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Murderers and murder ballads: Dr Pritchard, Burke and Hare,...

Date 15 October 1952
Track ID 48870
Part 1

Track Information

Original Track ID

SA1952.31.A3

Original Tape ID

SA1952.031

Summary

Murderers and murder ballads: Dr Pritchard, Burke and Hare, Kate Humphrey.

Charlie Peace could change his features and make himself look like a woman. He was hanged about 60 years previously, but there seem to be no songs about him. Dr Pritchard, who poisoned his wife, was hanged in Edinburgh c. 1825; there was a ballad about him to the tune of 'Tramps and Hawkers'. He wanted to be smart for his public hanging. Jimmy MacBeath quotes lines from 'Up the Close and Doon the Stair' about Burke and Hare. The last public execution in Aberdeen was of Kate Humphrey, in the Castlegate, c. 1810, for the murder of her husband. Jimmy gives graphic details of the event, which was witnessed by his grandfather.

Item Notes

Kate Humphrey was actually the last woman, not the last person, to be publicly hanged in Aberdeen, in 1830. Dr Pritchard was hanged in Glasgow, in 1865.

See:
'Blood and Granite: True Crime from Aberdeen' (Norman Adams, 2008)

Item Subject/Person

Humphrey, Kate; Burke, William; Hare, William; Pritchard, Dr Edward; Peace, Charlie

Language

English, Scots

Collection

SoSS

Classification

R2507 R4805

Source Type

Reel to reel

Audio Quality

Good