Английская Википедия:Elephant execution in the United States
Шаблон:Short description Шаблон:Distinguish
Elephant execution in the United States, sometimes elephant lynching, was the killing of an elephant in order to punish it for behaviors that had inconvenienced, threatened, injured, or killed humans. Elephant execution is distinct from both elephant euthanasia (in which the animal is ill or otherwise incapacitated) and from killing an elephant that is in the midst of an ongoing attack or "rampage." Elephant execution is a ritual process with a pseudo-legal or performative aspect. Documenting the execution or the body with film or still photos was not uncommon.
History
Elephant executions occurred most frequently in the United States during the carnival-circus era of roughly 1850 to 1950; at least 36 elephants were executed between the 1880s and the 1920s.Шаблон:Sfnp During this era, elephant behavior was often explained anthropomorphically, and thus granted a moral dimension wherein their actions were "good" or "bad."Шаблон:Sfnp
American animal trainers had little understanding of or experience with elephant musth, a period of late adolescence when juvenile bull elephants begin to transition hormonally and behaviorally to adulthood.Шаблон:Sfnp The consequences of this ignorance were reliably disastrous: for example, in Mississippi in March 1869 during a phase now recognized as musth, a bull elephant named Hercules became enraged, broke his chains, charged a freight train, and succeeded in derailing the locomotive (at the expense of one of his tusks). The locomotive then crashed into the lion cage, killing the female and releasing the male.Шаблон:Sfnp (The fate of Hercules himself is unclear.)Шаблон:Sfnp In the mind of the animal trainer or carnival owner of the era, a bull elephant was "an unruly brute…who required frequent punishment, without which he would become completely uncontrollable and destroy what showmen built."Шаблон:Sfnp Non-compliance with human commands was viewed as an elephant "trying to avoid work."Шаблон:Sfnp
Execution of elephants was thus viewed as appropriate retribution for "criminal" behavior, especially when an elephant had harmed or killed trainers or bystanders.Шаблон:Sfnp There was a clear-cut parallel between elephant executions and the lynching of minorities, which was both recognized at the time and remains a subject of scholarship today.Шаблон:Sfnp
List of executed elephants
- Albert, Keene, New Hampshire, 1885 - firing squad, first public execution of an elephantШаблон:Sfnp
- Black Diamond, Corsicana, Texas, 1929 - shot[1]
- Charlie, Universal City, California, 1923 - method disputed, probably garroted[2]
- Charlie Ed (later known as Wally), San Francisco, 1936 - shot[3][1]
- Chief, 1860s - unknown, possibly electrocutedШаблон:Sfnp
- Columbia, Bridgeport, Connecticut, 1907 - garrottedШаблон:Sfnp
- Fritz, Barnum & Bailey European Tour, Tours, France, 1902 - garrotted - souvenir photo captioned "Dead elephants are good elephants."Шаблон:Sfnp
- Gypsy, Valdosta, Georgia, 1902 - head shotШаблон:Sfnp
- Mandarin, Atlantic coast, 1902 - strangledШаблон:Sfnp
- Mary, Erwin, Tennessee, 1916 - hangedШаблон:Sfnp
- Pilot, location unknown (possibly New York), 1883 - shotШаблон:Sfnp
- Tip, New York City, 1894 - poisonedШаблон:Sfnp
See also
References
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Further reading
