In Britain, death by hanging was the principal form of execution from Anglo-Saxon times until capital punishment was suspended in 1964.
Up to May 1868 all hangings were carried out in public and attracted large crowds who were at least supposed to be deterred by the spectacle, but who more probably went for the morbid excitement and the carnival atmosphere that usually surrounded such events. The modern expression Gala Day is derived from the Anglo-Saxon gallows day.  After hangings retreated inside prisons, large crowds would still often gather outside the gates to see the raising of the black flag up to 1902, the posting of death notice up to abolition or to protest the execution.

Execution statistics.
In the 230 year the period from 1735 to 1964 there were some 10,935 civilian executions in England and Wales alone, comprising 10,378 men and 557 women.  In 273 of the early cases, it is not possible to be totally certain from surviving records whether a death sentence was actually carried out or not. 32 of the 375 women executed between 1735 and 1799 were burnt at the stake.Last executions in the UK.On the 26th of May 1868, Michael Barrett, a Fenian, (what would now be called an I.R.A. terrorist) became the last man to be publicly hanged in England, before a huge crowd outside Newgate prison, for causing an explosion at Clerkenwell in London which killed Sarah Ann Hodgkinson and six other innocent people. Three days later on the 29th of May 1868. Parliament passed the Capital Punishment (Amendment) Act, ending public hanging. Frances Kidder was the last woman to be publicly hanged in Britain, when she was executed at Maidstone at midday on Thursday, the 2nd of April 1868. Strangely the last fully public hanging in the British Isles did not take place until the 11th of August 1875, when Joseph Phillip Le Brun was executed for murder on the island of Jersey. The provisions of the Capital Punishment Amendment Act of 1868 did not apply there.Ruth Ellis was the last woman to suffer the death penalty in Britain on the 13th of July 1955. Wales had its last execution on the 6th of May 1958, when Vivian Teed was hanged for the murder of William Williams at Swansea. The last hanging in Northern Ireland was that of Robert McGladdery on the 20th of December 1961 at Belfast for the murder of Pearle Gamble. 21 year old Henry Burnett was the last person hanged in Scotland in the newly constructed Condemned Suite at Craiginches Prison in Aberdeen on the 15th of August 1963 for the murder of Thomas Guyan.The last hangings of all in Britain were two carried out simultaneously at 8.00 a.m. on August the 13th, 1964 at Liverpool’s Walton prison and Strangeways prison in Manchester, when Peter Anthony Allen and Gwynne Owen Evans were executed for the murder of John West. Thus ended capital punishment in Britain, the remaining death sentences passed prior to the 9th of November, 1965 being commuted and the death penalty effectively abolished thereafter. A further 17 men would be sentenced to death, the last being 23 year old David Stephen Chapman on the 1st of November 1965, for a murder committed during the course of a robbery. Abolition.On the 9th of November 1965, the Murder (Abolition of Death Penalty) Act suspended the death penalty for murder in the United Kingdom for a period of five years. On the 16th of December 1969, the House of Commons reaffirmed its decision that capital punishment for murder should be permanently abolished. On a free vote, the House voted by 343 to 185, a majority of 158, that the Murder (Abolition of Death Penalty) Act 1965, should not expire. Thus, the death penalty for murder was formally abolished. For a detailed discussion of abolition click here.The gallows.(Visit the Gallows Gallery for pictures of British gallows up to the beginning of the 20th century)A tree was the earliest form of gallows with prisoners being either hauled up manually by the hangman or turned off from a ladder or the tail of a cart. Two trees with a beam between them formed the gallows (see picture) for 33 year old Mary Blandy’s execution at Oxford on April the 6th, 1752. For a detailed account of her case, click here.In other places more conventional gallows were built, having either a single upright with a projecting beam cross braced to it or two uprights and a cross beam where more than one person could be hanged at a time. Both types still required the use of a ladder or a cart to get the criminal suspended. Many of these gallows were not permanent and were dismantled after each execution. In some cases, the gallows was erected near to the scene of the crime so that the local inhabitants could see justice done.In 1571, the famous “Triple Tree” was set up at Tyburn (see picture) to replace previous smaller structures and was, at least once, used for the hanging of 24 prisoners simultaneously. This was on the 23rd of June 1649 when 23 men and one woman were executed for burglary and robbery, having been conveyed there in eight carts. Another mass execution took place on March 18th, 1740 when the famous pickpocket and thief, Jenny Diver, was hanged before a huge crowd, together with 19 other criminals. Tyburn’s “Triple Tree” gallows remained in use until the end of 1759 and consisted of three tall (approx. 12 foot high) uprights joined at the top with beams in a triangular form to provide a triple gallows under which three carts could be backed at a time. The structure was removed, as it had become a cause of traffic congestion, and was replaced by a portable gallows. At the end of 1783 executions were transferred to Newgate prison (where now stands the Old Bailey courts in London). For a history of Newgate prison click here.On Monday 21st of April 1760 a new design gallows was used to execute the Earl of Ferrers at Tyburn. It comprised a scaffold covered in black baize reached by a short flight of stairs. Two uprights rose from the scaffold, topped with a cross beam. Directly under the beam there was a small box like structure, some three feet square and 18 inches high, which was designed to sink down into the scaffold and thus leave the criminal suspended. This was the forerunner of the “New Drop” gallows.