The practice of execution in Canada /

This study of executions in Canada is morbidly fascinating--literally. In calm, clear, well-researched prose, Leyton-Brown (history, Univ. of Regina, Canada) looks at several hundred Canadian executions and presents details about enough of them to make a good story. Trials often featured judges who relished their roles, and the time the condemned spent in jail awaiting hanging gave preachers ample opportunity to win their souls. Executions were frequently barbaric, botched by incompetent hangmen and sometimes replete with pious vengeance. There were practices designed to cow the community, such as flying black flags over prisons or ringing bells; issuing orders to bury corpses in unsanctified ground and, very frequently, in prison courtyards rather than cemeteries; and conducting cursory inquests. Journalist observers favorably commented on those who died well and less so on those whose terror overcame them. Executions did not cease in Canada until the 1960s and, as Leyton-Brown notes, John Diefenbaker's cabinet spent hours discussing capital sentences, in the end commuting most of those that came before them. Anyone who reads this dispassionate book will have difficulty concluding that execution can ever be justified. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries. J. L. Granatstein emeritus, Canadian War Museum