Caxton Gibbet
Encyclopedia
Hillock
A hillock or knoll is a small hill, usually separated from a larger group of hills such as a range. Hillocks are similar in their distribution and size to small mesas or buttes. The term is largely a British one...
on Ermine Street
Ermine Street
Ermine Street is the name of a major Roman road in England that ran from London to Lincoln and York . The Old English name was 'Earninga Straete' , named after a tribe called the Earningas, who inhabited a district later known as Armingford Hundred, around Arrington, Cambridgeshire and Royston,...
(now the A1198
A1198 road
The A1198 is a road in Cambridgeshire, England, following the route of Ermine Street between the A505 at Royston, Hertfordshire and Godmanchester, near Huntingdon....
) in England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, running between London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
and Huntingdon
Huntingdon
Huntingdon is a market town in Cambridgeshire, England. The town was chartered by King John in 1205. It is the traditional county town of Huntingdonshire, and is currently the seat of the Huntingdonshire district council. It is known as the birthplace in 1599 of Oliver Cromwell.-History:Huntingdon...
, near its crossing with the road (now the A428
A428 road
The A428 road is a major road in central and eastern England. It connects the cities of Coventry and Cambridge by way of the county towns of Northampton and Bedford.-Coventry - Northampton:...
) between Oxford
Oxford
The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...
and Cambridge
Cambridge
The city of Cambridge is a university town and the administrative centre of the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It lies in East Anglia about north of London. Cambridge is at the heart of the high-technology centre known as Silicon Fen – a play on Silicon Valley and the fens surrounding the...
. There are tales of murderers being hanged and displayed at the nearby village of Caxton
Caxton, Cambridgeshire
Caxton is a small rural village and civil parish in South Cambridgeshire, England. It is 9 miles west of the county town of Cambridge. In 2001, the population of Caxton parish was 480 people. Caxton is most famous for the Caxton Gibbet.-History:...
in the 1670s, and records in a court case that the gibbet
Gibbet
A gibbet is a gallows-type structure from which the dead bodies of executed criminals were hung on public display to deter other existing or potential criminals. In earlier times, up to the late 17th century, live gibbeting also took place, in which the criminal was placed alive in a metal cage...
was still there in 1745. Several local writers say that it was no longer there by the early decades of the nineteenth century. There is presently a modern replica which can be seen in photographs dating back to 1900http://www.cromwellcollection.org.uk/cgi-bin/cambscoll/history.pl?id=328;action=display, the erection of which may have been connected with the nearby inn of the same name.
It is reputed to be a gruesome example of the cage variation of the gibbet
Gibbet
A gibbet is a gallows-type structure from which the dead bodies of executed criminals were hung on public display to deter other existing or potential criminals. In earlier times, up to the late 17th century, live gibbeting also took place, in which the criminal was placed alive in a metal cage...
into which live victims were placed until they died from starvation
Starvation
Starvation is a severe deficiency in caloric energy, nutrient and vitamin intake. It is the most extreme form of malnutrition. In humans, prolonged starvation can cause permanent organ damage and eventually, death...
, dehydration
Dehydration
In physiology and medicine, dehydration is defined as the excessive loss of body fluid. It is literally the removal of water from an object; however, in physiological terms, it entails a deficiency of fluid within an organism...
or exposure
Hypothermia
Hypothermia is a condition in which core temperature drops below the required temperature for normal metabolism and body functions which is defined as . Body temperature is usually maintained near a constant level of through biologic homeostasis or thermoregulation...
. After execution dead bodies were certainly suspended in cages as a warning, and may have been here. There are a number of folk tales reported on various websites and in secondary sources of people being hanged at Caxton, none of which can be verified from primary sources. The most gruesome concerns the murder of a man called Partridge, either by a poacher or a man who thought Partridge had killed his dog. The murderer, sometime after having escaped abroad for a period, boasted, or was otherwise detected of the crime and ordered to be gibbeted alive. In some versions a local baker who offered him bread suffered a similar fate. There is no contemporaneous record of anything that confirms any part of this story, either in court or burial records. The practical difficulties of enforcing this penalty would be insuperable. There is little evidence of this practice anywhere in England.
Cambridgeshire County
Cambridgeshire County Council
Cambridgeshire County Council is the county council of Cambridgeshire, England. The council currently consists of 69 councillors, representing 60 electoral divisions. The Conservative Party has a majority on the council, having gained control in the 1997 local elections...
Record Office, which is part of Cambridgeshire Archives and Local Studies
Cambridgeshire Archives and Local Studies
Cambridgeshire Archives and Local Studies Service is a UK local government institution which collects and preserves archives, other historical documents and printed material relating to the modern county of Cambridgeshire, which includes the former counties of Huntingdonshire and the Isle of Ely...
, says that the following entry in the manuscripts of William Cole, a Cambridgeshire antiquarian (1714-1782) has been taken to refer to the Caxton Gibbet although there is no more specific mention of the actual location in the text. He is clearly referring to a dead body.
- "About 1753 or 1754 the son of Mrs. Gatward being convicted of robbing the Mail was hanged in chains on the Great Road. I saw him hanging in a scarlet coat after he had hung 2 or 4 months it is supposed that the screw was filed which supported him and that he fell in the first high wind after."
Sources
- Whitehouse, R., The Iron Cage, Cambridgeshire Journal, Feb 2001, p.11, includes a full and lurid exposition of the folk tales.
- Mossop, D., Caxton Gibbet, available from Cambridge Local Studies Collection includes an extensive analysis of the tales connected with Caxton Gibbett, their possible sources, correlates and the (lack of) sources for any of them.
- http://www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk
- Cambridgeshire County Records Office Add MS5820 fo. 19v.