Throughout history there have been a number of strange stories as to men and women who’s
executions did not go as well as they could have.
For example John Babbacombe Lee who was believed to have murdered his female employer, took
three attempts at the gallows to be executed and still this did not work.
The faulty equipment meant that John Lee’s sentence was changed to life imprisonment
and because of this he lived decades after his death sentence.
Also Maggie Dickson, a young Scottish lady was hanged in Edinburgh but later after being
placed in a coffin she awoke from what was seemingly believed to have been the clutches
of death.
But one of the most infamous execution sites in England was Tyburn, a place where a triangular
gallows stood that was known for taking the lives of many condemned people at one time.
But following an execution in the 18th century, the man who was hanged survived his ordeal,
and he was a man who awoke at just the right time.
Join us today as we look at the brutal execution of the man that woke up after his hanging,
and remember to support our channel, please make sure to subscribe.
William Duell was born in 1723, and he was 17 when he was convicted of a horrific crime.
He lived in London, and was brought to trial for the brutal murder and assault of a lady
named Sarah Griffin.
In September 1740, Sarah who was suffering from Severe bronchitis left London and she
was returning to her family in rural Worcestershire to escape the terrible air in London.
She journeyed via West London and was going to walk to the Midlands, but along the way
she encountered a Farmer’s son in William Duell.
He offered to hire Sarah a night lodgings, and then stayed inside a barn in Acton.
As she laid down on a hay bale, Duell went to the nearby pub and je met 5 men and boasted
about Sarah being in the barn, and with this the group then began to attack her.
The court reports were her harrowing of what the men subjected her to.
She was also robbed before she was subjected to a horrifying ordeal, but William Duell
was convicted of being an accessory to the crimes involving Sarah Griffin.
The following day, Sarah died from a stroke and her dead body was left bloodied and bruised
by the ordeal.
The trial was held at the old Bailey, and after being found guilty William was sentenced
to death for the crimes he had committed.
Duell was described as a boy of little education, and what little reading he had he had almost
forgotten being an obstinate boy.
He was held in prison at Newgate for a while until on the 24th November 1740 he was taken
to Tyburn where a huge triangular gallows stood.
It was on this gallows that thousands of people were condemned and executed throughout the
centuries since it was created, and accounts of executions at tyburn show how thousands
of people would flock to the site of the scaffold to witness executions.
The crowds on the 24th November 1740 would have been similar to how they were previously,
as on this day there were 5 executions to take place on the Tyburn Tree.
On this day, there was a northerly gale of wind with rail, snow and hail and it was not
a nice day at all.
Duell was to be executed with four other criminals, but he was taken by the executioner, and was
stood on top of a box or a step, before the executioner placed the noose around his neck.
His death sentence was read out and then the stool was removed and Duell was left hanging.
It was said he had been suspended from the rope for more than 50 minutes, but when he
was cut down and presumed dead, as he was a young teenage boy, his body was transported
to the Surgeon’s Hall near the old Bailey to be used to teach anatomy students.
The body of William Duell was taken in through the under door at street level and was taken
up a spiral staircase, and it was then laid out in a passage.
It was then attended on by a washerwoman who’s job it was to swill and wash the corpse to
prepare it for the next dissection demonstration which would take place in the anatomy theatre.
However whilst she was doing this, she then heard William Duell begin to groan for around
10 minutes, and then as he was laid on the board about to be dissected, one of the servants
also noticed that he had begun to breathe very slowly.
As they watched on, his breathe got quicker and quicker, and then the anatomist bled him,
and after this he revived very quickly.
He could not initially respond to questions, and his body was warmed up with wine and hot
water, but then he managed 2 hours later to sit up.
The next morning, the surgeon and the sheriff questioned Duell about what he remembered
and his execution.
He claimed he did not remember his ordeal at tyburn, but the last thing he recalled
was receiving the last rites.
He was then taken back to Newgate Prison where he was fed, but there were no physical side
effects of his execution and he had his memory.
But there was a problem as it was said, ‘Duell was socially and legally dead, but he was
not medically dead,’ and someone with this status did not exist in Georgian society at
the time.
But then a week later a hearing at the Old Bailey occurred as to what to do with him,
and whether to hang him again.
If there was a problem with a rope on the gallows on the execution day, then it was
common for a condemned criminal to be tied and executed using a different one.
However there was the question raised as to whether God had spared William Duell, and
his case remained a mystery even to the doctors.
He was not scheduled for execution again, but the authorities decided to transport William
Duell for lie to North America, where he lived out his life in exile in Boston and was reported
to have died around 1805 at the age of 82.
The story of William Duell is one in which saw a man who was complicit in the horrific
killing and assault of a woman escape ultimately the hangman’s noose.
He was just 17 when he was executed in front of a crowd at tyburn, and just before the
anatomists cut him open with their scalpel’s he woke up and was seen breathing.
His story is one which is shocking and still remains a mystery today, and it’s not known
why he woke up.
The knowledge of his case today has helped to save lives, as it was learned that the
body’s own biological defences against trauma reduced the temperature of the body, and this
preserved energy and may have helped to keep William Duell’s vital organs such as his
heart beating.
As he was hanged in the winter cold, this may have contributed to his survival.
But the story of William Duell is a rather puzzling one.
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