Motivation
Wall Street Journal published an interesting book review on 4/8/2013 headlined “A Final Sentence” about the book titled “A Faithful Executioner” written by Joel F. Harrington.
An Executioner Is A Human Being
I believe generally we do not learn too much about past and contemporary executioners as a human being. How many of us would like to have a job like this? Are they just merciless, faceless humans, who have a license to kill or maim a convicted person? Do they take pleasure in what they are doing?
Thus, I found it intriguing to discover that Mr. Harrington wrote a biography of such a 16th century, German executioner, i.e. Meister Frantz Schmidt, who apparently kept a diary.
Abolition Of Capital Punishment
Is not one of the reasons why so many people and countries oppose the death sentence that there must be at least one human being who has to carry out this sentence?
About The Life Of The Executioner
He learnt the profession from his father. He married the daughter of the chief executioner of Nuremberg. He was supposedly well compensated for this work.
“Frantz was tasked not only with killing convicted criminals but often with interrogating them through torture and punishing them through mutilation. It was vital that these tasks be done properly to avoid clumsy maiming or botched executions that might inflame the mob and bring the city authorities into disrepute.”
According to his diaries, during his professional life of 40 years he executed 361 persons and dispensed 345 minor punishments.
According to his biographer, he had a dual career as a doctor. Wikipedia adds that he became a medical consultant after retirement.
One may also be surprised to read about the brutality of the criminals that the executioner punished presuming for a moment that their guilt was established beyond reasonable doubt in a court of law of competent jurisdiction(to apply this modern standard). Is it conceivable that in those days both criminals and law enforcement were barbaric and oblivious of human rights?
“Frantz's father had been forced to take on the "dishonorable" task of public executioner through the arbitrary act of a local prince. Frantz was shunned by his schoolmates and, when he came of age, forbidden from any other profession. He dreamed of giving it up, not because it repelled him but because it condemned him to an outcast status. … A few years after retiring in 1617, at the age of 64, Frantz made a successful appeal to the emperor for the re-instatement of his family's honor, thereby freeing his children of the stigma he had endured.” (Emphasis added).
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