Gruesome Punishments
The ghosts of Perthshire's gruesome past have been awakened by staff who were cataloguing some of the sentences and death warrants contained in the papers of Perth Burgh Council held in Perth and Kinross Council Archive at the A K Bell library.
Whilst some of the crimes described in the papers would be familiar today, the sentences in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries appear rather more punitive. Hanging, of course, was the ultimate punishment, but some of the other sanctions were no less fearsome. For example, Janet Robertsone from Alyth was caught pick-pocketing and stealing during the public fair in 1724. She was sentenced to be "scourged by the hand of the common executioner of Perth around the town and then sent over the water never to return again." In another incident Grisell Robertson was banished from the Burgh of Perth in 1726 for Sabbath breach and "scandalous carriage" with soldiers!
Such examples are relatively minor! Receiving stolen goods was a particularly dangerous occupation. One woman caught in "resset of thief and corresponding with thieves" in 1701 was sentenced to be "scourged through the town of Perth by the hangman, and her right lug to be nailed to the tron and then slit."
Murderers were generally sentenced to death by hanging. However, this was not the full extent of the punishment as the case of Alexander MacNaughton from the parish of Dowally clearly illustrates. In 1773 he was convicted and sentenced "to be fed on bread and water until the time of his hanging, thereafter his body to be delivered to James Wood, surgeon in Perth, to be publicly dissected and anatomised." Clearly bloody times!
These cheerful examples reveal a glimpse of Perth's past both in terms of the crimes committed and the types of punishment sanctioned. These and other fascinating documents are available for consultation at Perth and Kinross Council Archive in the A K Bell library building in Perth.
