Mary Timney - for the murder of her neighbour.
Mary Timney - for the murder of her neighbour. On Tuesday the 29th of April 1862, 27 year old Mary Timney became the last woman to be publicly hanged in Scotland. She was executed at 8.15 a.m. on a gallows borrowed from Edinburgh and erected at the junction of St David Street (now Irish Street) and Buccleuch Street outside the prison in Dumfries, before a crowd of some 3,000 people. Mary lived in a cottage on a small farm owned by 40 year old Ann Hannah at Carsphad, near the eastern edge of what is now the Galloway Forest Park. Her cottage was just 50 yards from the farmhouse where Ann lived with her two brothers, Lockhart and William. It appears that the two women did not get on well and that there was a problem with Mary frequently trying to borrow money from Ann. Ann also accused Mary of stealing wood from her. Things came to a head on the morning of the 13th of January 1862 when Mary attacked Ann in her own home and beat her to death, after her brothers had left for work. An