THE PUNISHMENT OF GAROTTERS.

West Coast Times, Issue 346, 1 November 1866, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE PUNISHMENT OF GAROTTERS.

At the last Lancashire Assizes, Mr Baron Martin endeavored to repress the street robberies with violence, which had become alarmingly frequent, by passing sentences of long terms of penal servitude upon the convicted offenders. Within a week of the close of those Assizes the crime was renewed, and, accordingly, in his charge to the grand jury, Mr Justice Lush intimated his intention of exercising the authority conferred upon him by the Acts 26 and 27 Victoria, cap. 44, and adding flogging to the penal servitude which he would inflict on prisoners guilty of robbery with violence. The result was that twelve young men were sentenced to be flogged ; and they have been flogged at the rate of four a day. The punishment has taken place in the afternoon, in an open flagged court-yard in the New Bailey, Manchester, and in the presence of the Governor (Captain Mitchell), tbe surgeon (Mr W. B. Scott), several warders, and such justices as chose to attend. At one end of the court is a fixed wooden apparatus, consisting of a box constructed on the principle of the old stocks, but horizontal instead of perpendicular. In this the culprit's legs are fastened. An upright pole is attached to each end of this box, which is steadied by a beam passing into the wall. Across these uprights is a moveable bar, upon which the convict's breast rests. His arms are extended, and his wrists fastened by leathern thongs to rings in the wall. Thus fixed, a man can only move his head. Each prisoner is prepared for the flogging in his cell, whence he emerges in his shoes and trousers only. The cat-o' -nine-tails is a whip with nine lashes of stout whipcord, each lash having nine knots at intervals from the extremity. The lash is about eighteen inches long. Armed with this weapon, one of the strongest warders stands about six feet to the left of the culprit, and deals him a hard, sharp stroke, the direction of which is immediately seen by the nine purple weals on the back, extending from the right shoulder towards the waist on the left. To give the fullest effect to every stroke, the warder waits fully half a minute, that with renewed strength he may give the second stroke, and this interval elapses betw.-en every stroke. The laches are so directed that, after eighteen the whole of the back is secured with purple weals, and tbe skin is broken and blood issxxes where, the knots have struck. The surgeon stands by, counting the strokes. The first offender who received his deserts was Alexander Metcalfe, a youth of twenty years, who, in his pain, roared for that mercy which he had not thought of when he assaulted and robbed Mary Murphy. He looked round, and called upon the Governor and the bystanders to have mercy, for,- said he, " I am an innocent lad, I am, for sure." Seeing that he had previously been convicted three times, one could estimate his declaration at its real value. The next culprit had told one of the warders tint as a soldier he had received 150 lashes, therefore it was not quite so surprising as it would have been otherwise, that, with a capability of endurance which might have been turned to great good, he received his eighteen lashes without moving a muscle or uttering a sound. His stoicism furnished an example which his successor attempted to imitate, but the terrible pain was too much for him, and he writhed about and groaned in his agony ; the last was Thomas Greenwood, for a robbery with violence at Gorton, and his cries and moans told how keenly he felt the physical torture he had brought upon himself. Each man, as he was released from the frame, was assisted by the warders to his cell, where he would be supplied with some lint steeped in spirits and water for his lacerated back. It is to be hoped that the lesson will not be forgotten ten years hence, when their term of penal servitude will have expired. The most important fact re-" mains to bo stated — that in every case in which the flogging has been administered the lash has produced the desired effect, and the convicts appear to be very sincere in their protestations that they will never again deserve such a punishment. — " News of the World."