Hallo Can anyone help indetify the museum where as a child I visited in Scotland?
I remember one of the exhibits was a 6'full length knarled wooden birching table with leather wrist straps for feet and legs and a horrific saucer size hole cut in the middle!
My childlike curiosity remembers this curious feature.
I now realise it was to allow the genitals of face down male members to dangle
and possibly release themselves into a bucket below if they fouled themselves during a birching rather than flood the table.
This was a real exhibit taken out of service by the 1960s.
Also in Norcwich castle there are I remember several whips,
In the Royal Marines museum in Portsmouth are exhibited some real Cats of Nine Tails in a glass case.

Its in Room 3 at the West Highland Museum in Fort William.

SC

Wow!Its still there after 40 years!Had no idea!It just goes to show
Thanks!
Now I know where I was!!!!!!

Quote:http://britishspanking.com/forums/showthread.php?p=233614

The birching table Mark Spanks referes to that is housed in Inverary jail is a replica of an original birching table which can be seen - or could in the early 1990s - at the West Highland Museum in Fort William. I'm appending a picture I took through the museum's window around 1990. In those days you could view it from the street. It was not possible to take a picture inside the museum as it was forbidden at the time!

While in the museum I listened to the converstions of people who were examining the table. One young lady was quite excited by the whole idea of naughty boys being birched and she called her boyfriend over and gave him a demonstration of how she thought the birch would have been use. I heard similar comments from visitors at Inverary while I was there.

Incidently the table at Fort William is not a specifically designed birching table, rather it is a modified small kitchen table made from Oak I think. It's two drawers have been removed and two holes cut at the top for the birchees arms. Below there narrow slots have been cut for a securing waist strap and another two sets of slots would have allowed securing of the legs with more straps. Thus ensuring no interuptions during infliction of the alloted strokes.

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