Peirrepoint
 

Watched this the other night about Britains famous/infamous hangman.A bloke who took great pride in his work & was as cold & calculated in despatching those found guilty(rightly or wrongly) as the murderers themselves.Never took his work home & was somewhat affronted when his identity became public after the Nazi war trials,where he executioned up to 13 war criminals a day(1 or 2 was the norm).The only emotion he showed was when he had to hang an old friend of his(personally i'd have called in sick).Anyway (& i realise this is considered by some to be rather light hearted on such a serious subject,but someone had to do it)Was he a ruthless killer like his victims? Heaven or hell for Albert?

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Heaven. He didnt convict or try the people, he just performed a public service. At the time, the death penalty was acceptable and he was an instrument of the court.If 12 people find someone guilty then why should he question it ?

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Heaven , maybe a question for the 'older' Accy webers .......when did Peirrepoint become famous ? Was he 'famous' while he was still hanging folk , or did the fame come after he retired and the death penalty stopped .

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Heaven, missed it apart from last 30 mins cos forgot it was on, think he became "Well Known" in later years steeljack, more after he resigned, wouldn't put money on,but its how i remember.

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Thats whats got me a bit confused , seem to remember going on trips to Southport when I was a kid and when the coach passed a pub on the other side of Preston it was allways pointed out as the place where the 'hangman' lived , this would be mid 50s , and i'm thinking he was still working then

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My great grandma used to know him. According to my Grandma she said he was a very nice chap to know despite his grim profession. He was very concerned with making sure those that were executed were done so with a minimum of fuss, unlike other executioners.

I enjoyed the dramatization.

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I thought the play was very good but Timothy Spall made Pierrepoint a lot more "dramatic" than he really was. He treated the job as just that - a job - and, by all accounts I've read about him, he was quite a cheerful sort of bloke. As far as I know the story of him hanging a friend was made up. It never happened.

I first heard of him around the time of the Bentley and Ellis hangings, when I was 10 or 11, so about 1953/54. I remember my dad telling me he had a pub in Preston and I think there were a few articles in the Press about him.

No, he wasn't a ruthless killer. He did a job that few people would or could do and he did it as humanely as possible.

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I was going to ask about the "pub" thing .... I remember my grandad telling me he had a pub .... wonder what he called it? The "Drop Inn" would have been a good name;)

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think he topped his last one in 55, aint certain but thats what i reckon.

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I just Googled it. Apparently the pub in Preston was the "Rose and Crown" but (it says) the pub he had before that, in Oldham, was called the "Help The Poor Struggler". :eek:

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When was Ruth Ellis hung? That caused an uproar.

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I watched it too-was good and made you realise what soem people go through because of their job.Very sad when he got bullied though :(
I say Heaven.

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now the brain cells are kicking in (still morning here) I think the pub on the Southport Rd. was near the Lancashire Constabulary (sp?) H.Q. at Hutton ? maybe for security/personal safety reasons

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I just checked on the "hanging a friend" story too. He did hang a man who had been a regular in his Oldham pub. He knew him well but they were not great friends and Pierrepoint didn't have any qualms about the execution.

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July 1955. I remember it very well but I also remember the Derek Bentley case, in 1953. I was only 10 then but it made a big impression on me, along with the Christie/Timothy Evans case.

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perhaps Ruth Ellis was his last? sure he quit in 55?

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In answer to steeljack's question, his "fame" came when he was chosen to execute the Nazi criminals. He expected his anonimity to continue, and was totally shocked to come back to this country as a "hero". A far cry from the treatment he received in latter years, just before the death penalty was dropped.

His father and uncle were hangmen before him, but he gained notoriety due to the Nazi hangings, and the number he hung overall, believed to be about 600

A lot of dramatic licence was used in the film. It was slated when it originally came out in 2005, and some actors previously offered the part of Pierrepoint turned it down, because it did not tell the story correctly. One instance being the over emphasis on his friendship with "Tish".

He apparantly turned against the death penalty after his retirement. It would have been interesting to have seen this in the film, which incidently was originally incorrectly titled "the last Hangman"

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Who was the 'last hangman'?

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was never aware of the others even though there was a government list.

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Robert Leslie Stewart, apparantly, hanged Peter Allen at Walton, in 1964. But his accomplice, Gwynne Owen, was hanged at the same time at Strangeways. Don't know who did that, haven't managed to find anything yet.

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This article contains an audio link of an interview with Mr Pierrepoint in 1976. It's well worth listening to.

BBC - Liverpool - Local History - Albert Pierrepoint

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Found this bit interesting on your link, Westender. Only abolished totally in 1999!

Piracy? Arson on a royal dockyard???......

The death penalty was suspended in 1965, but remained for crimes including piracy with violence and arson on a Royal Dockyard.
In January 1999 Home Secretary Jack Straw signed protocol six of the European Convention of Human Rights, formally abolishing the death penalty in the U.K.

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I suppose that would be in case someone had a go at the Royal Yacht. Once it was decommissioned, in 1997, the pirates could do what they damn-well pleased. :rolleyes:

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I watched it and thought it was good, not a job I'd have liked though.

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I watched it. I thought it was quite well done although there was obviously a lot of artistic licence.

I would say he'd be headed for Heaven unless there were things about him we don't know. He was only doing his job and somebody had to do it.

The Derek Bentley case is one good reason why I don't support the death penalty in all but a few situations. I don't think it should have been totally banned.

I believe he resigned in 1956 and it wasn't over a matter of conscience but something to do with his pay when someone was reprieved at the last minute and the sheriff's office refused to pay him the full fee despite the fact that he'd done all the work to prepare. He was just offered £1.

"Tish" was a regular customer at Pierrepoint's pub "Help the Poor Struggler" and they were friends. They gave each other the nicknames "Tish" and "Tosh" and apparently used to do singsongs togther in the pub so it was more than a casual aquaintance.

Interestingly Pierrepoint referred to Tish in his memoirs when he was speculating about whether the death penalty was a deterrant or not. He decided it wasn't, because Tish had not only known that he could have hung but also known who his executioner would be but it didn't stop him killing.

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Listen to the interview in the link I posted. That's not what Mr Pierrepoint says. He didn't even know the man's real name.

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That much was shown in the film. When Corbett's mother visited Peirrepoint to ask for help, he didn't even know who she was referring to. He only ever knew him as a regular at the pub he originally frequented, coz they used to do a routine together.