Margaret Clitherow
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Margaret Clitherow was an English Catholic recusant known as The Pearl of York. She was pressed to death for refusing to enter a plea to the charge of harbouring Catholic priests. She was canonised in
St. Margaret Clitherow JS
The Black Swan, Peasholme Green, York
The shrine to Saint Margaret on The Shambles, York, 2018
Commemorative plaque on the Ouse Bridge, York
Peine forte et dure
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Peine forte et dure was a method of torture formerly used in the common law legal system, in which a defendant who refused to plead would be subjected to having heavier and heavier stones placed upon
Margaret Clitherow
…was executed on Lady Day, 1586, (which also happened to be Good Friday that year) in the Toll Booth at Ouse Bridge, York, by being crushed to death (peine forte et dure), the standard inducement to force a plea. The two sergeants who should have carried out the execution hired four desperate beggars to do it instead…
An engraving of the peine forte et dure inflicted on a prisoner (appearing in the "Malefactor's register" of 1780)
Giles Corey was pressed to death during the Salem Witch Trials in the 1690s.