Execution of Mrs Biggadike, The Stickney Murderess.
The jury found the prisoner guilty, but by some extraordinary reasoning coupled with the verdict a recommendation to mercy. The query of the Judge- �On what grounds gentlemen?� staggered the foreman but he quickly recovered himself, and answered �Simply because it is circumstantial evidence.� After her conviction the wretched woman appeared to pay considerable attentions to the ministrations of the chaplain, but she declined to make any confession of her guilt.
Last week she addressed a letter to the employer of George Ironmonger, one of her lodgers, which the authorities, for certain reasons, do not think it right to publish. In this letter, the prisoner, although utterly callous and indifferent to her own position, implored Ironmonger to seek forgiveness of his sins, and to mourn her sad end, and she also expressed a hope that he would not despise those (alluding to her children) who were left behind.
On Saturday, Ironmonger presented himself at the Castle, and begged for permission to see the prisoner, which was, of course, refused. On the same day, however, the unfortunate woman was visited by a brother and three sisters, who stayed with her about two hours and a half. But all the distress and agony of the interview appears to have been borne by them. They exhorted her to confess her guilt, of which they obviously had little doubt, but their earnest entreaties, instead of moving her to a declaration of her crime, roused her only into passionate excitement. None of her children have seen her since her conviction. It is believed the miserable woman fully intended to commit suicide, but the opportunity never presented itself. Once she had a garter, and on another occasion, a handkerchief, with which it is feared she purposed strangling herself, but they were taken away from her. On Sunday evening she implored one of the female wardens to change clothes with her, in order to give her an opportunity of escaping, but, of course, her request could not be acceded to.
On Sunday she ate heartily, and attended a divine service in the prison. She slept well during the night, and was visited at seven o�clock in the morning by the Rev. H. W. Richter, the chaplain, who again implored her, without avail, to confess her guilt. At a quarter to nine she was pinioned by Askerne, the executioner; and although she fainted under the operation, she immediately recovered. Five minutes afterwards the sad procession left the Castle, and proceeded to the drop, which was erected on the east side of the Crown Court, a distance of 200 yards from the prison door. The unhappy woman, who was supported on by two of the warders, moaned piteously, and appeared to take little heed of the chaplain while reading the service for the dying. While on her way to the place of execution, she said to the warders, �I hope my troubles are ended.� And then asked �shall we be much longer?� to which a warder replied, �No, not much.� The service was brought to a close at the foot of the drop, and the chaplain, turning to the prisoner, asked her whether she still persisted in her declaration of innocence-whether she had anything to do with the crime in thought, word, or deed? In a firm voice she replied, �I had not, Sir.� She was then accommodated with a chair, and the chaplain addressed her as follows:-
�I have spent half an hour with you this morning in endeavouring to impress upon you a proper sense of your condition, for you are about to pass from this world into another, and to stand before God, to whom the secrets of all hearts are known. I implore you not to pass away without confessing all your sins, not only generally, but especially this particular one for which you are about to suffer. I had hoped that you would have made that confession, and thus have enabled me, as a minister of Christ, to have pronounced the forgiveness of your sins, under the promise that Christ came into this world to save sinners. It has grieved me very much to find that you still persist in the declaration that you are not accountable for you husbands death; that you still say you did not administer the poison yourself, that you did not see any other person administer it, and that you are entirely free of the crime. Do you say so now?�
The prisoner, still in a firm voice replied �Yes.�
The Chaplain-�There is only one hope left- that you have endeavoured to confess your sins to God, though you will not to your fellow-creatures. All I can now say is that I leave you in the hands of God, and may He have mercy upon your soul. What a satisfaction it would be to your children, to your friends, and to your relatives it would be to know that you had passed from death into life in the full persuasion that your sins were forgiven you, and that you would be admitted into the blessed kingdom of God. I fear I can hold out no further consolation to you. The matter rests between yourself and the Almighty. Had you made a declaration of your sins, I should have done what, as a minister of Christ I am entitled to do. I should have told you that your sins, though many, are forgiven. I am sorry that I cannot exercise that authority at the present moment. I must leave you to God.�
The condemned woman was then assisted up the steps of the platform, and placed on the trap door. When the noose was being affixed she stood firmly, without assistance. The cap was drawn over her face, and she then exclaimed �All my troubles are over; shame, you�re not going to hang me. Surely my troubles are over.� The bell of the Cathedral then tolled forth the hour of nine, and at that instant the bolt was drawn, and the struggles of the unhappy woman lasted at least three minutes.
A crowd of people had assembled out of curiosity on the Castle Hill, and were informed of the completion of the execution by the raising of a black flag on the keep tower. A report was circulated in the city to the effect that the poor creature struggled for at least twenty minutes, and that her shrieks were heartrending in the extreme. This, as will be seen from our report, was totally devoid of truth, and it is regretted that its author should have endeavoured, by disseminating it, to create a painful impression in the public mind.
The body, after hanging an hour, was cut down.
The last execution in this City took place in 1859, when Pickett and Carey suffered the penalty of the law for the shocking murder they committed in Sibsey.
