ExEcution of Bathsheba Spooner

 

 On this day ~ 2nd July 1778 
.

 ExEcution of Bathsheba Spooner 

.
 On 2nd July 1778, an intelligent and high-spirited beauty from Brookfield, became the first woman in American history to be eXecuted following the Declaration of Independence.

The 32-year-old’s crime was indeed horrific.
She had arranged for the cold-blooded murder of her husband with a sixteen year old boy, who fell under her spell....

 The daughter of a prominent Loyalist brigadier general Timothy Ruggles, Bathsheba had an arranged marriage to wealthy farmer Joshua Spooner.

The marriage took place on 15th January 1766.

The Spooners lived in relative comfort in a two-story house in Brookfield, and had four children between 1767 and 1775.

Spooner was later described as an abusive man, for whom his wife had developed utter hatred.

 In the spring of 1777, sixteen-year-old Ezra Ross, a soldier in the Continental Army, fell ill en route to his home.

Bathsheba nursed him back to health.
She took him into her home - and into her bed.

They soon began a passionate affair, and Bathsheba found herself pregnant.

She was locked in a loveless marriage to Joshua Spooner, and pregnant with her fifth child.

 It would not take long for people to connect her pregnancy with the sixteen year old Continental she had nursed.

Bathsheba’s pregnancy threatened to reveal her unfaithfulness.

With disaster looming, she hatched a plan.
It was then she began urging Ezra Ross to kill her husband.

 On the night of 1st March 1778, Bathsheba's husband was beaten to death, and his body hidden in a well.

Bathsheba and her lover Ezra, were soon arrested, tried, and convicted of Joshua Spooner's murder.
They were sentenced to death.

At the trial on 24th April 1778, Ezra Ross signed a confession :

"I had no intention of harming the deceased, i was
not aware of the plan until a few hours before the
murder.

I did not assist in the murder and pretended to
support it, to maintain my affair with Bathsheba".

He argued that Bathsheba had a disordered mind, and that her actions were irrational.

 With the exEcutions set for 4th June 1778, Bathsheba petitioned to have her exEcution delayed, because of her pregnancy.

Bathsheba was examined by a panel of twelve women and two male midwives.

All swore that she was not "quick with child."

 When Bathsheba contested the report, a second examination was conducted, confirming the claim of pregnancy.
However, the court did not accept the secondary findings.

Thirty-two year old Bathsheba was hanged alongside Ezra Ross, on 2nd July 1778, in Worcester's Washington Square.

A crowd of 5,000 spectators had gathered to see the murderess and her lover hanged.

 A postmortem examination revealed that Bathsheba was indeed five months pregnant, with a male foetus.

Bathsheba's body was claimed by her sister Mary, and was buried in an unmarked grave on her sister's Green Estate.

To this day, the burial site of Bathsheba and her unborn son has never been located.
It remains Worcester County’s favourite mystery....

The Tudor Intruders (and more)

.
 Sources - historicipswich/the-hanging-of-bathsheba-spooner.
wiki/Bathsheba_Spooner
.
 Bathsheba Spooner at her hanging.
Picture Courtesy of Historic Ipswich