Freeman’s Journal and Daily Commercial Advertiser, Dublin, Ireland
EXECUTION. On Saturday se’nnight, at the usual hour, were executed on the Castle Hill, Noah Peak , aged 40, and George Fortis , aged 29, labourers, for feloniously firing three hay stacks, on the night of February 25, the property of Mr. Kent, farmer, of Diss. Both the unfortunate men had been soldiers. Peak was born at Shelfanger, served ten years in the West Suffolk Militia, under Colonel Sir Wm. Parker; and afterwards seven years in the 34th and 4th, or King’s Own regiment of foot, in Portugal, Spain, and the Netherlands. He was present at the battle of Busaco, Albuera, and Waterloo, where he had many imminent escapes, and was injured by a fall and discharged. Fortis was born at North Lopham, and was seven years in the royal staff corps, from which he received his discharge with great credit; he was also at Waterloo. Peak has left a wife with six, and Fortis a wife with four children, all of them young. His family are reputable, and his character was good until a few months preceding the crime for which he suffered. With little and unimportant variation from the facts as they appeared in evidence at the trial, the criminals acknowledged their guilt. Fortis, however, constantly affirmed that he had no knowledge of the intention of firing the stacks; and only conceived companions, Peak and Baker, were going to steal firewood, until they had nearly reached Mr. Kent’s premises. He then most earnestly endeavoured to dissuade them from it; left them, and was at a considerable distance when the flames appeared. Baker, who had avowed that he had a grudge against Mr. Kent, and Peak, both declared that Fortis was not with them when the act was done. Fortis always expressed himself with the utmost gratitude for the obligations which he owed to Mr. Kent, who had formerly employed him. - Peak affirmed that Baker was the actual incendiary until the last morning of his life, when he privately confessed to the Chaplain, that he himself alone entered the stack-yard, took the live turf, and placed it in the straw, and that Baker remained on the other side of the hedge. Peak was then asked his motive for it, and said, that, by what he called warning letters, and, in his own language, “by a flash and a scare,” it was intended to alarm the farmers, and induce them to make a more ample allowance to the poor. Both the convicts confessed themselves great sinners, and that for some time past they had attended no place of worship. A few days before their death they wrote long letters to their wives and relations, full of moral and religious advice; earnestly exhorting them, then, and at their last interviews, to adhere to the worship of their parish churches. Much of the night previous to their execution, was passed in prayer and devotional reading. They were very penitent, and desirous of making all the atonement in their power by ample confessions to God and man. During divine service at Chapel, Fortis and Peak, in a firm voice, sang two appropriate hymns with great feeling and expression. They thankfully and fervently received the sacrament and Fortis, with much natural and impassioned eloquence, addressed his fellow prisoners in a long and well adapted exultation, which he thus concluded: - “In a few minutes I shall be no more; remember, my dear fellow prisoners, the dying words of poor George Fortis; and may God bless you, and have mercy on you all!” They then took an affecting leave of their companions in confinement, and thanked the Governor for his kindness and humanity.
Upon reaching the scaffold, at the foot of which the High Sheriff was present, and attentive to grant every request and indulgence consistent with their situation, they obtained permission to address the people. Fortis, with a loud voice, repeated part of his exhortation at chapel, and Peak was declaring that some of the witnesses had sworn wrongfully, when they were both reminded by the Ordinary to acknowledge, as they did, the justice of their sentence. After being tied up, and the caps drawn over their faces, while they were distinctly and audibly repenting after the Chaplain a short prayer, the platform fell, and they died almost without a struggle, in the faith and hope of Christ. The execution was skilfully performed by the executioner from the Old Bailey; and when they had hung the usual time, their bodies were delivered the same afternoon to their friends to be interred at Bressingham and Shelfanger. It is not three years since Noah Peak came to Norwich, and in a similar manner conveyed home for burial the body of Edward Fisher , his fellow parishioner, who was executed on the Hill in August, 1819, for stabbing William Harrison, of Bressingham.
