The Secrets of London’s Grisly Execution Sites

'The Secrets of London’s Grisly Execution Sites'
London is one of the most historic cities in the world, which means, it’s been home to some of the most famous executions in history. For the most minor crimes - cutting down trees, damaging Westminster Bridge, stealing from a rabbit warren or impersonating a Chelsea Pensioner - to more serious - murder, arson, robbery and treason - all of these could result in a journey to the gallows.
In this video, Alice Loxton visits some of London’s most famous execution sites, many of which are hidden in plain site, from Newgate Prison to Wapping Execution Dock - famous for hosting executions of some of the most infamous pirates in history. We hope you’re made of stern stuff, for this is not for the faint hearted!
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00:00 London's Execution Sites
00:28 Smithfield
01:42 Tyburn
02:43 Newgate Prison
03:57 Wapping Execution Dock
05:14 Tower of London
06:30 Lincoln's Inn Fields
07:17 Palace of Westminster (Old Palace Yard)
07:47 Kennington Park
#historyhit #aliceloxton #executionsites #londonhistory

[@davewilson9738]

A bandstand where the gallows once stood, one form of entertainment for another! Brilliant as always Ms Loxton - thank you!

[@durthacht]

Excellent video, and another fabulous presenter. I hope Alice presents more History Hit content.

[@diaroses3146]

I agree. She's fabulous...

[@HarcusCGTV]

@@diaroses3146 she horrendous... who talks like that?

[@popeye5989]

On the plaque at tower Hill it mentions the Jacobite "lord lovat". His execution was soo popular at the time that people came all over to watch, so many that a series of stands where built to give more people a view. However as lovat was about to be executed the stands collapsed, killing quite a few spectators, Lovat found this so funny that he was still laughing when the Axe fell- giving us the term "laughing your head of"

[@eileenlocke9397]

Funny but sad to

[@benberry2679]

Genuinely helps my mental health this channel! Keep them coming

[@williamfitch1408]

The term 'on the wagon' if you're off the drink (alcohol) comes from the era of executions at Tyburn Cross. At St Giles's Circus, en route from Newgate Gaol, the wagon carrying the condemned would stop, and they would be offered the opportunity of having a last drink. If they weren't inclined, they stayed on the wagon.

[@johnhehir508]

The Angel tavern on st Giles high Street is still there

[@williamfitch1408]

@@johnhehir508Cheers, John. I've drank there several times, but never realised.

[@johnhehir508]

@@williamfitch1408 though it's on the original site ,The Angel pub has been rebuilt

[@ohenekojo2561]

Incorrect.

[@eileenlocke9397]

Interesting thank u 🙏

[@havingalook2]

Alice, once again - brilliant. You are a treat to watch and certainly learn from.

[@keironastbury9399]

So good to see you back on youtube Alice always love watching you.

[@tooyoungtobeold8756]

Excellent, thank you. Nice graphics, brings it back to life - so to speak.

[@lvsarmy2012]

Interesting and educational, thank you Alice, excellent as always!

[@rogercude1459]

About time we brought them back into Service.

[@skeletor6789]

I loved every minute of it. Very educational thank you

[@krissmgvlogs]

I used to visit Lincolns Inn Field often to eat my lunch when I worked on The Strand. Would often admire that bandstand. Ewwww, how grisly!

[@ismarwinkelman5648]

Another great video on such an interesting subject! 👏🙂

[@rodeastell3615]

Great video ... thank you Alice.

[@azariahisrael5632]

My 12th great grandfather Rev. JJohn Rogers was the 1st Protestant burnt by Bloody Mary at Smithfield.

[@dc-gb2zx]

My 8th cousins uncles cats sisters neighbour was the 10065 turnip to be hung drawn and grated at that site too

[@jakecavendish3470]

My 8th great gradmother was a lady of the night and also the Queen of Belgium. They called her the Chocolate Bar because she was Belgian, cheap, but with a hint of glamour

[@sawahtb]

@@jakecavendish3470 that made me snort/laugh

[@mohammedsaysrashid3587]

Another wonderful historical coverage video about notoriously executive sites in London...(history Hit) always sharing excellent subjects 8:26

[@barryballinger5912]

Brilliant video excellent narration thank you x

[@sjqnes9984]

Alice, you always make my day

[@lesroberts3226]

Really enjoyed this video. 👍 thank you.

[@54mgtf22]

Hi Alice. Love your work 👍

[@peterosborne9101]

Your video are great love watching them keep them coming

[@MA-wo5gy]

Alice is brilliant ! More Alice please💚

[@theemporersnewclothes]

Alice is a great presenter!

[@TheMisterB2u]

Informative and liked the superimposed pieces ,which showed how it would have looked at that time in history!

[@simonkevnorris]

Thanks for the interesting and informative video.

[@AndersRingman]

A new and great video with Alice, always as fun and educational to watch.

[@davidcreager1945]

Great episode ! Surprising these sites survived so many years , and weren't developed.

[@pipwilson777]

Brilliant delivery ❤

[@gustavbrinkel5489]

Great video, learned a lot.

[@nextman53]

Really enjoyed this great video.

[@balancedactguy]

Bravo Alice...Excellent presentation!

[@jfilho1966]

Loved your video!

[@dustykeleher]

Great video!

[@Kimmy-pw8tm]

Alice, Dan Snow, Lucy, Robinson are amongst my favorite historians.

[@huibertlandzaat1889]

You made a interesting video. Thank you for uploading.

[@richardevppro3980]

I had no idea about a few of these tragic and probably well-haunted places, Thank you.

[@ImWithBigRed]

Not sure if it’s right to “like” this video but I did. Well done Alice and the team. Very educational.

[@cplcabs]

Well, why not. These people weren’t executed for handing out flowers cups of tea to old ladies.

[@deanmarskell1518]

Hiya Alice fascinating video very interesting and informative ❤️👍

[@tacituskilgore9803]

Really enjoyed that. Wish it had gone on for longer than 8 minutes.

[@brucebartow6229]

Great graphics, they definitely added to the narrative.

[@dalegowing]

An excellent video thank you

[@workingtheworld68]

Excellent presentations and agree with your choice of sensible shoes

[@ricopimento]

Fun Fact: The German equivilent of the Tyburn Jig was the Spandau Ballet.

[@staffiemama]

Brilliant video.

[@MeganElizaStott]

Amazing Alice :)

[@pureblood8427]

Alice is always a treat....

[@mackenziewalsh8750]

I love anything Alice covers! She's so cute and funny I want to be her friend. Very relaxing to watch and she makes me smile. More Alice!

[@robbiecrossing9447]

Yes Alice us a very good presenter . Her narration is impeccable and entertaining

[@ziggyfoos]

Correction... the photo used for the executed spy Josef Jakobs isn't the photo of the right guy. The photo incorrectly shows famed Josef Jacobs the German WW1 ace, who lived well into the 1970s.

[@johnDukemaster]

I wondered about that! The uniform suggests WW1

[@murrayscott9546]

I'm sure he's doing an Immelman Turn in his grave.

[@matthewmckever2312]

😂 wasnt Rudolph Hess shot at the tower later than 1941? I best check.

[@matthewmckever2312]

Ok Hess was only in prison at the tower died at Spandau in the mid 80s. Answering myself here. Didnt Mel Gibson die at Smithfield hmmmm that might be a Mandela effect that only I have.

[@georgepatterson3428]

@@matthewmckever2312Rudolph Hess died in prison in 1987

[@williammitchell9974]

Well Presented Alice 🎉 Very Professional 💯Bravo 🎉

[@anthonystevens8683]

A very informative video HistryHit. Great presentation from Alice as well. As we have seen in history some things move in cycles, I hope the return of death penalty followed by a public execution for entertainment is not one of them.

[@JohnSmith-rw2yn]

In tribute to Mr Filch from Harry Potter 1, "detention used to mean hanging by your thumbs, God I miss the screaming" 😅😅 Good video.

[@Jay-ql4gp]

Thank you!

[@eileenlocke9397]

Thank u Alice

[@vickywitton1008]

I love these videos with Alice but what I envy the most, is that she can walk around these places without a big bag weighing her down like I have to!

[@tezhug1890]

You could divorce him :)

[@soma4u289]

Where have you been all my life ,excellent rendition, you truly are a flower amongst the thorns. Lucky the soul that captured your heart.

[@stvdagger8074]

You omitted the Banqueting House on Whitehall, King Charles was shortened. Also Charing Cross - At the Restoration (1660 or shortly after) eight of the regicides were executed here, including the notable Fifth Monarchist, Colonel Thomas Harrison. Also Pentonville Prison which became an execution site after Newgate closed in 1902. 1902 and 1961 a total of 120 men were executed at Pentonville And HM Prison Wandsworth the site of 135 executions, between 1878 and 1961

[@ray.shoesmith]

Alice is by far my favourite HH presenter tbh

[@emmabrett9417]

Amazing documentary, thank you. I thought Catherine Howard was also beheaded inside the Tower of London too? Xx

[@cherrytraveller5915]

She was

[@zpy-nq7wv]

❤❤❤❤❤ LOVE YOUR STORIES ! ❤❤❤❤❤

[@ivebeenaround58]

I love you Alice Loxton ❤. Such a talented presentor.

[@user-up8jx3mt6j]

If given a choice of attending a play, a concert, a coronation, or some horrible grisly spectacle, - knowing the lauded nature of people in general, - is there any doubt in your mind which would draw eager crowds ?

[@elliegreen4738]

@user-up8Jx Awful to think about, true though and going by most of the comments on videos about the Media psyop case of Lucy Letby, ( aged 33, LL=33, the name of the hospital she allegedly was a nurse in = 33 ), there are plenty of people stupid enough to demand the reintroduction of the death penalty, never guessing that they're being set up and that they're Turkeys demanding Christmas.

[@monicacall7532]

It boggles my mind that an execution was the equivalent to a form of entertainment for the hundreds and thousands of people who attended public executions with family and friends. I’m glad that we’ve evolved beyond that since those times! I honestly can’t even imagine myself attending let alone enjoying myself while someone or a group of people lost their lives in spectacularly gruesome and inhumane ways. Ugh!

[@johnarnell4241]

Weird to imagine that people took the underground to go to Newgate to watch executions.

[@cshartley101]

We haven't evolved. We are the same people as we were a thousand years ago. If public execution tickets went on sale tomorrow, they would sell out faster than hot cakes.

[@ianmason2964]

I watched a documentary that suggested that it was the printing of novels that gave people a better empathy, to put themselves in the place of others, that started making such grotesque forms of entertainment less popular

[@paulashe61]

Not much tho. Reality tv shows you that.

[@jamesroberts9435]

It still happens today. The only difference is that it happens by stealth. People driven to suicide by being put in situations they can not handle. TV shows playing people off against one another etc

[@katherinecollins4685]

Very interesting

[@mats7492]

IN my hometown we have an area still called "gallows hill" which used to be waaay outside the city but is now almost dead center

[@tezhug1890]

I see what you did there

[@namgyal47]

Nice 👍

[@Azphreal]

I am not sure but i think the last drink on the way to your execution is where we get the term 'One for the road' from.

[@AndrewUtz3]

Pictures are hung; men are hanged. Excellent video! I love all of Alice’s presentations. Some of my ancestors were the public executioners of London, so this tour was especially interesting to me.

[@user-pv2qq6fv1w]

Local history is very interesting. How times have changed in not really a long time. Is it for the better?

[@darrengrant4047]

She seems to be having some trouble getting down the stairs there… 5:01

[@100CupsColombia]

The wonderful Alice is great in a gust!

[@loyalsupportisthebestever]

beautiful presenter. Also fantastic history to learn about.

[@stonehartfloydfan]

Well done and wonderful presenter

[@admiralbenbow5083]

1.31 Our x10 Gt grandpa was banged up with John Bradfield (on the plaque) for 29 weeks in the Nuns Bower, part of the Tower complex. Edwin Sandys was moved to the Marshalsea in early 1554 to make room for the Wyatt rebels, whilst Bradfield was eventually burned at Smithfield on July 1 1555.

[@leonakadir3833]

ive never appreciated the history in London as much as I do now, living in New Zealand. I make more effort now when I come back to learn more as I took it for granted when I lived there!

[@andyr4735]

Please take me with you on your next return to NZ

[@jamesspomeroypomeroy263]

I ❤️ Alice !

[@Maleni143]

Woo! Alice 🙋🏻‍♀️

[@andresmartinezlopez6751]

I looove Alice. I could listen her forever 😍

[@pjaybasmaignee]

I just adore Alice Loxton. Her, Dan Snow, and Lucy worsley are my favorites. Alice also has a great KZbin Channel! ☺️🙌🏾🦋

[@AnnaAnna-uc2ff]

Thanks.

[@leeroy25024941]

At last....more Alice 🙂

[@JelMain]

The building behind your shots of Tyburn was erected without foundations on a raft of beams from the gallows and stands. By the early 1980s, they'd rotted away, causing major subsidence, so a concrete raft was poured instead. The core problem is that the Ty-burn, the stream, is not clearly a river, but a marsh at that point. The bodies of the executed had been moved to a charnel house a few hundred yards to the west. During the clearing of the gardens between the street wall and the houses (actually raised beds, with service area storage below) another body was found, dating to WW2: we never did learn who or how he ended there. It's possible he was a tramp sleeping rough when bombs landed nearby, killing him and covering the body in soil.

[@murrayscott9546]

Reminds me of the London Dungeon. One big chamber of horrors, that.

[@murrayscott9546]

Back atcha ! Nice to know that there's siomoo out there that knows where I've been to, coming from. The creator perhaps knows where I'll gonna eñd up. Bless y'all,

[@kevbrown2532]

Finsbury is named after a member of the Fiennes family who was executed and buried there according to Ranulf Fiennes in his book Mad Dogs and Englishmen which traces his family history back to Charlemagne.

[@danielanimal]

Alice is the best! She is a great bicyclist also!

[@shadowslip7125]

I wish my history teacher looked like Alice!

[@sawahtb]

Alice and Lucy should do a documentary together.

[@whoarewe7515]

Beautiful woman and she loves history.

[@chrispbacon4519]

Nicely done Alice, though I believe it was from one of your very videos that we learned that Guy Fawkes was not in fact drawn and quartered, but instead avoided that somewhat uncomfortable procedure by hurling himself from the scaffold and breaking his treasonous neck.

[@craigpimlott204]

Most of the Government should do the same now

[@foybhoy9698]

@@craigpimlott204😂😂😂 💯

[@Trebor74]

Technically he was dead but the sentence was still carried out,I think

[@craigpimlott204]

@@Scavendon none of em are any good ..the whole lot of em are self serving opportunists

[@fellspoint9364]

A flash of thigh and a history lesson ? Yes , please.

[@matthewmckever2312]

I'm from Bethnal green but I didn't know they used Kennington or Lincolns inn fields for executions. Used to work on kingsway and yep had many a lunch in Lincoln's inn. The Shardlake books use that area to great effect. Cheers ears. MM

[@MadrasArsenal]

Quite the gruesome sites!

[@MarkFranklin-ws5jf]

Had lunch at Angel Inn,where the admirals would lunch while watching the hanging along the Thames. Very old wooden building on the south shore side of the river.

[@stewartmackay]

Haha I liked the flash of Mel Gibson. Great as always, Alice.

[@oml81mm]

Two small comments - Criminals were Hanged, not Hung. And, AFAIK women were not "drawn", or disembowelled, for reasons of modesty, but were as an alternative burnt at the stake.

[@paulmcgarrity5922]

Brilliant, i would love to be taken on a tour of london ie the hanging sites and miscellaneous history sites with the author. And would pay happily.

[@jetsons101]

I heard a story that the term: (ONE FOR THE ROAD) was because prisoners being allowed to have that last quart of ale at the Turk's Head Pub.

[@jon780249]

Great

[@passionforlust]

Enjoyed much, one correction Guy Faux wasn't hanged drawn and quartered, as he jumped to his death before that could be done cheers.

[@cherrytraveller5915]

They still carried out the sentence even though he was dead. Same way they did with Oliver Cromwell as well

[@passionforlust]

@@cherrytraveller5915 Okay, technically just a corpse symbolic and nothing more. Got to keep the mob happy!

[@leighwallis5782]

The Devil in the Marshallsea is an amazing book....