Tales from way back when…

Guiana’s reluctant hangman
FIVE CONDEMNED men are now awaiting execution at the Georgetown Prisons.
But who will hang them? Thomas Fisher, B.G’s official executioner who has hanged more than 150 murderers told the Graphic in an exclusive interview: “I don’t want to hang any more people.”
The 68-year-old hangman, who for 23 years carried out the death penalty for capital offences against B.G’s most notorious killers at $25 each, quitted his post on July 25,1960.
“I have seen enough people die …I was forced to execute my own school mate…now I am a sick man,” he said.
But the Prison Department has not yet accepted Fisher’s resignation, and he has been recalled more than once to spring the ‘death trap’.
“Now, however, I am too sick to do it any more; I am reluctant…I don’t want to hang anybody any more.”
He became the official hangman on December 13, 1938 at a salary of $10 a month, but it took him three years before he was given his first commission.
“My most agonizing moment was to hang my school mate, who was convicted of killing his wife. I asked the authorities to get another hangman, but my request was turned down. My only satisfaction was that I was allowed to carry out the burial,” he added.
He recalled an occasion when he had lost all the fingers on his left hand in an accident, but was taken out of hospital to carry out an execution.
There are some episodes of his hangman’s career which Fisher said he would never  forget.Some executions he would always remember were of some men who, apparently resigned to their fate, took their last “walk” in high spirits.
Read ‘the hangman’s story’ in the Graphic, starting next Sunday.
(Guiana Graphic: May 14, 1961)

My fear of ‘Black-Bess’ made me become a hangman
IT WAS A fine, long, black whip. His father called it ‘Black-Bess’. But how fine and long it was is known only to Thomas Fisher, who grew up terribly afraid of it.
In fact, Thomas’ fear for the black whip became so great that it resulted in him becoming a professional hangman in British Guiana.
Recalling his early life in an exclusive story told to Sunday Graphic, Fisher said that his dreams of becoming a doctor were shattered by a family feud when he was ten years old.
“My two brothers, Geoffrey and William, returned to Ireland with my father, but I remained in B.G.
“Daddy was taking ‘Black-Bess’ along, so I decided my best course of action would be to remain in Guiana with my mother who, apart from my skin, I also loved very much.
“A few years after my father died in Northern Ireland, my mother decided to marry for the second time. The marriage did not last very long as her husband died soon after from a severe illness.
“This meant that I was again without any help. My first job was that of a cash boy at J. P. Santos and Company Limited. I was fired for giving a licking to another cash boy. From then, it was one job after another. I found myself learning to make harnesses for horse-drawn carriages for my living. At another time, I worked in the detective branch of the Police Force. I attempted engineering but gave it up after injuring the middle finger on my right hand.
“Then I served as a carter to the police canteen, and an inspector of animals on the West Bank Demerara. Before accepting an appointment as executioner of ‘bad-men’ in 1938, I worked as a Supernumerary Constable with the now defunct Gaiety Cinema.
“This job I held for a long time until fire gutted the building in 1926. The same year the cinema burnt down, my mother died and I was left alone in the world to make my decisions.
“Not long after my mother died, I married my first wife, Margaret. She was very loving, and we lived happily together until 1951 when she died. I later married my second and present wife, Helena, now 56 years of age. My marriage to Helena meant adopting two children. I didn’t care; I love children, and Olga (seven) and Compton (now 11), live with us just as if they were my own children.”
Thomas, who has hanged over 150 people, including a woman, remembers the day when he bought a sailor a large bottle of white rum to stow him away to the outside world.
The now wrinkled 67-year-old man once served as an ‘altar boy’ in the Roman Catholic Church in B.G., and when he disembarked from the ship, he was dressed as a sailor.
“My sailor friend told me that we were in Colombia. The country looked so very beautiful to me; I told myself it was good to be outside B.G.”
But it was in this “beautiful country” that he learnt the art of hanging people.
NEXT WEEK: I was appointed executioner.
(Guiana Graphic: May 21, 1961)

Help us bring ‘Story of Georgetown’ up-to-date
THE BRITISH Guiana Historical Society launched a countrywide appeal yesterday for the assistance of Guianese to help Society members review and bring James Rodway’s ‘Story of Georgetown’ up-to-date.
The job Guianese are asked to do is to go through all old newspapers in the British Guiana Archives under the supervision of the archivist, from 1920 up to the present date, in order to collect information about the municipal extensions and other activities determined by the Georgetown Town Council.
Mr. A. J. Seymour, Chairman of the History and Culture Week Committee said it is hoped that when this newspaper material has been collected, the work of drafting the up-to-date sections of ‘The Story Of Georgetown’ will be done.
The work involved is relatively simple, but it is necessary to examine the daily newspapers for the period indicated.
He admitted that it will take some time to compile the revisions, and then to take the  matter to printing stage.
Therefore, the matter is of some urgency.
Mr. J. A. Young of the Ministry of Communications will make all the arrangements with willing helpers.
(Guiana Graphic:  May 20, 1961)

(Clifford Stanley can be reached to discuss any of the foregoing articles at cliffantony@gmail.com or by telephone: 657-2043)