Rebecca Smith - Wiltshire
Dear readers, this is one of the most harrowing cases that I have yet researched. Rebecca Smith was the last woman to be hung in the United Kingdom, for murdering her own children. This case would have serious implications on how the UK's legal system worked to protect both mothers and their children.
The case of Rebecca Smith begins in the village of Bratton in Wiltshire, both her parents were regarded as staunch pillars of the community, as they both attended the Baptist Church. However, according to an article published in the Patriot on the 30th August 1849, a man named Shem Evans presumably the minister of the said Baptist Church. Wrote to the Patriot in order to clear the taint left by Rebecca Smith. He said that her mother lived and died, a good and devout Christian, and that she showed a great deal of affection to her own children.
However, he disparages Rebecca's character by arguing that she was not much of a church goer, who only attended one quarter of the allotted time. Although that does not sound like a heinous crime to you or me, you have to remember that in Victorian period it was frowned upon if individuals did not attend a place of worship. Evans also claims that Rebecca's character was lacking from the start, he says that her Sunday school teacher had said that she "was thoughtless, inattentive girl, absolutely willing to be ignorant.". However much of Evans' account is true, it is clear that the association with Rebecca Smith's crimes had damaged the reputation of the village, and, of certain members of the congregation.
The next time we hear of Rebecca, it is that she married Phillip Smith on the 5th May 1831. However, this marriage was deeply unhappy. Phillip was a renowned alcoholic and although he worked he barely brought a shilling home. Her parents were emphatically opposed to the marriage, and wanted Rebecca to leave her husband and return home to Bratton. However, during this time Rebecca's father had passed away and had left his daughter £100 (around £6,041,70), however, this money disappeared quickly leaving Rebecca and her children in acute poverty. With Phillip not working it was up to Rebecca to fend for the family. she managed to find work in the fields, which gave her 4 shillings (around £12.08). Furthermore, this work was only seasonal, so she had to find something to live on in the meantime. It was said of Rebecca that she was “undernourished and in poor health, living in abject poverty and almost illiterate”. It was this combined pressure of Phillip's dependence of alcohol and having so many mouths to feed that Rebecca was forced to commit her crimes.
At the age of 44, Rebecca had been married eighteen years and had eleven children. The first child a daughter survived, the second child had died of a bowl complaint two weeks after he had been born. Seven of her children, she murdered by using a concoction she called "blue". It was this last child, Richard Smith who was born on the 16th May 1849, that finally neighbours began to be suspicious of Rebecca, who claimed that Richard was "wasting away" even though he looked perfectly normal. Rebecca had even asked her neighbour Caroline Mackay to purchase some arsenic, after she had done so Richard had passed away. This coincidence was too much for Smith's neighbours and the Police were called in to investigate, they discovered Richard's remains which had arsenic in them and arrested Rebecca for the murder.
It is believed that Rebecca pleaded guilty to the charge and that she did not just confess to Richard's murder but seven other children that she had murdered. She further claimed that no one helped her thereby eradicating suspicion on other members of her family. Rebecca was tried on Tuesday 7th August in front of Mr Justice Cresswell. The jury found Rebecca guilty, but recommended that the verdict by reduced from the death penalty to a more lenient sentence. This was a normal recommendation according to the time, that women who faced these charges were often given a reprieve. However, it was not until the passing of the Infanticide Act of 1922 that permitted juries to find a person guilty of infanticide and not murder. In 1938, this was further expanded on, it found that if a woman murdered her child in the first year of birth, then it was commuted from the death sentence. This is the first time that post-natal depression was regarded as mental illness by the authorities, rather than vilifying the women involved. However, the Judge found Rebecca guilty of murder and she was sentenced to death by hanging on the 5th September 1849.
Before her execution, Rebecca was visited by her husband, daughter and her siblings. It was said that her husband showed very little emotion to his wife. However, her siblings were deeply upset. When the day of the execution came, Rebecca was led to scaffold at the new Devizes prison. According to the Glasgow Chronicle, Rebecca conducted herself well, neither succumbing to hysteria or begging for mercy. Looking at her, people remarked that it was unthinkable she could have committed such a crime. With the noose finally around her neck, Rebecca clasped her hands in silent prayer. After a slight struggle she was dead.
This case was seen as one of the most infamous of the Victorian era. It would take decades for Infanticide to be seen as a crime in itself rather than under the more lethal sentence of murder. Whether Rebecca was driven by Post-Natal Depression or rather the circumstances of her unhappy marriage and the desperation to save her children from starvation, we will never know.
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