62 THE HISTORY OF THE DORCHESTER GALLOWS. 



The street now called Icen Way was not so named in years 

 gone by. It started as " Gaol-lane," from the gaol at the 

 corner of High East-street ; then a section was known as 

 Bell-street," taking this name from the Bell Inn, which stood 

 just above the present gasworks. Here the condemned 

 were allowed to halt and take their last earthly refreshment. 

 The final section up to the fatal mound was " Gallows Hill." 

 Upon this spot thousands must have suffered the cruel 

 lingering death by strangling that our murderous laws con- 

 demned man, woman, and child to suffer for even a theft 

 to the worth of 5s. Here, periodically, following the Assizes, 

 the State provided its public spectacles of torture, thinking 

 to terrorise evil-doers and improve the morals of the people. 

 Up the narrow lane from gaol to gallows the dismal pro- 

 cessions with the jolting cart constantly climbed. Some- 

 times, as a heretic or a traitor, the condemned would be 

 dragged by the heels along the rough road, or upon a hurdle 

 or sledge, with frightened horses kicking and plunging. At 

 the end of his journey still keener suffering awaited him, to be 

 hung, and even before death, disembowelled, and then 

 quartered. The crowd was always ready for the pastime, of 

 which it never grew weary. It was mostly a bloodthirsty 

 crowd that drank and cursed and jeered around the gallows, 

 but many there must have been that pitied and prayed when 

 some ragged, trembling lad was led up to close a life that had 

 hardly begun, or as they saw husband and wife or parents 

 and children ruthlessly parted when the last terrible moment 

 arrived. Dorchester gallows have a long, grim tale to tell, 

 for they were the County gallows, fed by the County gaol. 



A hundred years after these early plans of the town were 

 drawn by Speed, the gallows was removed to another place. 

 It is shown, still of the same design, standing on the west 

 side of the Amphitheatre, between it and the Weymouth- 

 road, in the engraving of that place to be found in " Grose's 

 Antiquities . ' ' The date of the picture is 1 755 . And Stukeley , 

 in his " Itinerary," written in 1723, tells us that " the amphi- 

 theatre was in greater perfection before the gallows was 



