The evolution of the short drop method of hanging.

The form of execution by hanging with little or no drop was brought to England by the Saxons in the fifth century AD. This type of hanging remained effectively universal up to 1872 when William Marwood introduced the “long drop” method. In London the long drop replaced the “short drop” in 1874 when John McDonald became the last to suffer it on the 10th of August of that year at the hands of William Calcraft. Marwood took over executions at Newgate thereafter. Almost certainly the last short drop hanging in Britain was that of John Henry Johnson at Armley prison Leeds for the murder of Amos Waite, on the 3rd of April 1877, when he was executed by Thomas Askern. Firstly the rope broke and Johnson had to be recovered from the pit and was hanged again 10 minutes later. The Yorkshire Post newspaper reported that Johnson struggled for four minutes.

There were a number of forms of short drop hanging used in Britain.

1) The hanging tree and the Anglo Saxon gallows.
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 back of a cart. In Anglo Saxon times the criminal was either suspended from a tree or a very simple gallows. In this illustration of an Anglo Saxon gallows it appears that the condemned person had to climb up one of the vertical legs, while the hangman climbed the other and tied the rope to the crossbeam. Having done so he dislodged the prisoner’s legs, leaving him suspended. There was little or no drop with this style of hanging. It was not unusual for the body to be buried under the gallows or close to it and there is considerable evidence of burial mounds at the sites of Medieval gallows. The Medieval period was from the 5th to the 15th centuries.

2) The ladder method.

Mary Blandy was hanged at Oxford Castle on Monday the 6th of April 1752 from a gallows consisting of a wooden beam placed between two trees. Her last request to the officials was "for the sake of decency, gentlemen, don't hang me high." She was naturally modest and concerned that the young men in the crowd would look up her skirts if she was too high. Here is a drawing of the scene.
She was made to climb a ladder draped in black cloth, whilst the hangman climbed a ladder beside her. Mary was noosed and her hands were tied in front to allow her to hold her prayer book. She covered her face with a large handkerchief. Her legs were not tied together. It had been agreed that when she had finished her prayers, she would drop the book as signal to the hangman to turn the ladder over and "turn her off" as the saying went. She passed into unconsciousness very quickly and, as reported, "died without a struggle" - presumably due to vagal or carotid reflex.

3) Dragging from the back of a cart backed under the beam.

London’s Tyburn gallows, “The Triple Tree” is perhaps the most famous short drop gallows in Britain and is commemorated by a stone marker set in the road at the end of Oxford Street. It was first erected in 1572 and remained in use until the end of 1759.

It is not known how many people in total were hanged at Tyburn during this period. Over the 69 years from 1715 to December 1783 (when Tyburn ceased to be used as a place of execution), some 2,168 people were put to death there. Here is a simplified drawing of a typical execution scene.

Up to 1759 prisoners were conveyed from Newgate prison to Tyburn in open carts which were then backed under one of the beams. The hangman uncoiled the free end of the rope from each prisoner and threw it up to one of his assistants positioned precariously on the beam above. They tied the rope to the beam leaving very little slack. The Ordinary would pray with the prisoners and when he had finished, the hangman pulled nightcaps over the faces of those who had brought them. As you can imagine, the preparations took quite some time where a large batch of prisoners were being hanged.
When everything was ready, the horses were whipped away, pulling the prisoners off the carts and leaving them suspended. They would only have a few inches of drop at most and thus many of them would writhe in convulsive agony for some moments, their legs paddling the air - “dancing the Tyburn jig” as it was known, until unconsciousness overtook them. They were also subject a pendulum effect as they had not dropped vertically and would be seen be swaying back and forth.

4) The “New Drop”.

The “New Drop” gallows was first used at Tyburn for the execution of Earl Ferrers on the 5th of May 1760. It comprised of 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. There were even black cushions for the Earl and the chaplain to kneel on to pray before the hanging. Some time around noon, the platform sank down leaving the Earl suspended. The mechanism had not functioned properly and Ferrers’ feet were still virtually in contact with the platform. He writhed slightly for a short period before becoming still. Here is a drawing of the scene. Note “Mother Proctor’s Pews” on the left of the gallows for the better off spectators.

Notwithstanding that this hanging did not go as expected, the concept of the “New Drop” caught on quite quickly and similar patterns of gallows began to replace the ladder and the cart methods. The New Drop obviated the pendulum effect created by dragging the prisoner off the back of a cart and seemed to lead to an easier death.

With the “New Drop” gallows in the early part of the 19th century the condemned typically fell 12-18 inches and this was found to give a slightly quicker death than was normal using the cart. However death was still typically by asphyxiation and body movements could continue for several minutes after the drop fell. Some prisoners went limp immediately and did not appear to suffer at all. There was no standard pattern for the “New Drop” and the design varied from county to county. Some were erected or brought out in front of the prison (County Gaol) as at Newgate, some were erected in the flat roof of the prison gatehouse as at Horsemonger Lane gaol. See drawing. Some had a few steps up to the platform while others had a number of steps for the condemned to climb.

The executions of Eliza Fenning, William Oldfield and Abraham Adams at Newgate on the 26th of July 1815 were well documented in the contemporary press, giving a clear picture of what happened.

They were taken from the condemned cells to the Press Room where their hands were pinioned with a cord in front to enable them to pray and a further cord tied around the body and arms above the elbows. The noose was placed around the neck and the free end wound round the waist. From the Press Yard, it was a quite a walk through the prison to the steps of the scaffold set up outside the Debtor’s Door. Eliza was the first to ascend the ten steps at around 8.15 a.m. Hangman John Langley uncoiled the rope from each body and threw the free end over the beam and tied it back on itself to the rope, not to the beam, so as to leave a minimal drop. Here is a drawing.

There was then time for prayers and final statements. At around 8.40 a.m., the preparations were complete and Langley withdrew the pin releasing the platform and “launched the prisoners into eternity”. It was reported that Eliza Fenning died easily, "almost without writhing". William Oldfield was “greatly convulsed” and Abraham Adams appeared to be dead almost instantly.

These were just three of the 1120 people who suffered short drop hanging between 1783 and 1874 at Newgate prison.

The last woman to suffer execution by the short drop was Mary Ann Barry at Gloucester on Monday, the 12th of January, 1874. She was hanged by Robert Anderson and struggled for some three minutes after the drop fell. Full article here.

The short drop today.

Of the 644 hangings carried out in ten countries in 2022, no fewer than 600 used the short drop. Once again, just as in 19th century Britain, some prisoners struggled for a minute or two, some momentarily and others not at all.

Iran executed at least 596 people by this means during this year.

What does it feel like to be hanged with a short drop.

The best account of this is given by John Smith who was hanged at Tyburn on Christmas Eve 1705. Having been turned off the back of the cart, he dangled for 15 minutes until the crowd began to shout "reprieve," whereupon he was cut down and taken to a nearby house where he soon recovered.
He was asked what it had felt like to be hanged and this is what he told his rescuers:
"When I was turned off I was, for some time, sensible of very great pain occasioned by the weight of my body and felt my spirits in strange commotion, violently pressing upwards. Having forced their way to my head I saw a great blaze or glaring light that seemed to go out of my eyes in a flash and then I lost all sense of pain. After I was cut down, I began to come to myself and the blood and spirits forcing themselves into their former channels put me by a prickling or shooting into such intolerable pain that I could have wished those hanged who had cut me down."

A further account was published in the New York Times in November 1885 under the title “The pleasures of hanging”.

It stated that the British newspaper, the Pall Mall Gazette, had originally published the story, about an unnamed person who wrote of his experiences as a member of a suicide club. The hanging took place in a barn, where a “stout” rope had been tied to the rafters. The anonymous subject mounted a chair and placed the noose around his neck, before his friends removed the chair. He describes feeling a “great jerk”. In another moment he was transported into a new world which he described as being “more beautiful than anything imagined by the poets.” He further relates “swimming in a sea of oil” which was an “exquisitely delicious” feeling. He reported seeing bright colours and lights. He “swam” to shore and lay on the beach but when he opened his eyes he saw his friends peering at him. After he was taken down he felt pain in his neck and weakness, but still insisted that the experience had been pleasurable. His friends, who had witnessed his convulsions and “struggles” were not convinced.

A man named Niazali, was hanged in Iran in February 1996 but survived after the victim's relatives pardoned him. He told the Iranian daily newspaper "Kayhan" what it had felt like. "That first second lasted like a thousand years. I felt my arms and legs jerking out of control. Up on the gallows in the dark, I was trying to fill my lungs with air, but they were crumpled up like plastic bags."

What actually happens during a short drop hanging?

Based upon photos and videos of actual hangings in Iran and Iraq and of Nazi’s executed in Poland after World War II, it is possible to get a clearer picture of what really happens. A number of short drop/suspension hangings, carried out in Iran have been filmed and these videos show that consciousness is often lost within 10 seconds or less, although body movements can continue for up to three minutes. It is reasonable to assume that the conscious phase is painful due to the constriction and pressure on the neck and the panic caused by being unable to breathe.

In one of these filmed hangings the man is lifted into the air by a crane at Nishapur in Iran in September 2016. The hands are clearly visible as he is being lifted and show no signs of struggle or pain initially. This was when he was almost certainly still conscious. His body then appears to go through all the remaining four phases described below. There is a clear convulsive phase where he trembles violently, followed by drawing up of the legs and strange posturing of the limbs. In a more recent (2019) filmed hanging in Iran three men are simultaneously lifted into the air by a crane. The man farthest from the camera appears to go limp almost immediately, the man in the centre appears to writhe momentarily and then go limp and the man nearest the camera is initially still but after some seconds begins to make body movements for about two minutes, again exhibiting the phases described below. His legs are drawn up almost to a sitting position.

The Working Group on Human Asphyxia examined 14 hangings that had been filmed. None of these were executions, all being suicides or auto-erotic hangings. But their published results provide a valuable insight into what really happens in short drop/suspension hangings. Their report is here.

The Working Group concluded that consciousness was typically lost between 8 and 18 seconds after suspension. A secondary “convulsive” phase may occur, while unconscious, which can persist for as long as three or four minutes where there are visible movements of the body and limbs and drawing up of the legs. Agonal respiration sounds may be heard, the person gagging and gasping for air. Decerebrate posturing typically follows the convulsive phase, where the limbs extend and contort. A decorticate phase may follow with further apparent contortions. Decorticate posturing is a sign of damage to the brain stem and spinal cord. These two phases can last about three minutes before the person goes limp, but isolated, spasmodic body movements can continue for some minutes longer. All of these movements were and still may be mistakenly perceived/reported as conscious suffering and struggling.

It should be noted that not everyone hanged experiences all five phases. Indeed some show no signs of any of them.

The film of a partial suspension suicide hanging of a young woman, which took place in Syria in 2012 and appears to be genuine, conforms very much to what is outlined above. She is seen to place what appears to be a scarf around her neck, with the knot at the back of her neck and then bend her legs so that her body weight is taken by her neck. After a few seconds she removes the “noose” and appears to adjust the camera angle, before returning and re-applying the scarf. If the first few seconds had been incredibly painful it is at least likely that she would not have tried again. Movements persist for just over two minutes and for a short time her legs are drawn up and she is fully suspended. Decerebrate and Decorticate posturing can be clearly observed, particularly with her arms and hands.

What she does not do is equally interesting. Her arms and hands are completely free and yet at no time does she put her hands to her throat to try and relieve any pain. It is a natural reaction to put one’s hands on a part of the body that is experiencing pain. This would seem to indicate that either it was not painful or that she passed into unconsciousness very quickly. Although the focus is not sharp, her face does not appear to be contorted with pain.

The short drop/suspension form of hanging develops far less force and thus causes far less damage to the structures of the neck. It is less likely to tear muscles and tendons than longer drops might do. In executions the wrists are typically secured behind the prisoner’s back either by handcuffs or straps so that arm movements are limited, although clearly visible in at least two of the filmed Iranian hangings. Similarly the legs are normally strapped or shackled which limits their movement, although it is not at all uncommon for them to be drawn up, almost to a sitting position, as is often seen in photos and videos of Iranian hangings.

How does the short drop kill?

Hanging with little or no drop typically causes death by a combination of factors.

1) the pressure created by the noose occluding the carotid arteries and jugular veins causing cerebral hypoxia (ischemia), i.e. a severely reduced flow of oxygenated blood to and from the brain. Trauma to the carotid artery can render the victim almost immediately unconscious. Because the nervous system is still intact convulsive movements can occur for several minutes.

2) Asphyxia occurs due to the weight of the person's body forcing the base of the tongue upwards against the roof of the mouth, blocking the airway and thus preventing breathing.

3) The pressure of the noose may also constrict the trachea (air passage), which it estimated requires some 33 pounds per square inch of pressure to compress.

4) Compression of the carotid arteries may also cause rapid heart stoppage due to carotid/Vagal reflex, this requiring just 11 pounds per square inch of pressure, whereas compression of the jugular veins only requires some 4.5 pounds per square inch of pressure.

The vertebrae protect the vertebral and spinal arteries which also supply blood to the brain. However, these arteries go outside the fourth vertebrae instead of inside it, which subjects them to blockage if the pressure on the neck is high enough (usually about 40-50 pounds per square inch of pressure).

Consciousness can be lost in as little as 8-10 seconds or persist for as much as a minute. Flashes of light and “blackness” together with feelings of weakness and powerlessness have been reported by those who have survived hanging. It is thought that brain death will occur in around six minutes and the heart will stop beating within 10-15 minutes.
Where the jugular veins are occluded before the carotid arteries, the face will typically become engorged and livid as the brain is filled with blood which cannot get back out. There will be the classic signs of petechiae - little blood marks on the face and in the eyes from burst blood capillaries due to excessive blood pressure in the head. The tongue may protrude due to the pressure of the noose on the base of it. Where death has occurred through carotid/Vagal reflex, the face will typically be pale and bluish in colour and not show petechiae. In all cases there will normally be an inverted “V” mark where the knot of the noose was situated and the head will be forced over away from the knot.

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