In the fourth of his blogs Jim Butler gives a behind-the-scenes account of the build-up to our new major York Castle Prison exhibition.
We knew from the outset of this project that by unearthing the Prison’s history we would encounter troubling and emotive issues.
Perhaps one of the most disturbing accounts we discovered was the tragic tale of Martha Chapel, a teenager who killed her newborn baby and was hanged for murder six weeks later. Martha was a servant girl, described as industrious and good-tempered, who was 18 or 19 when she fell pregnant while unmarried in 1802. The identity of the father was never discovered, though some claimed it was her employer. Whoever it was, the court established that she had no reputation as a ‘loose woman.’Martha took a new job about three or four months before the baby was due which meant she could not have looked pregnant or she would not have been employed . She told no-one she was pregnant and may not have known herself.
Complaining of being ill and in pain she gave birth, alone, on June 15, 1803 and the baby, a girl, was found dead shortly afterwards. A doctor said Martha must have killed the baby with her own hands. Martha defended herself, saying she was rendered delirious with pain and, having never given birth and with no idea what was happening, mangled the child whilst trying to hasten the delivery
A jury took just ten minutes to find her guilty and Martha, of Ackworth, near Wakefield, was hanged at the ‘new drop’ – the large white doors on the Castle car park side of the museum building - on August 1, 1803. Her body was dissected by surgeons and it is unlikely she ever had a grave. Martha was quoted at trial. ‘I am a wretched woman, it was my child. I never meant it harm…I loved my child before I saw it.’Within 30 years her conviction was being questioned as unsound as attitudes to new mothers and illegitimate birth very, very slowly began to change. It wasn’t until 1922 that the crime of infanticide was created, which meant a new mother couldn’t be put to death. The act recognised that a mother might suffer derangement as a result of childbirth.This tragic tale tells us too much not to be mentioned at all but we won’t have an actor recounting the story like the others. Some of the details, particularly surrounding the body of the baby, are just too shocking for an area accessible by very young children. Instead it is likely that Martha’s story will form part of a designated learning programme where the sensitive issues raised can be more thoroughly and appropriately explored.
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