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Document : 28

Title: Execution of Mrs M'Kinnon, Who was Executed at Edinburgh

Author(s): Anonymous

EXECUTION
Of
MRS. M'KINNON,
Who was Executed at Edinburg on Wednesday morning the
16th April, 1823, in the presence of 30,000 spectators, for the
Murder of Mr. Wm. Howat, and her body given for dissection;
with an account of her Dress, Behaviour, and Dying
Declaration on the scaffold.
Edinburgh, April 16 - This day Mrs. M'KINNON was Executed here pursuant to
her sentence, for the Murder of Mr. Wm. Howat, a writer's clerk, by
stabbing him
with a knife. It appeared that Mrs. M'Kinnon kept an infamous house on the
South
Bridge, and that Howat, along with some companions on the evening of the
18th
of February last, went to her house intoxicated, and after drinking some
time a
squabble took place betwixt them and some of the girls who lodged in her
house.
Mrs. M'Kinnon was absent at the commencement of the affray, but she soon
arrived,
and flying into a passion, said "Give me a knife and I will soon settle the
b-,"
she then deliberately went to a knife-case, and seized a knife, with which
she gave
Howat a mortal wound in the breast, of which he died several days after in
the Infirmary.
Her trial lasted 18 hours, and excited the greatest interest, and till near
the end, she had great hopes that it would prove favourable to her, but
when she
heard the verdict, she exclaimed, "Lord have mercy on me," and immediately
fainted.
Mrs. M'Kinnon has conducted herself since her trial with the greatest
propriety,
At first, her mental agony was so excessive, that she refused sustenance of
every
kind, until the evening of the following Sunday; but since then she
acquired more
fortitude, and on being informed that her petition for mercy could not be
complied
with, she heard final doom with the greatest composure. Early on Monday
morning
she was removed from the Calton hill Jail to the Lock-up-house; she
appeared very
dejected, and was supported on the arm of an old woman.
About half-past eight o'clock she left the Lock-up-house, attended by the
Magistrates,
Officers, and the Rev. Mr. Porteous, the chaplain of the prison, and
several
other pious Gentlemen, and proceeded with a slow and feeble step to the
head of
Libberton's Wynd, where the scaffold was erected. On her arrival at the
fatal spot
she appeared greatly agitated, and a general sigh of sorrow pervaded the
immense
multitude who had assembled to witness her melancholy end.
During the time that the awful preparations were going on, she was
supported by
two of the attendants; she acknowledged the justness of her punishment, and
was
truly sorry for the crime which she had committed; and as she could not be
forgiven
by men, she Trusted in the mercy of Him who hath said, "He that sincerely
repenteth
shall be freely forgiven." The fatal cord being adjusted, a short but
impressive
prayer was pronounced in which she seemed ferverently to join; about five
minutes
before nine o'clock this unhappy victim of passion expiated with her life,
the outrage
which she had committed on the laws of God, and her country - an awful
warning
to the dissipiated of the one sex, and the vicious of the other. After she
had hung
the usual time. her body was taken down and conveyed to the College for
dissection.
Mrs. M'Kinnon was elegantly dressed in a black silk gown, trimmed with
white
lace at the bottom, silk stockings, and white slippers. She was betwixt 35
and 40
years of age, good looking, and rather corpulent. Her father at one time
was quarter
master of the 79th regiment of foot. At a very early age she was debauched
by an officer in the army, under very atrocious circumstances; and after
that event her
family thrust her from under their roof, and totally abandoned her, to
which circumstance
may be attributed her after course of profligate life.
The crowd assembled on this lamentable occasion, was unusually great; at an
early
hour the High Street was crowded, and all the windows trims of houses, and
every
elevated place within view of the fatal spot was filled with spectators, so
that it is
calculated that not less than 30,000 people were present.
John Muir, Printer, Glasgow.