nn
n
n
n
n Sir Thomas Smith was a classicist, diplomat andnSecretary of State in the court of Elizabeth I, and he wrote a book DenRepublica Anglorum that was published, posthumously, in 1583. In it, Smithnwrote,
n
n
n
n“…torment or question which is used by the order of the civill lawenand custome of other countreis to put a malefactor to excessive paine, to makenhim confesse of him selfe, or of his felowes or complices, is not used innEngland.”n
n
n
nNow this is a odd thing for Smith to write, because in a letternwritten in Lord Burghley’s hand and with Elizabeth’s signet applied, datednSeptember 25th 1571, Smith is specifically authorised to put twonservants of the Duke of Norfolk named Barker and Banister, who were prisonersnin the Tower of London, to the rack. Two days later, Smith replied to Burghley,nadvising that the racking had yielded some results and might yet yield more.
n
n
n
 |
| Guy Fawkes racked |
n
n
n
nItnis common knowledge that Guy Fawkes was racked in November 1605, to disclosendetails of the Gunpowder Plot, and the records of the Tower show that the itemsnof torture were not short of victims during the reigns of Elizabeth and JamesnI. Thus, the good knight Smith was being somewhat economical with the truth.nTorture was being used in English prisons and had been for a good many years.nOne form was initially called prison forte et dure and a statute of 1275nallows for men who will not answer charges put to them shall ‘… have strongnand hard Imprisonment (prison forte et dure)’ applied. A person could notnbe tried for felony until they had pleaded either ‘guilty’ or ‘notnguilty’, but if a guilty person refused to plead, to ‘stand mute fornmalice’; their property could not be confiscated by the crown and could benwilled or inherited by their relatives.
n
n
n
 |
| Peine forte et dure – Newgate |
n
n
n
nThe ‘hard Imprisonment’ meantnbeing placed in the worst part in the prison, on bare hard ground, clad only inna linen loin cloth, fed one day on the worst bread and on alternating daysngiven putrid water (but never fed and watered on the same day), and laden withniron chains from hand to elbow and from knee to foot. In 1302, one prisonernsubjected to this ‘great penance’ gave up his information after tenndays, but in 1357, Cecilia de Rygeway, indicted for murdering her husband, ‘stoodnmute’ and suffered the penance for forty days without relenting and innconsequence was pardoned. This practice was felt to be too harsh and it was toondifficult to assuage the pain upon confession and so it was replaced by anvariation, peine forte et dure, (‘hard and forceful punishment’) where,nin addition to the starving, the prisoners were also pressed with weights, ‘morenthan they can bear.’ Shakespeare alludes to this in Troilus and Cressida,nwhen Pandarus says,
n
n
n
n“Because it shall not speak of your pretty encounters,npress it to death.”n
n
n
n
n
 |
| Margaret Clitherow pressed to death |
n
n
n
nAn instance was recorded from 1406, and furthernrefinements were added over the years, as in the case of Margaret Clitherow ofnYork, a Catholic accused of harbouring priests in 1586. Margaret ‘stood mute’nbecause she feared that any information she might reveal would incriminate hernchildren and so was condemned to peine forte et dure. She was given onlynbarley bread and puddle water for three days and then she was stripped andnspread on the floor, with her arms outstretched and bound to two posts, a sharpnstone ‘as much as a man’s fist’ was placed under her back and anwooden door put over her, onto which was placed seven or eight hundredweight ofnstones. Within fifteen minutes, the weights had broken her ribs ‘causingnthem to burst forth of the skin’ and although dead, she was left in thenpress for six hours.
n
n
n
 |
| Pressing with weights |
n
n
n
nIn 1772, it was enacted that anyone standing mute was tonbe assumed to be guilty and convicted of the crime charged against him. Thisnhappened in 1777, when Francis Mercier was charged with the murder of DavidnSamuel Mondrey. Mercier ‘stood mute’ when charged, so the sheriffnordered a jury to examine whether he did so ‘fraudulently, wilfully, andnobstinately or by the visitation of God.’ The jury concluded that Merciernhad stood mute fraudulently, wilfully or obstinately, and so Mr Justice Astonnimmediately passed sentence that Mercier should be executed and his body bendissected and anatomised.
n
n
n
 |
| Daniel Defoe (attrib.) – A History of the Press-Yard – 1717 |
n
n
n
nIn 1827, it was further enacted that if a prisonernrefused to plead, a court might enter a plea of ‘not guilty’, thusnsolving a five and a half century old problem.
nnn
n
n
nnn
