Alexander Green (–1879) was an Australian

executioner An executioner, also known as a hangman or headsman, is an official who executes a sentence of capital punishment on a legally condemned person. Scope and job The executioner was usually presented with a warrant authorising or order ...

. He arrived in the

colony of New South Wales The Colony of New South Wales was a colony of the British Empire from 1788 to 1901, when it became a State of the Commonwealth of Australia. At its greatest extent, the colony of New South Wales included the present-day Australian states of New ...

in 1824 as a

convict A convict is "a person found guilty of a crime and sentenced by a court" or "a person serving a sentence in prison". Convicts are often also known as "prisoners" or "inmates" or by the slang term "con", while a common label for former convict ...

and became the colony's official executioner in 1828. His career as an executioner spanned over 25 years and carried out almost 500 executions, all but one of which were

public In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the ''Öffentlichkei ...

Early life

Green was born in the Netherlands in about 1802, the son of a travelling circus performer. In 1824, he was convicted of theft at

Shrewsbury Shrewsbury ( , also ) is a market town, civil parish, and the county town of Shropshire, England, on the River Severn, north-west of London; at the 2021 census, it had a population of 76,782. The town's name can be pronounced as either 'Sh ...

for stealing "a piece of brown stuff from a shop" and sentenced to be

transported ''Transported'' is an Australian convict melodrama film directed by W. J. Lincoln. It is considered a lost film. Plot In England, Jessie Grey is about to marry Leonard Lincoln but the evil Harold Hawk tries to force her to marry him and she wou ...

to Australia. He was listed as working as a tumbler on the court record and was recorded as standing tall.

Australia

Green arrived in

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

as a

on 12 July 1824 aboard '' Countess of Harcourt''. He was initially lodged in the Hyde Park Barracks and worked for William Hutchison and

Samuel Marsden Samuel Marsden (25 June 1765 – 12 May 1838) was an English-born priest of the Church of England in Australia and a prominent member of the Church Missionary Society, believed to have introduced Christianity to New Zealand. Marsden was a prom ...

under the system of

convict assignment Convict assignment was the practice used in many penal colonies of assigning convicts to work for private individuals. Contemporary abolitionists characterised the practice as virtual slavery, and some, but by no means all, latter-day historians ...

. He received a conditional pardon in May 1825 and his initial life sentence was commuted to a term of seven years. He subsequently worked as a

scourge A scourge is a whip or lash, especially a multi-thong type, used to inflict severe corporal punishment or self-mortification. It is usually made of leather. Etymology The word is most commonly considered to be derived from Old French ''escorgi ...

r at Hyde Park Barracks and Sydney Gaol and as a labourer and honorary constable at Port Stephens.

Career as executioner

In January 1828, Green succeeded Harry Stain as the official executioner for the colony of New South Wales, having previously been Stain's assistant. He was employed on an initial salary of £15 14s 2d () plus accommodation in the Sydney Gaol. This eventually increased to just over £60 per year (). Between 1828 and 1855, Green officiated at the executions of almost 490 people. The first years of his tenure coincided with strict enforcement of the

Bloody Code The "Bloody Code" was a series of laws in England, Wales and Ireland in the 18th and early 19th centuries which mandated the death penalty for a wide range of crimes. It was not referred to as such in its own time, but the name was given later ...

; he hanged 170 people in less than four years under

Ralph Darling General Sir Ralph Darling, GCH (1772 – 2 April 1858) was a British Army officer who served as Governor of New South Wales from 1825 to 1831. He is popularly described as a tyrant, accused of torturing prisoners and banning theatrical entertain ...

and 183 people in six years under

Richard Bourke General Sir Richard Bourke, KCB (4 May 1777 – 12 August 1855), was an Irish-born British Army officer who served as Governor of New South Wales from 1831 to 1837. As a lifelong Whig (Liberal), he encouraged the emancipation of convicts and ...

, but under

George Gipps Sir George Gipps (23 December 1790 – 28 February 1847) was the Governor of New South Wales, Governor of the British colony of New South Wales for eight years, between 1838 and 1846. His governorship oversaw a tumultuous period where the rights ...

only ten people in eight years. He frequent undertook multiple executions on the same date, including a group of eleven men in October 1828. Notable prisoners executed by Green included ten

bushranger Bushrangers were originally escaped convicts in the early years of the British settlement of Australia who used the bush as a refuge to hide from the authorities. By the 1820s, the term had evolved to refer to those who took up "robbery under ...

s associated with the

Bathurst rebellion The Bathurst rebellion of 1830 was an outbreak of bushranging near Bathurst in the British penal colony (now the Australian state) of New South Wales. The rebellion involved a group of escaped convicts who ransacked villages and engaged in shooto ...

in November 1830, thirteen

Norfolk Island Norfolk Island (, ; Norfuk: ''Norf'k Ailen'') is an external territory of Australia located in the Pacific Ocean between New Zealand and New Caledonia, directly east of Australia's Evans Head and about from Lord Howe Island. Together with ...

mutineers in September 1834, the perpetrators of the

Myall Creek massacre The Myall Creek massacre was the killing of at least twenty-eight unarmed Indigenous Australians by twelve colonists on 10 June 1838 at the Myall Creek near the Gwydir River, in northern New South Wales. After two trials, seven of the twelve co ...

in December 1838, convicted murderer John Knatchbull in February 1844, and Indigenous resistance leader

Dundalli Dundalli (c. 1820 – 5 January 1855) was an Aboriginal lawman who figured prominently in accounts of conflict between European settlers and indigenous aboriginal peoples in the area of Brisbane in South East Queensland. Traditionally described ...

in January 1855.

Other activities

Green's reduced sentence expired in 1831. He moved into the

Darlinghurst Gaol The Darlinghurst Gaol is a former Australian prison located in Darlinghurst, New South Wales. The site is bordered by Darlinghurst Road, Burton and Forbes streets, with entrances on Forbes and Burton Streets. The heritage-listed building, predom ...

in 1841, where he lived on a small tenement. Green had several minor brushes with the law and had a prominent facial scar from a fight with an axe-wielding prisoner. In the later part of his career he was "in growing disfavour with the authorities for intoxication, insolence and mental instability". In May 1855, he was committed to the Tarban Creek Lunatic Asylum by

Edward Deas Thomson Sir Edward Deas Thomson (1 June 1800 – 16 July 1879) was a Scotsman who became an administrator and politician in Australia, and was chancellor of the University of Sydney. Background and early career Thomson was born at Edinburgh, Scotland ...

, the

Colonial Secretary of New South Wales Colonial or The Colonial may refer to: * Colonial, of, relating to, or characteristic of a colony or colony (biology) Architecture * American colonial architecture * French Colonial * Spanish Colonial architecture Automobiles * Colonial (1920 ...

. He was observed at the Parramatta Lunatic Asylum in 1877, described as "86, and he looks about 500". It was said that "At one time this man used to amuse himself by hanging a number of dolls all day, but he is now past entertaining himself even in this genial manner". Green died at the Parramatta Asylum in 1879.

Early life

Australia

Career as executioner

Other activities

References

Further reading