The BOTCHED Execution Of Tom 'Black Jack' Ketchum

[@steffenritter7497]

Thanks for the change of pace, in your videos. The American West is full of interesting stories, and I hope you will tell more of them.

[@hearmeout9138]

“Many women were infatuated by their manners and their money” Some things never change. 😂

[@carvinlambert6899]

Told that the head MAY BE smatched off the body, The Sherrif replied, we'll if it does, somebody will Ketchum".

[@renee1961]

I Appreciate All of your Research, Effort, and Time that goes into each video, for each of your channels. I learn from every one. Excellent, ALWAYS.🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

[@matthewalvarez-mahoney7801]

A very nice detour from British history. I use to think American history was boring. I have learned in the last 20 years or so that there are incredible stories to be heard about the past of the United States. If you have more to share, my eyes are peeled and my ears are cleaned out👍

[@YouMe-ru6wi]

Well there is the United States Of America the country which is relatively new. But of course the actual land and the early people of it(the indigenous natives) have been here for thousands of years and have a very fascinating story themselves.

[@charlesmaximus9161]

@@YouMe-ru6wi well, let us not forget that America also has a distinctly British history. Our Anglocentric foundation is something that is too often ignored and overlooked. We were proud British subjects for nearly 170 years. English may not be the “official” language of the US, however, most of the states that comprise this federal republic do in fact have English as their official language. Therefore, one can confidently and accurately say that English IS the primary language of the U.S. But of course, say that out loud and expect to be attacked by the usual slew of left-wing sociopaths.

[@NinjaGrrrl7734]

@@charlesmaximus9161 I lean quite far left and agree with what you said. You didn't say everyone should only speak English. Our legal system is very much based on the British systems, also. We may be bastards, but we are their bastards. 😊

[@verbalkint1770]

My eyelids are peeled off and ears cleaned with a bowie knife

[@youtubeacc6059]

Some history you can trust, because it were written and cannot be changed to a extend, the rest is word by mouth and changed as history goes, so who u believe?

[@dev-debug]

Really cool direction you took with this one, was surprised. They did make postcards post hanging which sounds bizarre. It's 2 men posing under the gallows with the decapitated Ketchum laying in front of them (head not connected but still in the hood). You can see it was a very messy execution, not exactly the kind of post card I would buy on my journeys to send home lol Thanks for the video !

[@dev-debug]

@@ari_chameleon Did not know that, will check it out. Thanks

[@dev-debug]

@@ari_chameleon That's insane, saw one from 1960 just 3 years before I was born. Hard to believe that was still going on only about 60 years ago.

[@weilandiv8310]

One of my top 5 channels and that's saying a lot. Please make a bio vid on the hanging of the last pirate of New York, Albert Hicks. Hanged on the isle where the Statue of Liberty now stands.

[@cyberleaderandy1]

If you Google the execution there are images of the aftermath of the hanging that were sold as postcards. Theres a school of thought the ", botched" execution was deliberate and they told him it was going to be so. His head was apparently sewn back onto his body for public viewing afterwards.

[@owencrater7089]

you missed a few details, one of which Black Jack gained a lot of weight while waiting for his trial and execution. It is said his weight was way over 200 pounds when he finally mounted the scaffold. You have to take in account the weight when you figure out how much rope to use. As it was, they allowed too much rope and so the body dropped further than necessary for someone that heavy. All that mass plus distance created a lot of inertia that help pull the head off the body. Death was instantaneous, so that was merciful.

[@petesmith9472]

The drop is calculated on weight and height a day before the drop. So, it doesn’t matter how much weight he gained while waiting for the end.

[@renee1961]

Good afternoon, and Thank You, as ALWAYS. I hope you're doing well.

[@Stoogewriter]

I love history because it teaches us many things. It's a shame that people fail to learn the lessons of history causing the same mistakes to be repeated over and over again! We can change that if we try both individually and as nations.

[@amaslim45tx]

There used to be photos of the hanging on the walls of the local Dairy Queen. There’s nothing like dining on a Hunger Buster while looking at photos of a headless corpse. Seriously you couldn’t see much in the photos due to the poor quality and grainy photos, It’s been out of business for years, torn down and replaced with a convenience store.

[@80sMetalHead]

Great Video…thanks!

[@josephheinecke1992]

Cant say it went terribly wrong. We just didn't know where it was "headed"

[@bernecomp]

I guess it was inevitable that he would head off into the sunset before his time.

[@YouMe-ru6wi]

Red Dead Redemption 2 one of my favorite games. But yes the good old Wild West has no short of very colorful and notorious stories and people. Tom Black Jack Ketchum lived a brutal life and also died in a brutal way.

[@hearmeout9138]

So this guy was invited into a store to take cover from a storm and then he robbed or burglarized it? Having lived in two of the worst states for killer tornadoes, this act alone was justification for any terrible fate that befell this guy.

[@russellnixon9981]

Fascinating history,

[@soldierski1669]

I can only imagine being a witness to this😲

[@richardgeorge3136]

Robbing trains are nothing to lose your head over.

[@ravenslaves]

I'm not sure I can say his execution went wrong. It certainly did its job

[@ericdelf]

He was lucky not to strangle to death.

[@ravenslaves]

@@ericdelf I was thinking alone those same lines.

[@richardsteele6776]

If he ended up dead how was it a failure?

[@kevinklei3005]

No mention of the probably most famous ; most sort after person in the town .The person who had the grizzle job of sewing Tom's Head back on !!!

[@eddiemiller2969]

There was a restaurant on the old El Paso highway, called Griggs'. They had on display a piece of the hood that covered Black Jack's head.

[@tengew]

So how was it botched . He died from the hanging. Just a little messy

[@YouMe-ru6wi]

It was botched because his head came off he was decapitated and that's not how a hanging is supposed to go.

[@SleepyFl0wer]

He died from beheading not hanging 2 different ways. Do you not know the meaning of botched? Google is not that hard to use 🤦🤦🤦

[@johncarlisle6865]

@@SleepyFl0wer agree with what you say, but you can't say that it wasn't a successful execution lol. he didn't suffer like some of the Nazi war criminals who were sentenced to hang at the Nuremberg trials. the American executioner - an electric chair man- didn't have a clue, unlike his British counterpart, Albert Pierrepoint, an experienced 'hangman' who approached things scientifically & dispatched every prisoner he was responsible for without a hitch- no pun intended

[@merikatools568]

Gave the executioner some head

[@markdeegan7268]

Better than choking for a few minutes

[@ugochukwuanadyk6954]

Mehn is something wrong with me. I've watched almost all the videos on this channel. Why on earth am I so captivated by these stories about executions?

[@donniejmanos]

This was in my hometown.

[@rexfrommn3316]

An interesting sidebar comment here about hanging executions in mid-19th to early 20th centuries. Hank Ketchum had plenty of company with other decapitations. Western hero and murderer Tom Horn's execution in 1904 in Cheyenne, Wyoming was only four feet or so due to the tragedy of the botched Ketchum execution in New Mexico. Most American hangings, either state or federal/military hangings employed a short drop gallows with a 24 inch drop or perhaps a 36 inch drop. No one expected the neck of the condemned to be instantly broken in these hangings but decapitations were unheard of in these short drop executions. The condemned man's feet and legs were tied tightly together in several places, in large part to avoid the ghastly flaying of the legs but also to try to keep feces in the pants of the dying man from dropping out on the ground. John Brown's execution in 1859 used a 24 inch short drop. All other Harper's Ferry traitors were also hanged with this short drop method. Many American territorial governments used the short drop method of hanging with a roughly three foot drop well into the 20th century. The hanging of 38 Sioux warriors used a standard drop of about nearly five feet on December 26, 1862 in Mankato, Minnesota for the Sioux war. Two more Sioux warriors were hanged at Fort Snelling, Minnesota in 1865 after the Civil War for their murders during the 1862 Sioux war. These Sioux warriors, Shakopee and Medicine Bottle, were given a standard drop of nearly five feet according to photographs of the hanging. Confederate raider Champ Ferguson was hanged in Nashville, Tennessee in the summer of 1865 after the Civil War on a US Army prison gallows for conviction of over 50 murders. This Army hanging of Champ Ferguson used a short drop gallows of less than three feet. The Lincoln conspirators were given a five foot standard drop in Washington DC in July, 1865. So we see from the historical record here that the United States was only slowly adopting the standard drop hanging method of four to six feet at the time of the Civil War. British students of history will note that the measured long drop where the prisoner's weight was used based on a table and formula only started being used around the 1850's or so. British hangmen had much more experience than an American hangman, often an elected sheriff or his deputy. It takes much experience and judgement because the drop tables can still cause a decapitation even if correctly applied. British hangmen knew their business because it was their profession. American authorities were assigned execution service as an extra duty. Also wide jurisdictions across far flung territories made hangings fairly infrequent in many places in the United States. The hangman at Fort Smith, Arkansas became proficient at his craft and was complemented on his humane hangings of prisoners for the Oklahoma territory in the later 19th century. So it isn't that Americans can't do this job right like the British executioners but long drop hanging requires experience, judgment and a degree of skill to prevent decapitations. Most American hangmen were prison guards or deputies who never hanged enough prisoners to get as skilled as their British counterparts. I study western and military history of the United States. Many hangings of criminals used the short drop method with a gallows with a drop of only two or three feet during most of the 19th and early decades of the 20th century. Standard drop hangings were adopted only gradually in the United States. The measured long drop hanging based on the prisoner's weight became more common in both federal and state exectutions in the 20th century. However, decapitations happened fairly regularly in many of these executions. A woman prisoner was decapitated in Arizona in the 1930's with newspaper accounts so grisly that the state legislature quickly adopted the gas chamber. Most executions in the 1930's were increasingly the gas chamber or electrocution from the 1920's onward until just in recent decades with the lethal injection table. Sources for these history of American hangings are from websites, the National Park Service or from researching the specific cases. The Clint Eastwood movie "Hang'em High" gives an accurate description of Judge Parker's brand of justice in 1880's Fort Smith, Arkansas. Fort Smith's courthouse, prison cemetery and replica gallows is a National Park Service federal historical site.

[@russellnixon9981]

Now I understand why America adopped other form of execution and the UK continued with hanging until capital punishment was stopped in the 1960's.

[@rexfrommn3316]

@@russellnixon9981 The movie about Pierrepoint called "the Last Hangman," in Britain has a scene where a young woman and mother Ruth Ellis was hanged in the mid-1950's. Her case had her drunken abusive husband/boyfriend (I don't recall which one ) punched her hard in the abdomen. She was with a child pregnant and the blow caused her to have a miscarriage. She got a hold of a revolver and shot the abusive father of her child. She clearly was temporarily insane but convicted of murder and executed. The British public was so repulsed by this execution of a clearly temporarily insane woman that capital punishment was abolished in Britain. However, in the U.S. the public became repulsed at hanging as a method of execution. High levels American gun violence is probably why we still have capital punishment. Some lethal injections can last up to 40 minutes long with the condemned suffering significant pain and convulsions. I don't support the death penalty in modern America because of the expense.

[@richardkeen5828]

Way out West, where I grew up and live. This ia a "Funny you should ask" story.

[@thevintagepoet]

Sad 😔

[@lestergillis8171]

I don't recall ever hearing of such an out law before. 🤔

[@Bing_Bong60]

At least at the end he knew where he was heading!😂😂

[@Jason-ts1rx]

A good depiction of him is in the movie The Gambler V - Playing For Keeps. Very good movie.

[@anthonysherry2628]

Lost a arm, and his head.

[@Handlebar-MustDash]

He robbed trains? Did he have his own railroad? Crazy guy.

[@roysimmons3549]

I don't think kilometres were used then or now.

[@phil955i]

I remember this story, didn't they miscalculate his weight, not taking into consideration the very heavy prosthetic arm he had, that was made from metal?

[@Number6_]

There was no calculation. They slung a rope. These people could barely add 2 and 2.

[@russellkeeling4387]

He was weighted when he first was arrested and the hangman made the calculations for rope length, after which Ketchum was held in jail for months and gained much weight. They didn't weigh him again before they hung him and there was to much slack in the rope causing it to jerk his head off.

[@Number6_]

@@russellkeeling4387 rubbish, no calculation, it was all guess work. The west was not full of scientists making calculations. That's just stupid.

[@leszekwolkowski9856]

@@Number6_ well at least, they did Ketchum.

[@Number6_]

@@leszekwolkowski9856 and killed him. Which was the point of the exercise.

[@Scenariania]

oh so that explains the mystery of ash's father

[@kirkmorrison6131]

Too much of a drop and your head comes away from your body

[@greatunwashed1856]

Heading of into the sunset.

[@ninaappelt9001]

Still a win. He was in fact executed.

[@donaldsteven7592]

Yeah guess you could say he wasn't coming back from that one wouldn't you agree?

[@russellkeeling4387]

I read the articles about this hanging years ago in True West or Old West magazine. Property we own in southern Colorado was used by Ketchum as a hideout at times. Ketchum was an angry man and even his own gang members didn't like him.

[@robbabcock_]

What a way to go! At least it was quick.😂

[@larry1824]

He came out ahead

[@cameronmccreary4758]

Without having to watch the show, this has to deal with Blackjack Ketchum and how his head was yanked off from his body due to miscalculation of his weight when he was in jail waiting to be executed. He put on weight and the Executioner did not take into account the extra weight that had been put on his body ergo, the drop took his head off.

[@Ramiiam]

Probably quicker than the usual way.

[@edg8535]

This happened more than once with heavy folks. Too much rope and the head has a tendency to come off.

[@robertenox7668]

Execution went wrong just because a well deserving outlaw lost his head. I don't think so.

[@charliekavanagh1217]

This guy's voice gets me down

[@crazyviking24]

If you decide to do any other old west stories then you might find the story of Big Nose George interesting. After his hanging the doctor skinned part of his body and had the skin tanned for a pair of shoes and a medical bag.

[@raymondhopwood9393]

That's kinda creepy!

[@familyiseverything1617]

Wow really.

[@Palootski]

I remember the old wax museum in Grand Prairie Tx had a very cool wax display of this hanging. Very gory and real looking.

[@markdeegan7268]

He was Blessed

[@christbanner3219]

Live by the sword die by the sword, no matter how brave, tough or bad you are.

[@hollysmith7393]

I mean , it’s just a part of already going to die anyways . I’d rather my whole head pop off than to have to hang there and slowly strangle for 15 min ….. I’m just saying . Most times they didn’t get the height right so most didn’t get the courtesy of an instant broken neck anyways . Plus if you’re already going to die for violent crimes then does it really matter how they got to the same end ?? If anything ,it did him a solid in the end . We should bring back public executions and it would get folks right a lot quicker . They would hang folks for stealing bread back in the day . Can you imagine what they would think about today ???? Ehhhh the older I get the more certain things just make sense . People don’t know how good they got it and create problems that shouldn’t be there and it will be the down fall of us all !!! United we’re unstoppable but the division is always looming overhead and they count on that . We fall for it everytime . Sad really

[@donaldsteven7592]

Yeah true but some men kinda Deserves to be left Hanging gagging kicking swinging for a while wouldn't you agree with me?

[@michaelw8371]

Looks like they tied his left hand/arm to his leg because he was missing his right arm.

[@jayduke6148]

Regardless, the execution was successfully completed.

[@johnnyboy62parker39]

death is death only gruesome for the spectators , he still met a quick end even if messy but wtf he was no angel

[@rizwanchohan1860]

Make Your videos better with Voice and Text

[@denmar355]

Dead is dead. Worked fine I’d say.

[@viperexpress305]

Stealing = Hanging ! ⚰️👍🍺

[@lisaquam5537]

This is inaccurate history. He was hung in Camp Verde Arizona

[@TheTreegodfather]

Botched? Nah.

[@Bigasander]

Gotta ketchum all!

[@ION400]

More merciful than a rope too short? but why sew the head back on before burial? Parts in a box. Unless for cameras or peoples sake

[@manxkin]

In the end dead is dead so it was actually quite successful. Waste of an epic mustache.

[@владимиргуреев-в4ы]

разбойники, они и остались разбойниками...

[@20alphabet]

Train robbery wasn't so bad.

[@maximasromulus2806]

⚫ The execution was instantly fatal. Better then the horrific pain of the blade the of guillotine. Creating the explosion of pain in the neck bone on the head end. A person could easily remained conscious for seconds after. But the slamming of the drawn spinal cord and brain stem completely and spontaneously. With massive force into the base of the skull. Causes instantaneous death with zero consciousness. A broken neck is also painful. With paralyzed diaphragm suffocation is twice the pain. Unlike the vile subhuman creatures that executed. Innocent men, women, and children claimed. Imagine standing on the scaffolding your neighbors calling for your execution. And the reprieve comes with proof another person committed the crime. Just before they pull the lever. Then imagine the reprieved is the immediately reinstated judge, city or town owner, or worse the faces captured in that historic photograph. Would be a reaction even more interesting than watching the murderer's cork pop.⚫

[@Number6_]

That he is killed is the point. Regardless of how.

[@mssmith3604]

The Fortress videos would be enjoyable if we could understand your accent. I lived in England for three years, but I cannot understand one complete sentence of the narration.

[@phil955i]

I can understand him perfectly 🤷‍♂️

[@YouMe-ru6wi]

He does have a very thick accent that for some might be tricky to understand. But you can turn on closed captioning as well that always helps.

[@sandidavis820]

I understand him very well.

[@civillady13]

I too have no problem understanding the narrator.

[@meljen8592]

Maybe you should concentrate and listen,it does help.

[@maximasromulus2806]

⚫ It's a dirty business regardless of the method. But the certain instant painless death. Is more humane for the executed. The scum that show up to watch a person die. Have no Rights to a more pleasing experience. It was s only public to be a deterrent, not a jolly good time!⚫

[@Waya420]

honestly would rather that then suffocating for 5 mins

[@maxsdad538]

In a proper execution, they don't "suffocate for 5 minutes", death is instantaneous from a broken neck.

[@jamesfowley4114]

@@maxsdad538 his neck broke, just before his head ripped off.

[@katarinalove8649]

I wish america pays for their crimes. I love your channel btw

[@balancedactguy]

I wish your English was better. STAY WHERE YOU ARE...the US doesn't need you!

[@shawnabloom]

What a ridicules statement. What crimes are you speaking of and what ‘crime free’ country do you live in that is so much better?? 🙄

[@maxsdad538]

We're to busy paying for everybody else's crimes, Katy.

[@kenneth9874]

When are you going to pay for yours?

[@charlesciminera5881]

Dear Katrina could you be more specific?

[@wef.rubbish4714]

Heady stuff!!

[@michaelmurratti4687]

So in other Words..He ain't Got NOBODY?

[@biagioverrocchio686]

Scusate,ma per uno ignorante come me,che cazzo sta dicendo,sottotitoli in italiano,troppo difficile

[@johnstewartrichards5922]

Topeka en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topeka,_Kansas sometimes = toe peek ah or tah peek ah