Whipping post

This whipping post was used in Newgate Prison from the late 18th century to carry out floggings, with the number of strokes prescribed at sentencing. Charles Gordon described how a whipping post was used in 'The Old Bailey and Newgate':

‘Out of a shed in this yard comes tumbling the whipping block, now in the custody of the Corporation of the City of London, to whom have been presented other relics of Newgate…This whipping-block is very simple and very effective. The bottom doors open, the prisoner is marched in, they are shut, and fastened, and he is impotent for mischief, and, moreover, unable to hurt himself; but to guard against any uncertainty, his wrists are imprisoned in the leather-covered holes in the transverse bar, which are considerately made of two sizes so as not to hurt the culprit. As to the other portion of the exhibition, the flogging, we find it very graphically depicted in an old engraving where a culprit is being whipped outside the Old Bailey Sessions House. This is a machine which has been productive of much good in its time, for your rogue cherishes his own hide, however much he may disfigure another's body, and one application has seldom been known to fail in curing, his brutal propensities.’

The public whipping of women was abolished in 1817 and of men in 1862, but private whipping continued until 1948.