York Museums Trust Blog

In his second blog about the build-up to our forthcoming York Castle Prison exhibition, Jim Butler, Learning Manager, tells the tale of the last woman in Yorkshire to be burned at the stake.

Elizabeth Boardingham, a victim of her time and a ‘must’ character for our Prison exhibition. Although tragic by today’s standards, Elizabeth’s story reveals much about the appallingly unfair position of women in the highly patriarchal society of 18th Century England.  But by no means was she a shrinking violet.  In fact, aside from the manner of her death, it was her strength and determination in the final days of her life that made her irresistible to us.

Elizabeth, from Flamborough in the East Riding of Yorkshire, was married with five children and in her early 30s when her husband, John, was sent to York gaol for smuggling in 1775. 

                                                 Murder! Murder!
Soon after she ran off with one Thomas Aikney who, late one night following her husband’s release, stabbed John twice before running off. John staggered into the street, pulled out the knife, and cried ‘murder! murder!’ before collapsing, quite dead.  Aikney was caught and later convicted of murder but blamed Elizabeth for pestering him to do it. Here’s the thing: Despite denying Aikney’s allegations and the fact there was very little evidence to support her role in the attack, Elizabeth was not just convicted of murder, but of the much worse crime of ‘petty treason’ – a crime in which the perpetrator was thought to have subverted the natural hierarchy of society, eg a servant killing a master, or a woman her husband. It was punishable by the worst means allowable, public burning at the stake. Of course the actual murderer, a man, was simply hung while his lover burned.So poor Elizabeth Boardingham, victim of her time, was let down by a feckless husband, her lover and a male-dominated society who decreed that her crime as worse than actual murder. All this simply because she was a woman. From the 17th July, Elizabeth will be one of 8 characters brought to life by actors and projected into the cells where some spent their final days.  Of course the character the public are most interested is always Richard (Dick) Turpin who I discussed in my first blog.  But actually it’s the stories of other former Castle inmates, like Elizabeth, that will really bring home the (in)justices of life in the 18th Century.The £200,000 York Castle Prison exhibition opens on July 17 at York Castle Museum (the former 18th century county gaol on the site of the Medieval castle).