Execution: A History of Capital Punishment in Britain by Simon Webb Page B

hanging. For unknown reasons two men, Alex Miranda and Benjamin Pyegate, were shot by firing squad. The first to be shot was Alex Miranda. He went out drinking but was apprehended and returned to camp by the British civilian police and upon his return he shot a sleeping sergeant dead. He was sentenced to death and was executed on 30 May 1944. Benjamin Pyegate got into a fight with three fellow soldiers at his barracks in Wiltshire and stabbed one of them to death. On the morning of 28 November 1944, Pyegate was led out of his cell and tied to a post in the grounds of Shepton Mallet. A black hood was placed over his head, while a white target was fixed to his shirt over his heart. An eight-man firing squad then shot him. He was the last person ever to face a firing squad in this country.
    There is some doubt as to the last time that a British firing squad carried out an execution. As has already been remarked, the use of firing squads against colonial troops always excited less disapproval than when they were used to execute British men. In July 1941, an army driver called Shabani bin Salu was shot for murder in Africa. The following year, a number of Sri Lankan soldiers were sentenced to death and executed for mutiny, the only soldiers in the Second World War to be executed for such an offence. They were, however, hanged rather than shot. It seems likely that Josef Jakobs was the last person to be executed anywhere in the world by a British firing squad.
    The death penalty under military law for mutiny remained after the end of the Second World War; it was a theoretical possibility in the armed forces until 1998, when Britain finally and formally abandoned all capital punishment.

B URNING AT THE S TAKE
     
    T here can be few ways of meeting one’s death worse than being burnt alive. For several centuries, being burnt alive was the prescribed penalty in Britain for a number of offences. This method of execution was used against both men and women. However, in later years, it was almost exclusively used for the execution of women. To begin with, it is necessary to clear up one misunderstanding about this form of execution. Burning at the stake was never used for the execution of witches in England. It was imposed in Scotland for witchcraft, but in England, convicted witches and sorcerers were hanged. The mistaken idea that English witches were burnt has been fostered by films such as the Hammer Horror film Witchfinder General , which was popular during the 1960s.
    The first instances of execution by being burnt alive in Britain, are recorded by Julius Caesar in the Gallic War . He claimed that the Celts built huge wicker-work figures, filled them with condemned criminals and then set fire to them. The Bible prescribes death by burning for certain crimes, such as sexual immorality. Also in the Bible, we learn that sinners will burn for all eternity. This probably fostered the belief that heretics should be given a taste of this punishment (which they would experience in the next world) right here on earth. In 1184, the Catholic Church declared, at the Synod of Verona, that death by burning should be officially adopted as the penalty for heresy. At a time when most people in Europe looked forward to a physical resurrection, this was an especially terrible fate. It more or less ruled out the person from rising from the grave on the last day. This was a time when those who had had a limb amputated took great care to preserve it so that it might be buried with them, ready for Judgement Day.
    The first person that we know to have been burned at the stake for heresy was a deacon from Oxford, who was executed in this way in 1222. His crime was to have fallen in love with Jewess; he then converted to Judaism so that he could marry her. In 1401, during the reign of Henry IV, the Statute of Heresy was passed in England, which gave clergy the authority to arrest and question those suspected of heresy. It was this Act, De Heretico