ABSTRACT
In September 1791 a murder trial took place at the Old Bailey courthouse in the City of London. The accused, Susannah Hill, was one of the capital’s many prostitutes; the victim (Francis Kotzwara) was her unfortunate client. Susannah was acquitted of the murder and the lesser charge of manslaughter on the grounds that there was insufficient evidence to prove her guilt. This chapter will explore the strange case of Francis Kotwara and Susannah Hill and attempt to show how it fist into the wider themes of this book and its concentration on the discretionary nature of decision-making in regards to capital punishment. Unlike the stories that have preceded it this did not play out in the contemporary press; instead there was a clear attempt to stifle any commentary on the affair. Yet that attempt was in vain and the survival of information about the case allows us to investigate the ways in which some contemporaries engaged with debates about hanging as a form of execution. This offers an alternative view of hanging and a new perspective on attempts to restrict access to the execution ceremony.
