transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:01] Every generation has a rite of passage. Here's yours, Faces of Death. The meta-horror remake of the notorious 1978 faux documentary opens in theaters April 10th from IFC and Shudder. But Bloody Disgusting has the early ticket for our bravest readers. On Wednesday, April 8th, we're presenting free sneak screenings in your town. Call RSVP now at bloodydisgusting.com and see you there, if you dare.

Speaker 2:
[00:37] Call me macabre, but I've always been fascinated with hangings. It's not that I want to watch someone die, it's that I enjoy the history surrounding public executions. Every hanging site has its own tale to tell, and there are hundreds to explore across North America, many of which are open to the public. There's this indescribable feel that comes with standing in an old building, knowing that not so long ago, people were climbing over one another to watch criminals die and cheering as it happened. So really, if anyone's macabre, it's them, not me. The experience I'm sharing today is my favorite. I don't want to be cheesy and say it chills me to this day, but it is the hanging site I've visited that's left the biggest impression on me. You know that high you get from reading a good horror story? That usually fades with time, but what I experienced there is as potent now as it was then. Let me tell you about the Noose of the Hanged Men, and yes, that's men, plural. About a year ago, I was in Nova Scotia on business when I learned of a little known hanging site down in a small port town, about an hour and a half away from Halifax. Given my aforementioned interest in the subject, I decided to use my day off to visit. I had to go through a few hoops, but after speaking with the Tourism Office, I was put in touch with someone from the town's historical society, who agreed to give me a tour. That's how I wound up, late one cloudy afternoon, standing at the edge of a seemingly abandoned property with Ainsley Murray as my own personal tour guide. A couple dozen keys jangled on Ainsley's keychain as she searched for the one to unlock the front gate. The gate was tall and wide, with ornate curlicues ending in pointed spades, reminding me of a cemetery. Beyond it was an unkempt lawn with yellowed grass reaching up about knee height, an overgrown stone path and the main attraction, a partially collapsed brick building with a central watchtower. I was excited. Ainsley tried another key, but it wouldn't even go all the way in. Tell me we're not going to need all of those keys. Ainsley laughed, deepening the creases of her crow's feet.

Speaker 3:
[02:56] Oh, heavens no, dear.

Speaker 2:
[02:58] She tried her tenth, or was it her eleventh, key.

Speaker 3:
[03:02] These are all for different buildings. I just like to keep everything on the same chain. Otherwise, I always forget one.

Speaker 2:
[03:09] Oh.

Speaker 3:
[03:10] Don't worry. I've only ever gotten locked in… twice. And my assistant Muriel got us out within a day or so, both times. There was hardly a need to resort to cannibalism.

Speaker 2:
[03:20] She grinned sheepishly. I snorted and replied, Ainsley, I like you already.

Speaker 3:
[03:26] Thanks, love. But keep your lustful thoughts to yourself. I've been happily married for thirty-nine years.

Speaker 2:
[03:32] She winked and then tried the next key.

Speaker 3:
[03:34] Ah, I think this is the one.

Speaker 2:
[03:36] The lock clicked and the gate screeched open. Flakes of paint peeled off at the slightest touch and exposed a rusted underbelly. For a property supposedly maintained by a historical society, it sure didn't look like anyone had given it any kind of attention in ages.

Speaker 3:
[03:53] Watch your step, dear. The ground's a little uneven, Ainsley warned.

Speaker 2:
[03:57] I was starting to feel it, that dread and excitement you get when you're watching a movie and you know a jump scare's about to happen. There was something in the air, in the way the wind blew through the brush and the crows cawed, like a storm of adrenaline was brewing. Ainsley motioned to the other end of the property.

Speaker 3:
[04:16] Let's start in the courtyard around back while the weather's still good. Then I'll take you inside and show you the cells.

Speaker 2:
[04:23] Sounds good, I replied. Ainsley led the way through the grass, not seeming to mind the fact that we couldn't see our feet. I guess it's easy to be brave in tall grass when you know there are no venomous snakes in the Canadian Maritimes. Something I wish she'd told me then, so I wouldn't have been quite as wary. So, what do you know about this place? I asked. She glanced back at me and smiled.

Speaker 3:
[04:47] This prison was built in the late 1860s and was originally charged with holding prisoners in transit for public execution in Halifax. In 1875, Warden Murray—no, dear, no relation to me— there are a lot of Murrays around these parts, claimed he'd been given permission to perform executions.

Speaker 2:
[05:11] What do you mean, claimed? She tapped a finger to her bottom lip.

Speaker 3:
[05:15] He alleged he'd received the go-ahead after a fire in Halifax, but there's no historical evidence to corroborate that. But there's no historical evidence to corroborate that. Now, it could be that these records were destroyed over the years, perhaps during the Halifax explosion. But as far as we can surmise, there were no reports of a fire that year, nor of such a permission being granted.

Speaker 2:
[05:41] We circled around the collapsed part of the building. The interior walls were still standing, but the façade had crumbled like a sandcastle. Erosion due to flooding Ainsley revealed later. They'd reinforced the rest of the structure, but had never bothered rebuilding, as the destruction had occurred during that pocket of time after the prison had been decommissioned, but before it had been deemed a local historical site. So Warden Mary began performing executions here at the prison. Ainsley nodded.

Speaker 3:
[06:10] That's right. Just around here.

Speaker 2:
[06:12] We turned the corner to the courtyard. The tall grass was interlaced with large patches of dry earth which surrounded the gallows. Years of salt air and rainwater had eaten away at the lumber like an old plywood shed, but it still stood. There was the base of the stairs leading up to it. Two large poles on either side and a splintered beam stretching across. The rope was missing, but it had left a groove in the wood from the weight of multiple executions. Something was off. The door was missing. I asked, You said he started in 1875, right? She nodded. I inspected the structure closer. Maybe the door was blending into the rest of the wood. The more I looked, the more convinced I became that it was missing. There were no seams, just straight planks going all the way across. But there's no door, I said. My eyes scanned the overhead beam and landed on the spot where the rope would have hung. The groove and discoloration could only be seen along the top quarter. Were they hoisting in 1875? Ainsley smirked.

Speaker 3:
[07:19] According to reports, it was Murray's favorite technique.

Speaker 2:
[07:23] I felt chills of excitement intertwined with hints of dread. Here's the thing, there are a handful of techniques to hang people. By 1870, most of Canada started adopting the long drop technique. That's the one you're probably most familiar with. The prisoner standing on the gallows with a noose around his neck. A door opens under him. He falls, his neck breaks, and he passes out. He suffocates while unconscious, which is considered more humane. Hoisting, on the other hand, is a lot more barbaric. The criminal starts on the ground. A rope gets tossed over a high beam, tied to his neck, and then they pull the other end to, you guessed it, hoist the person up by their neck. The process can be excruciatingly painful according to reports from survivors. Yes, you can survive this, and it can last upwards of ten, sometimes even fifteen minutes if the person struggles in the right way. That's sick, I said.

Speaker 3:
[08:22] And yet you're smiling, she answered.

Speaker 2:
[08:25] Sorry, can't help it. She waved a dismissive hand.

Speaker 3:
[08:29] Don't worry, I'm not judging.

Speaker 2:
[08:31] She motioned to the courtyard.

Speaker 3:
[08:33] Hanging are a morbid business, but somehow, they always draw people in. They were especially popular here, feeding a need from the local folk who couldn't take it to Halifax. And according to reports, the warden liked to hold surprise executions. He'd climb to the top of the watchtower early in the morning and ring a bell to signal a hanging. Once the courtyard filled up, he'd order the kill. He'd watch from above, waving at the crowd, like an emperor at the Coliseum.

Speaker 2:
[09:07] I looked at the watchtower and felt a knot in my stomach as I saw three shapes looking back at me. I blinked and they were gone. Just the clouds, I told myself. Just dark clouds peeking from the other side of the tower, right? Ainsley, as though reading my mind, leaned in close and whispered, You know, dear, there's a rumor the tower's haunted by a ghost of many faces. I shuddered. You're making that up to mess with me. She shook her head.

Speaker 3:
[09:37] You can ask around yourself. It's been spotted a few times in recent years. Last I hear, it was seen by a group of teenagers who jumped the fence.

Speaker 2:
[09:47] A few raindrops fell. I asked, What does it look like?

Speaker 3:
[09:52] She replied, Some say a fisherman, others say a man in prison garbs. Everyone agrees its face changes every time you look away. One second, he has a beard, the next, he's bald with a scar across his eye, and so on.

Speaker 2:
[10:09] See, this kind of stuff, this is why I visit these sites. Does he attack? I asked.

Speaker 3:
[10:16] She shrugged, Some say those who see it are doomed to hang themselves. Others say it's all a myth.

Speaker 2:
[10:23] She raised her hands, palms up toward the sky.

Speaker 3:
[10:26] Starting to rain, let's head inside, shall we?

Speaker 2:
[10:29] I nodded. The gaslights were still mounted to the walls, but they'd run dry ages ago. Thankfully, Ainsley and I had the foresight to bring flashlights with us. We visited the cells, with their low ceilings, tight walls, old chamber pots, and beds made out of dry straw. Then the chapel, just a room with a cross. And finally, the offices. She shared more history about the region and the prison, but I won't bore you with the details, as they're not relevant to this story. I think you'll find this room quite interesting, Ainsley said as she stopped at the door to the watchtower. So far the rooms had all been interesting, so I was eager to see why she felt that one was special. She fumbled with her keychain, and began another round of guessing which key fit the lock. It didn't take too long this time. The lock clicked, she opened the door, and I immediately felt this odd, suffocating feeling like I just inhaled a cloud of volcanic ash.

Speaker 3:
[11:38] Welcome to the watchtower, Ainsley said.

Speaker 2:
[11:41] There's nothing brave about stepping into a dark room in the middle of a century-old prison. Logically, there's no real danger. It's only scary if you trick yourself into believing it is. But really, an old building is just an old building. Even though I knew this, and even though I'd walked into many old buildings before without issue, I found myself hesitating. My feet were cement blocks, and the threshold was a force field pushing me back. I had no idea where the apprehension was coming from, only that it was overwhelming and palpable.

Speaker 3:
[12:15] Oh dear, worn out already?

Speaker 2:
[12:17] Ainsley teased playfully.

Speaker 3:
[12:18] We can go back if you'd like.

Speaker 2:
[12:20] I shook the nervousness from my body like a dog drying himself. No, sorry, lost in thought. I lied. I stepped inside and felt a wave of vertigo as I looked up. The watchtower was only about three stories high, but the spiral staircase leading up and the way the room narrowed closer to the top made it feel like it stretched as high as a lighthouse. It took me a moment for the lightheadedness to clear and for me to notice the object dangling halfway up. A noose. A very large noose. Squinting, I circled around, trying to figure out if it was a trick of angles or if it really was that large. The more I looked, the less it seemed like an optical illusion. Why? The words caught in my throat. Why is that so big? Ainsley inhaled deeply, as though to scream, but what came out wasn't to scream. It was a story.

Speaker 3:
[13:17] That, love, is the Noose of the Hanged Men. You see, the key for this tower was actually lost for the longest time. It was only once the Historical Society began looking into the prison that it was discovered in the ruined West Wing, in the Warden's office. It's since been moved, but there was a chest here.

Speaker 2:
[13:38] She pointed to a spot at the foot of the wall. The bricks were brighter than the ones surrounding it.

Speaker 3:
[13:43] In it, we found the Warden's journals. He was, she narrowed her eyes, a very sadistic man.

Speaker 2:
[13:51] I circled around the room again, trying to look at the noose from every angle. There was something captivating about it, like a tire swing of death.

Speaker 3:
[14:00] Ainsley continued, He was obsessed with figuring out how many people he could hang with a single noose.

Speaker 2:
[14:06] I blinked. You mean, before having to replace the rope? She shook her head.

Speaker 3:
[14:12] No, not the amount of hangings he could perform. The amount of people that he could hang at the same time.

Speaker 2:
[14:21] The statement took my breath away. Hanging more than one person from a single noose at once? Could it even be done? She motioned to her neck.

Speaker 3:
[14:30] He started big. Ten people. He wrapped the noose around their throats and hoisted. It took five guards to lift the weight, but the cord snapped before they could see what would happen. He tried again with nine people, and this time the cord held. Unfortunately, with nine shoulders pushing the heads apart, there were gaps. It was impossible to make the noose tight enough to hold all the heads in. People slipped through the cracks, making room for more people to slip through until they all did.

Speaker 2:
[15:04] I tried to imagine what it felt like to stand in a semicircle with nine other people and I swear I could feel the rope around my neck. I wondered how it felt to be lifted. Certain you and everyone else was about to die, only to slip to freedom. Would it be a relief, or would it be horrific? So he started at ten, then nine, and went down from there? She nodded.

Speaker 3:
[15:28] He tried eight. Same problem. Then seven, and then six. His experiments caused some damage. The fewer people being hanged, the longer it took for someone to slip free. It all got worse when his subjects dwindled to five.

Speaker 2:
[15:44] Why's that?

Speaker 3:
[15:45] Well, by five, he was able to pull all prisoners high into the air before any of them were able to slip out. If you didn't die hanged, you died from the fall.

Speaker 2:
[15:57] So five was the lucky number? It was weird. I felt like we were being watched. I kept looking up at the top of the watchtower, expecting to see someone staring back down at me.

Speaker 3:
[16:08] No dear. He wanted people to die from the noose. Not the fall. He got stuck on five for a while. He was sure it was a question of tying the noose the right way. He was determined to make it work, but he only had a limited amount of prisoners to play with. Warden Murray began collecting people he didn't think would be missed.

Speaker 2:
[16:31] I winced. What did he do when he ran out? She took a seat on the staircase and glanced up at the noose. The room, despite being exposed to the fresh air from above, felt stale and suffocating.

Speaker 3:
[16:44] Ainsley said, Warden Murray began collecting people he didn't think would be missed. Homeless people. Transients. Anyone who didn't have a family or wander too close to the prison.

Speaker 2:
[16:56] I rubbed the back of my neck.

Speaker 3:
[16:59] Now, this may be unrelated, but I've uncovered reports of whole families going missing around that time. Their belongings untouched as though they'd been taken in the middle of the night. I can't confirm good old Warden Murray was involved, but it is interesting how the timelines match up. Purely conjecture on my part, of course. But how many transients can you kill before you run out? And still, with all that death, none of his five-person experiments worked.

Speaker 2:
[17:31] It felt like a boa constrictor was trying to hug my esophagus. Why was the air here so thick? Murray sounds like a sick bastard. My voice was hoarse. I was dehydrated. Ainsley nodded.

Speaker 3:
[17:44] He was. It took him months to give up on testing the noose on five people. He nearly lost it when he went down to four, and they still got out. To make matters worse, no one survived the fall at four. At least five, the first person was sometimes able to make it out with broken legs. At four, it was hopeless. They could hoist them faster, higher, and the fall was too high.

Speaker 2:
[18:11] As we talked, the noose above began swinging left to right in the breeze. Ainsley explained, He tried everything.

Speaker 3:
[18:19] Tightening the rope. Speeding up the process. Turning heads in every which direction he could try. Facing in, facing out, facing the side. Side out, side out, everything.

Speaker 2:
[18:31] The swinging changed direction. It went forward and back, forward and back.

Speaker 3:
[18:38] But it never worked. The prisoners would struggle. They'd twist free and splat on the ground.

Speaker 2:
[18:46] It was alternating now. Left to right, forward and back. Swinging incessantly.

Speaker 3:
[18:52] He was a stubborn man. He started binding people by the waist. But it just took one person to slip out of the noose and then… Splat. All four together.

Speaker 2:
[19:04] Fear spread through my body in a sudden splash, as though I'd been dropped into a tub of ice water. The noose. The goddamn noose. The rhythm of its swings stopped being so regular. It went right, forward, right, back, left, forward, right, as though being pulled in every direction. I rubbed my neck. I tried to inhale, but there was a weight on my chest.

Speaker 3:
[19:28] Are you starting to have trouble breathing?

Speaker 2:
[19:30] Ainsley asked. I gasped. Yeah, how did you know? She pointed up at the rope as she walked to the door.

Speaker 3:
[19:38] They say men can't stay in this room more than a couple minutes, because there's nowhere in this watchtower the noose can't reach.

Speaker 2:
[19:44] I can't explain it. I really can't. But I was struck with the fear that she'd leave and lock the door behind her. Her keys were jangling. She had her hand on the door. In my mind's eye, I could see her closing it. But as much as I wanted to run for the exit, I felt this invisible bond wrapped around my throat, holding me in place.

Speaker 3:
[20:05] Come on, let's get you out of here, she said gently.

Speaker 2:
[20:09] Her soft voice and kind smile loosened the unseen noose. I was able to jog out of the room, panting for air. She escorted me out, hand on my shoulder. I said nothing until we were outside in the cold rain. The number? I stuttered. What was the number? She held her palms to the sky and closed her eyes, inhaling deeply as though the rain were her lover. The number of people you can hang on a single noose. She looked back at me, her smile never losing its warmth.

Speaker 3:
[20:41] Three, she said, with three heads, there's not enough wiggle room to escape.

Speaker 2:
[20:46] We left the property and said our goodbyes back in town. I couldn't get it out of my mind. The swinging noose, the vivid mental images of people hanging together, the sensation of something wrapped around my throat. Once I was alone, I undid my scarf and checked my neck. I expected to find a rope burn or a bruise or something on my skin, but no. On my way back to Halifax, I glanced back at the watchtower. I swear, even through the sheets of rain and dimming daylight, I could see three silhouettes staring down at me. I still visit hanging sites. That's probably never going to change. The only thing that changed is every time I see a noose that's even slightly looser than the norm. I remember that little prison in Nova Scotia. And I feel a shot of adrenaline and just the slightest tightening in my throat.

Speaker 4:
[22:11] Imagine a city unlike any other, simmering 300 years in a raucous gumbo of debauchery versus devotion. Catholicism. Confession is anonymous. Versus voodoo.

Speaker 5:
[22:24] I think I done made a deal with the devil.

Speaker 4:
[22:29] What you call life.

Speaker 5:
[22:31] And what I called death.

Speaker 4:
[22:35] It's a mysterious crossroads where the denizens of this world. And others.

Speaker 6:
[22:40] He is a trickster, and I'm sure whatever he brought back from the world of the dead was a one-way trip.

Speaker 4:
[22:46] Collide Daily. And for Detective Frank Dupreeh.

Speaker 5:
[22:50] I will see you at the end.

Speaker 4:
[22:52] And Nicky Goodluck. This will be a dark ride. Welcome to New Orleans, Babies.

Speaker 5:
[23:02] Listen to Something Wicked on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or wherever you enjoy listening.