The New York herald., 1879-11-22
EXECUTIONS BY ELECTRICITY.

In advocating the abolition of hanging IN favor OF
one of the painless modes of death known to science
the HERALD is doing genuinely good work. The
subject is one that is frequently discussed among
scientific men. and there is well founded belief
that tho electric discharge could be used COM
pleely to dvest executions of the horrors attending
their bunging performance and to insure instan-
taneous death to the criminal. In one of his pub
shed lectures Professor Tyndall has considered the
physiological effects OF lightning which is identical
in nature with, though of course vastly different in
intensity from, the discharge of electrical bat
terry and he explains quite fully the rationale of the
painless death due to lightning stroke. The seat Of
sensation Professor Tyndal says. is the brain, and
to it the intelligence of any impression made upon
the nerves has to be transmitted before this i'm
preston can become manifest in consciousness.
This transmission requires time aud Helmholtz.
the celebrated German physicist has proved that it
travels at the rate Of about one hundred feet per
second at proximately one-tenth the velocity of
sound in air. Helmholtz has also shown that it
takes at least onetenth OF second for the brain to
put itself in order to perceivethat is to say. sup
posing person to cut his finger one-tenth of sec
ond elapses before the brain finds it out and the
sensation of pain follows. Now IL an injury can be
inflicted which will destroy life in less than one
tenth of second it is evident that the victim will,
to use an apt vulgarism. "never know what hurt
him."
It will at once occur to many that rifle bullet
piercing the brain will satisfy the above require
ment. Such projectile travels at the rate of some
fourteen hundred feet per second and allowing for
retardaton due to overcoming the increased resist
ance, it would not occupy more than 1-1.OO0 of sec
ond in traversing the brain Hence. We should ex
pect men thus killed to die instantaneously, and
this suppostion is abundantly substantiated by the
fact that on every battle fed men found dead,
home charge or in perfectly life-like attitudes
Usually in it is proved that the fatal bull
let penetrated the brain and boted out existence
before the victim had time to make the smallest.
movement in recognition OF the injury.
fash OF lightning-or the electric discharge
occurs in the hundred thousandth part OF Sec
ond-that is, it is hundred times more rapid than
the rifle bullet aud its deadly effects proportion
hs
nation. 1t is curious fact that Professor Tyndall
once came very nearly demonstrating in his own
discharge He states that, while lecturing before
large audience he accidentally touched wire lead
discharge passed through his body. In de-
scribing his sensations he dwells on the point
that "life was absolutely blotted out tor
very sensible interval without trace of pain and
he adds that 'there cannot be doubt that to per-
son struck dead by lightning the passage from life
to death occurs without consciousness being in the
least degree implicated"
1t remains now TO consider how the electric dis
ties are few. By means OF an inductorium or induc-
ton coil the tension OF the electric discharge is
greatly increased that few cells Of gavanic bat
terry can be made to yield very powerful physical.
chemical and physiological effects. With small
a.
produced that the manipulator is prostrated. The
Stevens Institute of Technology of Hoboken has
coil which yields sparks twentyone inches in length
which penetrate glass blocks three inches in thick
ness. The great induction coil at the Royal Poly
technic Institution in London gives miniature light
ming flashes twenty-nine inches in length. Either Of
these machines would give ample discharge to kill
simultaneously more men than have ever been
hanged in company in this country.
OF course the arrangement OF apparatus would
properly depend upon experiments. This work
should be awarded by the State to some competent
Qcia IN n mi ha cd for fhaC
bination of coil and generator OF electricity which
would yield discharge sufficient to meet all possi-
cubcal space. The whole apparatus could easily be
placed in moderate sized trunk, and it would have
to be contrived that it's operation would be
tain. At the same time its mode OF manipulation
must bo simple that the victim may not be the
Sheriff instead of the culprit. Tue person charged
with its keeping might be required to place it
in working order and deliver it to the
Sheriff. in closed case. from which nothing but
the conducting wires and the discharging button or
key protrude The adjustment should be such that
the discharge could not occur until the key was
pressed and this could be prevented by locking the
latter place that 1t could be released only by
the Sheriff. The condemned would be brought be-
fore the legal witnesses in the usual manner. The
medical attendant would attach the wires. probably
at the base OF the brain each side Of the spine.
At the proper moment the Sheriff would press the
dscharging key and all would be over. No writhinR
form dangling from rope. no failure of traps. no
breakage of the cord possible eternity Of torture
during the quarter second occupied in falling before
the moose tghtens. no strangulation, but simple
and certain extinction Of life.
The question has been asked me how 1t would be
known that death had surely taken place. First, by
the fact that the energy Of the available discharge
must be ascertained to be ample for the purpose,
and to reach some reliable data relative to this
periments the lower animals without Mr..
Berghs consent probably, would be needed Some
experiments of this sort have already been made by
Dr. b. w. Richardson, OF London. with the object OF
determining signs OF death after lightning stroke.
These he sums up as absence of all indication of
motion Of the heart-absence of reflex action, de-
of animal temperature in the cavities to the
temperature Of water lett exposed to the surround
ing air. absence OF color in transparent struc-
lures, rigidty Of muscles, coagulstion Of blood in
the veins and decomposition.
AS the law does not take life for revenge. but in
order to deter Others from. committing murder, the
possible moral influence OF death by electricity is
be considered. 1t WILL perhaps, be sufficient to point
out that the methods of causing death which have
caused the deepest popular horror those which
have been most mysterious and concealed OF all
natural phenomena those due to electricity both
the most imposing aud the least understood-the
lightning stroke is surrounded by the grossest
superstitions. In the minds of tho uneducsted the
sudden death OF q strong man caused by an utterly
unseen and unknown agency could not but produce
the strongest feelings Of awe aud fear.
PARK BENJAMIN. Phi. D.