Gruesome Bristol: New Gaol prison Jutting up like a broken tooth along the Cumberland Road it is all too easy to pass by the ruins of one of Bristol's last remaining execution sites. Commissioned in 1816 by the city council for a budget of ?60,000 - in today's money that would cost the city over ?2m - the New Gaol opened its doors to inmates in 1820. "This is an extensive and commodious building," wrote the editor of the Mathew's Bristol, Clifton and Hotwell Guide in 1825. "For health, convenience and excellent arrangement is not to be equaled in England, commanding extensive views of the surrounding countryside," he continued. "The boundary wall (20 feet high) is built in hewn variegated marble which has a beautiful appearance." Among its first guests were prisoners transferred from Bristol's infamous Newgate prison in Broadmead that it replaced. Built to hold 197 prisoners of mixed sex the prison was a great improvement over its predecessors: Bridewell jail's prisoners had a cat put into their cells at night to stop rats from gnawing at their feet. The New Gaol's accommodation consisted of single cells that measured 6 ft by 9 ft. Water supplies were drawn from a well using a large treadmill that could hold twenty inmates - not an unusual practice in those days. Despite the forward-thinking design it didn't take too long for conditions to deteriorate. The water from the well proved to be undrinkable, small windows stopped air circulating and created a stale and fetid interior. Prisoners were poorly clothed and suffered in the winter months from the cold. At night the whole prison was enveloped in a shroud of darkness that even hampered the warders carrying out their patrols. All that remains to mark the site now is the grim granite front entrance, resembling a small castle complete with its rusting mock portcullis and a small section of outer wall. On top of the gatehouse entrance open air gallows were erected for public executions. Designed not only as a entrance but as a platform for staging crowd-pulling public executions, the gatehouse's flat roof was built with a trap door. It was through this door the condemned dropped with a noose around their necks on the way to the next world. This ruin is the keeper of some gruesome tales of the judicial system in Bristol. We shall now look at some of the more notable executions that took place over this gatehouse as we follow how the New Gaol cast its shadow across Bristol's history. Bristol's traumatic last hanging and the Gaol's closure 1849 saw Bristol's final public hanging at the New Gaol. Servant girl Sarah Harriet Thomas, 17, had been found guilty of killing her elderly employer Miss Elizabeth Jefferies - bludgeoning her to death in her own bed. Throughout her trial she had not appeared to treat the court proceedings seriously, but records state that when the Judge put on his black cap and passed sentence she collapsed and broke down completely. William Calcraft, the longest-serving executioner in England was contracted to carry out the sentence, but even he was greatly affected by her youth and good looks. Sarah Thomas was dragged screaming to meet her death at the top of the prison gatehouse. On the day of her execution she was dragged screaming to the gallows where she continued to sob, scream and plead for her life right up to the final moment. So great and moving was the awful scene that even the prison governor was so overcome that he fainted. A crime reporter E. Austin who attended the execution reported: "Ribald jests were bandied about; and, after waiting to see the corpse cut down, the crowd dispersed, and the harvest of the taverns in the neighborhood commenced." However, a great many of the crowd felt repulsed by what they had seen and many carried the memory of that grisly day for years afterwards. Within the Gaol, conditions had again deteriorated with damage caused by the Reform Riots still unrepaired. In 1872, the Home Office wrote to the Bristol Corporation complaining that the prison was not fit for its purpose. The fabric of the buildings had degenerated to such an extent that even redeveloping it was out of the question. The Corporation bought an area of land at Horfield Gardens in preparation for building a new prison - in those days each city had to pay and run its own prisons. Despite leading the way in prison design and practices the gaol was closed in April 1883. Its successor, Horfield Prison, opened in 1884 and is still in use today. In 1895, the prison was sold to The Great Western Railway for a sum of ?22,000. It was then used as a coal yard and, with the exception of the granite gatehouse, most of its walls and buildings were demolished. Although accorded Grade 2 Listed Building Status, the New Gaol stands on private land. With the regeneration of Bristol's waterfront and historic docklands its future could still be far from

Not real imaginative but important. As part of our New Years resolution Lindy and I want to lose a few pounds. I bought a nice treadmill years ago and it has been in the garage. I have used it a lot but not much for a while. It has been so cold in the garage that we finally decided to bring the beast into the living room. Now we can watch TV and even talk to each other while exercising. For this shot I was playing with exposure and shutter speed trying to get a better handle on how they work.