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On being a hangman
Im not sure where this even belongs, but it was something I was thinking about the other day.
I have read a couple of biographies of Albert Pierrepoint (who was the UK's most well known executioner) and I find him a fascinating man. In many ways he was very hard to like - pompous, self important, a man who spent his life dedicated to a sense of discretion and then sold his story to the newspapers, a pedant...
He was also incredibly precise and efficient at the job of hanging a man (when he took part in the executions following the Nurembourg trials he was horrified by the standard of work he saw from some of the other countries executioners) - who would normally kill a man within 20 seconds of walking into the execution room.
I thought about what kind of man could be an executioner... certainly he was not a murderer, and he did not seem to feel any sense of power over life or death or see himself as Godlike, he rationalised what he did by his obsession in doing the job as quickly and painlessly as was possible.
He walked around his whole life with blood on his hands, and the carried that blood so that the politicians that made the law, the judges that passed the sentence, the society that demanded it, didnt have to wear it on there's.
Such a man was necessary in that society. He wasnt evil or brutal or violent, but he physically pulled the trap and killed 100's of men and even some women.
I know I couldnt have done what he did, and I think the majority of people who support the death penalty could not... but it does make you wonder what sort of a man is required for such work.
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"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."
The Gospel of Thomas
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