The Execution: May 16, 1691

Jacob Leisler and his son-in-law Jacob Milborne were executed on May 16, 1691. The charge was treason for failure to turn the government over to the incoming governor, Henry Sloughter.

The original court sentence was for them to “be hanged by the neck and being alive their bodyes to cutt downe to the Earth that their bowells be taken Out and they being alive burnt before their faces that their heads shall be severed from their bodyes & their bodyes cut into four parts.”

Sloughter commuted the sentence to hanging until half dead followed by beheading.

Transcription: "When Leisler was hanged the shrieks of the people [were] dreadful, especially the women —some fainted, some went into labour—the crowd cut off pieces of his garments as precious relics, and his hair also ect. out of their great respect for a martyr."

- Rev. Samuel Miller, 1799