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Victorian Hangings

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From 1837 to 1901 Queen Victoria presided over the world’s biggest empire – and during her 64-year reign approximately 1,100 judicial hangings were carried out in Great Britain and Ireland. Here we present a month-by-month calendar of the fascinating stories behind some of them, set frequently against a background of dire poverty, short trials and public executions...

Victorian Hangings: December

Victorian Murder Cases:
24/12/1889
William Dukes – Bury

George Gordon, 29, and his father ran a furniture business with warehouses in Burnley and Bury, and they were stern Victorian employers. Young Mr. Gordon frowned disapprovingly when he found the manager of his Bury branch, William Dukes, 28, drinking in the office, and he became exasperated when Dukes failed to prepare the monthly accounts in time for inspection.
He told the manager: “If there is any repetition of your idleness you will be dismissed.”
On the morning of September 25th, 1889, Mr. Gordon went to the Bury branch at 39 Bolton Street to check the books. Dukes, who had been drinking, went to a coffee shop to avoid him, but in the afternoon the boss returned, his patience stretched to breaking point.
No one knows precisely what happened after that, except that Mr. Gordon’s body was discovered in a wardrobe at the warehouse. He had been beaten to death with a hammer. When Dukes was arrested he claimed that it was all an accident, and that the boss had attacked him first. He was hanged on Tuesday, December 24th, 1889, at Strangeways. Victorian murder stories from True Crime Library.

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Victorian Hangings

Victorian Murder Cases:24/12/1889William Dukes – Bury

Victorian Murder Cases:
24/12/1889
William Dukes – Bury