A new book by Professor Harry M. Ward of the University of Richmond exam­ines the death penal­ty in Virginia at a time when exe­cu­tions were car­ried out for all to see. In Public Executions in Richmond, Virginia: A History, 1782 – 1907, Ward pro­vides a his­to­ry of the hang­ings and, dur­ing the Civil War, fir­ing-squad exe­cu­tions in Virginia’s cap­i­tal city. Thousands of wit­ness­es attend­ed the exe­cu­tions, which were seen as a form of enter­tain­ment. Public exe­cu­tions end­ed with the intro­duc­tion of the elec­tric chair in 1908. In 1995, Virginia adopt­ed lethal injec­tion as its pri­ma­ry form of execution.

Professor Ward is the William Binform Vest Professor of History emer­i­tus at Richmond. He has authored 18 books, includ­ing col­lege-lev­el text­books on colo­nial America, the American Revolution, and military biographies.

(H. Ward, ​“Public Executions in Richmond, Virginia: A History, 1782 – 1907,” McFarland Publishing, 2012; DPIC post­ed Aug. 27, 2012). See Executions and History of the Death Penalty. See also Books on the death penalty. 

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