Broadside entitled 'Public Whipping'

Transcription

Public Whipping.

An Account of the Public Whipping of JOHN KEAN, on
Wednesday, the llth of May,   1825, for   Laiming and
Wounding,with intent to Murder, JOHN GRAHAM,
Cotton Spinner in Barrowfield Road, on the 30th March
last, and who is to be transported for life.

GLASGOW, 11th May, 1825.

This day, a new plan of punishment was exhibited in this city, and which, we
presume would answer the purpose better on every, occasion when this degrading
punishment is required to Be inflicted; we mean, a public scaffold erected in front
of the jail, where the prisoner is placed to the view of every person who has feel-
ings strong enough to witness the," cat o' nine tails" applied to the back of him
who has injured the laws of his country, without causing that tumult and uproar
on the public streets, winch has been too often witnessed.

But we believe, it was not merely for the tranquillity of the public streets this
new plan was adopted, but to convince the mind of every beholder, the narrow
escape he had made from a scaffold, far more dreadful, and on which death would
have been the issue. The law of Scotland, however, does not extend so for, for
cases like the present; but, if practices, such as these, are persevered in, the law
which at present exists may be changed, and Lord Ellenborough's Act extended
to Scotland, which punishes with death all offences of a like kind.

The prisoner, who this day suffered the lashes of the public executioner, was
found Guilty of feloniously and maliciously discharging a pistol or more pistols,
with intent to murder John Graham, cotton-spinner, Barrowfield Road, whereby
the said person was severely and desperately wounded in the back, to the great-
effusion of his blood, and the imminent danger of his life, aggravated by using
such means, of deterring others from following their lawful employment in safety.

For this offence, Kean, about 12 o'clock this day, appeared on the new scaffold,
and being tied up, and his back uncovered, received the lashes of the public exe-
cutioner,which were pretty smart, as could.be distinguished from the shrugging
of the prisoner ; they amounted to between 80 and 90. Sympathy seemed to be
excited by some, but the general conversation was, " he deserved all, as the poor
man whom he had wounded would be an object for life." After undergoing this
punishment, he was remitted back to prison, where a surgeon was in attendance
to afford him every aid, and where he will remain till such time as a vessel arrives,
when he will be conveyed, along with his fellow prisoners to Leith, and sent away
to some foreign country, never more to see his native shore.

An example, such as this, should operate as a warning to all, to keep from crime
of such a cowardly and dastardly nature; to way-lay a man, shoot at and wound
him, tor striving to gain an honest livelihood for himself and family, cannot be
called by aay name but cowardly; if he had not accepted the work offered him,
some other person would, for self preservation is the first law of nature. Cases
of one man filling the place of another, occur daily in manufactories and among
trades of all descriptions, and were all who have lost their places to way-lay, fire
at, and wound those who fill them, thousands in Glasgow and its neighbourhood
would either be killed or made cripples for life.    We hope, for the honour of this
country, this outrage will be the last.

By this tranaction, 2 families have lost their support; Graham is now unable to
maintain his and Kean is deprived of it; for the latter's conduct, surely the fami-
lies of either should not want.

W. Carse, Printer, Glasgow,

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