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1577
? Abbott, Julian Gliddon, William Kylter, William Pearce, Hugh Wooger, 1577
ALL PUBLICLY HANGED AT LAUNCESTON
November 29th 1577 Cuthbert Maine Charged with preferring the Catholic Faith Hung, drawn and quartered in Launceston Market Place. His head being set up on the Castle of Launceston, and his quarters distributed between Bodmin, Barnstaple, Tregonyas and Wadebridge as an example!
1720 circa Male * ROSEVEAR. Riot and theft at Parr
Hanged at Launceston. The History of Cornwall Hitchins and Drew. 1824 p72. We are told that he was hanged at Launceston for his part in a Tinners Riot at Par demanding grain from a store house waiting to be shipped. At the time he was a constable. He was publicly hanged and his body taken to St Austell Downs where he was suspended on the Gibbet to “blacken in the sun and furnish meat for birds of prey.”
1735 Weds.6th August 1735 Henry Rogers Murder of William Carpenter
Also John Sheel Murder of William Carpenter
PUBLICLY HANGED AT LAUNCESTON (St. Stephens)
Monday 5th October 1767 William Pearse Stole from a wreck.
PUBLICLY HANGED AT LAUNCESTON (St. Stephens)
1771 Monday 1st April 1771 Catherine Burgess Murder of her female illegitimate child
PUBLICLY HANGED AT LAUNCESTON (St. Stephens)
Friday 9th August 1771 Ann Chapman Murder of her female illegitimate child
PUBLICLY HANGED AT LAUNCESTON
Friday 29th March 1776 Mary Penylegon Murder of a male illegitimate child
PUBLICLY HANGED AT LAUNCESTON (St. Stephens)
Thursday March 28th 1793 William Trevarvas (Trewarris) 25 Murder of Martha Blewitt
PUBLICLY HANGED AT BODMIN
The burglary at the Launceston Post Office in 1805, caused a great local sensation, and much credit was given to the three borough constables (by the names of Atkins, Short, and Watts) for, according to the saying of the time, having found the culprits out ‘like Narraway (or Norway) rats.’ The two men, John Williams and James Joyce, were found guilty at Launceston assizes and were sentenced to death.
This is where local folklore takes over as its stated that the men were taken in an open cart, rope around their necks, from the Castle gaol to Gallow’s Hill on St. Stephens Down, followed by a large crowd, and that on their way to execution the landlady whose house they had frequented got up into the cart and kissed them; but as Sir Alfred Robbins points out in his book ‘Launceston Past and Present,’ one is bound to accept the legend with caution in the absence of proof that this transport to St. Stephens was ever portion of a Launceston execution. Also records show that the incident was actually committed in 1793 some 12 years to that in the newspaper. There is also a listing that the two men, John Williams and James Joyce, were publicly hanged at Bodmin for breaking into the shop of Ms Tyeth, on Wednesday 17th April 1805. Given the distance from the county gaol on the Castle Green it is hard to give reason why the condemned felon would be conveyed to St. Stephens for execution, but that the name Gallows Hill exists does preclude that they did occur at this place,
1810 Unknown Lawrence Roach Murder Launceston?
Thursday March 1814 William Burns Barnes?21 The murder of John Allen of Sennen
PUBLICLY HANGED AT LAUNCESTON
Friday 31st March 1815 John Simms Murder of Joseph Burnett
PUBLICLY HANGED AT LAUNCESTON
Thursday 20th August William Rowe Junior from Stokeclimsland 41 Sheep stealing
PUBLICLY HANGED AT LAUNCESTON
Monday 2nd April 1821 John Barnicott Earnicott, 24, and John Thompson, 17, Murder of William Hancock at Cury
PUBLICLY HANGED AT Launceston; Thomson and Barnicott were hanged in the Castle Green Launceston for the murder of a farmer near Probus, the scaffold being erected on a slight mound in the centre of the Green, known from this circumstance as Gallows Hill until it was levelled some twenty years since.
Bodmin Executions Website
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