Crowds protest as last man to be hanged in Scotland dies in prison
AUGUST 15, 1963
The name of Harry John Burnett will forever go down in the annals of Scottish criminal history.
The 21-year-old factory worker from Aberdeen was the last person in Scotland to be hanged, having been sent to the gallows in the city’s Craiginches Prison
57 years ago.
Around a year later, Westminster suspended the practice and, in 1969, permanently banned capital punishment.
Burnett had begun a relationship with mumof-two Margaret May at the fish curers where they both worked. Margaret was married to merchant seaman Thomas Guyan, but left him to move in with Burnett.
Her lover turned out to be a jealous man, and would often lock her in the house when he went out. On one occasion when she did go outside, on May 31, 1963, she met her husband and agreed to go back to him.
Burnett’s anger boiled over, and after threatening Margaret with a knife, he went to his brother’s home and stole a shotgun, before turning up at Margaret’s family house, where he shot Thomas twice in the face, at close range, killing him.
Taking Margaret from the property, he stole a car and went on the run, but when police caught up with him he offered no resistance to his arrest.
During his two-day trial in July, it was revealed Burnett had suffered a troubled childhood and had tried to commit suicide as a teenager.
Two doctors giving evidence at the trial said he was insane at the time of the murder and one of the medics revealed Burnett had signed himself into a mental hospital after the failed attempt to take his own life. But the jury took just 25 minutes to throw out the defence team’s plea of insanity or diminished responsibility and found him guilty.
After Burnett was sentenced to death, both his family and relatives of his victim petitioned for him to be given a reprieve, even sending a telegram to the Queen.
Thomas Guyan’s mother, Jeanne, said: “I don’t want revenge. The last thing I want is that he should die. His death won’t bring my Tom back.
“When my grief wore off I got to thinking about the boy’s mother and my heart went out to her. It was a terrible thing he did but he’s only a laddie.”
Margaret revealed in the witness stand that she had agreed to marry Bennett while they were in the stolen car together after her husband’s murder, adding: “I said I would marry him before and I still stand by him. My heart is with
Harry. People can talk, but I still love Harry.”
Bennett was said to have remained calm when his loved ones told him on August 14 that his reprieve was denied. The two lovers were allowed a 30-minute reunion and final goodbye later that day. The next morning, at 8am, Bennett was led out to the gallows to be hanged by executioner Harry Allen at Craiginches Prison, where a crowd of around 300 had gathered outside.
Bennett’s body was buried in an unmarked grave within the prison confines, where it remained until the jail was closed in 2014 and the land was earmarked for redevelopment. His remains were exhumed and taken to Aberdeen Crematorium.
The UK’s final hangings were in Manchester and Liverpool in August 1964.