Hangman's Elm, or simply "The Hanging Tree", is an

English Elm The field elm (''Ulmus minor'') cultivar 'Atinia' , commonly known as the English elm, formerly common elm and horse may, Republished 1978 by EP Publishing, Wakefield. and more lately the Atinian elm was, before the spread of Dutch elm disea ...

located at the northwest corner in

Washington Square Park Washington Square Park is a public park in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Lower Manhattan, New York City. One of the best known of New York City's public parks, it is an icon as well as a meeting place and center for cultural activity. ...

Greenwich Village Greenwich Village ( , , ) is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street to the north, Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the south, and the Hudson River to the west. Greenwich Village ...

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

. It stood at tall when last measured nearly 35 years ago, and has a diameter of . In 1989, the

New York City Department of Parks and Recreation The New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, also called the Parks Department or NYC Parks, is the department of the government of New York City responsible for maintaining the city's parks system, preserving and maintaining the ecolog ...

determined that this English Elm was 310 years old, although that was subsequently revised to "more than 300 years old". As a result, it is considered to be Manhattan's oldest, outliving Peter Stuyvesant’s pear tree at the northeast corner of 13th Street and

Third Avenue Third Avenue is a north-south thoroughfare on the East Side of the New York City borough of Manhattan, as well as in the center portion of the Bronx. Its southern end is at Astor Place and St. Mark's Place. It transitions into Cooper Square ...

, and the great

Tulip poplar ''Liriodendron tulipifera''—known as the tulip tree, American tulip tree, tulipwood, tuliptree, tulip poplar, whitewood, fiddletree, and yellow-poplar—is the North American representative of the two-species genus '' Liriodendron'' (the othe ...

at Shorakapkok in Manhattan's Inwood neighborhood. The earliest references to the elm as a "hanging tree" date from the late 19th century, long after the supposed hangings were said to have taken place and many come from the accounts of the

Marquis de Lafayette Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de La Fayette (6 September 1757 – 20 May 1834), known in the United States as Lafayette (, ), was a French aristocrat, freemason and military officer who fought in the American Revolutio ...

. Recent extensive research into the park's history by more than one historian has shown that the tree was on a private farm until the land was bought by the city and added to Washington Square in 1827. No public records exist of hangings from this tree. The only recorded execution in this area was of Rose Butler, in 1820, for arson. She was hanged from a

gallows A gallows (or scaffold) is a frame or elevated beam, typically wooden, from which objects can be suspended (i.e., hung) or "weighed". Gallows were thus widely used to suspend public weighing scales for large and heavy objects such as sacks ...

in the city's potter's field, on the eastern side of

Minetta Creek Minetta Creek was one of the largest natural watercourses in Manhattan, New York City, United States. Minetta Creek was fed from two tributaries, one originating at Fifth Avenue and 21st Street, and the other originating at Sixth Avenue and 16th ...

, about from the elm; at that time, Minetta Creek ran in a shallow ravine between the potter's field and the farm where the elm stood.

References

External links

Washington Square Park Phase 1A Archaeological Survey
Individual elm trees Greenwich Village Individual trees in New York City {{NYC-stub

See also

References

External links