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Crime and Punishment in Colonial Times
Conner Fountain and
Stryder Lydon
During the early years of the English colonization of what is now America, the crimes and following punishments were equally unique and cruel. Much like modern America and many other countries, the crimes the colonies dealt with included theft, murder, and public indecency, but they also dealt with crimes such as hog theft, bestiality, and being absent from church on the Lord's day. These crimes were dealt with with equally strange punishments such as being held in stocks, ducking stools, pillories, being branded on your skin or clothes, or being publicly whipped.
-Crimes such as Theft, Adultery, Murder, Bestiality, Public Drunkenness, and Hog theft were amongst the more severe crimes.
-Many crimes were conceived from religion, for example, if you missed church on multiple occasions you could be whipped, put in stocks, or even hung
-Those who were accused and tried would testify in court but would rarely be found not guilty
-Roger Scott was a citizen of Boston in the early seventeenth century and was publicly whipped for repeatedly "sleeping on the Lord's Day"
Punishment
-Punishments were carried out in public in order to discourage onlookers from committing the same crime
-Most punishments were often extremely disproportionate to the crime that was committed
-the punishments of the accused often immediately followed their persecution
-Crimes such as slander and theft were dealt with much more severely , and often led to death or serious injury
-Whippings, branding, cutting off ears and being placed in stocks were used as an example to discourage people from committing crimes
-Having letters branded onto ones skin or writing on their clothes were used to mark people who have committed crimes (an A for adultery and B for Burglary )
-Banishment was amongst the more extreme Punishments.
-Hog theft would lead to a being whipped or hung
-The letter T was branded on to ones hand if they were a thief.
the punishments inflicted upon the citizens of the colonies were as severe as they were for many reasons, many of which revolved around religion and sending a message. During this time period, religion and government were intertwined heavily, and therefore the beliefs of the church bled into the laws and punishments that were enforced in England and its colonies. As well as this, England and the colonies had such severe punishments for seemingly miniscule crimes because the government believed that if punishments were a public affair, they could use the brutality of the branding, hangings, and whippings to discourage further crimes.