The Spanking Writers

I’ve just discovered a rather remarkable account of “A visit to a prison in Siberia”, at the “Eros-Thanatos library”. Written by John Villiot in a volume entitled “Curiosities and Trivia on Flogging”, it purports to be “A copy of a letter written by a young English doctor, traveling in Siberia” in 1880 – although whether it’s genuine (or far more likely a work of Victorian spanking erotica), I can’t say for sure.

The full article‘s about 13 pages long, so the following extracts will have to suffice to whet your appetites. (The online version is in French – but Google Translate does a pretty wonderful job, and I’ve tweaked the output a little for readability).

The author claims to have met the governor and staff of the local jail, and the establishment’s doctor (Lazareff) extended a generous invitation:

You’ve seen all the arrangements of the prison, and you should see how we punish women resistant to discipline.  You have to stay in Tomsk at least six more days, and before your departure, it’s likely that  a flogging  will be ordered. Would you like to attend?

Our correspondent explains that “I was not exactly eager to see a woman whipped, but I thought that since I was on the scene, it was good that I take this opportunity to see everything that was related to the prison system in Russia.” Indeed.

Three days later…

Read the rest of this entry »

I want to go to Denmark.

Actually, strike that – I don’t.   I’ve travelled to far too many countries as it so far in 2010 – 15 at the last count – to want to head anywhere I don’t have to. But nonetheless, the Danish tourist board does make the place sound rather interesting:

As late as in the 19th century the whipping post was of great importance in the urban life of many towns in Northern Europe. The post was placed on a brick-built rise, and chained to it the offenders were whipped by the executioner. Simultaneously the victim lost his civil rights and had to leave the municipality.

Minor violations of the law often led to public whippings. In 1813 a shoemaker’s apprentice was caught in stealing apples. He was sentenced to public whipping and to be put in stocks. But on thisoccasion justice was tempered with mercy. The judgment was reversed. The apprentice was sentenced to three days’ imprisonment and put on bread and water. So he was allowed to serve his apprenticeship.

It turned out differently for a young girl who in 1865 had committed a minor theft. She was whipped and put in stocks and was expelled from the municipality.

As a reminder to observe the law a statue carved out of wood was often placed on the top of the whipping post, a so called ‘whipping post-man’. Toender got its last ‘whipping post-man’ in 1699. 8 men and 6 horses dragged a log of oak up to town, and the wood-carver carved a soldier-like figure.

It is unknown how many years the figure was placed in the market place. Today the original figure – the only remaining whipping post figure in Denmark – is exhibited at Toender museum – a valuable souvenir of the legal system in the past.

I’m picturing the display now – the ancient figure (known locally as the Kagmanden) presumably overlooking a mock-up of the village square, complete with reproduction whipping post and hourly re-enactments of the fate of the poor thieving girl. And as for what they must sell in the museum’s souvenir shop… Any Danish readers (we must surely have some?!) are kindly requested to investigate and report back!

Does anyone out there ever visit the Welsh town of Brecon? Well, if you do, here’s a story from the Powys county archives that I bet you won’t be able to forget the next time you’re there. It’s from the ‘Order Book’ of the Breconshire “Quarter Sessions” held in midsummer 1725:

It’s quite hard to decipher the hand-writing, so here goes with a transcription:

“Margaret Luke being indicted at this Sessions for ye felonious stealing of one Bodice of ye Goods of Walter Davies and upon her Tryall Convicted of ye said offence It is by this Court ordered that she be stript from ye waist upward and publickly whipt tomorrow Morning between ye hours of eleven and twelve from ye East Gate to ye West Gate in ye Town of Brecon.”

So, here’s the question: how far is it from ye east to ye west gate in Brecon?   And what sights would you take in on a modern-day walk from on to t’other?!

A quite wonderful column appeared in the New York Times back in May 1899, headlined: “VIRGINIA PEOPLE SLANDERED.; An Imaginary Picture of the Flogging of a Girl Published by a French Journal.”.

The story reports that a top French paper had published an illustration – sadly not reproduced – of a sheriff flogging an eighteen-year-old girl with a whip, whilst she was tied to the stocks in the main square of a Virginia town.

“The chastisement is witnessed with apparent enjoyment” by the bystanders, the journalist reports. (Surely not?!)

What makes the story all the more interesting is that it’s entirely fabricated: it’s claim that the Virginia state assembly had “voted a law permitting the application of corporal chastisement in public” was simply not true, and floggings weren’t legal in the state at the time! Still, it makes for an interesting diversion…

Marxist writers have cropped up here before as sources of spanking references, and here’s one from the man himself. I’m not entirely sure that, when Karl and his friend Engels were writing, appealing to the kinky community 150 or so years later was really their key goal. But I rather liked this, first published: in Die Presse, June 20, 1862.

Humanity in England, like liberty in France, has now become an export article for the traders in politics.

We recollect the time when Tsar Nicholas had Polish ladies flogged by soldiers and when Lord Palmerston found the moral indignation of some parliamentarians over the event “impolitic”.

We recollect that about a decade ago a revolt took place on the Ionian Islands… which gave the English governor there occasion to have a fairly considerable number of Grecian women flogged. Probatum est, said Palmerston and his Whig colleagues who at that time were in office.

Flogging Polish girls is clearly a good thing. (Hi, Kami!). As for the women in Greece: I’m curious as to how many constitute “a fairly considerable number”. Are we talking four rabble-rousers brought to the governor’s office and held down over a table for a birching, or a hundred stripped and whipped in the market place? Typical Marx: fascinating writing, but so deeply flawed.

So I’m happily browsing the web, and I discover an article from the learned “Encyclopaedia Britannica” about corporal punishment:

By the common law of England, Scotland and Ireland, the infliction of corporal punishment is illegal unless it is done in self-defence or in defence of others, or is done either by some person having punitive authority over the person chastised or under the authority of a competent court of justice…

Among persons invested with punitive authority, mention must first be made of parents and guardians, and of teachers, who have, by implied delegation from the parents, and as incidental to the relation of master and pupil, powers of reasonable corporal punishment. Such powers are not limited to offences committed by the pupil upon the premises of the school, but extend to acts done on the way to and from school and during what may be properly regarded as school hours (Cleary v. Booth, 1893, I Q.B. 465)…

A master has a right to inflict moderate chastisement upon his apprentice for neglect or other misbehaviour… At common law the master of a ship is entitled to inflict reasonable chastisement on a seaman for gross breach of duty…

In civil prisons, whether they are convict prisons or local prisons, corporal punishment may not be inflicted except under sentence of a competent court, or except in the case of prisoners under sentence of penal servitude, or convicted of felony, or sentenced to hard labour, who have been guilty of mutiny or incitement to mutiny, or of gross personal violence to an officer or servant of the prison (Act of 1898, § 5). Flogging for these offences in prison may not be inflicted except by order of the board of visitors or visiting committee of the prison, made at a meeting specially constituted, and confirmed by a secretary of state…

The mode of inflicting the punishment is prescribed by the Convict Prison Rules (rr. 82-85) and the Local Prison Rules (rr. 88-91), which limit the number of strokes and prescribe the instrument to be used for inflicting them, the cat or birch for prisoners over 18, and the birch for prisoners under 18.

I nearly choked on my coffee, until I looked more closely and found that this was the 1911 edition of Britannica, and not its contemporary counterpart. But I do love the section on civil prisons – the concept of a scene involving a girl brought before the board of visitors sounds oh-so appealing!

I had the pleasure of meeting the lovely Nicky Montford recently, when I went to meet Emma Jane at the end of the amazing judicial scene that’s been much-discussed lately. Nicky’s just launched her own blog, called Thursday’s Child – after a children’s book by Noel Streatfield set in a strict orphanage.

Amongst her excellent early posts is one offering her perspectives of those judicial birchings. In it, she made an interesting reference as she described how pleas that “corporal punishment by the court was contrary to the 1820 Whipping of Female Offenders Abolition Act” fell on deaf ears.

Now *that* is piece of legislation that begs to be Googled. Lo and behold, Hansard – the official UK parliamentary record – comes up trumps with details of the original debate in the House of Commons from 29 June 1820:

FEMALE OFFENDERS WHIPPING BILL.

Mr. Chetwynd rose to move for leave to bring in a bill to abolish the punishment of Whipping Female Offenders in any case whatever. The House was aware, that by an act of the year 1817, the system of public whipping of females had been wholly exploded; but he was surprised that the private whipping of females had been by that measure permitted to continue, looking on it as he did as objectionable, or even more objectionable than the other.

It might be said, in defence of its continuance, that it was necessary for the sake of example; but, on the other hand, as the infliction of the punishment was private, it was in the power of the gaoler or other superintendant to render it the most excruciating torture possible, or a mere matter of form; and this alone he thought a decided objection to it.

With respect to the public whipping of females, he was of opinion that no exhibition could be more revolting to the feelings. The act to which he had alluded only abolished the punishment of the public whipping of females; but if the House would agree with him, they would go much further. His intention was to move for leave to bring in a bill to repeal that act, and substitute other provisions for the more effectual prevention of the whipping of females; and the object of it would be to prohibit that practice, not only in the cases already provided for, but in workhouses, houses of correction, lunatic asylums, and other places for the reception of lunatics.

If, therefore, the House should be of opinion that it should in no case be permitted, he should humbly move for leave to bring in a bill to abolish the punishment of whipping female offenders in any case whatever.

Leave was given, and the bill was brought in and read a first time.

I confess to being slightly disappointed that the motion appears to have passed unopposed. Where were the advocates of flogging, with their lurid tales of whippings galore? Could punished girls not have recounted their experiences before some committee or other? Might options not have been explored (“I agree that the lash is too severe – but the cane might be deployed to good effect instead” – “Hear, hear; jolly good, sir!”).

Still, I have marked a date in my diary – for 29 June 2020 isn’t all that far away. What are we all going to do to mark the bicentenary of the debate? Surely the simultaneous recreation of countless private floggings in houses of correction must be called for?

Always erudite. I’ve recently been reading Alfred Church’s 1883 volume “Roman life in the days of Cicero”. (OK, OK, I was idly searching for references to canes on Google books, but I can at least pretend to be learned…). It provides an interesting little section linking our activities back to more ancient times:

The third choice of the famous Winchester line, “Either learn, or go: there is yet another choice–to be flogged,” was liberally employed. Horace celebrates his old schoolmaster as a “man of many blows,” and another distinguished pupil of this teacher, the Busby or Keate of antiquity, has specified the weapons which he employed, the ferule and the thong.

The thong is the familiar “tawse” of schools north of the Border. The ferule was a name given both to the bamboo and to the yellow cane, which grew plentifully both in the islands of the Greek Archipelago and in Southern Italy, as notably at Cannae in Apulia, where it gave a name to the scene of the great battle. The virga was also used, a rod commonly of birch, a tree the educational use of which had been already discovered. The walls of Pompeii indeed show that the practice of Eton is truly classical down to its details.

As to the advantage of the practice opinions were divided. One enthusiastic advocate goes so far as to say that the Greek word for a cane signifies by derivation, “the sharpener of the young” (narthex, nearous thegein), but the best authorities were against it.

The diary of Anna Green Winslow, “A Boston schoolgirl of 1771″, popped up whilst I was browsing Project Gutenberg recently. It contains an interesting little anecdote for those who are fascinated by accounts of historical thrashings:

Dear mamma,

I suppose that you would be glad to hear that Betty Smith who has given you so much trouble, is well & behaves herself well & I should be glad if I could write you so.

But the truth is, no sooner was the 29th Regiment encamp’d upon the common but miss Betty took herself among them (as the Irish say) & there she stay’d with Bill Pinchion & awhile.

The next news of her was, that she was got into gaol for stealing: from whence she was taken to the publick whipping post.

The annotated edition of the book provides some historical context in a footnote:

The large whipping-post painted red stood conspicuously and prominently in the most public street in the town. It was placed in State Street directly under the windows of a great writing school which I frequented, and from them the scholars were indulged in the spectacle of all kinds of punishment suited to harden their hearts and brutalize their feelings.

Here women were taken in a huge cage, in which they were dragged on wheels from prison, and tied to the post with bare backs on which thirty or forty lashes were bestowed…

Oh, those poor scholars, having to watch from the windows at the floggings below! (If ever there was an incentive that could have persuaded me to enroll in a writing school, this would surely have been it!)

Oh, how delightful! A story at Google Books of a young lady passing herself off as a boy to join the army in times gone by – and suffering the consequences of her misbehaviour.

‘A Mirror for Ruffians’, by Philip Lindsay, tells the tale:

And there was Hannah Snell, the eighteenth centruy soldier who shouldered a musket at Pondicherry; Hannah is a delightful case, she was such an obvious liar, and apart from those tales proved mendacious, I rather doubt her boast of having been twice flogged.

Her biographer explains that her bosom was exceptionally small and that she tied a long handkerchief around her neck… Nevertheless, flogging was unbelievably brutal punishment, and even the most powerful man inevitably jerked some cry between his clenched teeth at the first swing of the knotted cat; Hannah must have been amazingly tough to withstand this.

So: who’s up for a scene?!