Spence Broughton

Spence Broughton (c. 1746 – 14 April 1792) was an English highwayman who was executed for robbing the Sheffield and Rotherham mail.

After his execution he gained notoriety because his body was gibbeted at the scene of the crime on Attercliffe Common between Sheffield and Rotherham, where it hung for 36 years.

[3] The robbery took place on 29 January or 9 February 1791 (sources differ[4][5]) at Ickles, on the Rotherham edge of Attercliffe Common.

[6] George Leasley, the boy driving the mail cart, described how he was led into a field, blindfolded with a handkerchief, and his hands tied behind his back and fixed to a hedge.

[8] Shaw testified that Broughton and Oxley had come to him after robbing the Rotherham mail to ask him where they could cash the £123 bill.

[2]At his execution he is reported to have professed his innocence, "saying that he was a murdered man; that, though he came down with the intent to rob the mail, he was six miles from the place at the time of the robbery", though he admitted receiving part of the proceeds.

George Drabble, the keeper of a pub called the Arrow that was located near the site, reported that crowds started to gather on the common the day before.

One story was that a group of drunken potters from the Don Pottery, passing the site of the gibbet, threw stones at the skeleton and managed to dislodge two fingers.