896). The Rising of 1381 in East Anglia. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. OCLC 1404665. p. 25 [3]
- ^ Waldron, Ronald (2008) [2004], "Usk, Thomas (c.1354–1388)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.), Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/28030, retrieved 22 August 2010 (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- ^ Steffan, Rhobert ap (2006), Llywelyn Ap Gruffydd Fychan, bbc.co.uk, retrieved 22 August 2010
- ^ Haydon, Frank Scott, 1822–1887. Eulogium (historiarum Sive Temporis). London: Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans, and Roberts, 1863. Vol 3 p. 402. [4]. "Johannes Cerle tractus, suspensus, et vivus depositus, et tandem ductus Londoniae tractus ibidem et suspensus demum decollatus est atque in quartas divisus."
- ^ Gilbert, Sir John Thomas (24 October 1865). "History of the Viceroys of Ireland: With Notices of the Castle of Dublin and Its Chief Occupants in Former Times". J. Duffy – via Google Books.
- ^ "The Project Gutenberg eBook of Ireland under the Tudors (vol. I), by Richard Bagwell, M.A." www.gutenberg.org.
- ^ "The Statutes at Large: From the third year of Edward the Second, A.D. 1310, to the eleventh, twelfth and thirteenth years of James the First, A.D. 1612, inclusive". B. Grierson. 24 October 1765 – via Google Books.
- ^ Letters and Papers; Weir, Henry VIII, p. 454
- ^ Nichols, John Gough (1852). Chronicles of the Grey friars of London. Camden Society, p. 65
- ^ Hamilton, Dakota L. (2005) [2004], "Thomas, William (d. 1554)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.), Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/27242, retrieved 20 August 2010 (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- ^ a b Trudgian, Raymond Francis (2008) [2004], "Mayne, Cuthbert [St Cuthbert Mayne] (bap. 1544, d. 1577)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.), Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/18440, retrieved 19 August 2010 (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- ^ a b Graves, Michael A. R. (2008) [2004], "Campion, Edmund [St Edmund Campion] (1540–1581)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.), Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/4539, retrieved 19 August 2010 (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- ^ "Lambert, Matthew | Dictionary of Irish Biography". www.dib.ie.
- ^ Lonergan, Aidan. "Wexford Martyrs: 7 facts about Six Irish Catholics hanged, drawn and quartered by Elizabeth I for treason in 1581". The Irish Post.
- ^ Simpson, Richard. Edmund Campion: A Biography. New ed., ed., J. Hodges, 1896. p. 457. url= https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b55231?urlappend=%3Bseq=471
- ^ a b c d e f g h Francis Edwards, S.J., Plots and plotters in the reign of Elizabeth I. (Dublin: Four Courts, 2002), p. 164.
- ^ Holinshed 1808, pp. 915–916:
John Ballard a preest, and first persuader of Babington to these odious treasons, was laid aloue vpon an hurdell, and six others two and two in like sort, all drawne from Tower hill through the citie of London, untu a field at the vpper end of Holborne, hard by the high waie side to saint Giles in the field, where was erected a scaffold for their execution, and a paire of gallows of extraordinarie hight ... and although the thousands were thought (and indeed so seemed) to be numberlesse: yet somewhat to note the huge multitude, there were by computation able men enow to giue battell to a strong enimie ... On the first daie the traitors were placed vpon the scaffold, that the one might behold the reward of his fellowes treason. Ballard the preest, who was the first brocher of this treason, was the first that was hanged, who being cut downe (according to judgement) was dismembred, his bellie ript up, his bowels and traitorous heart taken out and throwne into the fire, his head also (seuered from his shoulders) was set on a short stake vpon the top of the gallows, and the trunke of his bodie quartered and imbrued in his owne bloud, wherewith the executioners hands were bathed, and some of the standers by (but to their great loathing, as not able for their liues to auoid it, such was the throng) beesprinkled.
- ^ "Publications". 24 October 1908 – via Google Books.
- ^ "Oct 25 - The Forty Martyrs of England and Wales".
- ^ Thomas M. McCoog, The Society of Jesus in Ireland, Scotland, and England (Brill, 2017), p. 68.
- ^ Northcote Parkinson 1976, pp. 91–92
- ^ Fraser 2005, pp. 283
- ^ Allen 1973, p. 37
- ^ Thompson 2008, p. 102
- ^ Guy Fawkes, York Museums Trust, retrieved 16 May 2010
- ^ "Arrowsmith [alias Bradshaw, Rigby], Edmund [formerly Bryan] (1585–1628), Jesuit". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. 2004. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/699. ISBN 978-0-19-861412-8. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- ^ ""The Lancaster priest executed for his zeal", Catholic Herald, 26 August 2010".
- ^ Camm, Bede (1907). "Ven. Edward Ambrose Barlow". The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 2. New York: Robert Appleton. Retrieved 10 September 2013.
- ^ "Blessed Ambrose Barlow, O.S.B." St Ambrose Barlow Website. Archived from the original on 4 August 2003. Retrieved 10 September 2013.
- ^ Tyldesley, PJ. "Sir Thomas Tyldesley 1612–1651". Tyldesley Family History. Retrieved 13 December 2008.
- ^ This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Cooper, Thompson (1886). "Bouchier, George". In Stephen, Leslie (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 6. London: Smith, Elder & Co. p. 4.
- ^ This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Pollard, Albert Frederick (1900). "Yeamans, Robert". In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 63. London: Smith, Elder & Co. p. 68.
- ^ This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Ven. Philip Powel". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
- ^ "BBC - Northern Ireland - A Short History". www.bbc.co.uk. Archived from the original on 1 January 2009.
- ^ "Sir Felim O'Neill - Irish Biography".
- ^ Morrill, John (2004), "Southworth, John [St John Southworth] (1592–1654)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.), Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/67460, retrieved 19 August 2010 (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- ^ Stephen, Leslie, ed. (1885). . Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 2. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
- ^ Drake, Francis. Eboracum : Or, the History and Antiquities of the City of York, from Its Origin to This Time. Together with an Account of the Ainsty, or County of the Same, and a Description and History of the Cathedral Church, from Its First Foundation to the Present Year. Illustrated with Seventeen Copper-Plates. in Two Volumes. Printed for T. Wilson and R. Spence, High-Ousegate, 1788, vol 1. p. 60. [5]
- ^ Hopper, Andrew (June 2002), "The Farnley Wood Plot and the Memory of the Civil Wars in Yorkshire", The Historical Journal, 45 (2), Cambridge University Press, hosted at jstor.org: 281, 296–297, doi:10.1017/s0018246x02002406, JSTOR 3133646, S2CID 159769395
- ^ "Joshua Tefft". Espy Project Execution Records. Retrieved 5 March 2024.
- ^ "William Staley (Stayley) - National Portrait Gallery".
- ^ Zook 1999, p. 141
- ^ James Kelly "'That Damn'd Thing Called Honour'" Cork University Press 1995 pp194-196
- ^ The Roman Catholic Church – Waterford County Museum Archived 20 July 2011 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "Irish Historical Mysteries: The Grave of Robert Emmet". Retrieved 7 May 2013.
- ^ Brooke-Tyrrell, Alma (1983). "Focus on Thomas Street". Dublin Historical Record. 36 (3): 107–117. JSTOR 30100607.
- ^ Dawson, T. (1971). "Between the Steps". Dublin Historical Record. 24 (3): 65–75. JSTOR 30103977.
- ^ Howell, Thomas Bayly; Howell, Thomas Jones (1820). Cobbett's Complete Collection of State Trials and Proceedings for High Treason: And Other Crimes and Misdemeanor from the Earliest Period to the Present Time ... from the Ninth Year of the Reign of King Henry, the Second, A.D.1163, to ... [George IV, A.D.1820]. R. Bagshaw. pp. 65–75.
Sources
edit- Allen, Kenneth (1973), The Story of Gunpowder, Wayland, ISBN 978-0-85340-188-9
- Feilden, Henry St. Clair (2009) [1910], A Short Constitutional History of England, Read Books, ISBN 978-1-4446-9107-8
- Fraser, Antonia (2005) [1996], The Gunpowder Plot, London: Phoenix, ISBN 0-7538-1401-3
- Haynes, Alan (2005) [1994], The Gunpowder Plot: Faith in Rebellion, Sparkford, England: Hayes and Sutton, ISBN 0-7509-4215-0
- Holinshed, Raphael (1808), Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland, vol. 4, London: Johnson
- Jesse, John Heneage (1847), Literary and historical memorials of London, vol. 2, Bentley
- Northcote Parkinson, C. (1976), Gunpowder Treason and Plot, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, ISBN 0-297-77224-4
- Oman, Charles (1906), The Great Revolt of 1381, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- Thompson, Irene (2008), The A to Z of Punishment and Torture: From Amputations to Zero Tolerance, Book Guild Publishing, ISBN 978-1-84624-203-8
- Wormald, Patrick (2001) [1999], The Making of English Law: King Alfred to the Twelfth Century , Legislation and Its Limits, Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, ISBN 0-631-22740-7
- Zook, Melinda S. (1999), Radical whigs and conspiratorial politics in late Stuart England, Penn State Press, ISBN 0-271-01856-9