The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1849-11-20 00:00:00

TO CORRESPONDENTS,

The Treasurer o'

Ind Ear Infirmary begs to acknow-
receipt of " C. M." 's donation of which the
donor requested to have noticed in the LIVERPOOL STAN-
DARD.

me of the provincial papers are in the habit of transferring
rticles from our paper to their own without acknowled4-
" The Stockport Advertiser of last week inserts, as one
s," the whole of some remarks,
;Inns several weeks since, on the
It is being at present carried on

lg article;

g taken from us another hour.

couitl r

priet y c

to go to press before Eleven o'clock. and
Ire, publish a notice of the very gratifying
the Philharmonic Hall, last night.
ssed a letter to a contemporary to contra.
n our last, which stated that he had at-

where t

the chic

lea!, at

rnant of
tiered that

ther part in th
the meeting. I

ag of gentlemen to consider the pro-
, the dock and corporate estates. Mr.
,g which I have attended
s of the Shipowners'
,„.. ascertaining that certain reso-
r their object an alteration of the manage-
estate, were about to be proposed, I consi-
iember of the Town Council and one of the
►•erpool docks, I ought not to take any fur-

ly meet i

mooted v

eeetlings, and rtherefore retired-from
mention that Mr. Chilton adopted the

th.turrpool &tanttarb.

VING, NOT. 20, 1849

r punishment should operate as a preventa-
. _
deratum yet to he worked
We should not, however, for a

tive of crime is a d

islatio

moment be disposed to carry our experiments to
the length, advocated by the sentimental portion
of mankind, of dispensing with capital punish-
ment, as at present inflicted upon murderers and
old that " tl‘e murderer shall
not only as a terror to

traitors onl
surely I

je put to death,

evil-doers, hut as a righteous retribution for his
crime. And, with respect to other classes of of-
fenders, we are not aware that the leniency of our
modern legislation—the practical abolition of trans-
portation for a short term of years--has produced
..cult. Far more merciful and bene-
olent, we believe, to those criminals whom our
I,res sentence to seven or I-

satisfacto

n years' transporta-

ual carrying into execution

the letter of such sentences, as affording them op-
portunities of commencing life anew, in a country
where scope is afforded for industry, even with
characters tainted in the eyes of an established
m to the abortive disci-

:ommuniV, tt

an submis

pline of our reformat°

prison system

Before
we can succeed in converting the rogue permanently
into an honest man we must enable him to live
in his new character; and, to do this, we must
first produce in society a different feeling to that
with which persons, who have been convicted of
crime, are at present regarded.
Adhering, however, as we do to the punishment
of death as due to the murderer, because com-
manded by the eternal lawgiver Himself, we may
still ask the question whether the mode of inflict-
ing that punishment may not, with advantage to
society, be altered. The sentence of our courts is
that such criminals shall be publicly hanged. Pub-
licity has always been insisted upon as an essential
portion of the punishment, obviously with a view
to its appalling influence upon the spectators. In
times past, when death by the rope was inflicted
for offences short of murder, we carried this prin-
ciple further than at present. We had our Tyburn
tree, with its procession, of which the criminal was
the hero, and enjoyed his last cup by the way,
escorted by his brethren in crime, anxious above all
things to watch his fortitude in death, and the
callous activity with which he ascended the fatal
'ed to learn the effect of that
who looked on at Ty-

ladder.
practice

Every pe

burn, felt his ambition raised to become one day
the principal personage in the show. An execu-
tion was a rogue's gala day; and Tyburn, with its
festivities, not its terrors, was looked forward to as

)hable termination of his career. We
have improved upon this state of things in our
modern legislation, by dispensing with the cart and
the procession ; but we suspect that we shall have
to-go further and dispense with the element of
publicity altogether.

the most pr

ase of the Mannings, and the scenes
which took place on the occasion of their execution
in front of Horsernonger-lane Gaol
very serious considerations. Of what classes were

e recen

suggest some

the vast concourse assembled to witness the death
of these wretched criminals composed ? Of the
most degraded of both sexes, intermingled with a
sprinkling of the morbidly curious, who would be
as ready to gloat over any other painful, or bloody
spectacle. It was not to take warning at the sight
of guilt meeting its reward that the thousands of de-
based beings spent the night jammed up inthe streets
gallows, amusing themselves in
or in bandying obscenities; nor
sous feeling—a pure detestation of the

surrounding the
horrible levity,

murde

vhich induced the more
respectable(?) portion of the audience to pay their
guineas for the same spectacle. A few, it is pos.
Bible, might go away from the scene horror-struck,
and warned of the consequences of indulging in

Nvould leave it more -Pol-
luted in heart and hardened in sin than they came.
It is revolting to contemplate the state of mind in
which a crowd must be, by whom women and chil-
ntonly trampled upon, as they were
_ how little the taking of life was
regarded in comparison with_ securing " a good

es ; but as r

lay last ;

_ ..
"to witness the hangman's performance. Al-
ed that one person has fallen a

Ldy we are info
tim to brutal v

records of the I

on the occasion ; and the
olice-courts of the follow-
wretch in the form of a
gh bearing the name of
~bbour jostling her in the
mom, " knocked her down,
It she would have her life, and that she
• hPr, and would have her

manning*, who;

t to us

)n a tic

3t for standing

ting 'Lb.
Tied a 1

," ad,

she would swing for
A Horsenionger-lane Gaol, on the same drop as

eyed to this

uur ow

.ens, no

the." The warning eon-
ago by the fate of "her namesake,"

been long—and we rejoice
ice given to it by the letter

the London limes by Mr. Charles
mean exponent of the character and
ses of the metropolis, at
,tion of criminals within

e walls of

the lc

of

'ecently

age of

th their

I, in which they hve been con-
•er all the ends which society

of our readers a question.
vhose minds the fate of the
recurred on Tuesday last,
:hing to awe at the thought

ine o'cl

ock, two fellow
d into another

nselves,

they are

throughout

thousands- who

mghfares of London,