Stories

 

The whipping post in Uusikaarlepyy is known to have been used a lot. Frans Ervard Henelius has reminisced having seen some executions in his school years in the 1860s. In one of them, a short, sturdy man had to stand for a few hours in a neck iron, while still looking brave enough to receive the whippings. The whipping had not lasted long before he started to cry: “Mercy, dear marshal, pardon me!” Whipping left bloody wounds on the convict’s back, and the audience standing too close also received their share of blood on their faces. When the man passed out, he was given drinking water. When he regained consciousness, he had to take on the rest of the sentenced whippings. After the punishment, the man was put on his stomach, and the physician spat out liquor from his mouth onto the man’s wounds. After this “disinfection”, the man was dressed in his shirt and taken away. (http://www.nykarlebyvyer.nu/sidor/texter/prosa/birck/ii/spopalen.htm)