Hannah Ocuish
Hannah Ocuish (March 1774-December 1786) was executed at the age of twelve years and nine months, being hanged on 20 December 1786, in New London, Connecticut. She is believed to be the youngest person legally executed in America.[1][2]
Biography
Ocuish was a Pequot Indian girl with an intellectual disability who was accused of killing six-year-old Eunice Bolles, the daughter of a wealthy farmer, after quarreling with her over some strawberries. The primary evidence against her was the confession to the investigators. At her execution, she thanked the sheriff for his kindness as she stepped forward to be hanged.[2]
"[Rev.] Henry Channing preached at [her] 1786 execution, publishing the sermon under the title God Admonishing His People of their Duty . . . a Sermon . . . Occasioned by the Execution of Hannah Ocuish, a Mulatto Girl, Aged 12 Years and 9 Months, for the Murder of Eunice Bolles, Aged 6 Years and 6 Months."[3] The sermon, which admonished parents not to neglect religious instruction for their children, summarized the crime as follows, according to Karen Halttunen:
On the 21st of July, 1786, at about 10 o'clock in the morning, the body of the murdered child was found in the public road leading from New-London to Norwich, lying on its face near to a wall ... The neighborhood turned out to hunt for the murderer; Hannah was questioned and claimed that she had seen four boys near the scene of the crime. When a search failed to turn them up, Hannah was interrogated again, and then taken to the Bolles home to be charged with homicide in the presence of the dead child. She burst into tears and confessed. Only at this late point in the narrative is the reader offered a sequential account of the crime. Five weeks earlier, Eunice had reported Hannah for stealing fruit during the strawberry harvest, and Hannah had plotted revenge. Catching sight of her young enemy headed for school one morning, Hannah had lured Eunice from her path with a gift of calico, then beat and choked her to death.[4]
Her name has also erroneously appeared as Hannah Omish.[2]
See also
- Capital punishment in Connecticut
- Capital punishment in the United States
- List of individuals executed in Connecticut
References
- ↑ Regional Studies, The Northeast at the Wayback Machine (archived February 4, 2009)
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
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Bibliography
- Streib, Victor L. (1987), Death Penalty for Juveniles, Indiana Univ Press, ISBN 0-253-31615-4
- Dickerson, Sonya (2012), "Hannah: A Fictional Life Account of The Youngest Child Executed in U.S. History", ASIN: B008P5VYCK
External links
- A clap clap song for Hannah Ocuish, by devorah major (min. 3:30)
- People from Connecticut
- 1774 births
- 1786 deaths
- American children
- 18th-century Native Americans
- American people with disabilities
- Executed people from Connecticut
- American female murderers
- American murderers of children
- Executed children
- People executed by Connecticut by hanging
- People executed for murder
- American people convicted of murder
- People convicted of murder by Connecticut
- Executed American women
- Juvenile offenders executed by the United States
- 18th-century executions of American people by hanging
- People with intellectual impairment
- People of colonial Connecticut
