Listen to the story of Susan Newell who was the last woman in Scotland to face capital punishment. Was she pushed into murdering a young boy or was she inherently wicked?
Apple Podcasts
Stitcher
Pandora
Spotify
Google Podcasts
iHeartRadio
TuneInFamily Background
Susan McAllister was born in 1893 in Oban, Scotland (about 91 miles northwest of Glasgow).
One of a family of 13 children, she was born into a life of grinding poverty. At 17 she moved to Glasgow in search of a better life. She ended up working low-paid jobs until she met 24-year-old John McLeod. John was just scraping by himself and decided to join up in 1914 for WWI. He was sent abroad leaving Susan pregnant and alone. Only a few weeks later she would find out that John had been killed in France.
Susan Remarries
In 1922 now 30, she had remarried, to John Newell, an ex-serviceman working as a tube worker. The three lived in a rented room in Newlands Street, Coatbridge, around eight miles from Glasgow.
John was a drinker and a womanizer. An additional strain was put on their marriage when John was laid off and the family struggled financially for over 6 months.
A Violent Relationship
The couple had a tempestuous relationship, which often flared into violence on both sides.
In one particularly heated exchange in 1923, Susan attacked her husband. This wasn’t the first time, and the attack left his face bloody and bruised. He reported the assault at the local police station. Due to the lack of evidence and perhaps a reluctance to get involved in what was deemed a domestic dispute, the police didn’t even speak with Susan about the allegations. Following this incident, John packed his bags and left his wife and stepdaughter. In a further blow to Susan, she was given notice by her landlady to quit her lodgings. The landlady cited unreasonable behavior as the reason due to the arguments.
The following day, Wednesday the 20th of June 1923, was carnival day in Coatbridge. 13-year-old John Johnston was a street newsvendor. He saw the increased activity due to the carnival as a way to increase his sales. He began calling on houses hoping to sell his papers. At 6:45 pm he called at No. 2 Newlands Street and knocked on the door of Susan Newell. He was invited in and once inside Susan Newell took a newspaper from him. She made no attempt to pay for it and an argument ensued between the pair.
Susan Newell Commits Murder
During the disagreement, John Johnston was strangled and had his head bashed by Susan Newell.
Shortly after killing John, Susan’s daughter Janet came home and found his body. Susan told Janet that it was her stepfather that had killed the boy and swore her to secrecy. The next morning Susan and Janet loaded his carpet-wrapped body into a cart (some say a stroller). A truck driver offered them a ride to Glasgow.
The truck driver let the pair off on Duke Street. While helping to unload the cart it almost turned over and fell to the ground. He managed to catch hold of the cart to stop it from falling completely but its burden became partially dislodged. John Johnston’s head protruded from under the thick quilt-like cover, while his left foot jutted out the bottom, hanging over the edge of the cart. Susan managed to quickly shroud her sinister cargo and thanked Dickson with a terse, ‘I’ll manage it. Leave it alone.’ Susan and Janet then walked off along Duke Street but the incident had been witnessed by an alert resident who had been looking out her window. She decided to discreetly follow Susan and Janet.
Disposing of the Body
She explained to her sister what she had seen. They both began to follow Newell and her daughter as they pushed the cart along Duke Street and then pulled into an access lane next to No. 630. One of them decided to fetch the police while the other continued to watch the tenement building. Robert Foot, a local resident, came out of a news agent’s shop when one of the women shouted to him: ‘There is a woman away up that entry and she is carrying a dead body.’
Susan reached the end of the lane and found herself in the backcourt of the tenement. There was no exit except for the way she had come in or by climbing a six-foot wall that separated the backcourts from each other. Newell was aware of the suspicion she had aroused since the incident at the lorry and panicked as she saw Robert Foot walking up the lane. She immediately let go of the cart, abandoning Janet and began climbing the six-foot dividing wall.
However, a passing police officer, Constable Thomas McGennet, had been alerted and appeared in the backcourt as Newell was halfway over the wall. He managed to take hold of her, pulled her off the wall, and placed her under arrest
It Wasn’t Me
In the police interview, Susan already had a story ready. She claimed that it was her husband John that killed the boy and forced her and her daughter to dispose of the body. Susan had planned so well that her 8-year-old daughter told the same story in a separate interview.
A warrant was put out for John with his description. He turned himself in and was arrested. Regardless of the fact that he had an alibi, both husband and wife were put on trial.
On Sept 18th Lord Alness presided over the trial. Husband and wife were seated next to each other in the dock. On the first day, John was able to provide multiple witnesses that proved he was not at the house at the time of the murder. Lord Alness had him freed immediately stating that he never should have been brought to trial in the first place.
I’m Insane
With her scapegoat gone, Susan went to her next tactic and pled insanity.
Witnesses were brought against Susan including her daughter Janet. Janet recanted her original testimony and now said that when she came home the boy was dead on the couch. She said her mother made her help wrap him up and dispose of him. Susan also told her what to say if she was questioned by police.
Susan’s insanity plea was based on the murder not being premeditated and having no motive. Susan’s insanity was rebutted by Professor John Glaister. Glaister was a Scottish forensic scientist. He worked as a general practitioner, police surgeon, and lecturer at Glasgow Royal Infirmary Medical School and the University of Glasgow.
Show Susan Some Mercy!
The trial closed on the 2nd day. The Jury went out for 37 minutes before coming back with a guilty verdict. It was not unanimous because one juror believed the insanity plea.
Every member of the jury believed that Susan should be shown mercy.
Lord Alness however sentenced her to death by hanging.
In respect of the verdict returned in your case, I discern and adjudge you, Susan Newell, panel, be carried to the prison of Glasgow, therein to be detained until the 10th day of October next, and on that date between the hours 8 an 10 o’clock forenoon, within the walls of the said prison at the hands of the common executioner, to be hanged by the neck on a gibbet till you be dead, and your body thereafter to be buried within the walls of the said prison, and your whole moveable goods are discerned to be escheat and forfeit to His Majesty’s use. And I pronounce this for doom.
Lord Alness
No Mercy for the Wicked
Petitions were made requesting Susan’s sentence be commuted to a life of service imprisonment due to the fact that she was a woman and that her husband had left her the day before. Unfortunately for Susan, 10 months prior Edith Thompson had been hanged in England for the murder of her husband which was considered a less severe crime.
The Secretary of State for Scotland decided that she could not be reprieved and her execution was set for October the 10th, 1923.
Don’t Put That Thing Over Me!
She was to be hanged by executioner John Ellis who had also executed Edith Thompson. He was known to be swift.
Ellis decided to use the leather body belt that he had made for Edith Thompson which had an additional strap to go round the thighs. This was necessary because as skirts got shorter over the years, there was concern that they would billow up as the prisoner dropped. On the gallows, Susan allowed Baxter to strap her legs and thighs without protest. She was able to get her hands free from the loose wrist straps on the body belt. Susan defiantly pulled off the white hood saying to Ellis, “Don’t put that thing over me.”
Rather than risk another trying scene, Ellis decided to proceed without it. The noose was already in place. So he simply pulled the lever. She went through the trap with her face in full view of the small number of officials who were present. Susan Newell became the last woman to hang in Scotland. She was said to be the calmest person in the execution chamber accepting her fate with both courage and dignity.
She never admitted to her crime.
Resources
- Susan Newell – Wikipedia
- Susan Newell
- The chilling story of child killer Susan Newell – the last woman hanged in Scotland – Glasgow Live
- The Glasgow Crime Story of Susan Newell who killed the boy delivering the newspaper | Glasgow Times
- University of Glasgow – MyGlasgow – Library – Collections – Medical Humanities – Forensic Medicine Collections – Case Files – John & Susan Newell (1923)