Life around the suburb of Burwood in Sydney’s Inner West has definitely changed in the last one hundred and fifty years or so. Burwood is only 10 kilometres west of the Sydney central business district, however in 1858-59, when this picture was thought to have been taken it was a farming area. It would have been a good walk to the city to watch a hanging if one didn’t own a horse or dray or couldn’t afford the cost of passage on a coach.

And yes, hanging was a form of entertainment for the masses back then.

(image courtesy State Library of NSW)

 

(Image courtesy State Library of Vic. Photographer – Nicolas John Caire, ca. 1886)