1800-1859 | Executions | India

10 SEPTEMBER

ByAlisdare Hickson

BRITISH MAJOR RECOUNTS WITH PRIDE HIS EXTRA-JUDICIAL HANGINGS

Two suspect rebels hung at Lucknow in 1857 –
Felice Beato – Albumen silver print – via Wikimedia.

[ 10 September 1857 ]

On 10 September 1857, during the suppression of the ‘Indian Mutiny’, The Globe newspaper carried a report by Major MacDonald, commanding the third irregular cavalry, in which he proudly recounted how he carried out executions of suspect rebels without any legal authorization. As he put it

‘I took on my own shoulders of hanging them first, and asking leave to do so afterwards,’ adding that ‘two of the culprits were paralysed with fear and astonishment, never dreaming that I would dare to hang them without an order from government.’1

FOOTNOTE

  1. ‘India,’ The Globe, 10 September 1857 p. 4.

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