Birthplace of Ruth Ellis, last woman hanged in the UK

What is it? 

Ruth Ellis was born in a house on Rhyl’s West Parade in October 1926, before moving to Hampshire during her childhood. 

Where is it? 

Dee Rd, Talacre, Holywell CH8 9RS 

What’s there? 

A row of 4-story terraced houses 

Facts - 

▪ Ruth Ellis was a bar hostess and call girl. She was often described as a “platinum blonde” 

▪ She became romantically involved with motor racing enthusiast David Blakely. He had other women and Ruth also had another lover. This provoked jealousy and drunken rows between them, during which Blakely was physically violent toward Ellis. 

▪ In March 1955, according to Ellis, she suffered a miscarriage after Blakely punched her in the stomach. In April, after desperate attempts to contact him, Ellis waited outside a pub in London and shot Blakely dead 

▪ At the Old Bailey in June, it took the jury less than half an hour to find Ellis guilty of murder. She declined to plead insanity and maintained that she had acted under provocation. She believed she deserved the death penalty and said: “I am quite happy to die.” She was hanged at Holloway Prison in London on 13 July 

▪ Prior to her execution, thousands of people signed petitions asking for the death penalty to be lifted in this case. Home Secretary Gwilym Lloyd George (son of Liberal Prime Minister David Lloyd George) rejected the final appeal to reprieve Ellis. 

▪ Her case increased the debate about criminal justice and the death penalty. The last male execution occurred in 1964 and the death penalty was formally abolished in Britain in 1969.