1855: The Wife Who Forged a Will and Bought a Murderer: Bridget Hurford Hanged at Perth
Bridget Hurford had grown to despise her older, wealthy husband John Hurford long before she decided to have him killed. She paid a ticket-of-leave man named Dodd with cash and the promise of her husband’s own horse to strangle him in his bed at Vasse, first arranging for the man who usually guarded him at night to be sent away, and had another convict quietly forge a will in her favour beforehand.
Tried and convicted alongside Dodd, Hurford was hanged first at the new Perth Gaol on 15 October 1855, attended to the last by her confessors. Witnesses who expected a dramatic collapse instead described her as quiet and subdued as she went to the gallows, even as crowds, among them women carrying infants, gathered to watch.
She fully confessed her guilt before her death, corroborating the evidence given against her at trial.
