John Horwood

John Horwood (1803–1821) was a miner's son convicted of murder in Bristol, England, and executed in 1821. He was the first person to be hanged at Bristol New Gaol.

John Horwood was born in Hanham, the third child of Thomas and Pheebee Horwood. Raised in a mining family, he refused to work in the mines after his older brother died in a shaft explosion.

Horwood's troubled relationship Eliza Balsom, an older girl with whom he had been infatuated, came to a head in 1821.

“It appears that Horwood for some time past, teased the girl with proposals, which she had uniformly and indignantly refused: and having lattlerly endeavoured to intimidate her with his threats, she became alarmed at his conduct, and took every means of avoiding him.”

This newspaper report included in The Horwood Book goes on to document multiple attacks on Ms Balsom by Horwood through 1820 and 1821 including throwing oil of vitriol (sulphuric acid) at her.

It was suggested by the prosecution at the time that John Horwood was associated with the “Cock Road Gang”, notorious for being violent troublemakers.

On 25 January 1821, he saw Eliza Balsom with another boy and threw a stone which struck her on the temple. The stone caused only minor injury, but she was treated at the Bristol Royal Infirmary for a depressed fracture and a theory put forward by Horwood's antecedent in a Daily Mail interview gives Dr Richard Smith's operation as the cause of a fatal abscess. She died four days later on 17 February 1821.

According to the diary of medical cases kept by Dr Edward Estlin (ref. 35893/32/a) (online catalogue) held at Bristol Archives, Eliza Balsom’s wound was greatly infected five days after the attack and Dr Richard Smith needed to clear the infection from inside the skull so undertook a trepanning procedure to cut away the bone. Smith discovered an abscess under the surface of the skull which caused the death of Eliza Balsom.

...
Wikipedia