public hanging

[natty]

does anyone know when the last public hanging was? cheers

[Quizmonster]

Newgate Prison on May 26, 1868, assuming you mean in England. If you mean anywhere in the world...probably today!

[natty]

thanks Quizmonster.

wasn't Ruth Ellis's hanging in 1955 made public then?

[spainlads]

22nd March 1868. Last fully public hanging in Scotland - that of Joseph Bell at Perth.
2nd April 1868. Last public hanging of a woman - Francis Kidder at Maidstone for murder.

12th May 1868. Last nominally public hanging in Scotland. Robert Smith was executed outside Dumfries prison but the authorities ensured that the public saw very little.
26th May 1868. Last fully public hanging in England. Michael Barrett at Newgate for the Fenian bombing at Clerkenwell which killed seven people.
29th May 1868. Parliament passes the Capital Punishment within Prisons Bill ending public hanging.

13th July 1955. Ruth Ellis becomes the last woman to hang

15th August 1963. The last hanging in Scotland was that of 21-year-old Henry Burnett who was executed at Craiginches Prison in Aberdeen for the murder of seaman Thomas Guyan.
13th August 1964. Peter Anthony Allen (at Walton Prison Liverpool) and Gwynne Owen Evans - real name John Robson Walby, (at Strangeways Prison Manchester) become the last to be hanged. The executions taking place simultaneously at 8.00 a.m.
1st November 1965. Last passing of the death sentence in England - on David Chapman at Leeds. He was subsequently reprieved and his sentence commuted to life in prison.

[bernardo]

The last public execution by guillotine in France was 1939.