Editing Newgate Prison (section)

==Executions==
[[File:Hangin outside Newgate Prison.jpg|thumb|right|Execution by hanging, outside Newgate, early 1800s]]
In 1783, the site of London's gallows was moved from Tyburn to Newgate.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Smith |first=Oliver |date=2018-01-25 |title='Strike, man, strike!' – On the trail of London's most notorious public execution sites |language=en-GB |work=The Telegraph |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/europe/united-kingdom/england/london/articles/Londons-most-notorious-execution-sites/ |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220112/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/europe/united-kingdom/england/london/articles/Londons-most-notorious-execution-sites/ |archive-date=12 January 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |access-date=2020-10-26 |issn=0307-1235}}{{cbignore}}</ref>  Public executions outside the prison – by this time, London's main prison – continued to draw large crowds.  It was also possible to visit the prison by obtaining a permit from the [[Lord Mayor of the City of London]] or a [[sheriff]].  The condemned were kept in narrow, sombre cells separated from [[Newgate|Newgate Street]] by a thick wall and received only a dim light from the inner courtyard.  The gallows were constructed outside a door in Newgate Street for public viewing. Dense crowds of thousands of spectators could pack the streets to see these events, and in 1807 [[1807 Newgate disaster|dozens died]] at a public execution when part of the crowd of 40,000 spectators collapsed into a [[crowd crush]].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=5fALAAAAYAAJ&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA34|title=The Follies and Fashions of Our Grandfathers (1807)|last=Tuer|first=Andrew|date=1887|page=34-36|publisher=Field & Tuer |access-date=25 May 2019}}</ref> In November 1835 [[James Pratt and John Smith]] were the last two men to be executed for [[sodomy]].<ref>{{cite book |title=A Gay History of Britain: Love and Sex Between Men Since the Middle Ages |publisher=[[Greenwood World Publishing]] |last=Cook |first=Matt |editor-last=Mills |editor-first=Robert |editor-last2=Trumback |editor-first2=Randolph |editor-last3=Cocks |editor-first3=Harry |year=2007 |isbn=978-1846450020 |page=109 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1GuGAAAAIAAJ}}</ref> 

[[Michael Barrett (Fenian)|Michael Barrett]] was the last man to be hanged in public outside Newgate Prison (and the last person to be publicly executed in Great Britain) on 26&nbsp;May 1868.<ref>A Dictionary of Irish History, D.J. Hickey & J.E. Doherty, Gill and Macmillan, Dublin, 1980. p 26. {{ISBN|0-7171-1567-4}}</ref> From 1868, public executions were discontinued and executions were carried out on gallows inside Newgate, initially using the same mobile gallows in the Chapel Yard, but later in a shed built near the same spot. Dead Man's Walk was a long stone-flagged passageway, partly open to the sky and roofed with iron mesh (thus also known as Birdcage Walk).<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22819964|title=The secret world of the Old Bailey|date=9 June 2013|newspaper=BBC|access-date=10 October 2022}}</ref> The bodies of the executed criminals were then buried beneath its flagstones.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Nh-KDQAAQBAJ&pg=PT49|title=Capital Punishment: London's Places of Execution|first= Robert|last= Bard|year=2016|publisher=Amberley Publishing|isbn=978-1445667379}}</ref> Until the 20th century, future British executioners were trained at Newgate. One of the last was [[John Ellis (executioner)|John Ellis]], who began training in 1901.<ref>[https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045462/1924-03-29/ed-1/seq-23/ Britain's Official Hangman Quits After 23 Years Without Excuses], in ''[[the Washington Star|the Evening Star]]'' (via ''[[Chronicling America]]''); published March 29, 1924</ref> In total – publicly or otherwise – 1,169 people were executed at the prison.<ref>{{cite book|title=History of Criminal Justice|date=2011-07-22|publisher=Elsevier|isbn=9781437734911|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qhPdaCJWQikC&pg=PA152|author=Mark Jones, Peter Johnstone|access-date=2014-05-11}}</ref> [[Death mask]]s of several of them were transferred to the [[Crime Museum|Black Museum]] at New Scotland Yard on the prison's closure.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/discover/death-masks-crime-museum|title=Death masks of the Crime Museum|first=Jackie|last=Keily|date=9 March 2016|access-date=22 May 2023|work=Museum of London}}</ref>