Pierrepoint (32 page)

The press were immediately made aware of this decision and a short paragraph appeared in most newspapers on the following day.

On the surface it appears that the decision to resign was a spur-of-the-minute reaction at Albert’s being denied payment he believed – wrongly – he was entitled to. Behind the scenes, however, he had already entered into correspondence with the editor of the Empire News and Sunday Chronicle for a series of articles. Under the heading ‘The Hangman’s Own Story’ he proposed (for a fee believed to be in today’s money the equivalent of £500,000) to reveal the last moments of many of the notorious criminals he executed.

On 3 March, the Home Office wrote to Albert asking if he could confirm the rumour they had heard that he had entered into an agreement to publish his memoirs in the press. The letter also again reminded him of the agreement he had made when becoming an assistant executioner, and which he had been reminded of from time to time over the years through a variety of correspondence as he gained subsequent promotions.

On the following day the Empire News and Sunday Chronicle led with the story that Albert Pierrepoint, who had resigned in the previous week, was set to tell his amazing life
and experiences. They also claimed that he would throw light on the subject of capital punishment, ‘one of the most hotly debated issues of the day’.

Albert replied to the Home Office’s letter, confirming that he had indeed entered into an agreement with the Empire News but adding that he did not intend to reveal any details other than those that had already been published and which were already in the public domain. On 12 March the Home Office wrote back acknowledging that they noted his remarks about the series of articles but suggesting it would be best if Albert submitted the articles to them for approval before publication, in order to remove any passages to which objection could be taken.

Albert apparently ignored the request and commencing on Sunday, 18 March, under the heading ‘Pierrepoint Speaks’, a two-page article began with an introduction telling readers of how Albert had taken over from his uncle and that he carried out the execution of 433 men and 17 women. He also wrote of how it was a relief to him that since his retirement he was able to answer the phone or read a morning paper without the interruption of someone asking if he was available to carry out an execution.

Illustrated with photographs of Albert playing ‘find the thimble’ with customers, and pulling a pint from behind the bar, the two-page account recounted the tale of his father’s first execution and of how Albert himself had first acquired the ambition to follow in the family ‘business’. There was nothing to whet the appetite of readers hoping to discover something a little more sensational, graphic or controversial. He did, however, propose in future editions to reveal how he hanged Christie (‘a coward’), the last moments of Heath, Haigh and Ruth Ellis, and how he went to Germany to hang ‘The Beasts of Belsen’.

The Home Office reacted to the planned series of articles at once, and in the following week publishers Kemsley Newspapers were visited by Detective Superintendent Kennedy. He interviewed Mr Berry, the proprietor, and the editor, who had openly defied the Home Office the previous week. Albert was also interviewed and they promised to submit the following week’s article for censoring.

The second instalment appeared on the following Sunday, and although proofs were sent to the Home Office, the original version with Albert’s recollections and account of Christie’s final moments went to press anyway. Again Whitehall were enraged and contacted the publishers. This time they threatened legal action under the Official Secrets Act.

Discussing that week’s revelations, which dealt with the Christie case, they had found that the newspaper account contradicted evidence from other witnesses who had been present at the execution. When a similar overly dramatised account appeared in the following week’s paper, concerning Neville Heath’s execution, serious talks were held at a high level. These discussions debated whether it was worthwhile pursuing legal action against the recently retired executioner, as again, when witnesses were questioned who had been present at Pentonville, they found that in the main his version of the facts differed from their memories of the events. It was decided therefore that journalistic fiction was probably behind the majority of the ‘startling revelations’ and that there was no point in pressing ahead with a prosecution against Albert Pierrepoint under the Official Secrets Act. Pressure was seemingly brought to bear on the publishers, who had much to lose by getting involved in a lawsuit with the Home Office, and what had started out as a major exclusive soon became little more than a damp squib; the series of articles stopped on the following week. Albert
returned from a holiday on the French Riviera and went back to running the Rose and Crown.

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Shortly after he retired Albert bought a pony, which he named Trio, possibly in reference to the family threesome who had shared the same profession. He took the pony to a nearby farm where it was broken in; the son of the horseman there remembered him as a chain smoker of ‘Wills Whiffs’ cigars.

In 1961, Albert contributed to a television programme entitled The Death Penalty, in which he read from a piece of paper to camera the duties of an executioner almost word for word as they appeared in the Royal Commission Report. In the same year a report appeared in a Yorkshire newspaper stating that Tom Pierrepoint’s memoirs had been sold to an antique dealer in Bradford. To date, these archives and papers have remained hidden and have not appeared in the public domain.

In 1965, the journalist and broadcaster Ludovic Kennedy wrote a book on the Christie and Evans case. Entitled 10 Rillington Place, it told the ‘full story of an appalling miscarriage of justice’, and lead to the case eventually being heard in Parliament. The ‘Brabin Report’, as it became known, came out the following year and found that although it was likely that Timothy Evans had murdered his wife, he probably did not strangle his daughter. As this had been the offence he was convicted of, Home Secretary Roy Jenkins granted Evans a posthumous pardon later that year. In 1971, the book was turned into a massively successful film starring Richard Attenborough as Reg Christie and John Hurt as Timothy Evans. Albert offered his services to the film as a
technical advisor, though his name was kept off the credits. Many years later John Hurt told of how Albert Pierrepoint was not averse to making jokes in rather bad taste on set and that following the harrowing execution scene, a number of the female secretaries were physically sick.

Around this time Diana Dors published a biography that included a chapter entitled ‘H is for Hangman’. She recalled her unhappy experiences in meeting Albert Pierrepoint, and how during filming a movie, she had been invited back to Help the Poor Struggler with other members of the cast. Her reminiscences portrayed the hangman as an attention seeker, who took great pride in his job, and boasted of the people he had hanged. She ended the chapter by saying that happily it was the only time she had been in his company.

In 1973 Albert wrote a biography entitled
Executioner Pierrepoint
, in which he retold his father’s story from newspaper cuttings and from his own recollections, along with details of his training and work during the war. The book is effectively in three parts, with three different subjects: his father; Uncle Tom and Albert; and the Royal Commission Report.

Albert makes a number of contradictions during the course of the book, and includes one or two errors. The most obviously contradictory statement is his claim that he does not want to put a number to the executions he had carried out, as to do so would make it appear as if he were trying to claim some kind of world record. This conveniently overlooks the fact that 17 years earlier he was paid a large sum to boastfully announce the total number of people he had executed. Evidence that Albert certainly had a highly idiosyncratic sense of humour is not thin on the ground. Many people who knew Albert Pierrepoint, customers at both Help the Poor Struggler, and later at the Rose and
Crown have attested that at various times there were signs up over the bar stating, ‘No hanging around the bar.’

Syd Dernley was shocked to find veiled references to himself in the book, when Albert told a tale about blistering a new assistant after he had made a tasteless remark following an execution, and how Albert had seen to it he never worked with him again. Syd had been guilty of making a crass comment following the execution of John Livesey at Wandsworth in 1952, but Albert had not rebuked him as he had claimed, nor had he done anything to terminate Syd’s career as a hangman. Syd had a lean spell of reprieves that lasted a whole year, and his career ended in the following year in circumstances that had nothing to do with his role as a hangman.

Not long after the book appeared, Albert was interviewed for a Lancashire radio programme. Talking frankly about his life and how he took up the role of hangman, he again littered the programme with errors of fact. The programme starts with him twice repeating that he was just 22 when he was interviewed for the position, despite the autobiography clearly showing he was 26 at the time he applied. Discussing the execution of Ruth Ellis he said that she ‘had wobbled a bit’ as they led her to the drop, but that she had been as brave as any man: ‘She was as good as bloody gold really,’ he commented.

In 1974, Ruth Ellis’s sister had written to Albert in an attempt to put the record straight on what Ruth had said as her final words. By now Albert had already said in print, on more than one occasion, that Ruth Ellis hadn’t spoken a word on the short walk to the gallows. Albert talked about his relationship with her sister on the radio show, and had even told of how they had gone out for a picnic shortly after the execution ‘before the shock had sunk in’. Albert also said, on his honour,
that they had gone for a drive in a car together and were singing as they took a detour to see where Ruth was buried, in the family plot at Amersham. Many years later Ruth’s sister Muriel Jakubait wrote a book entitled Ruth Ellis: My Sister’s Secret Life, in which she gives a totally different take on their meeting, claiming that newspaper reporters tricked her into meeting Albert. She also said that Albert wrote her many letters, often under the alias of his wife’s maiden name – Fletcher – suggesting that they meet up in a variety of locations in and around the capital. She claimed to have refused all offers of meeting up with him until she found herself set up by the press into finally meeting her sister’s executioner.

By the time Albert appeared on the BBC television programme Read All About It, broadcast on 2 January 1977, he had retired from the Rose and Crown and was living in a bungalow in Preston New Road, Southport. He was questioned by host Melvyn Bragg and a panel that consisted of footballer Rodney Marsh, novelist Angela Huth and explorer Chris Bonnington. Marsh congratulated Albert on a ‘wonderful book’ and asked him about his reaction to hanging Christie, after having hanged Evans three years before. Albert replied that he didn’t wish to comment on individual cases. Asked by Angela Huth why he had chosen to break his silence after all these years, he commented – straight-faced – that as he had refused to speak about his craft, and as so much rubbish had been written by the press about his career, the public didn’t know what to believe, so he was now setting things right. Albert also revealed that although he had admitted at the end of his book that he was now on the side of abolition, the steady rise in crime, which had included a few years earlier the shooting dead of one of his friends, Police Superintendent Gerald Richardson, in Blackpool, he was now on a ‘see-saw’, unsure what he believed.

In 1986, Albert appeared as a guest on Robert Kilroy-Silk’s Day to Day programme to take part in a discussion about the death penalty for child killers. Footage that was recorded before the programme went to air shows Kilroy-Silk explaining to the audience how the programme would work, telling them to put their hands up if they wanted to ask a question or make a point, etc. In this footage, Albert states that he wishes to make a point on the 1966 Moors Murders case, which had recently been in the headlines after the police went back onto the moors in an attempt to locate missing bodies following a statement from Myra Hindley. He is warned that he is not allowed to comment on the case, but responds by saying that he will speak if he wants to. The host warns him that any comments he makes about Brady or Hindley may be libellous and could result in the programme being taken off the air. Albert is asked for the sake of all the other guests to refrain from commenting. The programme was broadcast with the only comment from the now 81-year-old hangman being that he believed that he had never hanged anyone whom he hadn’t believed was guilty and deserved to be hanged. Wearing a bizarre-looking black leather-palmed tweed glove on his left hand, covering a scar from a recent operation, and looking a little lost and uncomfortable whenever the camera picked him out during the debate, he was asked if he had ever made a mistake and hanged the wrong man. His reply was that nobody knew if anyone innocent had been hanged but that it hadn’t been his decision who to hang, as he had merely been a servant of the law; Albert claimed he slept soundly at night. Also sitting in the audience that day was Ruth Ellis’s sister.

Soon after the programme was aired, Albert’s Southport bungalow was burgled while both he and his wife were in hospital being treated for illnesses, and shortly afterwards
they moved into the Melvyn Nursing Home at Southport. Following his retirement, Albert had sold the bulk of his papers, memorabilia and diaries to a former neighbour Michael Forman, who put the items up for auction at Christie’s in May 1992. Albert was seriously ill at the time and it was reported in the press that staff and relatives kept news of the auction a secret from him so as to avoid causing him upset. Albert had said in his biography that the true total of his executions was a secret he would take to the grave. Copies of his diaries, various photographs and documents were sold to collectors and the auction was covered in most national newspapers.