Saint-Pierre Prison in Versailles holds a somber place in history as the site of the last public execution by guillotine in France on June 17, 1939. Eugen Weidmann was executed early in the morning, but the event turned grotesque as the crowd gathered, some pushing forward to soak handkerchiefs in his blood as gruesome trophies. The public's gruesome enthusiasm for such a spectacle prompted the French government to abolish public executions entirely, realizing the extent to which barbarity transcended law and moral standing. The very spectacle that once unified the populace in horror and fascination became unsettling enough to outlaw itself under the growing sentiment against public display of violence. The guillotine, a symbol of revolutionary justice, thus lay at the intersection of ethics and public fascination, leading to a broader conversation about capital punishment that persists today.