The Infamous Captain Richard Swayne: Master of Torture

Captain Richard Swayne from the Cork Militia was one who certainly gained notoriety for inventing the vicious torture known as pitch capping where “a cap of coarse linen which was smeared on the inside with hot pitch was compressed on their heads. It was then allowed to cool in order that it could not be easily pulled off. The pitch-cap was then set alight resulting in further anguish of melting pitch trickling down into their eyes. The pain of trying to disengage this pitch-cap from the head was next to intolerable. The hair was often torn out by the roots and frequently parts of the scalp would come off along with it. Another notorious pitch capping practitioner was Thomas Honam, a sergeant with the North Cork militia earned his reputation as "Tom the Devil" for his expertise in torture and his perfection of the pitchcap. Old men who had their heads sheared and had been pitch capped as croppies were still to be seen in Co Wexford as far after the 1798 rebellion as the early 1860’s