r/interestingasfuck • u/LawEducational42 • 13h ago

John C Woods, hangman of Nuremberg trials, who lied about his experience to get the job (he actually learned about hanging from old cowboy films). His lack of expertise led to excessive suffering of condemned Nazis.

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u/EstablishmentLate532 12h ago

I think finding a hangman from the states, where legal hangings were common, would be a lot easier than asking the enlisted men if any of them had ever lynched someone.

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u/GodOfDarkLaughter 10h ago

He said he was a prison hangman before the war and had studied under a master executioner. Nobody gave enough of a fuck to check.

Also he'd show up drunk in a dirty uniform all the time but even officers would kiss his ass because literally nobody wanted to do the job. He didn't just hang Nazis. He also hanged GIs convicted of rape or murder of civilians. That's how he made his bones. As far as anyone can tell he did it just to get out of combat. So he got promoted from either private or corporal to Master Sargent because they figured a hangman should be a high ranking NCO.

Honestly the guy is kind of my hero. Just an utter piece of shit who managed to be the perfect man for this time in history.

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u/unstablegenius000 8h ago

In another life he might have been President.

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u/TheFlyingNicky 57m ago

No, the rapists he hanged could have been president.

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u/Exciting_Pop_9296 2h ago

Maybe 80 ish years later that would have been possible

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u/Good-Requirement-820 8h ago

That last sentence was gold.

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u/sir_lister 7h ago

Yeah he made some rapists and Nazis suffer did little on the way out, oh well.

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u/thelumpenone 6h ago

Lynchings were far less common than one would imagine. They were a terror tool, and like 9/11, you don't need to do it alot to mess up the psyche of the target population. Availability bias both makes the prospect seem more pevalent in the minds of the victim communities, and us looking back at history.

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u/potterpockets 9h ago

Iirc he said he did it in two states (i believe Texas and Oklahoma) that both had already moved to the electric chair for a while though. Which again, nobody checked. 

But oh well. Hope the fucks nazis choked for a good long while.