The Electric Chair
The electric chair was introduced as a "modern" and humane alternative to hanging by New York state in 1890. It soon became the preferred method of execution in the majority of retentionist states, although not all continued to use it. Ohio was the second state to introduce the electric chair, in 1896 - 17 year old William Hass becoming its first victim the following year. Massachusetts followed in 1898, with New Jersey in 1906, with Virginia in 1908 and North Carolina in 1910.
4,308 people have been electrocuted in 27 states between 1890 and 1966. Most of these executions were for murder, including over 600 at New York's famous Sing Sing prison (the largest number of executions at any single US prison). However 458 men have been put to death in the electric chair for rape and at least one man and one woman (the Rosenbergs) for treason. Six people were electrocuted for wartime sabotage in Washington DC on August 8th 1942. A further 150 men and two women have been electrocuted (all for murder) since the resumption of executions in 1977 up to the end of 2004, bringing the total to 4436 men and 24 women.
Alabama carried out most of the post Furman electrocutions, with 4 in 2000. Nationwide there were no electrocutions in 2001 and both Georgia and Ohio removed electrocution as an option during that year. Alabama executed one person in its electric chair in 2002.
After the particularly cruel hanging of 40 year old murderess, Roxalana Druse in New York in 1887, who took 15 minutes to strangle to death, the state Governor, David B Hill, was searching for a more acceptable form of execution. He set up a legislative committee in 1886 to examine other methods. At that time there was a lot of interest and experimentation with electricity so it was perhaps obvious that a politician would opt for a new, "more scientific", method such as electrocution.
The first electric chair was designed in 1888/9. Although the stated reason for its development was that it was to be a more humane method of execution, there was also another interesting reason.
In the 1880's, electricity was a new and novel power source. Thomas Edison and George Westinghouse were the two major players in the struggle to control electrical utilities. Technical and economic circumstances made Westinghouse's alternating current superior to Edison's direct current. Alternating current was soon adopted as the standard for electrical transmission world wide.
Edison had tried to convince everyone that Westinghouse's AC current was unsafe and was delighted when New York State introduced the electric chair, which required alternating current.
The electric chair was used in 19 states at various times and also by the Philippines, the only country outside America to use it.
Into law in New York.
On June 4th 1888 the New York Legislature passed Chapter 489 of Laws of New York of 1888, providing for the execution by "a current of electricity of sufficient intensity to cause death" for offences committed after January 1st 1889.
There was one small problem - New York did not possess an electric chair and had to commission Harold Brown, an electrician, to build a chair for each of the three prisons where executions were to take place - Auburn, Sing Sing and Clinton. This seemed an over provision for an average of 8 executions per annum state-wide.
Brown favored Westinghouse's alternating current for the purpose, which made him most unpopular with George Westinghouse who was trying to promote it as a safe form of domestic energy. Westinghouse refused to supply Brown with the necessary generators and he was forced to buy second hand units.
The chairs were solid oak constructions and each had two electrodes, one for the prisoner's head and one for the lower back.
The first electrocution - William Kemmler August 6th 1890.
William Kemmler was convicted of the murder of his lover Tillie Ziegler and became the first man to be sentenced to death under the new law.
Kemmler's lawyers appealed, sighting the Eighth and Fourteenth amendments to the Constitution, which prohibit "cruel and unusual punishment". The appeal was turned down on October 9th 1889 and the execution date was fixed for August 6th 1890. It was a strangely casual affair carried out in the presence of twenty five witnesses, fourteen of them doctors. Kemmler was led into the execution chamber in the basement of Auburn prison and was introduced to the witnesses before taking off his coat and seating himself into the chair.
The head and spinal electrodes each consisted of a 4 inch diameter wooden cup, containing a three inch diameter metal plate faced with a layer of sponge which was soaked in brine to improve conductivity.
Kemmler was strapped into the chair by leather straps around his arms legs and waist. The head electrode, in a leather harness, was applied and a black cloth was pulled over his face. The warden, Charles Durston, gave the signal to Edwin Davis, the executioner, to throw the switch which caused Kemmler to go completely rigid.
He remained in this condition for seventeen seconds until the current was turned off and then his whole body appeared to relax. He was certified dead, but after half a minute there were a series of spasmodic movements of the chest which tended to indicate that he was not, in fact, dead and the warden ordered a second charge of electricity which lasted about seventy seconds until vapor and later smoke could be seen rising from the spinal electrode accompanied by the smell of burning flesh.
At this point the current was again switched off and the body carefully examined. There were no signs of life and Kemmler was dead. Not everyone was impressed by the "humanity" of the new method and an expert interviewed for the New York Times said that the execution was "an awful botch, Kemmler was literally roasted to death".
Women in the chair.
Martha Place became the first woman to die in the electric chair when she was executed on March 20th 1899 at New York's Sing Sing prison for the murder of her step daughter Ida in February of the same year.
An account of the execution in the National Police Gazette said she was guided into the death chamber, clutching a Bible. "Her eyes were closed, she was dressed in a black gown with a few fancy frills at the bosom. She wore russet slippers." A spot had been clipped near the crown of her head to make room for the electrode. Another electrode was fastened to her leg. A current of 1,760 volts went through her body in an execution that was "successful in every way". The doctor who pronounced Martha dead was also a woman.
23 women have been electrocuted in America in the 20th century (see American Women 1900 - 2001, for individual details) and one in the 21st century (see below).
Ruth Snyder, who was executed January 12th 1928, aged 33, became the subject of a very famous photograph taken at the moment of her death by New York Daily News photographer, Tom Howard, using a hidden 16-millimeter one-shot camera strapped to his ankle, with the shutter release controlled from his pocket. She had been convicted of murdering her husband.
Judi Beunoano was the first woman to have been electrocuted since the resumption of executions in 1977. She went to the electric chair in Florida's Starke prison on March 30th 1998 for 4 murders, her execution taking 12 minutes to carry out. She was dubbed the "Black Widow" by the press.
Lynda Lyon Block was electrocuted in Alabama on May 10th 2002 for the murder of a policeman in Opelika on October 4th 1993. She may well be the last person to suffer this form of death in America and will almost certainly be the last woman. Her execution was described thus : Wearing a white prison outfit with her shaved head covered by a black hood and wearing light makeup, with mascara and a light shade of pink lipstick she was led into the execution room at the Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore, Alabama. Witnesses said she appeared to pray with her eyes closed about 11:52 p.m. She made no final statement. The execution began with a 2,050-volt, 20-second shock, which caused Block to clench her fists, her body tensed and steam came from the sponge on her head and the electrode on her left leg. She then received 250 volts for 100 seconds. The whole execution took just two minutes.
Modern electrocutions.
150 men and 2 women have been electrocuted in the U.S.A. since the Supreme Court reinstated capital punishment in 1977, up to the end of 2004, making it the second most common method (after lethal injection). It is still a legal method in seven states - Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Nebraska, Tennessee and Virginia. It is only mandatory now in Nebraska and it is doubtful whether it will ever be used there.
On the of April 26th 2002 the state Governor of Alabama, Don Siegelman, signed a law making lethal injection the primary method of execution there providing that from July 1st 2002 condemned inmates in Alabama will be executed by injection unless they choose the electric chair. Alabama carried out the first electrocution of the new millennium when it put David Ray Duren to death for the robbery murder of a young girl on January 7th 2000. The "Yellow Momma", as its chair is known (pictured left) was last used on the May 10th 2002 for the execution of Lynda Lyon Block.
South Carolina electrocuted James Neil Tucker on May 29th 2004. Virginia electrocuted 61 year old Earl Conrad Bramblett on April 9th 2003. Bramblett had been convicted of the murders of a family of four. Both Tucker and Bramblett had elected to die this way. Bramblett was strapped into the oak chair and given an initial burst of 1,800 volts for 30 seconds. Bramblett's body tensed against the leather and nylon straps, his hands were clenched into white-knuckled fists, his knees slowly opened and his skin turned bright red around the leather face mask. The first jolt was followed by 240 volts for 60 seconds, and then the entire cycle was repeated. A small stream of smoke wafted up from his right leg during the second cycle. He was certified dead 5 minutes later.
James Neil Tucker elected to die by electrocution in South Carolina on the 29th of May 2004 for a double murder committed in 1994. The execution appears to have gone smoothly. Prisoners sentenced there before 1995 have the choice between electrocution and injection but if they make no choice then death is by electrocution.
Georgia abandoned the electric chair in October 2001. 441 people had been put to death in it since the abolition of hanging there in 1924.
Kentucky has carried out one electrocution since 1977, Nebraska 2, and there have been none in Tennessee although this state has prisoners on death row, including Christa Gail Pike, the youngest woman under sentence of death in the US, 19 at the time of her crime.
On January 6th, 2000 the Florida Senate passed a bill by a vote of 102-5 to give death row inmates the option of lethal injection rather than the electric chair. Apparently they have all elected lethal injection. The electric chair was not used at all in 2001 although John Byrd had elected it in Ohio to protest against what he claimed was the cruelty of capital punishment . His execution was stayed and in the meantime (11/21/01) Ohio altered its law to allow only lethal injection. Georgia's highest court struck down the state's use of the electric chair on October 5th 2001 on the basis that death by electrocution "inflicts purposeless physical violence and needless mutilation that makes no measurable contribution to accepted goals of punishment.
Execution procedure.
After being led into the execution chamber, the prisoner is strapped into the chair with leather belts across the chest, thighs, legs, and arms. The electrodes are then attached - one or two to the leg(s), where a patch will have been shaved bare to improve conductivity, and the other contained within a helmet, to the shaved head. Some states use helmets with a copper mesh screen covered with 5/8 thick artificial sponge to improve conductivity mesh. All this is attached with a 1/4" x 20 Machine brass screw to the turret electrode on the top. The sponge is usually soaked in brine or treated with gel (Electro-Creme) to increase conductivity and reduce burning. Some states use lead for the leg electrode(s) as it is more easily formed around the leg.
A leather face mask or black face cloth is applied. The prisoner, whether male or female, will also be wearing a diaper.
The executioner presses a button on the control panel to deliver a first shock of between 1700 and 2,400 volts, which lasts for between thirty seconds and a minute. This is automatically timed and controlled. The current must be under 6 amps to ensure the body does not cook. Smoke usually comes from the prisoner's leg and head where the electrodes are in contact with the skin. A doctor then examines the prisoner, who if not dead is given a further shock. (In some states this is done automatically by the control gear)
A third and fourth are given if necessary. (It took five jolts to kill Ethel Rosenberg)
On average the process takes 2 min 10 seconds and two shocks are given.
The first shock runs for up to one minute and normally destroys the brain and central nervous system. It also causes complete paralysis due to every muscle in the body contracting and staying contracted while the current is flowing. This makes heartbeat and respiration impossible. The second shock continues the process to ensure the heart beat does not resume. The prisoner is supposed to be rendered unconscious in 1/240th of a second.
After electrocution the body temperature rises to about 138 degrees F and is initially too hot to touch. Heating destroys the body's proteins and "bakes" the organs.
Physical reactions include heaving chest, gurgles, foaming at the mouth, bloody sweat, burning of the hair and skin, and release of urine and faeces.
The body has to be allowed to cool before an autopsy can be performed.
According to Robert H. Kirschner, the deputy chief medical examiner of Cook County, Illinois, "The brain appears cooked in most cases."
According to Judge Brennan, the prisoner's eyeballs sometimes pop out and rest on his cheeks. The prisoner often defecates, urinates, and vomits blood and drool. The body turns bright red as its temperature rises, and the prisoner's flesh swells and his skin stretches to the point of breaking. Sometimes the prisoner catches on fire, particularly if he perspires excessively. Witnesses hear a loud and sustained sound like bacon frying, and the sickly sweet smell of burning flesh permeates the chamber.
There is some debate about what the electrocuted prisoner experiences before he dies, many doctors believe that he feels himself being burned to death and suffocating, since the shock causes respiratory paralysis as well as cardiac arrest. According to Harold Hillman, "It must feel very similar to the medieval trial by ordeal of being dropped in boiling oil." Because the energy of the shock paralyses the prisoner's muscles, he cannot cry out. "My mouth tasted like cold peanut butter. I felt a burning in my head and my left leg, and I jumped against the straps," according to Willie Francis, a 17-year-old who survived his execution in 1946. Francis was successfully executed a year later.
Botched Electrocutions
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