Eleanor Power (died 11 October 1754) was the first English woman to be executed in what is today
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
. Power was
hanged
Hanging is the suspension of a person by a noose or ligature around the neck.Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed. Hanging as method of execution is unknown, as method of suicide from 1325. The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' states that hanging in ...
for the
murder
Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification (jurisprudence), justification or valid excuse (legal), excuse, especially the unlawful killing of another human with malice aforethought. ("The killing of another person wit ...
of
William Keen, a
justice of the peace
A justice of the peace (JP) is a judicial officer of a lower or ''puisne'' court, elected or appointed by means of a commission ( letters patent) to keep the peace. In past centuries the term commissioner of the peace was often used with the sa ...
in
St. John's,
Newfoundland
Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...
.
The crime
Power, her husband Robert Power, and seven other men were convicted of murdering Keen in a
burglary
Burglary, also called breaking and entering and sometimes housebreaking, is the act of entering a building or other areas without permission, with the intention of committing a criminal offence. Usually that offence is theft, robbery or murder ...
attempt of Keen's summer home on 9 September 1754. There had been ten accomplices who initially broke into Keen's house and stole a chest and some silver spoons. When the chest was found to contain only alcohol, Eleanor Power and one of the male accomplices left the scene. The eight who remained behind decided to make another burglary attempt. When Keen awoke in his bed during the second attempt, he was beaten by two of the accomplices with a
scythe
A scythe ( ) is an agricultural hand tool for mowing grass or harvesting crops. It is historically used to cut down or reap edible grains, before the process of threshing. The scythe has been largely replaced by horse-drawn and then tractor m ...
and the butt of a
musket
A musket is a muzzle-loaded long gun that appeared as a smoothbore weapon in the early 16th century, at first as a heavier variant of the arquebus, capable of penetrating plate armour. By the mid-16th century, this type of musket gradually d ...
. Keen died of his injuries on 29 September 1754.
Trial and execution
On 8 October 1754, nine of the accomplices, including Eleanor Power, were brought to trial for murder before the Court of Oyer and Terminer of Newfoundland. The tenth accomplice, Nicholas Tobin, was the only Crown witness against the nine defendants. Undefended by lawyers, the nine defendants were convicted of murder by a jury after 30 minutes of deliberation and sentenced to death by hanging. Two of the male accomplices were executed on 10 October 1754; the following day, Eleanor and Robert Power followed and became the first married couple to hang together in present-day Canada. Eleanor Power was also the first non-Native American woman to be executed by British authorities in present-day Canada.
After years of imprisonment in St. John's, the five remaining defendants were eventually pardoned on condition that they leave Newfoundland and never return.
Modern analysis
Modern commentators have suggested that Eleanor Power might have escaped execution had she been represented by a qualified lawyer at her trial. This is because while Power could have legitimately been convicted of burglary, she was likely not guilty of murder since she had abandoned the conspirators after the first break-in and played no role in Keen's death. The same commentators have also suggested that the court that convicted the nine defendants was illegally constituted because the English law that governed the Colony of Newfoundland mandated that capital trials for offences committed in Newfoundland had to be tried by courts in England.
[Greenwood and Boissery, pp. 29–31, 35–36, citing King William's Act, 10&11 Wm. III (1699), c. 25, s. 13.]
Notes
References
*M. J. McCarthy, "The Irish in Early Newfoundland", ''Newfoundland Quarterly'' 83:43–48 (1988)
*Murray Greenwood and Beverley Boissery (2000). "The Eleanor Power Story" in ''Uncertain Justice: Canadian Women and Capital Punishment, 1754–1953'' (Toronto: Osgoode Society, ) pp. 23–38
*Paul O'Neill, "Jezebels and The Just", ''Newfoundland Quarterly'' 12:25–30 (1980)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Power, Eleanor
Year of birth unknown
1754 deaths
Executed Canadian women
Executed English women
Executed Canadian people
People executed by Newfoundland
British people executed for murder
Executed English people
People executed in British North America by hanging