The cruelty of the Blasted Land Orcs knows no bounds.

Taken:7/25/08

While the technical execution of this photo is lacking I've always loved this photo of my son flying off the rope swing into the dying rays of the late afternoon soon. Shot taken in summer of 2007.

This exercise provides training across the spectrum of OCS readiness from requirements and development of warfighter staff integration and synchronization through contract execution supporting the joint force commander. (U.S. Air Force Photo by Tech. Sgt. Chad Chisholm/Released)

Taken:7/25/08

Заключенные рыбы накануне (prisoner fish on the eve of execution)

Back when Sweden still was a barbaric country we used to execute people at this rock near Hanveden. The last person to die here was the farm worker Anders Gustav Pettersson, who brutally murdered his employer Hugo Fredrik Jaedren at the gates to the Näringsberg estate. That was back in 1855. When I passed the rock earlier today I noticed ice and decided to take a few photos.

Obscured by Jose Rizal's national monument in Luneta is a nearby wooded site where he was executed by the Spanish colonial government on 30 December 1896. He was then secretly buried in an unmarked grave at the Paco Cemetery. In 1898, his remains were exhumed and brought to the Rizal house in Binondo and placed in an urn during which a relative retrieved a vertabra with a lodged bullet that is now on display at Fort Santiago. The remains were then displayed and honored at the Marble Hall of the Ayutamiento before finally being interred in the Rizal monument that was designed by Swiss sculptor Richard Kissling.

 

Janusz Korczak memorial

I came to Oklahoma to witness a killing, a homicide in fact.

 

At a microphone Debbie Huggins fights tears and with a strong southern drawl says slowly, emphatically: "What we did to him today was much kinder than what he did to my dad."

 

"Him" refers to Michael Selsor and "what" to the murder of Clayton Chandler, a clerk shot six times during a gas station robbery in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Selsor pulled the trigger even after Chandler had complied and volunteered the loot.

 

"In 1975 I never would have thought that it would take 37 years for justice," Huggins says.

 

Today's justice was delivered about half an hour before Huggins approached the microphone; it is why I am here.

 

There are few acts graver than when a government takes the life of one of its own citizens. Executions often get a lot of coverage in the US, when there is something controversial about the case or enough people believe the condemned might be innocent. These scenarios attract media attention and fuel vigils. This was not the case with Michael Selsor. Everyone agreed that he did it, including him. The reporters who cover Selsor's execution will focus on Huggins and her family. Perhaps you cannot blame them. The only interview Selsor ever granted was to me.

 

Even though executions are conducted on behalf of the citizens of the state, very few are allowed to witness it: families of the condemned and their victims, lawyers, law enforcement, and journalists. This is why I felt a responsibility to witness Selsor's end and then to report it as dispassionately and honestly as I could. The following attempts such an account.

 

About an hour before Huggins gives her statement, I am led from a makeshift media center to the notorious H Unit, home of Oklahoma's death row. A pat down ensures our escorts that I carry no possessions other than the clothes on my back. They give me paper and a pen so I can take notes. I am joined by five other reporters. We maneuver through a set of gates that open to a large passageway. The walls and floor are made of smooth concrete. The passage feels stark, modern, like a secret missile silo - and incongruous with the century-old prison famous for inmate rodeos and executions.

 

Eventually we turn through a large yellow door into the death chamber's viewing room. I have been here before, but then the space was empty and part of the tour - now it is ready for business.

 

A handful of prison officials and guards are waiting for us in the viewing room, a narrow rectangle about four times as long as it is wide. A long series of windows to my right are covered by drawn blinds. Two rows of 12 brown metal folding chairs - the kind dragged out of a storage closet at a school picnic - are lined up. I am the first reporter in the room and told to go to the end of the second row and take a seat.

 

As I sidestep down the row I notice for the first time another set of windows on the left side of the room. The tinted panes conceal the identity of those on the other side. I suppose the setup is not unlike a wedding with two families to attend to and keep separated. The original victim, Clayton Chandler, is represented by an unknown number of family members behind the dark glass. It is hot in the room - at least 90 degrees and rising as people file in. Movement behind the opaque windows catches the light and my eye; at least two people are fanning themselves with white paper. Chandler's family members must already be in place, watching us nervously find our seats.

 

Three lawyers in dark suits representing Selsor enter next and sit directly in front of me. Selsor's family follows. His son wears a grey t-shirt, shorts and a military-short haircut. Tattoos cover his neck and arms. Selsor's sister, with a shock of blonde hair, looks tired. Her bright blue, short-sleeved shirt contrasts a suntanned face, wizened beyond her years. A box of cheap tissues rests in the son’s chair, courtesy of the state. Once Selsor's family is settled, a small contingent of law enforcement file in, including Jeff Jordan, who investigated Chandler's murder as a rookie homicide detective. He is now Tulsa's police chief.

 

A cacophony of banging echoes throughout the prison. We have been warned not to be alarmed by the noise - it is how inmates say their goodbyes.

 

Selsor is respected on death row. He is seemingly regarded as a serious and contemplative individual who became an asset of sorts to prison inmates and staff alike - though officials always caveat the sentiment with a reminder that his crime was inexcusably wrong and such actions must bear consequences. As the run guy, a job given to the toughest of the condemned, Selsor made deliveries to other cells and kept fellow inmates in line. When school children visited the prison, Selsor played a regular part in the tour. From behind bars he shared his life lesson about the consequences of one's actions with the children.

 

The appointed time nears and the banging becomes rhythmic - quick at first, but slowing now to a steady, dirge-like pace.

 

The director of Oklahoma prisons, Justin Jones enters. The yellow door shuts behind him. Rather than taking a chair, he is handed a phone, a hotline to the governor's office. Though not far from me, I cannot hear what he is saying. Jones hangs the receiver up, picks up a different phone connected with the execution chamber and tells them to proceed.

 

It is exactly 6 pm local time. The curtain goes up as guards raise the mini-blinds inside the execution chamber. Selsor's family in front of me gasps at the sight of him. He is strapped to the bed with his arms padlocked down and covered in a sheet up to his chest. Selsor's pinched eyebrows convey a look between fear and guilt.

 

The son waves to his father for what turns out to be the last time and reaches for the tissues. The son and sister begin to cry. Selsor lifts his head as much as he can and turns toward his small audience: "My son, my sister, I love you 'til I see you again next time. Be good. Eric, [Selsor's lawyer] keep up the struggle." His eyes scan the viewing room: "I'll be waiting at the gates of heaven for you. I hope the rest of you make it there as well."

 

He looks at the prison official standing over him and says: "I'm ready." Relaxing back to the bed, he turns his head to the side and focuses on his son.

 

Though we cannot see it, we all know what is happening now. Two intravenous lines run from Selsor's arms to two holes in a wall about three feet behind his head. From a hidden room, three executioners each press a plunger sending lethal doses into his veins: one with pentobarbital, another with vecuronium bromide and a third with potassium chloride. The executioners are each paid $300 in cash, so no paper trail leads to their identity.

 

With a tilted head still looking at his son, Selsor's gaze begins to fade, his eyelids half closing. A final breath exits his body with a visible puff from his lips. His body stills, eyes half open and locked on his son. It is roughly 6:03 pm.

 

The next three minutes pass painfully slowly. No one moves in the death chamber or viewing room. I hear barely perceptible sounds of crying from the row in front of me. A medical examiner in the chamber approaches the bed, checks for signs of life and pronounces Michael Selsor dead at 6:06 pm.

 

We solemnly return to the media center. Huggins holds a press conference and tells us that the execution did not bring closure or the kind of justice it seems she was seeking, but it is easy to see her relief from the death of Selsor. The ultimate boogeyman in her mind was finally gone.

 

In time a death certificate will be issued from the state of Oklahoma. For cause of death, it will say Selsor died from a homicide. Though it took nearly four decades to find its target, it is clear now that the trigger Selsor pulled that fateful day in 1975 ended not only Chandler's life, but his own as well.

The execution wall between blocks 10 & 11 at Auschwitz - the area is entered in silence in respect of the lives lost in this & the blocks next to it - the sadness, darkness was so evident (for me) in this space ....

32oz of fake blood.

One fairly large Seedless Watermelon.

And a fairly large load from a shot gun.

 

BOOM! HEADSHOT!

Firing Squad executing the Rebel Leader.

17th Century re-enactment performed by The Sealed Knot at Stockwood Park

اقدام الأحرار فوق رؤوس الملالي الارهابي ..

 

至德幼稚園 - 聖誕節活動 / 看到小姪女天真的快樂 - 好像也多了一個歡樂童年

Chih Der Kindergarten - Christmas day Activities / To see little niece naive happiness - Seems more a happy childhood

Jardín de la infancia de Chih Der - Actividades del día de la Navidad / Para ver la felicidad ingenua sobrina poco - Parece más una infancia feliz

至徳幼稚園 - クリスマスのイベント / 小さい姪の無邪気な楽しみを見ます - １つの楽しい少年時代に多くなるようです

Chih Der Kindergarten - Weihnachtstagtätigkeiten / Um kleine Nichte naive Glück zu sehen - Scheint eine glückliche Kindheit

Jardin d'enfants de Chih Der - Activités de jour de Noël / Pour voir le bonheur petite nièce naïve - Semble plus une enfance heureuse

 

Tainan Taiwan / Tainan Taiwán / 台灣台南

 

管樂小集 2012/12/09 台南赤嵌樓 Tainan Chihkan Tower performances

{ The one you love / 你愛的人 / あなたが愛するもの }

 

{View large size on fluidr}

 

{My Blog / 管樂小集精彩演出-觸動你的心}

{My Blog / Great Music The splendid performance touches your heart}

{My Blog / 管楽小集すばらしい公演-はあなたの心を心を打ちます}

{Mi blog / La gran música el funcionamiento espléndido toca su corazón}

{Mein Blog / Große Musik die herrliche Leistung berührt Ihr Herz}

{Mon blog / La grande musique l'exécution splendide touche votre coeur}

 

家住安南鹽溪邊

The family lives in nearby the Annan salt river

 

隔壁就是聽雨軒

The next door listens to the rain porch

 

一旦落日照大員

Once setting sun according to Taiwan

 

左岸青龍飛九天

The left bank white dragon flying in the sky

We came to Helgen, where they let us out. With horror I realized that we had arrived at a place of execution. The general wanted to have us all beheaded.

 

The other prisoners were Stormcloaks, who had fought against the Empire and were now sentenced to death.

 

And there was a thief who was shot when he tried to escape.

 

The first Stormcloak man was led to the executioner and beheaded. I felt sick.

 

Then it was my turn. They pulled me to the block and let me kneel down.

 

When I thought my end had come, a dragon appeared and spat fire. Soldiers. Stormcloaks and civilians ran screaming away.

 

The camp was established in 1936. It was located north of Berlin, which gave it a primary position among the German concentration camps: the administrative centre of all concentration camps was located in Oranienburg, and Sachsenhausen became a training centre for Schutzstaffel (SS) officers (who would often be sent to oversee other camps afterwards). Executions took place at Sachsenhausen, especially those that were Soviet Prisoners of War. Some Jews were executed at Sachsenhausen and many died there, the Jewish inmates of the camp were relocated to Auschwitz in 1942. Sachsenhausen was not intended as an extermination camp — instead, the systematic mass murder of Jews was conducted in camps to the east. However, many died as a result of executions, casual brutality and the poor living conditions and treatment.

 

Sachsenhausen was intended to set a standard for other concentration camps, both in its design and the treatment of prisoners. The camp perimeter is, approximately, an equilateral triangle with a semi circular roll call area centred on the main entrance gate in the side running northeast to southwest. Barrack huts lay beyond the roll call area, radiating from the gate. The layout was intended to allow the machine gun post in the entrance gate to dominate the camp but in practice it was necessary to add additional watchtowers to the perimeter.

 

The standard barrack layout was two accommodation areas linked by common storage, washing and storage areas. Heating was minimal. Each day, time to get up, wash, use the toilet and eat was very limited in the crowded facilities.

 

There was an infirmary inside the southern angle of the perimeter and a camp prison within the eastern angle. There was also a camp kitchen and a camp laundry. The camp's capacity became inadequate and the camp was extended in 1938 by a new rectangular area (the "small camp") north east of the entrance gate and the perimeter wall was altered to enclose it. There was an additional area (sonder lager) outside the main camp perimeter to the north; this was built in 1941 for special prisoners that the regime wished to isolate.

 

An industrial area, outside the western camp perimeter, contained SS workshops in which prisoners were forced to work; those unable to work had to stand to attention for the duration of the working day. Heinkel, the aircraft manufacturer, was a major user of Sachsenhausen labour, using between 6000 and 8000 prisoners on their He 177 bomber. Although official German reports claimed "The prisoners are working without fault", some of these aircraft crashed unexpectedly around Stalingrad and it's suspected that prisoners had sabotaged them. [1] Other firms included AEG.

  

Plaque to honour over 100 Dutch resistance fighters executed at Sachsenhausen.Later, part of the industrial area was used for "Station Z", where executions took place and a new crematorium was built, when the first camp crematorium could no longer cope with the number of corpses. The executions were done in a trench, either by shooting or by hanging. Amongst those executed were the commandos from Operation Musketoon and the Grand Prix motor racing champion, William Grover-Williams, also John Godwin RNVR, a British Naval Sub-Lieutenant who managed to shoot dead the commander of his execution party, for which he was mentioned in despatches posthumously. Over 100 Dutch resistance fighters were executed at Sachsenhausen.

 

The camp was secure and there were few successful escapes. The perimeter consisted of a three metre high wall on the outside. Within that there was a path used by guards and dogs; it was bordered on the inside by a lethal electric fence; inside that was a "death strip" forbidden to the prisoners. Any prisoner venturing onto the "death strip" would be shot by the guards without warning.

  

Arbeit Macht Frei gateOn the front entrance gates to Sachsenhausen is the infamous slogan Arbeit Macht Frei (German: "Work Makes [You] Free"). About 200,000 people passed through Sachsenhausen between 1936 and 1945. Some 100,000 inmates died there from exhaustion, disease, malnutrition or pneumonia from the freezing winter cold. Many were executed or died as the result of brutal medical experimentation. According to an article published on December 13, 2001 in The New York Times, "In the early years of the war the SS practiced methods of mass killing there that were later used in the Nazi death camps. Of the roughly 30,000 wartime victims at Sachsenhausen, most were Russian prisoners of war, among them Joseph Stalin's eldest son (Yakov Dzhugashvili).[2]

 

The wife and children of Rupprecht, Crown Prince of Bavaria, members of the Wittelsbach family, were held in the camp from October 1944 to April 1945, before being transferred to the Dachau concentration camp. Reverend Martin Niemöller, a critic of the Nazis and author of the poem First they came..., was also a prisoner at the camp. Herschel Grynszpan, whose act of assassination was used by Joseph Goebbels to initiate the Kristallnacht pogrom, was moved in and out of Sachshausen since his capture on the 18th July 1940 and until September 1940 when he was moved to Magdeburg.[3] Ukrainian nationalist leader Stepan Bandera was imprisoned there until October 1944, and two of his brothers died there.

 

On September 15 1939, August Dickman, a German Jehovah's Witness, was publicly shot as a result of his conscientious objection to joining the armed forces. The SS had expected his death to persuade fellow Witnesses to abandon their own refusals and to show rspect for camp rules and authorities. It failed; the others enthusiastically refused to back down and begged to be martyred also. [4]

 

Sachsenhausen was the site of the largest counterfeiting operation ever. The Nazis forced Jewish artisans to produce forged American and British currency, as part of a plan to undermine the British and United States' economies, courtesy of Sicherheitsdienst (SD) chief Reinhard Heydrich. Over one billion pounds in counterfeited banknotes was recovered. The Germans introduced fake British £5, £10, £20 and £50 notes into circulation in 1943: the Bank of England never found them. Today, these notes are considered very valuable by collectors.

 

Many women were among the inmates of Sachsenhausen and its subcamps. According to SS files, more than 2,000 women lived in Sachsenhausen, guarded by female SS staff (Aufseherin). Camp records show that there was one male SS soldier for every ten inmates and for every ten male SS there was a woman SS. Several subcamps for women were established in Berlin, including in Neukolln.

 

Camp punishments could be harsh. Some would be required to assume the "Sachsenhausen salute" where a prisoner would squat with his arms outstretched in front. There was a marching strip around the perimeter of the roll call ground, where prisoners had to march over a variety of surfaces, to test military footwear; between 25 and 40 kilometres were covered each day. Prisoners assigned to the camp prison would be kept in isolation on poor rations and some would be suspended from posts by their wrists tied behind their backs (strappado). In cases such as attempted escape, there would a public hanging in front of the assembled prisoners.

 

With the advance of the Red Army in the spring of 1945, Sachsenhausen was prepared for evacuation. On April 20–21, the camp's SS staff ordered 33,000 inmates on a forced march westward. Most of the prisoners were physically exhausted and thousands did not survive this death march; those who collapsed en route were shot by the SS. On April 22, 1945, the camp's remaining 3,000 inmates, including 1,400 women were liberated by the Red Army and Polish 2nd Infantry Division of Ludowe Wojsko Polskie.

 

It's estimated that 200,000 people passed thrugh Sachsenhausen concentration camp and that 100,000 died.

  

Where they would line up people in the concentration camps and shoot them. Blood ditch for people bleeding out.

Paul Delaroche, The Execution of Lady Jane Grey, 1833, oil on canvas, 246 x 297 cm (The National Gallery, London)

Paul Delaroche - The Execution of Lady Jane Grey, 1833 at National Gallery London England

Jorge Pineda (1879 – 1946)

The Execution of José Rizal

 

Ca. 1910

oil on canvas

11 1/2" x 20" (29 cm x 51 cm)

 

Opening bid: PHP 1,000,000

 

Lot 144 of the Leon Gallery auction in November 2019. For more details, please see leon-gallery.com

 

Jorge Pineda, hailed as the King of Filipino Illustrators, was also a worthy painter who specialized in two subjects: the simple pleasures of Filipino country life and the significant historical event. He was an ardent patriot and a devoted Rizalist who styled himself after our national hero.

 

The critic Eric Torres described him as “a free-thinker and an anti-cleric.” He would frequently rail against the friars for engineering the execution of Rizal and bluster about the banning of the reading of the Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo in Catholic schools.

 

One of his favorite pastimes—apart from long walks—was fencing. It was a sport that entranced the ilustrado gentlemen of the time, from Rizal to the Luna brothers, and the pioneer art collector, the late Don Alfonso Ongpin. (Don Alfonso would become Pineda’s fencing partner.) It is no surprise therefore that Pineda would capture this most quintessential and defining moment in our national history.

 

This painting, based on the single most famous photograph of Rizal’s demise, is made even more startling since it brings to life the taut colors and brooding atmosphere of that somber morning. Pineda himself was seventeen years old in 1896 and, by one account, was among the crowd on that fateful day. His prodigious memory for detail coupled with his reputation for meticulous research and his fine hand as an illustrator make this a priceless work of historical import.

 

Pineda’s The Execution of José Rizal captures the poignant details of that remarkable occasion. Rizal stands, arms bound at the elbow, a chistera (or derby) on his head. There was a gruesome choreography to his death. First, the Filipino troops were massed on three sides, the better to give the impression that Rizal was to die at the hands of his own countrymen. Immediately in front of Rizal was a drum corps. These men were instructed to play as loud as possible to deliberately drown out Rizal’s voice should he try to address the crowd. (The corps had jauntily played the Spanish national anthem on the way to the killing field.)

 

The account of one eyewitness, Hilarion Martinez, adds further details: When Rizal was near the center of the quadrangle, the mayor de la plaza, a colonel, announced, “En el nombre del Rey, el que se levante la voz a favor del reo sera ejecutado.” (In the name of the King, he who raises his voice in favor of the criminal will be executed.)

 

The drum corps then withdrew and were replaced by a troop of Filipino soldiers. Massed behind the Filipinos on every side was a phalanx of Spanish soldiers, ready to take up arms should the Filipinos fail to do their duty and execute Rizal. There were civilian spectators, too, and we see their white shirts in the distance.

 

Rizal was accompanied by two Jesuit priests, Fr. Estanislao March and Fr. Jose Villaclara, as well as his defense counsel, Lt. Luis Taviel de Andrade. The other men in white were also Spanish officers.

 

“With visible effort,” Martinez says, “Rizal raised his right hand which was tied and took off his hat.”The moment captured in this painting was just before that split second, corresponding in almost balletic detail to Christ’s last breath on the Holy Cross. “Amidst the silence, Rizal moved his head very slowly up and down, his lips moving as if in prayer.”

 

He continues, Then the commanding officer by means of his saber signaled the firing squad to aim. Then the saber dropped and there was a simultaneous crack of rifle fire that shattered the stillness of the morning. José Rizal wheeled in one last effort and toppled forward with a thud, his face towards the sky and his derby hat thrown ahead. He had fallen in the direction of the bay.

 

At the center of the painting is a stark, leafless tree that conveys the isolation of Rizal and the utter sadness of his death. As did Rizal at the moment of his death, it reaches plaintively to the sky in an eloquent plea for freedom and justice.

 

Martinez continues, Suddenly, as if from nowhere, a small dog appeared and ran in circles around Rizal’s fallen body, barking and whimpering. This incident would much later be the subject of our talk in our quarters. Some of my comrades were quick to conclude that it was a premonition of a coming misfortune.

 

That pale dog is captured standing near the Spanish soldiers in the painting. Indeed, it would bode the end of the Spanish empire in the Philippines.

 

Martinez proceeds, Then the capitan militar de la sanidad (medical officer) stepped forward, knelt before the fallen man, and felt his pulse. Looking up, he beckoned to a member of the firing squad to come forward and give the final tiro de gracia (coup de grace), another shot done at close range. I thought I saw a faint haze rise from Rizal’s coat, but it might have been a wisp of the morning mist. Seeing the body before me, I felt weak.

 

The officers began to show animation again. They fell in formation and marched to the tune of the Spanish national air, the Paso Doble Marcha de Cadiz.

 

As was customary in past executions, we filed past the body to view it for the last time. When we were commanded “eyes left,” I did not shut my eyes as I had at the sight of the several reos (convicts) whose heads were blown off by rifle fire. I wanted to see the face of the man for one last time. Rizal lay dead on the dewy grass. The day had started and I realized that I was gazing on the face of the great Malayan; that I was witnessing history in the making.

 

(Lisa Guerrero Nakpil)

Late at night on the 31 of July 1853 the 26-year-old farmworker Anders Gustav Pettersson brutally murders his very cruel employer Hugo Fredrik Jaedren at the gates to the Näringsberg estate together with a compatriot. Jaedren was on his way home from a weekly visit to Stockholm when he was attacked and killed by the two men. They were arrested the following day. The trial took place at Tingshuset in Västerhaninge, and two years later Anders Gustav Pettersson became the last person to be executed here. He was beheaded. The rock stands next to the bike path that I use on a daily basis. Day 26 in my project 100 Days Of Darkness.

Phew, it has been a struggle, but these are the final 5 uploads from St Sepulchre: a glorious church, a church of delights if you will.

 

Next up, St Dunstan in the West, the photos of which have not come out well, so I will have to return, but so it goes, so it goes.

 

With the rain falling harder, it was a bit of a route march to Holborn and my next church, the stunning St Sepulchre, which was also open.

 

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St Sepulchre-without-Newgate, also known as the Church of the Holy Sepulchre (Holborn), is an Anglican church in the City of London. It is located on Holborn Viaduct, almost opposite the Old Bailey. In medieval times it stood just outside ("without") the now-demolished old city wall, near the Newgate. It has been a living of St John's College, Oxford, since 1622.

 

The original Saxon church on the site was dedicated to St Edmund the King and Martyr. During the Crusades in the 12th century the church was renamed St Edmund and the Holy Sepulchre, in reference to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. The name eventually became contracted to St Sepulchre.

 

The church is today the largest parish church in the City. It was completely rebuilt in the 15th century but was gutted by the Great Fire of London in 1666,[1] which left only the outer walls, the tower and the porch standing[2] -. Modified in the 18th century, the church underwent extensive restoration in 1878. It narrowly avoided destruction in the Second World War, although the 18th-century watch-house in its churchyard (erected to deter grave-robbers) was completely destroyed and had to be rebuilt.

 

The interior of the church is a wide, roomy space with a coffered ceiling[3] installed in 1834. The Vicars' old residence has recently been renovated into a modern living quarter.

 

During the reign of Mary I in 1555, St Sepulchre's vicar, John Rogers, was burned as a heretic.

 

St Sepulchre is named in the nursery rhyme Oranges and Lemons as the "bells of Old Bailey". Traditionally, the great bell would be rung to mark the execution of a prisoner at the nearby gallows at Newgate. The clerk of St Sepulchre's was also responsible for ringing a handbell outside the condemned man's cell in Newgate Prison to inform him of his impending execution. This handbell, known as the Execution Bell, now resides in a glass case to the south of the nave.

 

The church has been the official musicians' church for many years and is associated with many famous musicians. Its north aisle (formerly a chapel dedicated to Stephen Harding) is dedicated as the Musicians' Chapel, with four windows commemorating John Ireland, the singer Dame Nellie Melba, Walter Carroll and the conductor Sir Henry Wood respectively.[4] Wood, who "at the age of fourteen, learned to play the organ" at this church [1] and later became its organist, also has his ashes buried in this church.

 

The south aisle of the church holds the regimental chapel of the Royal Fusiliers (City of London Regiment), and its gardens are a memorial garden to that regiment.[5] The west end of the north aisle has various memorials connected with the City of London Rifles (the 6th Battalion London Regiment). The church was designated a Grade I listed building on 4 January 1950.

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Sepulchre-without-Newgate

 

The Early History of St. Sepulchre's—Its Destruction in 1666—The Exterior and Interior—The Early Popularity of the Church—Interments here—Roger Ascham, the Author of the "Schoolmaster"—Captain John Smith, and his Romantic Adventures—Saved by an Indian Girl— St. Sepulchre's Churchyard—Accommodation for a Murderess—The Martyr Rogers—An Odd Circumstance—Good Company for the Dead—A Leap from the Tower—A Warning Bell and a Last Admonition—Nosegays for the Condemned—The Route to the Gallows-tree— The Deeds of the Charitable—The "Saracen's Head"—Description by Dickens—Giltspur Street—Giltspur Street Compter—A Disreputable Condition—Pie Corner—Hosier Lane—A Spurious Relic—The Conduit on Snow Hill—A Ladies' Charity School—Turnagain Lane—Poor Betty!—A Schoolmistress Censured—Skinner Street—Unpropitious Fortune—William Godwin—An Original Married Life.

 

Many interesting associations—Principally, however, connected with the annals of crime and the execution of the laws of England—belong to the Church of St. Sepulchre, or St. 'Pulchre. This sacred edifice—anciently known as St. Sepulchre's in the Bailey, or by Chamberlain Gate (now Newgate)—stands at the eastern end of the slight acclivity of Snow Hill, and between Smithfield and the Old Bailey. The genuine materials for its early history are scanty enough. It was probably founded about the commencement of the twelfth century, but of the exact date and circumstances of its origin there is no record whatever. Its name is derived from the Holy Sepulchre of our Saviour at Jerusalem, to the memory of which it was first dedicated.

 

The earliest authentic notice of the church, according to Maitland, is of the year 1178, at which date it was given by Roger, Bishop of Sarum, to the Prior and Canons of St. Bartholomew. These held the right of advowson until the dissolution of monasteries by Henry VIII., and from that time until 1610 it remained in the hands of the Crown. James I., however, then granted "the rectory and its appurtenances, with the advowson of the vicarage," to Francis Phillips and others. The next stage in its history is that the rectory was purchased by the parishioners, to be held in fee-farm of the Crown, and the advowson was obtained by the President and Fellows of St. John the Baptist College, at Oxford.

 

The church was rebuilt about the middle of the fifteenth century, when one of the Popham family, who had been Chancellor of Normandy and Treasurer of the King's Household, with distinguished liberality erected a handsome chapel on the south side of the choir, and the very beautiful porch still remaining at the south-west corner of the building. "His image," Stow says, "fair graven in stone, was fixed over the said porch."

 

The dreadful fire of 1666 almost destroyed St. Sepulchre's, but the parishioners set energetically to work, and it was "rebuilt and beautified both within and without." The general reparation was under the direction of Sir Christopher Wren, and nothing but the walls of the old building, and these not entirely, were suffered to remain. The work was done rapidly, and the whole was completed within four years.

 

"The tower," says Mr. Godwin, "retained its original aspect, and the body of the church, after its restoration, presented a series of windows between buttresses, with pointed heads filled with tracery, crowned by a string-course and battlements. In this form it remained till the year 1790, when it appears the whole fabric was found to be in a state of great decay, and it was resolved to repair it throughout. Accordingly the walls of the church were cased with Portland stone, and all the windows were taken out and replaced by others with plain semi-circular heads, as now seen—certainly agreeing but badly with the tower and porch of the building, but according with the then prevailing spirit of economy. The battlements, too, were taken down, and a plain stone parapet was substituted, so that at this time (with the exception of the roof, which was wagon-headed, and presented on the outside an unsightly swell, visible above the parapet) the church assumed its present appearance." The ungainly roof was removed, and an entirely new one erected, about 1836.

 

At each corner of the tower—"one of the most ancient," says the author of "Londinium Redivivum," "in the outline of the circuit of London" —there are spires, and on the spires there are weathercocks. These have been made use of by Howell to point a moral: "Unreasonable people," says he, "are as hard to reconcile as the vanes of St. Sepulchre's tower, which never look all four upon one point of the heavens." Nothing can be said with certainty as to the date of the tower, but it is not without the bounds of probability that it formed part of the original building. The belfry is reached by a small winding staircase in the south-west angle, and a similar staircase in an opposite angle leads to the summit. The spires at the corners, and some of the tower windows, have very recently undergone several alterations, which have added much to the picturesqueness and beauty of the church.

 

The chief entrance to St. Sepulchre's is by a porch of singular beauty, projecting from the south side of the tower, at the western end of the church. The groining of the ceiling of this porch, it has been pointed out, takes an almost unique form; the ribs are carved in bold relief, and the bosses at the intersections represent angels' heads, shields, roses, &c., in great variety.

 

Coming now to the interior of the church, we find it divided into three aisles, by two ranges of Tuscan columns. The aisles are of unequal widths, that in the centre being the widest, that to the south the narrowest. Semi-circular arches connect the columns on either side, springing directly from their capitals, without the interposition of an entablature, and support a large dental cornice, extending round the church. The ceiling of the middle aisle is divided into seven compartments, by horizontal bands, the middle compartment being formed into a small dome.

 

The aisles have groined ceilings, ornamented at the angles with doves, &c., and beneath every division of the groining are small windows, to admit light to the galleries. Over each of the aisles there is a gallery, very clumsily introduced, which dates from the time when the church was built by Wren, and extends the whole length, excepting at the chancel. The front of the gallery, which is of oak, is described by Mr. Godwin as carved into scrolls, branches, &c., in the centre panel, on either side, with the initials "C. R.," enriched with carvings of laurel, which have, however, he says, "but little merit."

 

At the east end of the church there are three semicircular-headed windows. Beneath the centre one is a large Corinthian altar-piece of oak, displaying columns, entablatures, &c., elaborately carved and gilded.

 

The length of the church, exclusive of the ambulatory, is said to be 126 feet, the breadth 68 feet, and the height of the tower 140 feet.

 

A singularly ugly sounding-board, extending over the preacher, used to stand at the back of the pulpit, at the east end of the church. It was in the shape of a large parabolic reflector, about twelve feet in diameter, and was composed of ribs of mahogany.

 

At the west end of the church there is a large organ, said to be the oldest and one of the finest in London. It was built in 1677, and has been greatly enlarged. Its reed-stops (hautboy, clarinet, &c.) are supposed to be unrivalled. In Newcourt's time the church was taken notice of as "remarkable for possessing an exceedingly fine organ, and the playing is thought so beautiful, that large congregations are attracted, though some of the parishioners object to the mode of performing divine service."

 

On the north side of the church, Mr. Godwin mentions, is a large apartment known as "St. Stephen's Chapel." This building evidently formed a somewhat important part of the old church, and was probably appropriated to the votaries of the saint whose name it bears.

 

Between the exterior and the interior of the church there is little harmony. "For example," says Mr. Godwin, "the columns which form the south aisle face, in some instances, the centre of the large windows which occur in the external wall of the church, and in others the centre of the piers, indifferently." This discordance may likely enough have arisen from the fact that when the church was rebuilt, or rather restored, after the Great Fire, the works were done without much attention from Sir Christopher Wren.

 

St. Sepulchre's appears to have enjoyed considerable popularity from the earliest period of its history, if one is to judge from the various sums left by well-disposed persons for the support of certain fraternities founded in the church—namely, those of St. Katherine, St. Michael, St. Anne, and Our Lady—and by others, for the maintenance of chantry priests to celebrate masses at stated intervals for the good of their souls. One of the fraternities just named—that of St. Katherine— originated, according to Stow, in the devotion of some poor persons in the parish, and was in honour of the conception of the Virgin Mary. They met in the church on the day of the Conception, and there had the mass of the day, and offered to the same, and provided a certain chaplain daily to celebrate divine service, and to set up wax lights before the image belonging to the fraternity, on all festival days.

 

The most famous of all who have been interred in St. Sepulchre's is Roger Ascham, the author of the "Schoolmaster," and the instructor of Queen Elizabeth in Greek and Latin. This learned old worthy was born in 1515, near Northallerton, in Yorkshire. He was educated at Cambridge University, and in time rose to be the university orator, being notably zealous in promoting what was then a novelty in England—the study of the Greek language. To divert himself after the fatigue of severe study, he used to devote himself to archery. This drew down upon him the censure of the all-work-and-no-play school; and in defence of himself, Ascham, in 1545, published "Toxophilus," a treatise on his favourite sport. This book is even yet well worthy of perusal, for its enthusiasm, and for its curious descriptions of the personal appearance and manners of the principal persons whom the author had seen and conversed with. Henry VIII. rewarded him with a pension of £10 per annum, a considerable sum in those days. In 1548, Ascham, on the death of William Grindall, who had been his pupil, was appointed instructor in the learned languages to Lady Elizabeth, afterwards the good Queen Bess. At the end of two years he had some dispute with, or took a disgust at, Lady Elizabeth's attendants, resigned his situation, and returned to his college. Soon after this he was employed as secretary to the English ambassador at the court of Charles V. of Germany, and remained abroad till the death of Edward VI. During his absence he had been appointed Latin secretary to King Edward. Strangely enough, though Queen Mary and her ministers were Papists, and Ascham a Protestant, he was retained in his office of Latin secretary, his pension was increased to £20, and he was allowed to retain his fellowship and his situation as university orator. In 1554 he married a lady of good family, by whom he had a considerable fortune, and of whom, in writing to a friend, he gives, as might perhaps be expected, an excellent character. On the accession of Queen Elizabeth, in 1558, she not only required his services as Latin secretary, but as her instructor in Greek, and he resided at Court during the remainder of his life. He died in consequence of his endeavours to complete a Latin poem which he intended to present to the queen on the New Year's Day of 1569. He breathed his last two days before 1568 ran out, and was interred, according to his own directions, in the most private manner, in St. Sepulchre's Church, his funeral sermon being preached by Dr. Andrew Nowell, Dean of St. Paul's. He was universally lamented; and even the queen herself not only showed great concern, but was pleased to say that she would rather have lost ten thousand pounds than her tutor Ascham, which, from that somewhat closehanded sovereign, was truly an expression of high regard.

 

Ascham, like most men, had his little weaknesses. He had too great a propensity to dice and cock-fighting. Bishop Nicholson would try to convince us that this is an unfounded calumny, but, as it is mentioned by Camden, and other contemporary writers, it seems impossible to deny it. He died, from all accounts, in indifferent circumstances. "Whether," says Dr. Johnson, referring to this, "Ascham was poor by his own fault, or the fault of others, cannot now be decided; but it is certain that many have been rich with less merit. His philological learning would have gained him honour in any country; and among us it may justly call for that reverence which all nations owe to those who first rouse them from ignorance, and kindle among them the light of literature." His most valuable work, "The Schoolmaster," was published by his widow. The nature of this celebrated performance may be gathered from the title: "The Schoolmaster; or a plain and perfite way of teaching children to understand, write, and speak the Latin tongue. … And commodious also for all such as have forgot the Latin tongue, and would by themselves, without a schoolmaster, in short time, and with small pains, recover a sufficient habilitie to understand, write, and speak Latin: by Roger Ascham, ann. 1570. At London, printed by John Daye, dwelling over Aldersgate," a printer, by the way, already mentioned by us a few chapters back (see page 208), as having printed several noted works of the sixteenth century.

 

Dr. Johnson remarks that the instruction recommended in "The Schoolmaster" is perhaps the best ever given for the study of languages.

 

Here also lies buried Captain John Smith, a conspicuous soldier of fortune, whose romantic adventures and daring exploits have rarely been surpassed. He died on the 21st of June, 1631. This valiant captain was born at Willoughby, in the county of Lincoln, and helped by his doings to enliven the reigns of Elizabeth and James I. He had a share in the wars of Hungary in 1602, and in three single combats overcame three Turks, and cut off their heads. For this, and other equally brave deeds, Sigismund, Duke of Transylvania, gave him his picture set in gold, with a pension of three hundred ducats; and allowed him to bear three Turks' heads proper as his shield of arms. He afterwards went to America, where he had the misfortune to fall into the hands of the Indians. He escaped from them, however, at last, and resumed his brilliant career by hazarding his life in naval engagements with pirates and Spanish men-of-war. The most important act of his life was the share he had in civilising the natives of New England, and reducing that province to obedience to Great Britain. In connection with his tomb in St. Sepulchre's, he is mentioned by Stow, in his "Survey," as "some time Governor of Virginia and Admiral of New England."

 

Certainly the most interesting events of his chequered career were his capture by the Indians, and the saving of his life by the Indian girl Pocahontas, a story of adventure that charms as often as it is told. Bancroft, the historian of the United States, relates how, during the early settlement of Virginia, Smith left the infant colony on an exploring expedition, and not only ascended the river Chickahominy, but struck into the interior. His companions disobeyed his instructions, and being surprised by the Indians, were put to death. Smith preserved his own life by calmness and self-possession. Displaying a pocket-compass, he amused the savages by an explanation of its power, and increased their admiration of his superior genius by imparting to them some vague conceptions of the form of the earth, and the nature of the planetary system. To the Indians, who retained him as their prisoner, his captivity was a more strange event than anything of which the traditions of their tribes preserved the memory. He was allowed to send a letter to the fort at Jamestown, and the savage wonder was increased, for he seemed by some magic to endow the paper with the gift of intelligence. It was evident that their captive was a being of a high order, and then the question arose, Was his nature beneficent, or was he to be dreaded as a dangerous enemy? Their minds were bewildered, and the decision of his fate was referred to the chief Powhatan, and before Powhatan Smith was brought. "The fears of the feeble aborigines," says Bancroft, "were about to prevail, and his immediate death, already repeatedly threatened and repeatedly delayed, would have been inevitable, but for the timely intercession of Pocahontas, a girl twelve years old, the daughter of Powhatan, whose confiding fondness Smith had easily won, and who firmly clung to his neck, as his head was bowed down to receive the stroke of the tomahawks. His fearlessness, and her entreaties, persuaded the council to spare the agreeable stranger, who could make hatchets for her father, and rattles and strings of beads for herself, the favourite child. The barbarians, whose decision had long been held in suspense by the mysterious awe which Smith had inspired, now resolved to receive him as a friend, and to make him a partner of their councils. They tempted him to join their bands, and lend assistance in an attack upon the white men at Jamestown; and when his decision of character succeeded in changing the current of their thoughts, they dismissed him with mutual promises of friendship and benevolence. Thus the captivity of Smith did itself become a benefit to the colony; for he had not only observed with care the country between the James and the Potomac, and had gained some knowledge of the language and manners of the natives, but he now established a peaceful intercourse between the English and the tribes of Powhatan."

 

On the monument erected to Smith in St. Sepulchre's Church, the following quaint lines were formerly inscribed:—

 

"Here lies one conquered that hath conquered kings,

Subdued large territories, and done things

Which to the world impossible would seem,

But that the truth is held in more esteem.

Shall I report his former service done,

In honour of his God, and Christendom?

How that he did divide, from pagans three,

Their heads and lives, types of his chivalry?—

For which great service, in that climate done,

Brave Sigismundus, King of Hungarion,

Did give him, as a coat of arms, to wear

These conquered heads, got by his sword and spear.

Or shall I tell of his adventures since

Done in Virginia, that large continent?

How that he subdued kings unto his yoke,

And made those heathens flee, as wind doth smoke;

And made their land, being so large a station,

An habitation for our Christian nation,

Where God is glorified, their wants supplied;

Which else for necessaries, must have died.

But what avails his conquests, now he lies

Interred in earth, a prey to worms and flies?

Oh! may his soul in sweet Elysium sleep,

Until the Keeper, that all souls doth keep,

Return to judgment; and that after thence

With angels he may have his recompense."

 

Sir Robert Peake, the engraver, also found a last resting-place here. He is known as the master of William Faithorne—the famous English engraver of the seventeenth century—and governor of Basing House for the king during the Civil War under Charles I. He died in 1667. Here also was interred the body of Dr. Bell, grandfather of the originator of a well-known system of education.

 

"The churchyard of St. Sepulchre's," we learn from Maitland, "at one time extended so far into the street on the south side of the church, as to render the passage-way dangerously narrow. In 1760 the churchyard was, in consequence, levelled, and thrown open to the public. But this led to much inconvenience, and it was re-enclosed in 1802."

 

Sarah Malcolm, the murderess, was buried in the churchyard of St. Sepulchre's in 1733. This coldhearted and keen-eyed monster in human form has had her story told by us already. The parishioners seem, on this occasion, to have had no such scruples as had been exhibited by their predecessors a hundred and fifty years previous at the burial of Awfield, a traitor. We shall see presently that in those more remote days they were desirous of having at least respectable company for their deceased relatives and friends in the churchyard.

 

"For a long period," says Mr. Godwin (1838), "the church was surrounded by low mean buildings, by which its general appearance was hidden; but these having been cleared away, and the neighbourhood made considerably more open, St. Sepulchre's now forms a somewhat pleasing object, notwithstanding that the tower and a part of the porch are so entirely dissimilar in style to the remainder of the building." And since Godwin's writing the surroundings of the church have been so improved that perhaps few buildings in the metropolis stand more prominently before the public eye.

 

In the glorious roll of martyrs who have suffered at the stake for their religious principles, a vicar of St. Sepulchre's, the Reverend John Rogers, occupies a conspicuous place. He was the first who was burned in the reign of the Bloody Mary. This eminent person had at one time been chaplain to the English merchants at Antwerp, and while residing in that city had aided Tindal and Coverdale in their great work of translating the Bible. He married a German lady of good position, by whom he had a large family, and was enabled, by means of her relations, to reside in peace and safety in Germany. It appeared to be his duty, however, to return to England, and there publicly profess and advocate his religious convictions, even at the risk of death. He crossed the sea; he took his place in the pulpit at St. Paul's Cross; he preached a fearless and animated sermon, reminding his astonished audience of the pure and wholesome doctrine which had been promulgated from that pulpit in the days of the good King Edward, and solemnly warning them against the pestilent idolatry and superstition of these new times. It was his last sermon. He was apprehended, tried, condemned, and burned at Smithfield. We described, when speaking of Smithfield, the manner in which he met his fate.

 

Connected with the martyrdom of Rogers an odd circumstance is quoted in the "Churches of London." It is stated that when the bishops had resolved to put to death Joan Bocher, a friend came to Rogers and earnestly entreated his influence that the poor woman's life might be spared, and other means taken to prevent the spread of her heterodox doctrines. Rogers, however, contended that she should be executed; and his friend then begged him to choose some other kind of death, which should be more agreeable to the gentleness and mercy prescribed in the gospel. "No," replied Rogers, "burning alive is not a cruel death, but easy enough." His friend hearing these words, expressive of so little regard for the sufferings of a fellow-creature, answered him with great vehemence, at the same time striking Rogers' hand, "Well, it may perhaps so happen that you yourself shall have your hands full of this mild burning." There is no record of Rogers among the papers belonging to St. Sepulchre's, but this may easily be accounted for by the fact that at the Great Fire of 1666 nearly all the registers and archives were destroyed.

 

A noteworthy incident in the history of St. Sepulchre's was connected with the execution, in 1585, of Awfield, for "sparcinge abrood certen lewed, sedicious, and traytorous bookes." "When he was executed," says Fleetwood, the Recorder, in a letter to Lord Burleigh, July 7th of that year, "his body was brought unto St. Pulcher's to be buryed, but the parishioners would not suffer a traytor's corpse to be laid in the earth where their parents, wives, children, kindred, masters, and old neighbours did rest; and so his carcass was returned to the burial-ground near Tyburn, and there I leave it."

 

Another event in the history of the church is a tale of suicide. On the 10th of April, 1600, a man named William Dorrington threw himself from the roof of the tower, leaving there a prayer for forgiveness.

 

We come now to speak of the connection of St. Sepulchre's with the neighbouring prison of Newgate. Being the nearest church to the prison, that connection naturally was intimate. Its clock served to give the time to the hangman when there was an execution in the Old Bailey, and many a poor wretch's last moments must it have regulated.

 

On the right-hand side of the altar a board with a list of charitable donations and gifts used to contain the following item:—"1605. Mr. Robert Dowe gave, for ringing the greatest bell in this church on the day the condemned prisoners are executed, and for other services, for ever, concerning such condemned prisoners, for which services the sexton is paid £16s. 8d.—£50.

 

It was formerly the practice for the clerk or bellman of St. Sepulchre's to go under Newgate, on the night preceding the execution of a criminal, ring his bell, and repeat the following wholesome advice:—

 

"All you that in the condemned hold do lie,

Prepare you, for to-morrow you shall die;

Watch all, and pray, the hour is drawing near

That you before the Almighty must appear;

Examine well yourselves, in time repent,

That you may not to eternal flames be sent.

And when St. Sepulchre's bell to-morrow tolls,

The Lord above have mercy on your souls.

Past twelve o'clock!"

 

This practice is explained by a passage in Munday's edition of Stow, in which it is told that a Mr. John Dowe, citizen and merchant taylor of London, gave £50 to the parish church of St. Sepulchre's, under the following conditions:—After the several sessions of London, on the night before the execution of such as were condemned to death, the clerk of the church was to go in the night-time, and also early in the morning, to the window of the prison in which they were lying. He was there to ring "certain tolls with a hand-bell" appointed for the purpose, and was afterwards, in a most Christian manner, to put them in mind of their present condition and approaching end, and to exhort them to be prepared, as they ought to be, to die. When they were in the cart, and brought before the walls of the church, the clerk was to stand there ready with the same bell, and, after certain tolls, rehearse a prayer, desiring all the people there present to pray for the unfortunate criminals. The beadle, also, of Merchant Taylors' Hall was allowed an "honest stipend" to see that this ceremony was regularly performed.

 

The affecting admonition—"affectingly good," Pennant calls it—addressed to the prisoners in Newgate, on the night before execution, ran as follows:—

 

"You prisoners that are within,

Who, for wickedness and sin,

 

after many mercies shown you, are now appointed to die to-morrow in the forenoon; give ear and understand that, to-morrow morning, the greatest bell of St. Sepulchre's shall toll for you, in form and manner of a passing-bell, as used to be tolled for those that are at the point of death; to the end that all godly people, hearing that bell, and knowing it is for your going to your deaths, may be stirred up heartily to pray to God to bestow his grace and mercy upon you, whilst you live. I beseech you, for Jesus Christ's sake, to keep this night in watching and prayer, to the salvation of your own souls while there is yet time and place for mercy; as knowing to-morrow you must appear before the judgment-seat of your Creator, there to give an account of all things done in this life, and to suffer eternal torments for your sins committed against Him, unless, upon your hearty and unfeigned repentance, you find mercy through the merits, death, and passion of your only Mediator and Advocate, Jesus Christ, who now sits at the right hand of God, to make intercession for as many of you as penitently return to Him."

 

And the following was the admonition to condemned criminals, as they were passing by St. Sepulchre's Church wall to execution:—" All good people, pray heartily unto God for these poor sinners, who are now going to their death, for whom this great bell doth toll.

 

"You that are condemned to die, repent with lamentable tears; ask mercy of the Lord, for the salvation of your own souls, through the [merits, death, and passion of Jesus Christ, who now sits at the right hand of God, to make intercession for as many of you as penitently return unto Him.

 

"Lord have mercy upon you;

Christ have mercy upon you.

Lord have mercy upon you;

Christ have mercy upon you."

 

The charitable Mr. Dowe, who took such interest in the last moments of the occupants of the condemned cell, was buried in the church of St. Botolph, Aldgate.

 

Another curious custom observed at St. Sepulchre's was the presentation of a nosegay to every criminal on his way to execution at Tyburn. No doubt the practice had its origin in some kindly feeling for the poor unfortunates who were so soon to bid farewell to all the beauties of earth. One of the last who received a nosegay from the steps of St. Sepulchre's was "Sixteen-string Jack," alias John Rann, who was hanged, in 1774, for robbing the Rev. Dr. Bell of his watch and eighteen pence in money, in Gunnersbury Lane, on the road to Brentford. Sixteen-string Jack wore the flowers in his button-hole as he rode dolefully to the gallows. This was witnessed by John Thomas Smith, who thus describes the scene in his admirable anecdotebook, "Nollekens and his Times:"—" I remember well, when I was in my eighth year, Mr. Nollekens calling at my father's house, in Great Portland Street, and taking us to Oxford Street, to see the notorious Jack Rann, commonly called Sixteenstring Jack, go to Tyburn to be hanged. … The criminal was dressed in a pea-green coat, with an immense nosegay in the button-hole, which had been presented to him at St. Sepulchre's steps; and his nankeen small-clothes, we were told, were tied at each knee with sixteen strings. After he had passed, and Mr. Nollekens was leading me home by the hand, I recollect his stooping down to me and observing, in a low tone of voice, 'Tom, now, my little man, if my father-in-law, Mr. Justice Welch, had been high constable, we could have walked by the side of the cart all the way to Tyburn.'"

 

When criminals were conveyed from Newgate to Tyburn, the cart passed up Giltspur Street, and through Smithfield, to Cow Lane. Skinner Street had not then been built, and the Crooked Lane which turned down by St. Sepulchre's, as well as Ozier Lane, did not afford sufficient width to admit of the cavalcade passing by either of them, with convenience, to Holborn Hill, or "the Heavy Hill," as it used to be called. The procession seems at no time to have had much of the solemn element about it. "The heroes of the day were often," says a popular writer, "on good terms with the mob, and jokes were exchanged between the men who were going to be hanged and the men who deserved to be."

 

"On St. Paul's Day," says Mr. Timbs (1868), "service is performed in St. Sepulchre's, in accordance with the will of Mr. Paul Jervis, who, in 1717, devised certain land in trust that a sermon should be preached in the church upon every Paul's Day upon the excellence of the liturgy o the Church of England; the preacher to receive 40s. for such sermon. Various sums are also bequeathed to the curate, the clerk, the treasurer, and masters of the parochial schools. To the poor of the parish he bequeathed 20s. a-piece to ten of the poorest householders within that part of the parish of St. Sepulchre commonly called Smithfield quarter, £4 to the treasurer of St. Bartholomew's Hospital, and 6s. 8d. yearly to the clerk, who shall attend to receive the same. The residue of the yearly rents and profits is to be distributed unto and amongst such poor people of the parish of St. Sepulchre's, London, who shall attend the service and sermon. At the close of the service the vestry-clerk reads aloud an extract from the will, and then proceeds to the distribution of the money. In the evening the vicar, churchwardens, and common councilmen of the precinct dine together."

 

In 1749, a Mr. Drinkwater made a praiseworthy bequest. He left the parish of St. Sepulchre £500 to be lent in sums of £25 to industrious young tradesmen. No interest was to be charged, and the money was to be lent for four years.

 

Next to St. Sepulchre's, on Snow Hill, used to stand the famous old inn of the "Saracen's Head." It was only swept away within the last few years by the ruthless army of City improvers: a view of it in course of demolition was given on page 439. It was one of the oldest of the London inns which bore the "Saracen's Head" for a sign. One of Dick Tarlton's jests makes mention of the "Saracen's Head" without Newgate, and Stow, describing this neighbourhood, speaks particularly of "a fair large inn for receipt of travellers" that "hath to sign the 'Saracen's Head.'" The courtyard had, to the last, many of the characteristics of an old English inn; there were galleries all round leading to the bedrooms, and a spacious gateway through which the dusty mail-coaches used to rumble, the tired passengers creeping forth "thanking their stars in having escaped the highwaymen and the holes and sloughs of the road." Into that courtyard how many have come on their first arrival in London with hearts beating high with hope, some of whom have risen to be aldermen and sit in state as lord mayor, whilst others have gone the way of the idle apprentice and come to a sad end at Tyburn! It was at this inn that Nicholas Nickleby and his uncle waited upon the Yorkshire schoolmaster Squeers, of Dotheboys Hall. Mr. Dickens describes the tavern as it existed in the last days of mail-coaching, when it was a most important place for arrivals and departures in London:—

 

"Next to the jail, and by consequence near to Smithfield also, and the Compter and the bustle and noise of the City, and just on that particular part of Snow Hill where omnibus horses going eastwards seriously think of falling down on purpose, and where horses in hackney cabriolets going westwards not unfrequently fall by accident, is the coach-yard of the 'Saracen's Head' inn, its portals guarded by two Saracen's heads and shoulders, which it was once the pride and glory of the choice spirits of this metropolis to pull down at night, but which have for some time remained in undisturbed tranquillity, possibly because this species of humour is now confined to St. James's parish, where doorknockers are preferred as being more portable, and bell-wires esteemed as convenient tooth-picks. Whether this be the reason or not, there they are, frowning upon you from each side of the gateway; and the inn itself, garnished with another Saracen's head, frowns upon you from the top of the yard; while from the door of the hind-boot of all the red coaches that are standing therein, there glares a small Saracen's head with a twin expression to the large Saracen's head below, so that the general appearance of the pile is of the Saracenic order."

 

To explain the use of the Saracen's head as an inn sign various reasons have been given. "When our countrymen," says Selden, "came home from fighting with the Saracens and were beaten by them, they pictured them with huge, big, terrible faces (as you still see the 'Saracen's Head' is), when in truth they were like other men. But this they did to save their own credit." Or the sign may have been adopted by those who had visited the Holy Land either as pilgrims or to fight the Saracens. Others, again, hold that it was first set up in compliment to the mother of Thomas à Becket, who was the daughter of a Saracen. However this may be, it is certain that the use of the sign in former days was very general.

 

Running past the east end of St. Sepulchre's, from Newgate into West Smithfield, is Giltspur Street, anciently called Knightriders Street. This interesting thoroughfare derives its name from the knights with their gilt spurs having been accustomed to ride this way to the jousts and tournaments which in days of old were held in Smithfield.

 

In this street was Giltspur Street Compter, a debtors' prison and house of correction appertaining to the sheriffs of London and Middlesex. It stood over against St. Sepulchre's Church, and was removed hither from the east side of Wood Street, Cheapside, in 1791. At the time of its removal it was used as a place of imprisonment for debtors, but the yearly increasing demands upon the contracted space caused that department to be given up, and City debtors were sent to Whitecross Street. The architect was Dance, to whom we are also indebted for the grim pile of Newgate. The Compter was a dirty and appropriately convictlooking edifice. It was pulled down in 1855. Mr. Hepworth Dixon gave an interesting account of this City House of Correction, not long before its demolition, in his "London Prisons" (1850). "Entering," he says, "at the door facing St. Sepulchre's, the visitor suddenly finds himself in a low dark passage, leading into the offices of the gaol, and branching off into other passages, darker, closer, more replete with noxious smells, than even those of Newgate. This is the fitting prelude to what follows. The prison, it must be noticed, is divided into two principal divisions, the House of Correction and the Compter. The front in Giltspur Street, and the side nearest to Newgate Street, is called the Compter. In its wards are placed detenues of various kinds—remands, committals from the police-courts, and generally persons waiting for trial, and consequently still unconvicted. The other department, the House of Correction, occupies the back portion of the premises, abutting on Christ's Hospital. Curious it is to consider how thin a wall divides these widely-separate worlds! And sorrowful it is to think what a difference of destiny awaits the children—destiny inexorable, though often unearned in either case—who, on the one side of it or the other, receive an eleemosynary education! The collegian and the criminal! Who shall say how much mere accident— circumstances over which the child has little power —determines to a life of usefulness or mischief? From the yards of Giltspur Street prison almost the only objects visible, outside of the gaol itself, are the towers of Christ's Hospital; the only sounds audible, the shouts of the scholars at their play. The balls of the hospital boys often fall within the yards of the prison. Whether these sights and sounds ever cause the criminal to pause and reflect upon the courses of his life, we will not say, but the stranger visiting the place will be very apt to think for him. …

 

"In the department of the prison called the House of Correction, minor offenders within the City of London are imprisoned. No transports are sent hither, nor is any person whose sentence is above three years in length." This able writer then goes on to tell of the many crying evils connected with the institution—the want of air, the over-crowded state of the rooms, the absence of proper cellular accommodation, and the vicious intercourse carried on amongst the prisoners. The entire gaol, when he wrote, only contained thirty-six separate sleeping-rooms. Now by the highest prison calculation—and this, be it noted, proceeds on the assumption that three persons can sleep in small, miserable, unventilated cells, which are built for only one, and are too confined for that, being only about one-half the size of the model cell for one at Pentonville—it was only capable of accommodating 203 prisoners, yet by the returns issued at Michaelmas, 1850, it contained 246!

 

A large section of the prison used to be devoted to female delinquents, but lately it was almost entirely given up to male offenders.

 

"The House of Correction, and the Compter portion of the establishment," says Mr. Dixon, "are kept quite distinct, but it would be difficult to award the palm of empire in their respective facilities for demoralisation. We think the Compter rather the worse of the two. You are shown into a room, about the size of an apartment in an ordinary dwelling-house, which will be found crowded with from thirty to forty persons, young and old, and in their ordinary costume; the low thief in his filth and rags, and the member of the swell-mob with his bright buttons, flash finery, and false jewels. Here you notice the boy who has just been guilty of his first offence, and committed for trial, learning with a greedy mind a thousand criminal arts, and listening with the precocious instinct of guilty passions to stories and conversations the most depraved and disgusting. You regard him with a mixture of pity and loathing, for he knows that the eyes of his peers are upon him, and he stares at you with a familiar impudence, and exhibits a devil-may-care countenance, such as is only to be met with in the juvenile offender. Here, too, may be seen the young clerk, taken up on suspicion—perhaps innocent—who avoids you with a shy look of pain and uneasiness: what a hell must this prison be to him! How frightful it is to think of a person really untainted with crime, compelled to herd for ten or twenty days with these abandoned wretches!

 

"On the other, the House of Correction side of the gaol, similar rooms will be found, full of prisoners communicating with each other, laughing and shouting without hindrance. All this is so little in accordance with existing notions of prison discipline, that one is continually fancying these disgraceful scenes cannot be in the capital of England, and in the year of grace 1850. Very few of the prisoners attend school or receive any instruction; neither is any kind of employment afforded them, except oakum-picking, and the still more disgusting labour of the treadmill. When at work, an officer is in attendance to prevent disorderly conduct; but his presence is of no avail as a protection to the less depraved. Conversation still goes on; and every facility is afforded for making acquaintances, and for mutual contamination."

 

After having long been branded by intelligent inspectors as a disgrace to the metropolis, Giltspur Street Compter was condemned, closed in 1854, and subsequently taken down.

 

Nearly opposite what used to be the site of the Compter, and adjoining Cock Lane, is the spot called Pie Corner, near which terminated the Great Fire of 1666. The fire commenced at Pudding Lane, it will be remembered, so it was singularly appropriate that it should terminate at Pie Corner. Under the date of 4th September, 1666, Pepys, in his "Diary," records that "W. Hewer this day went to see how his mother did, and comes home late, telling us how he hath been forced to remove her to Islington, her house in Pye Corner being burned; so that the fire is got so far that way." The figure of a fat naked boy stands over a public house at the corner of the lane; it used to have the following warning inscription attached:— "This boy is in memory put up of the late fire of London, occasioned by the sin of gluttony, 1666." According to Stow, Pie Corner derived its name from the sign of a well-frequented hostelry, which anciently stood on the spot. Strype makes honourable mention of Pie Corner, as "noted chiefly for cooks' shops and pigs dressed there during Bartholomew Fair." Our old writers have many references—and not all, by the way, in the best taste—to its cookstalls and dressed pork. Shadwell, for instance, in the Woman Captain (1680) speaks of "meat dressed at Pie Corner by greasy scullions;" and Ben Jonson writes in the Alchemist (1612)—

 

"I shall put you in mind, sir, at Pie Corner,

Taking your meal of steam in from cooks' stalls."

 

And in "The Great Boobee" ("Roxburgh Ballads"):

 

"Next day I through Pie Corner passed;

The roast meat on the stall

Invited me to take a taste;

My money was but small."

 

But Pie Corner seems to have been noted for more than eatables. A ballad from Tom D'Urfey's "Pills to Purge Melancholy," describing Bartholomew Fair, eleven years before the Fire of London, says:—

 

"At Pie-Corner end, mark well my good friend,

'Tis a very fine dirty place;

Where there's more arrows and bows. …

Than was handled at Chivy Chase."

 

We have already given a view of Pie Corner in our chapter on Smithfield, page 361.

 

Hosier Lane, running from Cow Lane to Smithfield, and almost parallel to Cock Lane, is described by "R. B.," in Strype, as a place not over-well built or inhabited. The houses were all old timber erections. Some of these—those standing at the south corner of the lane—were in the beginning of this century depicted by Mr. J. T. Smith, in his "Ancient Topography of London." He describes them as probably of the reign of James I. The rooms were small, with low, unornamented ceilings; the timber, oak, profusely used; the gables were plain, and the walls lath and plaster. They were taken down in 1809.

 

In the corner house, in Mr. Smith's time, there was a barber whose name was Catchpole; at least, so it was written over the door. He was rather an odd fellow, and possessed, according to his own account, a famous relic of antiquity. He would gravely show his customers a short-bladed instrument, as the identical dagger with which Walworth killed Wat Tyler.

 

Hosier Lane, like Pie Corner, used to be a great resort during the time of Bartholomew Fair, "all the houses," it is said in Strype, "generally being made public for tippling."

 

We return now from our excursion to the north of St. Sepulchre's, and continue our rambles to the west, and before speaking of what is, let us refer to what has been.

 

Turnagain Lane is not far from this. "Near unto this Seacoal Lane," remarks Stow, "in the turning towards Holborn Conduit, is Turnagain Lane, or rather, as in a record of the 5th of Edward III., Windagain Lane, for that it goeth down west to Fleet Dyke, from whence men must turn again the same way they came, but there it stopped." There used to be a proverb, "He must take him a house in Turnagain Lane."

 

A conduit formerly stood on Snow Hill, a little below the church. It is described as a building with four equal sides, ornamented with four columns and pediment, surmounted by a pyramid, on which stood a lamb—a rebus on the name of Lamb, from whose conduit in Red Lion Street the water came. There had been a conduit there, however, before Lamb's day, which was towards the close of the sixteenth century.

 

At No. 37, King Street, Snow Hill, there used to be a ladies' charity school, which was established in 1702, and remained in the parish 145 years. Dr. Johnson and Mrs. Thrale were subscribers to this school, and Johnson drew from it his story of Betty Broom, in "The Idler." The world of domestic service, in Betty's days, seems to have been pretty much as now. Betty was a poor girl, bred in the country at a charity-school, maintained by the contributions of wealthy neighbours. The patronesses visited the school from time to time, to see how the pupils got on, and everything went well, till "at last, the chief of the subscribers having passed a winter in London, came down full of an opinion new and strange to the whole country. She held it little less than criminal to teach poor girls to read and write. They who are born to poverty, she said, are born to ignorance, and will work the harder the less they know. She told her friends that London was in confusion by the insolence of servants; that scarcely a girl could be got for all-work, since education had made such numbers of fine ladies, that nobody would now accept a lower title than that of a waiting-maid, or something that might qualify her to wear laced shoes and long ruffles, and to sit at work in the parlour window. But she was resolved, for her part, to spoil no more girls. Those who were to live by their hands should neither read nor write out of her pocket. The world was bad enough already, and she would have no part in making it worse.

 

"She was for a long time warmly opposed; but she persevered in her notions, and withdrew her subscription. Few listen, without a desire of conviction, to those who advise them to spare their money. Her example and her arguments gained ground daily; and in less than a year the whole parish was convinced that the nation would be ruined if the children of the poor were taught to read and write." So the school was dissolved, and Betty with the rest was turned adrift into the wide and cold world; and her adventures there any one may read in "The Idler" for himself.

 

There is an entry in the school minutes of 1763, to the effect that the ladies of the committee censured the schoolmistress for listening to the story of the Cock Lane ghost, and "desired her to keep her belief in the article to herself."

 

Skinner Street—now one of the names of the past—which ran by the south side of St. Sepulchre's, and formed the connecting link between Newgate Street and Holborn, received its name from Alderman Skinner, through whose exertions, about 1802, it was principally built. The following account of Skinner Street is from the picturesque pen of Mr. William Harvey ("Aleph"), whose long familiarity with the places he describes renders doubly valuable his many contributions to the history of London scenes and people:—"As a building speculation," he says, writing in 1863, "it was a failure. When the buildings were ready for occupation, tall and substantial as they really were, the high rents frightened intending shopkeepers. Tenants were not to be had; and in order to get over the money difficulty, a lottery, sanctioned by Parliament, was commenced. Lotteries were then common tricks of finance, and nobody wondered at the new venture; but even the most desperate fortune-hunters were slow to invest their capital, and the tickets hung sadly on hand. The day for the drawing was postponed several times, and when it came, there was little or no excitement on the subject, and whoever rejoiced in becoming a house-owner on such easy terms, the original projectors and builders were understood to have suffered considerably. The winners found the property in a very unfinished condition. Few of the dwellings were habitable, and as funds were often wanting, a majority of the houses remained empty, and the shops unopened. After two or three years things began to improve; the vast many-storeyed house which then covered the site of Commercial Place was converted into a warehousing depôt; a capital house opposite the 'Saracen's Head' was taken by a hosier of the name of Theobald, who, opening his shop with the determination of selling the best hosiery, and nothing else, was able to convince the citizens that his hose was first-rate, and, desiring only a living profit, succeeded, after thirty years of unwearied industry, in accumulating a large fortune. Theobald was possessed of literary tastes, and at the sale of Sir Walter Scott's manuscripts was a liberal purchaser. He also collected a library of exceedingly choice books, and when aristocratic customers purchased stockings of him, was soon able to interest them in matters of far higher interest…

 

"The most remarkable shop—but it was on the left-hand side, at a corner house—was that established for the sale of children's books. It boasted an immense extent of window-front, extending from the entrance into Snow Hill, and towards Fleet Market. Many a time have I lingered with loving eyes over those fascinating story-books, so rich in gaily-coloured prints; such careful editions of the marvellous old histories, 'Puss in Boots,' 'Cock Robin,' 'Cinderella,' and the like. Fortunately the front was kept low, so as exactly to suit the capacity of a childish admirer. . . . . But Skinner Street did not prosper much, and never could compete with even the dullest portions of Holborn. I have spoken of some reputable shops; but you know the proverb, 'One swallow will not make a summer,' and it was a declining neighbourhood almost before it could be called new. In 1810 the commercial depôt, which had been erected at a cost of £25,000, and was the chief prize in the lottery, was destroyed by fire, never to be rebuilt—a heavy blow and discouragement to Skinner Street, from which it never rallied. Perhaps the periodical hanging-days exercised an unfavourable influence, collecting, as they frequently did, all the thieves and vagabonds of London. I never sympathised with Pepys or Charles Fox in their passion for public executions, and made it a point to avoid those ghastly sights; but early of a Monday morning, when I had just reached the end of Giltspur Street, a miserable wretch had just been turned off from the platform of the debtors' door, and I was made the unwilling witness of his last struggles. That scene haunted me for months, and I often used to ask myself, 'Who that could help it would live in Skinner Street?' The next unpropitious event in these parts was the unexpected closing of the child's library. What could it mean? Such a well-to-do establishment shut up? Yes, the whole army of shutters looked blankly on the inquirer, and forbade even a single glance at 'Sinbad' or 'Robinson Crusoe.' It would soon be re-opened, we naturally thought; but the shutters never came down again. The whole house was deserted; not even a messenger in bankruptcy, or an ancient Charley, was found to regard the playful double knocks of the neighbouring juveniles. Gradually the glass of all the windows got broken in, a heavy cloud of black dust, solidifying into inches thick, gathered on sills and doors and brickwork, till the whole frontage grew as gloomy as Giant Despair's Castle. Not long after, the adjoining houses shared the same fate, and they remained from year to year without the slightest sign of life—absolute scarecrows, darkening with their uncomfortable shadows the busy streets. Within half a mile, in Stamford Street, Blackfriars, there are (1863) seven houses in a similar predicament— window-glass demolished, doors cracked from top to bottom, spiders' webs hanging from every projecting sill or parapet. What can it mean? The loss in the article of rents alone must be over £1,000 annually. If the real owners are at feud with imaginary owners, surely the property might be rendered valuable, and the proceeds invested. Even the lawyers can derive no profit from such hopeless abandonment. I am told the whole mischief arose out of a Chancery suit. Can it be the famous 'Jarndyce v. Jarndyce' case? And have all the heirs starved each other out? If so, what hinders our lady the Queen from taking possession? Any change would be an improvement, for these dead houses make the streets they cumber as dispiriting and comfortless as graveyards. Busy fancy will sometimes people them, and fill the dreary rooms with strange guests. Do the victims of guilt congregate in these dark dens? Do wretches 'unfriended by the world or the world's law,' seek refuge in these deserted nooks, mourning in the silence of despair over their former lives, and anticipating the future in unappeasable agony? Such things have been—the silence and desolation of these doomed dwellings make them the more suitable for such tenants."

 

A street is nothing without a mystery, so a mystery let these old tumble-down houses remain, whilst we go on to tell that, in front of No. 58, the sailor Cashman was hung in 1817, as we have already mentioned, for plundering a gunsmith's shop there. William Godwin, the author of "Caleb Williams," kept a bookseller's shop for several years in Skinner Street, at No. 41, and published school-books in the name of Edward Baldwin. On the wall there was a stone carving of Æsop reciting one of his fables to children.

 

The most noteworthy event of the life of Godwin was his marriage with the celebrated Mary Wollstonecraft, authoress of a "Vindication of the Rights of Women," whose congenial mind, in politics and morals, he ardently admired. Godwin's account of the way in which they got on together is worth reading:—"Ours," he writes, "was not an idle happiness, a paradise of selfish and transitory pleasures. It is, perhaps, scarcely necessary to mention, that influenced by ideas I had long entertained, I engaged an apartment about twenty doors from our house, in the Polygon, Somers Town, which I designed for the purpose of my study and literary occupations. Trifles, however, will be interesting to some readers, when they relate to the last period of the life of such a person as Mary. I will add, therefore, that we were both of us of opinion, that it was possible for two persons to be too uniformly in each other's society. Influenced by that opinion, it was my practice to repair to the apartment I have mentioned as soon as I rose, and frequently not to make my appearance in the Polygon till the hour of dinner. We agreed in condemning the notion, prevalent in many situations in life, that a man and his wife cannot visit in mixed society but in company with each other, and we rather sought occasions of deviating from than of complying with this rule. By this means, though, for the most part, we spent the latter half of each day in one another's society, yet we were in no danger of satiety. We seemed to combine, in a considerable degree, the novelty and lively sensation of a visit with the more delicious and heartfelt pleasure of a domestic life."

 

This philosophic union, to Godwin's inexpressible affliction, did not last more than eighteen months, at the end of which time Mrs. Godwin died, leaving an only daughter, who in the course of time became the second wife of the poet Shelley, and was the author of the wild and extraordinary tale of "Frankenstein."

 

www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=45116

The last execution performed at the Tower of London was Josef Jakobs, a German spy who parachuted into Cambridgeshire in 1941 but was spotted and captured at his landing point. He'd broken his ankle on impact, so was seated for his death by firing squad in August 1941. The damage to the chair was caused by the seven Lee Enfield .303 bullets that struck him in the chest.

 

Tower of London armory display in April 2012.

Bernardino Luini (?), vers 1460 - après 1532, actif à Milan

Vierge et l'Enfant, vers 1510

Vraisemblablement, l'artiste de cette image prévoyait une hommage au Christ, parce que dans la radiographie à gauche et à droite de la Madonna encore des figures sont visibles. Seulement dans une autre étape, le maître mit la Vierge avec enfant isolé sur un fond sombre. Les études de la nature de Leonardo sur motif mère-enfant pour cette composition dynamique aussi ont été une source d'inspiration, tel que Leonardo dans le système des figures et la décoration picturale devint exemplaire, aussi.

 

Bernardino Luini (?), um 1460 - nach 1532, tätig in Mailand

Maria mit Kind, um 1510

Vermutlich hatte der Künstler dieses Bild als Darbringung Christi geplant, denn in der Röntgenaufnahme sind zu Seiten der Madonna noch Figuren sichtbar. Erst in einem weiteren Schritt setzte der Meister die Madonna mit Kind isoliert gegen einen dunklen Grund. Leonardos Naturstudien zum Mutter-Kindmotiv waren auch für die lebhafte Komposition Inspirationsquelle, so wie Leonardo auch im Figurensystem und der malerischen Gestaltung vorbildhaft wurde.

 

Austria Kunsthistorisches Museum

Federal Museum

Logo KHM

Regulatory authority (ies)/organs to the Federal Ministry for Education, Science and Culture

Founded 17 October 1891

Headquartered Castle Ring (Burgring), Vienna 1, Austria

Management Sabine Haag

www.khm.at website

Main building of the Kunsthistorisches Museum at Maria-Theresa-Square

The Kunsthistorisches Museum (KHM abbreviated) is an art museum in Vienna. It is one of the largest and most important museums in the world. It was opened in 1891 and 2012 visited of 1.351.940 million people.

The museum

The Kunsthistorisches Museum is with its opposite sister building, the Natural History Museum (Naturhistorisches Museum), the most important historicist large buildings of the Ringstrasse time. Together they stand around the Maria Theresa square, on which also the Maria Theresa monument stands. This course spans the former glacis between today's ring road and 2-line, and is forming a historical landmark that also belongs to World Heritage Site Historic Centre of Vienna.

History

Archduke Leopold Wilhelm in his Gallery

The Museum came from the collections of the Habsburgs, especially from the portrait and armor collections of Ferdinand of Tyrol, the collection of Emperor Rudolf II (most of which, however scattered) and the art collection of Archduke Leopold Wilhelm into existence. Already In 1833 asked Joseph Arneth, curator (and later director) of the Imperial Coins and Antiquities Cabinet, bringing together all the imperial collections in a single building .

Architectural History

The contract to build the museum in the city had been given in 1858 by Emperor Franz Joseph. Subsequently, many designs were submitted for the ring road zone. Plans by August Sicard von Sicardsburg and Eduard van der Null planned to build two museum buildings in the immediate aftermath of the Imperial Palace on the left and right of the Heroes' Square (Heldenplatz). The architect Ludwig Förster planned museum buildings between the Schwarzenberg Square and the City Park, Martin Ritter von Kink favored buildings at the corner Währingerstraße/ Scots ring (Schottenring), Peter Joseph, the area Bellariastraße, Moritz von Loehr the south side of the opera ring, and Ludwig Zettl the southeast side of the grain market (Getreidemarkt).

From 1867, a competition was announced for the museums, and thereby set their current position - at the request of the Emperor, the museum should not be too close to the Imperial Palace, but arise beyond the ring road. The architect Carl von Hasenauer participated in this competition and was able the at that time in Zürich operating Gottfried Semper to encourage to work together. The two museum buildings should be built here in the sense of the style of the Italian Renaissance. The plans got the benevolence of the imperial family. In April 1869, there was an audience with of Joseph Semper at the Emperor Franz Joseph and an oral contract was concluded, in July 1870 was issued the written order to Semper and Hasenauer.

Crucial for the success of Semper and Hasenauer against the projects of other architects were among others Semper's vision of a large building complex called "Imperial Forum", in which the museums would have been a part of. Not least by the death of Semper in 1879 came the Imperial Forum not as planned for execution, the two museums were built, however.

Construction of the two museums began without ceremony on 27 November 1871 instead. Semper moved to Vienna in the sequence. From the beginning, there were considerable personal differences between him and Hasenauer, who finally in 1877 took over sole construction management. 1874, the scaffolds were placed up to the attic and the first floor completed, built in 1878, the first windows installed in 1879, the Attica and the balustrade from 1880 to 1881 and built the dome and the Tabernacle. The dome is topped with a bronze statue of Pallas Athena by Johannes Benk.

The lighting and air conditioning concept with double glazing of the ceilings made ​​the renunciation of artificial light (especially at that time, as gas light) possible, but this resulted due to seasonal variations depending on daylight to different opening times .

Kuppelhalle

Entrance (by clicking the link at the end of the side you can see all the pictures here indicated!)

Grand staircase

Hall

Empire

The Kunsthistorisches Museum was on 17 October 1891 officially opened by Emperor Franz Joseph I. Since 22 October 1891 , the museum is accessible to the public. Two years earlier, on 3 November 1889, the collection of arms, Arms and Armour today, had their doors open. On 1 January 1890 the library service resumed its operations. The merger and listing of other collections of the Highest Imperial Family from the Upper and Lower Belvedere, the Hofburg Palace and Ambras in Tyrol will need another two years.

189, the farm museum was organized in seven collections with three directorates:

Directorate of coins, medals and antiquities collection

The Egyptian Collection

The Antique Collection

The coins and medals collection

Management of the collection of weapons, art and industrial objects

Weapons collection

Collection of industrial art objects

Directorate of Art Gallery and Restaurieranstalt (Restoration Office)

Collection of watercolors, drawings, sketches, etc.

Restoration Office

Library

Very soon the room the Court Museum (Hofmuseum) for the imperial collections was offering became too narrow. To provide temporary help, an exhibition of ancient artifacts from Ephesus in the Theseus Temple was designed. However, additional space had to be rented in the Lower Belvedere.

1914, after the assassination of Franz Ferdinand, heir to the throne, his " Estonian Forensic Collection " passed to the administration of the Court Museum. This collection, which emerged from the art collection of the house of d' Este and world travel collection of Franz Ferdinand, was placed in the New Imperial Palace since 1908. For these stocks, the present collection of old musical instruments and the Museum of Ethnology emerged.

The First World War went by, apart from the oppressive economic situation without loss. The farm museum remained during the five years of war regularly open to the public.

Until 1919 the K.K. Art Historical Court Museum was under the authority of the Oberstkämmereramt (head chamberlain office) and belonged to the House of Habsburg-Lorraine. The officials and employees were part of the royal household.

First Republic

The transition from monarchy to republic, in the museum took place in complete tranquility. On 19 November 1918 the two imperial museums on Maria Theresa Square were placed under the state protection of the young Republic of German Austria. Threatening to the stocks of the museum were the claims raised in the following weeks and months of the "successor states" of the monarchy as well as Italy and Belgium on Austrian art collection. In fact, it came on 12th February 1919 to the violent removal of 62 paintings by armed Italian units. This "art theft" left a long time trauma among curators and art historians.

It was not until the Treaty of Saint-Germain of 10 September 1919, providing in Article 195 and 196 the settlement of rights in the cultural field by negotiations. The claims of Belgium, Czechoslovakia, and Italy again could mostly being averted in this way. Only Hungary, which presented the greatest demands by far, was met by more than ten years of negotiation in 147 cases.

On 3 April 1919 was the expropriation of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine by law and the acquisition of its property, including the "Collections of the Imperial House" , by the Republic. Of 18 June 1920 the then provisional administration of the former imperial museums and collections of Este and the secular and clergy treasury passed to the State Office of Internal Affairs and Education, since 10 November 1920, the Federal Ministry of the Interior and Education. A few days later it was renamed the Art History Court Museum in the "Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna State", 1921 "Kunsthistorisches Museum" . Of 1st January 1921 the employees of the museum staff passed to the state of the Republic.

Through the acquisition of the former imperial collections owned by the state, the museum found itself in a complete new situation. In order to meet the changed circumstances in the museum area, designed Hans Tietze in 1919 the "Vienna Museum program". It provided a close cooperation between the individual museums to focus at different houses on main collections. So dominated exchange, sales and equalizing the acquisition policy in the interwar period. Thus resulting until today still valid collection trends. Also pointing the way was the relocation of the weapons collection from 1934 in its present premises in the New Castle, where since 1916 the collection of ancient musical instruments was placed.

With the change of the imperial collections in the ownership of the Republic the reorganization of the internal organization went hand in hand, too. Thus the museum was divided in 1919 into the

Egyptian and Near Eastern Collection (with the Oriental coins)

Collection of Classical Antiquities

Collection of ancient coins

Collection of modern coins and medals

Weapons collection

Collection of sculptures and crafts with the Collection of Ancient Musical Instruments

Picture Gallery

The Museum 1938-1945

Count Philipp Ludwig Wenzel Sinzendorf according to Rigaud. Clarisse 1948 by Baroness de Rothschildt "dedicated" to the memory of Baron Alphonse de Rothschildt; restituted to the Rothschilds in 1999, and in 1999 donated by Bettina Looram Rothschild, the last Austrian heiress.

With the "Anschluss" of Austria to the German Reich all Jewish art collections such as the Rothschilds were forcibly "Aryanised". Collections were either "paid" or simply distributed by the Gestapo at the museums. This resulted in a significant increase in stocks. But the KHM was not the only museum that benefited from the linearization. Systematically looted Jewish property was sold to museums, collections or in pawnshops throughout the empire.

After the war, the museum struggled to reimburse the "Aryanised" art to the owners or their heirs. They forced the Rothschild family to leave the most important part of their own collection to the museum and called this "dedications", or "donations". As a reason, was the export law stated, which does not allow owners to perform certain works of art out of the country. Similar methods were used with other former owners. Only on the basis of international diplomatic and media pressure, to a large extent from the United States, the Austrian government decided to make a change in the law (Art Restitution Act of 1998, the so-called Lex Rothschild). The art objects were the Rothschild family refunded only in the 1990s.

The Kunsthistorisches Museum operates on the basis of the federal law on the restitution of art objects from the 4th December 1998 (Federal Law Gazette I, 181 /1998) extensive provenance research. Even before this decree was carried out in-house provenance research at the initiative of the then archive director Herbert Haupt. This was submitted in 1998 by him in collaboration with Lydia Grobl a comprehensive presentation of the facts about the changes in the inventory levels of the Kunsthistorisches Museum during the Nazi era and in the years leading up to the State Treaty of 1955, an important basis for further research provenance.

The two historians Susanne Hehenberger and Monika Löscher are since 1st April 2009 as provenance researchers at the Kunsthistorisches Museum on behalf of the Commission for Provenance Research operating and they deal with the investigation period from 1933 to the recent past.

The museum today

Today the museum is as a federal museum, with 1st January 1999 released to the full legal capacity - it was thus the first of the state museums of Austria, implementing the far-reaching self-financing. It is by far the most visited museum in Austria with 1.3 million visitors (2007).

The Kunsthistorisches Museum is under the name Kunsthistorisches Museum and Museum of Ethnology and the Austrian Theatre Museum with company number 182081t since 11 June 1999 as a research institution under public law of the Federal virtue of the Federal Museums Act, Federal Law Gazette I/115/1998 and the Museum of Procedure of the Kunsthistorisches Museum and Museum of Ethnology and the Austrian Theatre Museum, 3 January 2001, BGBl II 2/ 2001, in force since 1 January 2001, registered.

In fiscal 2008, the turnover was 37.185 million EUR and total assets amounted to EUR 22.204 million. In 2008 an average of 410 workers were employed.

Management

1919-1923: Gustav Glück as the first chairman of the College of science officials

1924-1933: Hermann Julius Hermann 1924-1925 as the first chairman of the College of the scientific officers in 1925 as first director

1933: Arpad Weixlgärtner first director

1934-1938: Alfred Stix first director

1938-1945: Fritz Dworschak 1938 as acting head, from 1938 as a chief in 1941 as first director

1945-1949: August von Loehr 1945-1948 as executive director of the State Art Collections in 1949 as general director of the historical collections of the Federation

1945-1949: Alfred Stix 1945-1948 as executive director of the State Art Collections in 1949 as general director of art historical collections of the Federation

1949-1950: Hans Demel as administrative director

1950: Karl Wisoko-Meytsky as general director of art and historical collections of the Federation

1951-1952: Fritz Eichler as administrative director

1953-1954: Ernst H. Buschbeck as administrative director

1955-1966: Vincent Oberhammer 1955-1959 as administrative director, from 1959 as first director

1967: Edward Holzmair as managing director

1968-1972: Erwin Auer first director

1973-1981: Friderike Klauner first director

1982-1990: Hermann Fillitz first director

1990: George Kugler as interim first director

1990-2008: Wilfried Seipel as general director

Since 2009: Sabine Haag as general director

Collections

To the Kunsthistorisches Museum are also belonging the collections of the New Castle, the Austrian Theatre Museum in Palais Lobkowitz, the Museum of Ethnology and the Wagenburg (wagon fortress) in an outbuilding of Schönbrunn Palace. A branch office is also Ambras in Innsbruck.

Kunsthistorisches Museum (main building)

Picture Gallery

Egyptian and Near Eastern Collection

Collection of Classical Antiquities

Vienna Chamber of Art

Numismatic Collection

Library

New Castle

Ephesus Museum

Collection of Ancient Musical Instruments

Arms and Armour

Archive

Hofburg

The imperial crown in the Treasury

Imperial Treasury of Vienna

Insignia of the Austrian Hereditary Homage

Insignia of imperial Austria

Insignia of the Holy Roman Empire

Burgundian Inheritance and the Order of the Golden Fleece

Habsburg-Lorraine Household Treasure

Ecclesiastical Treasury

Schönbrunn Palace

Imperial Carriage Museum Vienna

Armory in Ambras Castle

Ambras Castle

Collections of Ambras Castle

Major exhibits

Among the most important exhibits of the Art Gallery rank inter alia:

Jan van Eyck: Cardinal Niccolò Albergati, 1438

Martin Schongauer: Holy Family, 1475-80

Albrecht Dürer : Trinity Altar, 1509-16

Portrait Johann Kleeberger, 1526

Parmigianino: Self Portrait in Convex Mirror, 1523/24

Giuseppe Arcimboldo: Summer 1563

Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio: Madonna of the Rosary 1606/ 07

Caravaggio: Madonna of the Rosary (1606-1607)

Titian: Nymph and Shepherd to 1570-75

Portrait of Jacopo de Strada, 1567/68

Raffaello Santi: Madonna of the Meadow, 1505 /06

Lorenzo Lotto: Portrait of a young man against white curtain, 1508

Peter Paul Rubens: The altar of St. Ildefonso, 1630-32

The Little Fur, about 1638

Jan Vermeer: The Art of Painting, 1665/66

Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Fight between Carnival and Lent, 1559

Kids, 1560

Tower of Babel, 1563

Christ Carrying the Cross, 1564

Gloomy Day (Early Spring), 1565

Return of the Herd (Autumn), 1565

Hunters in the Snow (Winter) 1565

Bauer and bird thief, 1568

Peasant Wedding, 1568/69

Peasant Dance, 1568/69

Paul's conversion (Conversion of St Paul), 1567

Cabinet of Curiosities:

Saliera from Benvenuto Cellini 1539-1543

Egyptian-Oriental Collection:

Mastaba of Ka Ni Nisut

Collection of Classical Antiquities:

Gemma Augustea

Treasure of Nagyszentmiklós

Gallery: Major exhibits

de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunsthistorisches_Museum

Royal Hong Kong Police Memorial.

 

In memory of the Hong Kong Police and Royal Hong Kong Police

Who died in the Two World Wars or in the Execution of their Duty

In World War I, many Hong Kong officers volunteered to serve in the British Armed Forces in Europe and ten are known to have died and one died of his wounds in 1919. World War II in 1941 following the Japanese invasion of Hong Kong over one hundred officers lost their lives resisting the Japanese or subsequently, whilst incarcerated in detention camps.

 

Virtual Memorial

 

WW1 fallen

Police Constable 25 Herbert George WAKEFORD. Hong Kong Police. Served as Corporal R/15516 2nd Kings Royal Rifle Corps. He enlisted into the army on the 9 September 1915 aged 27 years, residing at 8 Irchester Street, East Cliff, Ramsgate. Occupation, police officer with the Hong Kong Police. Killed in action 16/05/1916 aged 28 years. Born at Newhaven, Sussex to William and Rose Wakeford. In 1901 he was residing with his mother, siblings and stepfather Albert Smith at 4 Cobourge Place, Ramsgate. At the time of his death his mother was residing at 17, Camden Square, Ramsgate, Kent. At rest in St Patrick’s Cemetery, Loos, France

 

Police Constable 52. Arthur ALLCHURCH. Hong Kong Police Force. Served at Rifleman R/17759, 2nd Kings Royal Rifle Corps. Died 01/07/1916 aged 24. Son of Mrs. E. Still, of 25A, Standard Road, Hounslow, Middlesex. Came with the contingent from Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Arras Memorial, France.

 

Police Constable 27 Ernest George PAINTING. Hong Kong Police Force. Served as Lance Corporal R17760 2nd Kings Royal Rifle Corps. Died 01/07/1916 aged 22 years. Son of Ernest and Sarah Painting, of Crowmarsh Gifford, Wallingford, Berks. Volunteered from the Hong Kong Police Force.

 

Police Constable 125 Harold Lee WILSON Hong Kong Police. Served as Lance Corporal R/15463, 1st King’s Royal Rifle Corps died of wounds 27/07/1916 aged 24 years. He enlisted into the army 9 September 1915 aged 26 years. Occupation police officer with the Hong Kong Police. Son of Edward and Mary Ann Wilson, of 53, Alexandra Street, Kettering. Commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France.

 

Police Constable 114 Peter Boyd GARDNER Hong Kong Police Force. Served as Air Mechanic 1st Class 28923 Royal Flying Corps died 06/12/1916 aged 28 years. Son of Peter Boyd Gardner and Elizabeth Love Gardner,nee Love of Currie, Midlothian. In April 1916 he disembarked in London from Hong Kong aged 29, occupation police officer, Hong Kong Police. Born at Leven Hall, Musselburgh. At rest in Currie Parish Churchyard, Midlothian.

 

Police Constable 124 Ernest Frederick DRURY. (Military Medal) Hong Kong Police Force. Served as Sergeant R/15465 1st King’s Royal Rifle Corps. Killed in action 17/02/1917 aged 26. Son of Edward and Lucy Drury, of 14, Blackheath Hill, Greenwich, London. Commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial, Somme, France.

 

Police Constable 155 Robert EDWARDS. Hong Kong Police Force. Served as Corporal 17812 48th Squadron, Royal Flying Corps died 30/04/1917. At rest in warlincourt Halte British Cemetery, Saulty, France.

 

Police Constable 120 Edward SILLIS Hong Kong Police Force. Served as Private 6810, 2nd Coldstream Guards died 01/08/1917 aged 28 years. Son of William and Alice Silliss, nee Gaffney of Old Buckenham, Attleborough, Norfolk. In 1911 he was residing with his parents and siblings at Old Buckenham, Attleborough. His father was granted a war gratuity 4 December 1917 revised 18 November 1919. Commemorated in the Menin Gate Memorial, Ypres, Belgium.

 

Police Constable 81 John DELAHUNTY. Hong Kong Police Force. Served as Private 10793, 2nd Irish Guards killed in action 09/10/1917 aged 27 years. Son of Michael and Mary Delahunty, of Inistioge, Co. Kilkenny. Commemorated on the Tyne Cot Memorial, West Vlaanderen, Belgium.

 

Police Constable 69 Frederick James. SINGLETON. Hong Kong Police Force. Served as Sergeant 17803 of No 6 Aircraft Acceptance Park Royal Air Force died 02/11/1918. On the 1st January 1916 he disembarked at London from Hong Kong, occupation, police officer, Hong Kong Police Force. Residing at 78Barnaby Buildings, Old Kent Road, London. At rest in Glasgow Western Necropolis, Glasgow, Scotland.

 

Police Constable Albert Edmond CLARKE. Hong Kong Police Force. Served as Corporal 1405, Special Reserve, 1st King Edward’s Horse. Born 1889 at St Pancras, London, resided at Goole, Yorkshire.

On the 1st January 1916 he disembarked at Plymouth from Hong Kong with many others from the Hong Kong Police with the purpose of serving their country in the Great War. He was aged 27 years and he gave his residence in England as 27 Park Terrace, Goole Yorkshire. He died of his wounds at is home 15/05/1919. At rest in Goole Cemetery, Yorkshire.

 

WW2 Fallen

 

Police Constable 409 ABDUL AZIZ KHAN. Hong Kong Police Force Died 22/07/1943 aged 27 years Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 798 AHMAD KHAN. Hong Kong Police Force. Died 07/11/1942 aged 19 years. Son of Muhammad Bakhsh, of Murid, Jhelum, Pakistan. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 128 ALI MUHAMMAD. Hong Kong Police Force Died16/04/1942 aged 38 years. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 772 ALI MUHAMMAD Hong Kong Police Force Died 23/10/1943 aged 38 years. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Lance Sergeant 612 ALLAH JAWAYA. Hong Kong Police Force. Died 19/12/1941. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong

 

Police Constable 478 ARJUN SINGH. Hong Kong Police Force. Died Between 01/12/1941 and 31/12/1941. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong

 

Police Constable 108 BABU KHAN Hong Kong Police Force Died 03/02/1942 aged 22 years. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Inspector ALBERT VICTOR BAKER Hong Kong Police Force Died 15/12/1941 aged 44 years. Son of Albert and Katherine Baker, of Barking, Essex husband of Edith Alice Baker, of Monrovia, California, U.S.A. At rest in Stanley Military Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 235 BAKHSHISH SINGH Hong Kong Police Force Died 19/12/1941. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong

 

Police Constable 423 BALWANT SINGH Died 19/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable R/247 BANSI RAM. Died Between 01/01/1945 and 31/12/1945aged 45 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 521 BOG SINGH Died 19/12/1941. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Lance Sergeant LSA/68 William CAMPBELL, WILLIAM Hong Kong Police Force Died 02/10/1942 aged 31 years. years enroute from Hong Kong to Japan in He was a prisoner in ship Lisbon Maru when it was sunk by torpedo. Lisbon Maru was a cargo ship and it sank with thousands of Allied PoWs trapped in the hold by the Japanese. Son of James and Elizabeth Campbell. Husband of Ansonina Loughlin, of Hampstead, London,

England. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

www.telegraph.co.uk/history/world-war-two/9575914/The-las.... Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/442 CHAN CHAM. Died Between 01/09/1942 and 30/09/1942. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable R/755 CHANAN SINGH. Died Between 03/09/1939 and 31/12/1947 aged 25 years. Indian Coy, Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 168 CHEUNG PAK WING Died Between 01/08/1942 and 31/08/1942 aged 28 years.

Chinese Coy, Hong Kong Police Force. Husband of Yeung Fong, of Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/544 CHOW LEUNG Died Between 01/10/1942 and 31/10/1942 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Lance Sergeant LSA/191 PATRICK DONOHUE. Died 12/12/1941. Hong Kong Police Force. Son of Mrs. E. Donohue, of Woodside, Long Island, New York, U.S.A. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 394 DULA SINGH Died 19/12/1941. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable R/1443 FAN WING KWAN Died Between 03/09/1939 and 31/12/1947 Chinese Coy.

Hong Kong Police Force Husband of Lei Sau Fong, of Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 136 FAZL DAD Died 21/04/1944 aged 22 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Son of Bahadur Khan, of Karsal, Jhelum, Pakistan. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 395 FAZL ILLAHI Died 19/12/1941, Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 324 FAZL MUHAMMAD Died 16/10/1944 aged 40 years. Hong Kong Police Force

Buried at the time in Kowloon (Ho Man Tin) No. 3 Muslim Cemetery now at Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 127 FAZL MUHAMMAD Died 22/01/1945 aged 35 years. Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable183 FAZL SHAH. Died 25/12/1941. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Lance Sergeant LSA/34 MICHAEL FLAHERTY. Died 22/06/1944 aged 45 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Husband of Lily Wong, of Hong Kong. At Rest in Stanley Military Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable1070 FONG IU NIN. Died 18/12/1941. Chinese Coy, Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 456 GHAZAN KHAN. Died 03/05/1945 aged 23 years. Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 165 GHULAM ALI. Died 30/01/1943 aged 21 years. Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 797 GHULAM MUHAMMAD Died 16/10/1944 aged 44 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Buried at the time in Kowloon (Ho. Man Tin) No. 3 Muslim Cemetery now at Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Sub-Inspector CHARLES HENRY GOODWIN. Died 25/06/1944 aged 44 years. Hong Kong Police Force.

Son of Frederick and Caraline Goodwin; husband of Kwong Yuet Goodwin, of Kowloon, Hong Kong.

At Rest in Stanley Military Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 47 GUL HUSAIN. Died 15/09/1942 aged 24 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Son of Nur Husain, of Bhakri, Jhelum, Pakistan. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 331 GURDAYAL SINGH. Died 10/10/1942 aged 30 years Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Lance Sergeant 502 HAKIM ALI. Died 01/11/1944 aged 44 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Buried at the time in Kowloon (Ho Man Tin) No. 3 Muslim Cemetery now at Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Inspector HENRY GEORGE HALLAM. Of Police Headquarters Station, Hong Kong, Hong Kong Police. Formerly Hong Kong Police. Secret Service work in Singapore. Escaped 13.2.42 on Relau but intercepted by the Japanese 16.2.42 at Muntok. Force Died 18/07/1944 at a Civilian Camp, Sumatra. His effects went to Dora Eleanor Maud Howe married woman and Alfred Howe, Captain, British Army. He was orginally buried in Grave E2 at Muntok Cemetery, Indonesia. His body was removed after the 1960s. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Lance Sergeant 476 HARNAM SINGH. Died 25/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 650 HAZURA SINGH. Died 30/01/1945 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/148 HON PAN. Died Between 01/09/1942 and 30/09/1942 Hong Kong Police Force. Husband of Yeun Cheuk Man, of Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Inspector, ALBERT LESLIE HOPKINS, Hong Kong Police Force. 15th December 1941. Age 42. Son of Mr. and Mrs. A. Hopkins husband of Doreen M. Hopkins, of Bournemouth, Hampshire. At rest in Stanley Military Cemetery, Hong Kong.

Wills and Admin, Ancestry. His residence in England was Bridgeford House, Gold Hill, Chalfont, St Peters Buckinghamshire. Died 19th December 1941 on war service. His effects went to Mary Elizabeth May Hopkins, widow.

 

Sergeant PSA/38 GEORGE ALFRED HUDSON. Died 12/12/1941. Hong Kong Police Force. Son of George and Rosie Hudson, husband of Sarah Maria Hudson, of Deiniolen, Caernarvonshire, Wales.

Wills and Admin, Ancestry. His residence in Hong Kong was Prince Edward Road, Kowloon, Hong Kong and died on date stated. His effects went to Sarah Maria Hudson, widow. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/952 HUI PUK YUEN. Died Between 01/09/1942 and 30/09/1942. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Sergeant ILLIN, V. Died Between 01/12/1944 and 31/12/1944 Hong Kong Police Force and British Army Aid Group. At rest in Sai Wan Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Sergeant A/178 HERBERT WINKFIELD JACKSON. Hong Kong Police Force. Died 23/09/1945 aged 30 as the direct result of a shark attacks.

Wills and Admin, Ancestry. His residence in England was Hunt Lane, Taplow, Buckinghamshire died 24 September 1945 at Hong Kong. His effects went to John Jacob Jackson, farm manager.

At rest in Stanley Military Cemetery, Hong Kong

 

The following extract credit to Battle for Hong Kong and Military History by Philip G Cracknell

Jackson, Herbert Winkfield (27/10/1912 – 23/9/1945)

He was a Police Sgt who tragically died just after the war ended whilst still in Stanley Camp. He was swimming at Tweed Bay Beach when a shark attacked him. He died from shock and loss of blood after he was dragged ashore. "Some forty years ago when I was interviewing former Stanley internees, Mrs Irene Braude told me she was on the beach the day Sgt Jackson was attacked by the shark and helped to pull him out of the water. The shark had bitten Jackson's leg and he bled to death." (Source: Geoffrey Emerson). John Stanton, a teenage boy was also on the beach that day with his friends. "We heard a cry for help. We all jumped in and swam to the rock and splashed to frighten the shark off. We brought him back to the beach covered in blood, his left buttock missing." (Source: J.K. Stanton's Memoires IWM). An Australian newspaper reports that Captain A.M. Braude of HK Telephone Co rescued him. The news report goes on to say that large sharks have not been seen in Hong Kong bathing waters and it is believed this one followed a ship.

 

Police Constable 40 JAG MAL SINGH. Died 19/12/1941. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 735 JAGAT SINGH. Died 16/04/1943. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 525 JERNAIL SINGH Died 19/12/1941.Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 271 JOGINDAR SINGH. Died 26/06/1944 aged 25. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 560 JOGINDAR SINGH. Died 19/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Sub-Inspector ALBERT JOSEPH JOHNSON. Born 1888, died of wounds received while on duty 18/12/1941 aged 53 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Son of Henry and Mary Johnson, of East Dulwich, London, England. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 388 KALA SINGH. Died 23/12/1941. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable KAM YUEN Died Between 01/08/1942 and 31/08/1942 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 01. KAPUR SINGH. Died 25/03/1942. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 89 KARAM SINGH. Died 19/12/1941. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable R/264 KARAMAT, A K. Died 11/12/1944 aged 27 years Reserve (Indian Coy). Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 766 KARNAIL SINGH Died 27/03/1943 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 253 KARTAR SINGH. Died 15/02/1942 aged 30 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 417 KARTAR SINGH

Died Between 01/01/1945 and 31/12/1945 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 496 KARTAR SINGH Died 16/07/1943 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 258 KARTAR SINGH Died 19/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 72 KARTAR SINGH Died 19/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 491 KEHAR SINGH Died 19/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable R/266 KESAR ALI Died 18/12/1941 aged 45 years. Indian Coy. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 367 KIRPAL SINGH Died 17/12/1941 aged 35 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Lance Sergeant 139 KISHAN SINGH. Died 19/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 590 LACHHMAN SINGH. Died 19/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/11 LAM CHI MING. Died 25/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Husband of Chung Yiu, of Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/665 LAU KAU. Died Between 01/09/1942 and 30/09/1942 Hong Kong Police Force. Husband of Li Nga, of Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/297 LAU LOI. Died Between 01/01/1942 and 31/12/1942 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/606 LEE SHUN. Died Between 01/06/1943 and 30/06/1943 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Lance Sergeant RICHARDSON BARRY LOXLEY LESLIE, Hong Kong Police Force. Born 4 May 1915 in Angus, Scotland. Died 26/12/1941 aged 26 years in the Queen Mary Hospital, Hong Kong. Son of Samuel Hunter Leslie Marie Lerslie nee McWalter and stepson of Frances E. Leslie, of Cockerton, Darlington, Co. Durham. At rest in Hong Kong Cemetery.

 

Detective Constable PCC/98 LEUNG MING. Died Between 01/01/1942 and 31/12/1942, Hong Kong Police Force. Husband of Li Wu, of Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Private 2057 LEUNG SHUI MING. Died Between 20/12/1941 and 25/12/1941 aged 27 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Husband of Yung Shau Han, of Kowloon, Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Private 2040 LI FU. Died Between 19/12/1941 and 25/12/1941 aged 29 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Son of Wong Sau Chang, of Kowloon, Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/292 LI LIM SANG. Died Between 01/12/1941 and 31/12/1941. Hong Kong Police Force. Son of Kwan Ling. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/289 LI WAH. Died Between 01/05/1942 and 31/05/1942. Hong Kong Police Force. Husband of Tang Kwan Tai, of Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Engineer E/22 LO WUN. Died 17/12/1941. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/398 LO YUI. Died Between 01/01/1942 and 31/01/1942. Hong Kong Police Force. Husband of Ho Wai Lan, of Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Assistant Superintendent LOIE, DAVID. Died Between 03/09/1939 and 31/12/1947. Chinese Coy.

Hong Kong Police Force. Awarded King's Police Medal for Gallantry. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Staff Sergeant PSA/45 PETER HENRY LOUGHLIN Hong Kong Police Force. (Royal Naval Dockyard Police)

Died 02/10/1942 aged 35 years enroute from Hong Kong to Japan in He was a prisoner in ship Lisbon Maru when it was sunk by torpedo. Lisbon Maru was a cargo ship and it sank with thousands of Allied PoWs trapped in the hold by the Japanese. Husband of Ansonina Loughlin, of Hampstead, London,

England. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

www.telegraph.co.uk/history/world-war-two/9575914/The-las...

Wills and Admin, Ancestry. His address was Police Headquarters, Hong Kong, China died at se on date stated. His effects went to Antonia Loughlin, widow.

 

Lance Serjeant LSC/698 MAK PUI Died Between 01/05/1945 and 31/05/1945 Hong Kong Police Force Husband of Chan Kwai Chu. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 734 MALIK KHAN Died 23/12/1942 aged 27 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Buried at the time in Kowloon (ho Man Tin) No.3 Muslim Cemetery. Now at rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/419 MAN LUNG. Died 03/04/1943 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 123 MEHDI KHAN. Died 29/01/1942 aged 30 years. Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable355 MEHNGA KHAN

Died 12/02/1945 aged 35 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Buried at the time in Kowloon (ho Man Tin) No.3 Muslim Cemetery. Now at rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 690 MIR ZAMAN. Died 25/09/1942 aged 22 years. Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 259 MIRAN KHAN

Died 28/11/1944 aged 37 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Buried at the time in Kowloon (ho Man Tin) No.3 Muslim Cemetery. Now at rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 150 MUHAMMAD AMIN. Died Between 01/12/1941 and 31/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 555 MUHAMMAD DIN. Died 19/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 795 MUHAMMAD KHAN. Died 29/07/1943 aged 23 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Buried at the time in Kowloon (ho Man Tin) No.3 Muslim Cemetery. Now at rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 195 MUHAMMAD KHAN. Died 13/05/1945 aged 25 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Buried at the time in Kowloon (ho Man Tin) No.3 Muslim Cemetery. Now at rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 349 MUHAMMAD SADIQ. Died 27/03/1945 aged 25 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Buried at the time in Kowloon (ho Man Tin) No.3 Muslim Cemetery. Now at rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 161 MUHAMMAD YUSUF. Died 07/07/1942 aged 28 years. Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Constable307 MUKHTIYAR SINGH. Died 01/04/1943 aged 22 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 346 MUNSHA SINGH. Died 07/06/1944 aged 38 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 05. NADIR KHAN. Died 14/09/1942 aged 25 years Hong Kong Police Force. Son of Mawaz Khan, of Rupwal, Jhelum, Pakistan. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Lance Sergeant 444 NAND SINGH. Died 06/04/1945 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable274 NAND SINGH. Died 19/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 17 NATHE KHAN. Died 16/08/1945 aged 48 years. Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Constable113 NAZAR SINGH. Died 26/10/1943 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable R/1291 NG CHI TAT. Died Between 03/09/1939 and 31/12/1947. Chinese Coy. Hong Kong Police Force. Son of Chung Yuk, of Kowloon, Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Lance Sergeant 157 NG PING KWONG. Died 21/02/1942 Chinese Coy. Hong Kong Police Force. Husband of Wong Lai Fan, of Kowloon, Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 601 NIAMAT KHAN. Died 16/10/1944 aged 42 years. Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 81 NUR DAD. Died 08/03/1945 aged 38 years. Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 784 NUR HUSAIN SHAH. Died 19/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Inspector NUR MUHAMMAD. Died 13/08/1945 aged 48 years. Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Inspector THOMAS O'CONNOR. Police Department Hong Kong Police Force. Died in action 18/12/1941 aged 46 years. Son of Thomas and Isabella O'Connor, husband of Lily Maud O'Connor, of Purley, Surrey, England. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Lance Sergeant LSA/92 THOMAS ARTHUR PORRITT. Died of wound received while on duty 18/12/1941 aged 40 years Hong Kong Police Force. Born 29 April 1907 at Stokesley Yorkshire to John Robert and Susanaha Porritt, nee Thompson of Great Ayton, Yorkshire, England. In 1911 aged 3 he was residing with his parents and siblings at Cleveland Street California, Great Ayton, Yorkshire.

He served in the Royal Navy, enlisting 24 May 1923 on HMS Ganges as Boy 2nd Class J107335. Leaving the service 2 September 1928 off Vivid I. He re-enlisted 24 March 1931 on HMS Emerald, leaving the navy by purchase 7 February 1944 of HMS Devonshire.

Wills and Admin, Ancestry. His residence in England was 10 Pool Terrace, Monkabecq Road, Great Ayton, Yorkshire. Died on dat. and place stated. His effects went to Susannah Porritt, widow.

Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Inspector EDWARD GEORGE POST . Police Department Hong Kong Police Force. Died in action 18/12/1941. Husband of Myrtle G Post, nee Palmer. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable652 PURAN SINGH. Died 15/03/1945 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 809 PYARA SINGH. Died 19/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 726 RATAN SINGH. Died 25/10/1943 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Sergeant A/149 MALCOLM KENNETH ROSS. Police Department, Hong Kong Police Force Killed in action 18/12/1941 aged 30 years. Son of Malcolm M. and Margaret Ross, of Aberdeen, Scotland.

Wills and Admin, Ancestry. His residence in England was 38 Ashvale Place, Aberdeen. Died on date stated. His effects went to William John Ross. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

  

Police Constable 751 RUSTAM KHAN. Died 21/01/1945 aged 42 years. Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 50 SAHIB KHAN. Died 11/01/1945 aged 25 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Buried at the time in Kowloon (ho Man Tin) No.3 Muslim Cemetery. Now at rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 607 SANTA SINGH. Died 14/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Deputy Commissioner WALTER RICHARDSON SCOTT. Police Department Hong Kong Police Force and British Army Aid Group. He was sentenced to death by the Japanese and was executed in Hong Kong 29/10/1943 aged 44 years along with Volunteer William John Whire, British Aid Group. . It may have been the discovery of an escape plan. Son of Walter Norman and ' Dora Lydia Scott, nee Carlisle. Husband of June Samson Scott, of Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. In 1911 aged 11 years he was residing with his parents and siblings at 14 Coley Terrace Fulwell, Durham, Sunderland

He served in the ranks as 58561 with the Northumberland Fusiliers. Gained commission, served as Lieutenant in the Royal Engineers during the Great War.

On the 4 November 1922 he embarked from Liverpool bound for Hong Kong aged 22, Police Officer. His residence in England was 6 Arlington Street, Hull.

At rest in Stanley Military Cemetery, Hong Kong. (Photo) credit find a grave

 

Police Constable 630 SHER KHAN. Died 16/03/1945 aged 23 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Buried at the time in Kowloon (ho Man Tin) No.3 Muslim Cemetery. Now at rest in Sai Wan War Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 110 SHER MUHAMMAD. Died Between 01/01/1945 and 31/12/1945. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 96 SHER MUHAMMAD. Died 16/01/1945 aged 35 years Hong Kong Police Force. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 98 SULTAN MUHAMMAD. Died 17/08/1942 aged 21 years. Hong Kong Police Force. Son of Sharaf Khan, of Chawli, Jhelum, Pakistan. At rest in Happy Valley Muslim Cemetery, Hong Kong.

 

Seaman 53 SUNG SHUI CHING. Died 19/12/1941. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Lance Sergeant 02. SURAYAN SINGH. Died 26/12/1944 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Cremation Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 29 SURJAN SINGH. Died 19/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 244 SWARUP SINGH. Died Between 01/01/1944 and 31/12/1944 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Coxswain 100 TAM TIM. Died 11/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Husband of Wong Fuk Yee. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/556 TANG WING. Died Between 01/01/1942 and 31/01/1942 Hong Kong Police Force. Husband of Chan Yuet. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/65 TANG YAU. Died 25/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force Husband of Leung Yung, of Hong Kong. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable 162 TEJA SINGH. Died 22/12/1941 Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Police Constable PCC/343 TSE MUK YUEN. Died Between 01/01/1942 and 31/12/1942. Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Constable 67 WALI DAD. Died 09/02/1944 aged 38 years Hong Kong Police Force. Commemorated on the Sai Wan Memorial, Hong Kong.

 

Sub-Inspector JOHN JOSEPH WALSH. Hong Kong Police Force. Died 04/03/1942 aged 43 years of a coronary infraction in Tweed Bay Hospital, Stanley Camp Honk Kong. Son of Thomas and Briget Walsh, of Macroom, Co. Cork, Irish Republic, husband of Jeannette Monica Walsh, of Macroom.

In 1911 he was residing with his parents and siblings at 56 Mountmassy Road, Macroom, County Cork. His father was a retired policeman. At rest in Stanley Military Cemetery, Hong Kong.

  

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heresienstadt concentration camp

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other uses of "Theresienstadt", see Theresienstadt (disambiguation).

 

Coordinates: 50°30′48″N 14°10′1″E

Theresienstadt concentration camp archway with the phrase "Arbeit macht frei" (work makes (you) free), placed over the entrance in a number of Nazi concentration camps

Location of Terezín within the modern Czech Republic

Part of a series on

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Jews on selection ramp at Auschwitz, May 1944

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Theresienstadt concentration camp, also referred to as Theresienstadt ghetto,[1][2][3] was a concentration camp established by the SS during World War II in the garrison city of Terezín (German: Theresienstadt), located in German-occupied Czechoslovakia.

 

Tens of thousands of people died there, some killed outright and others dying from malnutrition and disease. More than 150,000 other persons (including tens of thousands of children) were held there for months or years, before being sent by rail transports to their deaths at Treblinka and Auschwitz extermination camps in occupied Poland, as well as to smaller camps elsewhere.[4]

 

Contents

 

1 History

2 Small Fortress

3 Main fortress

4 Command and control authority

5 Internal organisation

6 Industrial labour

7 Western European Jews arrive at camp

8 Improvements made by inmates

9 Unequal treatment of prisoners

10 Cultural activities and legacy

11 Use as propaganda tool

12 Statistics

12.1 Allied POWs

13 Notable prisoners who died at the camp

14 Notable survivors

15 Final months at the camp in 1945

16 Postwar trials

17 Works about Theresienstadt

17.1 Documentary films

17.2 Dramatic films

17.3 Plays

17.4 Music

17.5 Literature

18 See also

19 Notes

20 References

21 Further reading

22 External links

 

History

 

The fortress of Theresienstadt in the north-west region of Bohemia was constructed between the years 1780 and 1790 on the orders of the Austrian emperor Joseph II. It was designed as part of a projected but never fully realised fort system of the monarchy, another piece being the fort of Josefov. Theresienstadt was named for the mother of the emperor, Maria Theresa of Austria, who reigned as archduchess of Austria in her own right from 1740 until 1780. By the end of the 19th century, the facility was obsolete as a fort; in the 20th century, the fort was used to accommodate military and political prisoners.

 

From 1914 until 1918, Gavrilo Princip was imprisoned here, after his conviction for the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife on June 28, 1914, a catalyst for World War I. Princip died in Cell Number 1 from tuberculosis on April 28, 1918.

 

After Germany invaded and occupied Czechoslovakia, on June 10, 1940, the Gestapo took control of Terezín and set up a prison in the "Small Fortress" (kleine Festung, the town citadel on the east side of the Ohře river). The first inmates arrived June 14. By the end of the war, the small fortress had processed more than 32,000 prisoners, of whom 5,000 were female; they were imprisoned for varying sentences. The prisoners were predominantly Czech at first, and later other nationalities were imprisoned there, including citizens of the Soviet Union, Poland, Germany, and Yugoslavia. Most were political prisoners.[5]

 

By November 24, 1941, the Nazis adapted the "Main Fortress" (große Festung, i.e. the walled town of Theresienstadt), located on the west side of the river, as a ghetto.[5] Jewish survivors have recounted the extensive work they had to do for more than a year in the camp, to try to provide basic facilities for the tens of thousands of people who came to be housed there.

 

From 1942, the Nazis interned the Jews of Bohemia and Moravia, elderly Jews and persons of "special merit" in the Reich, and several thousand Jews from the Netherlands and Denmark. Theresienstadt thereafter became known as the destination for the Altentransporte ("elderly transports") of German Jews, older than 65. Although in practice the ghetto, run by the SS, served as a transit camp for Jews en route to extermination camps, it was also presented as a "model Jewish settlement" for propaganda purposes.[6][7]

 

On November 11, 1943, commandant Anton Burger ordered the entire camp population, approximately 40,000 people at that time, to stand in freezing weather during a camp census (sometimes referred to as the "Bohušovicer Kessel Census"). About 300 prisoners died of hypothermia as a result.[8]

 

During a 1944 Red Cross visit, and in a propaganda film, the Nazis presented Theresienstadt to outsiders as a model Jewish settlement, but it was a concentration camp. More than 33,000 inmates died as a result of malnutrition, disease, or the sadistic treatment by their captors.[9] Whereas some survivors claimed that the prison population reached 75,000 at one time, according to official records, the highest figure reached (on September 18, 1942) was 58,491. They were crowded into barracks designed to accommodate 7,000 combat troops.[10]

 

In the autumn of 1944, the Nazis began the liquidation of the ghetto, deporting more prisoners to Auschwitz and other camps; in one month, they deported 24,000 victims[11] (about 18,000 in 11 transports between September 28 and October 28).

Small Fortress

Crematorium

 

The "Small Fortress" (Malá pevnost in Czech, Kleine Festung in German) was part of the fortification on the left side of the river Ohře. Beginning in 1940, the Gestapo used it as a prison, the largest in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. The first inmates arrived on June 14, 1940. By the end of the war, 32,000 prisoners, of whom 5,000 were female, passed through the Small Fortress. It was separate from and unrelated to the Jewish ghetto in the main fortress on the river's right side. An estimated 32,000 people were taken to the prison; most were usually deported later to a concentration camp.

Main fortress

 

In the spring of 1942, the Nazis expelled the 7,000 non-Jewish Czechs living in Terezín, and closed off the town. The Nazis established the ghetto and concentration camp in the main fortress on the east side of the river.

 

SS-Hauptsturmführer Siegfried Seidl[12] served as the first camp commandant, beginning in 1941. Seidl oversaw the labour of 342 Jewish artisans and carpenters, known as the Aufbaukommando, who converted the fortress into a concentration camp. Although the Aufbaukommando were promised that they and their families would be spared transport, during the liquidation of the camp in September 1944, all were transported to Auschwitz-Birkenau[13] for Sonderbehandlung, or "special treatment", i.e. immediate gassing of all upon arrival.[14]

Command and control authority

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The camp, Theresienstadt/Terezin, was a hybrid of ghetto and concentration camp, (KZ), with features of both. It was established by order of the SS-Reichssicherheitshauptamt (RSHA) in 1941 and administered by its GESTAPO Amt of the RSHA, Department IV-B-4, (Jews), headed by Eichmann who oversaw the ghetto and its SS-Commandant; he, in turn, was in charge of the daily ghetto administration, the SS officers, about 12, and the Czech gendarmes, who collaborated with the Germans; these last two were in charge of security and guard duties. An internal police force, run by Jewish inmates, answered directly to the Jewish self-administration and indirectly to the SS-commandant. Thus was the organisation responsible for the enslavement, deportation, and murder of the Jews. Theresienstadt was also the only KZ excluded from the control of SS-Wirtschafthauptamt (main economic administration office) under Pohl and was classified as "concentration camp, class 4" (mildest). Furthermore, the SS-men in this ghetto/concentration camp were not members of the Waffen-SS usually guarding concentration camps, as reported sometimes. Pohl and the SS-Wirtschafthauptamt were in control of all concentration camps except Theresienstadt.

Stone marking the burial of ashes of 15,000 victims of Terezín at the New Jewish Cemetery, Prague

 

Gestapo and Sicherheitsdienst oversaw the day-to-day operations of the Kleine Festung, (Small Fortress), a prison of the Prague Gestapo which was controlled by the 'Higher SS and Police Führer', (HSSPF), Karl Frank, who reported directly to Himmler rather than the Office of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, a civilian department.

 

SS-Hauptsturmführer Ernst Möhs (1898–1945) was Eichmann's liaison-officer in Theresienstadt. During the camp's operations, three officers served as camp commandant: Siegfried Seidl, Anton Burger, and Karl Rahm.

Internal organisation

 

As in other European ghettos, the Nazis required the Jews to select a Jewish Council, which nominally governed the ghetto. In Theresienstadt, this was known as the "Cultural Council"; later it was called the "Jewish self-government of Theresienstadt".[15] The first of the Jewish elders of Theresienstadt was Jakob Edelstein, a Polish-born Zionist and former head of the Prague Jewish community. He served until 1943, when he was deported to Auschwitz and shot to death after being forced to watch the executions of his wife and son.[16] The second was Paul Eppstein (de), a sociologist originally from Mannheim, Germany. Earlier, Eppstein was the speaker of the Reichsvereinigung der Juden in Deutschland, the central organisation of Jews in Nazi Germany. He served until the autumn of 1944, when he was allegedly shot in the Small Fortress on Yom Kippur.

 

Benjamin Murmelstein, a Lvov-born rabbi from Vienna, had been part of the Cultural Council in Vienna after the Anschluss. As in other cities, the Jews were charged by the Nazis with organising actions in the Jewish community, including selection of people for transport when the Germans decided to deport them, beginning in 1942. Murmelstein was also deported to Theresienstadt. In the autumn of 1944, he succeeded Eppstein. He and other prominent Jews of the Cultural Council were deported to Auschwitz in the liquidation of the ghetto, but he and some others survived the war. He and other Jewish elders have been extremely controversial figures, condemned for years for what was seen as their collaboration with the Nazis.

 

In the 21st century, there has been some reassessment, given the conditions of the times. The Last of the Unjust, released in 2013, is a documentary centring on interviews with Murmelstein that were filmed by Claude Lanzmann in 1975, during the production of his masterwork Shoah. The interviews were not used in the earlier film.[17][18]

 

In the last days of the ghetto, Jiří Vogel of Prague served as the elder. From 1943 to 1945, Leo Baeck was the speaker of the Council of Elders of Theresienstadt. Before being deported to the camp from Berlin, he had served as the head of the Reichsvereinigung der Juden in Deutschland. He survived Theresienstadt, and emigrated to London after the war.[19]

Industrial labour

 

Theresienstadt was used to supply the German war effort with a source of Jewish slave labour. Their major contribution was the splitting of local ore mined from Czechoslovakian mica. Blind prisoners were often spared deportation by assignment to this task. Others manufactured boxes or coffins, or sprayed military uniforms with a white dye to provide camouflage for German soldiers on the Russian front. According to ex-prisoners, Theresienstadt was also a sorting and re-distribution centre for underwear and clothing confiscated from Jews:

 

... from all parts of Germany, the baggage taken away from the Jews was sent to Theresienstadt, and there it was packaged, sorted-out in order to be sent out all over the country, to various cities, for the people who were bombed-out and suffered a shortage of underwear and clothing.[15]

 

Western European Jews arrive at camp

 

Among the western European Jews deported to the camp were 456 Jews from Denmark, sent to Theresienstadt in 1943. They had not been able to escape to neutral Sweden before the Nazis started the deportation. Included also in the transports were European Jewish children whom Danish organisations had tried to conceal in foster homes.

 

The arrival of the Danes was significant, as their government gained access to the ghetto for the International Red Cross in 1944, to view conditions there. (This took place after the D-Day Invasion of Normandy by the Allies). Most European governments, when occupied by the Nazis, had not tried to protect their fellow Jewish citizens. Historians believe the Germans were trying to keep the Danes satisfied as they had impressed many of their workers in war factories. In addition, the tide of war was changing.

Improvements made by inmates

 

Survivor Friedrich Schlaefrig described in 1946 how the early residents of Theresienstadt, with the assistance of the Germans, overcame the lack of water to the town:

 

We had no water system in Theresienstadt ... a number of wells were contaminated in a short time with typhoid fever. That was the reason that we had to close a number of wells, and had to undertake to extend the existing water pipe system. That was really a great piece of public works created under Jewish inventiveness and by Jewish labor. They expanded the water supply system, and have achieved [a condition] that we not only produced for the people good drinking water or, at least, not objectionable drinking water, but that also the toilet installations could be flushed with water, so that these unhygienic conditions were removed ... The Germans have permitted it, and we even obtained through them the material, because otherwise it would have been impossible ...[15]

 

After this, a fire department was established, made up of Jewish prisoners, with an acting fire chief. They relied on the newly constructed water system. Constructing the water system was only part of the major work undertaken by Jews, in what was called the technical service, in the first year of the camp. They had to make many more changes to buildings to adapt the fortress and barracks for the overcrowded conditions that the Germans imposed.[15]

Unequal treatment of prisoners

 

After the changes and sprucing up to prepare for the Red Cross visit, in the spring of 1944, the Gestapo screened the Jews of Theresienstadt, classifying them according to social prominence. Many of the "Prominente" were profiled, with photographs, among a collection of documents smuggled out after the liberation..[20] The Gestapo reassigned some 150 to 200 prominent individuals to single rooms that would be shared by only two people, so that a husband and wife could live by themselves. Several members of the Cultural Council were included among the Prominente, due to the influence of Benjamin Murmelstein, then the "Jewish elder" of Theresienstadt. Former prisoners suggested in statements that those who held positions of authority practised nepotism, trying to protect individuals close to them, while struggling to avoid deportation and death in the closing days of the war. Murmelstein and other members of the Cultural Council were still deported in the final liquidation, but he and some others survived the war.[15]

Cultural activities and legacy

 

Theresienstadt was originally designated as a model community for middle-class Jews from Germany, Czechoslovakia, and Austria. Many educated Jews were inmates of Theresienstadt. In a propaganda effort designed to fool the western allies, the Nazis publicised the camp for its rich cultural life. In reality, according to a Holocaust survivor, "during the early period there were no [musical] instruments whatsoever, and the cultural life came to develop itself only ... when the whole management of Theresienstadt was steered into an organized course."[15] An extremely rich cultural life then ensued, with lectures, recitals, poetry readings, concerts, and so on. At least four concert orchestras were organised in the camp, as well as chamber groups and jazz ensembles. Several stage performances were produced and attended by camp inmates. Many prominent artists from Czechoslovakia, Austria, and Germany were imprisoned at Theresienstadt, along with writers, scientists, jurists, diplomats, musicians, and scholars, and many of these contributed to the camp's cultural life.

 

The community in Theresienstadt tried to ensure that all the children who passed through the camp continued with their education. The Nazis required all camp children over a certain age to work, but accepted working on stage as employment. The prisoners achieved the children's education under the guise of work or cultural activity. Daily classes and sports activities were held. The community published a magazine, Vedem. The history of the magazine was studied and narrated by the Italian writer Matteo Corradini in his book "La repubblica delle farfalle" (The Republic of the Butterflies"). The English actor Sir Ben Kingsley read that novel, speaking on January 27, 2015 during the ceremony held at Theresienstadt to mark International Holocaust Memorial Day.

 

Ilse Weber, a noted Czech Jewish poet, writer and musician for children, was held in the camp from February 1942, and worked as a night nurse in the camp's children's infirmary. She volunteered to join a transport of children to Auschwitz in November 1944, where she, her son Tommy, and all the children with her were murdered in the gas chambers immediately on arrival.

Czech composer Rafael Schächter

 

The conductor Rafael Schächter was among those held at the camp, and he formed an adult chorus. He directed it in a performance of the massive and complex Requiem by Giuseppe Verdi. Schächter conducted 15 more performances of the work before he was deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau.[21]

 

Violinist Julius Stwertka, a former leading member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and co-leader of the Vienna Philharmonic, died in the camp on December 17, 1942.

 

The pianist Alice Herz-Sommer performed 100 concerts while imprisoned at Theresienstadt. She and Edith Steiner-Kraus, her friend and colleague, both survived the camp, emigrated to Israel after the war, and became professors of music, Herz-Sommer at the Jerusalem Academy of Music, and Steiner-Kraus at the Tel Aviv Academy of Music.[22] In March 2012, a biography of Herz-Sommer was published.[23] At the time of her death in London in February 2014, at 110, she was the oldest known Holocaust survivor.[24]

 

Martin Roman and Coco Schumann were part of the jazz band Ghetto Swingers.

 

Artist and art teacher Friedl Dicker-Brandeis created drawing classes for children in the ghetto, among whom were Hana Brady ("Hana's suitcase"). They produced more than 4,000 drawings, which she hid in two suitcases before she was deported to Auschwitz in the final liquidation. The collection was preserved from destruction, and was discovered a decade later. Most of these drawings can now be seen at The Jewish Museum in Prague, whose archive of the Holocaust section administers the Terezín Archive Collection. Others are on display at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem.

 

The children of the camp also wrote stories and poems. Some were preserved and later published in a collection called I Never Saw Another Butterfly, its title taken from a poem by young Jewish Czech poet Pavel Friedman. He had arrived at Terezín on April 26, 1942, and later died at Auschwitz.

 

Painter Malva Schalek (Malvina Schalkova) was deported to Theresienstadt in February 1942. She produced more than 100 drawings and watercolours portraying life in the camp. On May 18, 1944, because of her refusal to paint the portrait of a collaborationist doctor, she was deported to Auschwitz, where she was killed.[25]

 

The artist and architect Norbert Troller produced drawings and watercolours of life inside Theresienstadt, to be smuggled to the outside world. When the Gestapo found out, he was arrested and deported to Auschwitz. His memoirs and two dozen of his artworks were published in 1991.[26]

 

The composer Viktor Ullmann was interned in September 1942, and died at Auschwitz in October 1944. He composed some twenty works at Theresienstadt, including the one-act opera Der Kaiser von Atlantis (The Emperor of Atlantis or The Refusal of Death). It was planned for performance at the camp, but the Nazis withdrew permission when it was in rehearsal, probably because the authorities perceived its allegorical intent. The opera was first performed in 1975, and shown in full on BBC television in Britain. It continues to be performed.

 

Music composed by inmates is featured in Terezín: The Music 1941–44, a two-CD set released in 1991.[27][28] The collection features music composed mostly in 1943 and 1944 by Pavel Haas, Gideon Klein, Hans Krása, and Viktor Ullmann while interned at Theresienstadt. Haas, Krása, and Ullmann died in Auschwitz concentration camp in 1944, and Klein died in Fürstengrube in 1945.[29]

 

In 2007, the album Terezín – Theresienstadt of music composed at Theresienstadt was released by the Swedish singer Anne Sofie von Otter, assisted by baritone Christian Gerhaher, pianists, and chamber musicians. In 2008, Bridge Records released a recital by Austrian baritone Wolfgang Holzmair and American pianist Russell Ryan that drew on a different selection of songs.

Use as propaganda tool

Cell

Main article: Theresienstadt (film)

 

Late in the war, after D-Day and the invasion of Normandy, the Nazis permitted representatives from the Danish Red Cross and the International Red Cross to visit Theresienstadt in order to dispel rumours about the extermination camps. The commission that visited on June 23, 1944, included E. Juel-Henningsen, the head physician at the Danish Ministry of Health, and Franz Hvass, the top civil servant at the Danish Foreign Ministry. Dr. Paul Eppstein was instructed by the SS to appear in the role of the mayor of Theresienstadt.[30]

 

Weeks of preparation preceded the visit. The area was cleaned up, and the Nazis deported many Jews to Auschwitz to minimise the appearance of overcrowding in Theresienstadt. Also deported in these actions were most of the Czechoslovak workers assigned to "Operation Embellishment". The Nazis directed the building of fake shops and cafés to imply that the Jews lived in relative comfort.

 

The Danes whom the Red Cross visited lived in freshly painted rooms, not more than three in a room. Rooms viewed may have included the homes of the "prominent" Jews of Theresienstadt, who were afforded the special privilege of having as few as two occupants to a room.[15] The guests attended a performance of a children's opera, Brundibár, which was written by inmate Hans Krása.

 

The Red Cross representatives were conducted on a tour following a predetermined path designated by a red line on a map. The representatives apparently did not attempt to divert from the tour route on which they were led by the Germans, who posed questions to the Jewish residents along the way. If the representatives asked residents questions directly, they were ignored, in accordance with the Germans' instructions to the residents prior to the tour. Despite this, the Red Cross apparently formed a positive impression of the town.[15]

 

Following the successful use of Theresienstadt as a supposed model internment camp during the Red Cross visit, the Nazis decided to make a propaganda film there. It was directed by Jewish prisoner Kurt Gerron, an experienced director and actor; he had appeared with Marlene Dietrich in The Blue Angel. Shooting took eleven days, starting September 1, 1944.[31] After the film was completed, the director and most of the cast were deported to Auschwitz. Gerron was murdered by gas chamber on October 28, 1944.[32]

 

The film was intended to show how well the Jews were living under the purportedly benevolent protection of the Third Reich. If taken at face value, it documents the Jews of Theresienstadt living a relatively comfortable existence within a thriving cultural centre and functioning successfully during the hardships of World War II. They had to comply and perform according to Nazi orders. Often called The Führer Gives a Village to the Jews, the correct name of the film is Theresienstadt. Ein Dokumentarfilm aus dem jüdischen Siedlungsgebiet ("Terezin: A Documentary Film of the Jewish Resettlement").[a] As the film was not completed until near the end of the war, it was never distributed as intended, although a few screenings were held. Most of the film was destroyed, but some footage has survived.

Statistics

10 Kronen bill shown to the Red Cross committee. Ex-inmates of Theresienstadt have described how they each received 50 crowns every month with which to buy things.[33] Residents working at the camp were also paid in this currency,[15] a form of truck system.

 

Approximately 144,000 Jews were sent to Theresienstadt. Most inmates were Czech Jews, but 40,000 were from Germany, 15,000 from Austria, 5,000 from the Netherlands, and 300 from Luxembourg. In addition to the group of approximately 500 Jews from Denmark, Slovak and Hungarian Jews were deported to the ghetto. 1,600 Jewish children from Białystok, Poland, were deported from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz; none survived. About a quarter of the inmates (33,000) died in Theresienstadt, mostly because of the deadly conditions, which included hunger, stress, and disease. The typhus epidemic at the very end of war took an especially heavy toll.

 

About 88,000 prisoners were deported to Auschwitz and other extermination camps, including Treblinka. At the end of the war, 17,247 had survived. An estimated 15,000 children lived in the ghetto. Willy Groag, one of the youth care workers, mistakenly claimed after the war that only 93 survived.[34]

Allied POWs

 

During the war, Allied POWs who repeatedly attempted to escape from POW camps were sent to Theresienstadt as punishment. 21 British, 21 New Zealand, and 17 Australian POWs were held there.[35] Keeping POWs from signatory countries of the Geneva Convention in such camp conditions was a war crime. Many of the survivors suffered chronic physical and mental health problems for most of their lives.[35]

 

In 1964, Germany paid the British government £1 million as reparation for the illegal transfer of British POWs to Theresienstadt.[35] Britain made no provision for dominion troops. For many years, the governments of Australia and New Zealand denied that any of their servicemen had been held at the camp. In 1987, Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke established a committee of investigation. It confirmed that POWs were held at Theresienstadt. The government then authorised payments of A$10,000 each to the Australian survivors of the camp. The New Zealand government also arranged for compensation for the New Zealand survivors.[35]

Execution