Murderous Monday - Elizabeth Martha Browne - Last woman to publicly hang in Dorset
Murderous Monday - Elizabeth Martha Browne - Last woman to publicly hang in Dorset Artist's impression of Elizabeth Browne's hanging On a drizzly morning in August, Elizabeth Martha Browne met her maker at the end of William Calcraft's rope. She had murdered her second husband John Anthony Browne, twenty years her junior, with an axe becoming the last woman publicly executed in Dorset, England. Not much is known about Elizabeth before her arrest and trial. Her place of birth is unknown and the year estimated at around 1811, but her date of death - 9th August 1856 - is cemented in history. John and Elizabeth's marriage was not a happy one. Some accounts say that John only married Elizabeth for her money and that John had several affairs during the course of their marriage. It was an argument about one of these alleged affairs with a Mary Davis that sealed John's fate. Elizabeth had struck John with a wood chopping axe several times, shattering his skull. U...