CHAPTERLV.AFTER CONVICTION—A GLIMPSE AT PRISON LIFE.Charles Peace had not counted on receiving so heavy a sentence, and at first he was much borne down. He had been for a long time under the notice of the constabulary, who felt assured that he had perpetrated a series of robberies without being brought under the ban of the law. Had the authorities been oblivious to this fact, perhaps eighteen months, or at the most two years, would have been the maximum punishment awarded to him.“Penal servitude,” says an authority on this subject, “is a thing many people hear and read of a great deal, but about which only a certain number know really anything.”Mr. Charles Reade has touched the question in a masterly manner in his powerful romance of “Never Too Late to Mend,” but happily for the welfare of society at large, and criminals in particular, modifications have been made in the treatment of prisoners since the publication of Mr. Reade’s work.Peace, as we have already seen, was selfish and unscrupulous.He would have sacrificed his sister without the slightest compunction of conscience if he could thereby have saved himself.It transpired, however, at the trial, that he was the principal, his sister and the woman James being but accomplices.The bench took a righteous view of the question, and our hero simply got his deserts.He, however, endeavoured to make out that he was an ill-used man.After the sessions had come to a conclusion, he was taken in the prison van with a batch of convicts to the gaol where they were to undergo the first probationary term of their sentences.With a heavy heart, Peace once more entered the “Black Maria,” which was to convey him to a convict establishment, with which he had never had any previous acquaintance.When the prison van arrived at its destination the convicts were told to alight.The first thing on entering the prison, each man was released from his handcuffs, and told to seat himself on a long bench in the passage.Peace, during the progress of the van through the town, had been greatly annoyed at the shouting, screaming, and laughing of his fellow prisoners, who were, however, now much more quiet and comparatively well-behaved.They were all subjected to a new and to Peace a most painful operation.He was well aware that it would be next to useless, if not quite hypocritical, for one in his position to lay claim to any considerable delicacy of feeling, or to be over scrupulous in matters of common decency.But there were occasionally, however, he found, even amongst convicts, those who will bear a pretty long period of imprisonment, during which they are subjected to a variety of contaminating influences, and yet not have their susceptibilities completely destroyed. Of these he was one, and he felt that the treatment he had to undergo was conceived in a barbarous spirit, and was fitted to destroy utterly any feelings of self-respect which his previous experiences had left in him.Every part of his body was minutely inspected immediately on his arrival, in order that he might not take any money or tobacco into the prison.Doubtless it is very desirable and even necessary that every precaution should be taken to prevent such articles finding their way into prisons—at least on the persons of prisoners; but the fact remains that, notwithstanding these inspections, both money and tobacco do find their way into prisons.The trials of skill and invention which go on between the convict and the inspector, like those between artillery and iron plates, have as yet only proved that, given the power of resistance, the power of overcoming it will be found.One of his fellow-prisoners verified the truth of this conclusion by taking five sovereigns into prison with him, notwithstanding all the care and experience exercised by the inspector.Every prisoner on first entering the convict service has to undergo nine months of separate confinement in a cell by himself, working in that cell, and never leaving it except for exercise or to go to chapel.Daring that nine months no remission is given; but for the remainder of his time, if he obtains the full quantum of eight marks a day, which, curiously, he earned by good conduct and the completion of his day’s work, whatever that may be, he is allowed a remission of equal to three months in each year, or one-fourth of his sentence, except the nine months.The full amount of marks for a man to earn in a year is 2920.If less than this number is earned, so much remission is lost.It is seldom that a man goes through the whole of his service without losing some marks.The day after the arrival of our hero and his fellow-prisoners they were all ordered to strip a second time for medical examination, and as a considerable time elapsed before Peace’s turn came he had to remain in that state rather longer than was good for him.It was useless to complain, he had to submit to the humiliating process with the best grace he could.When the inspection was concluded, he had his hair cut after the approved prison fashion, and was put into his cell to make mats.His cell was white as the driven snow. His domestic duties were explained to him, and he was informed a heavy penalty would be inflicted if a speck of dirt was discovered on the wall or floor of his cell, or if his cocoa-bark mattress should not be neatly rolled up after use and the strap tight, and steel hook polished like glass, and his little brass gas-pipe glittering like gold.He listened to all these injunctions with exemplary patience, having made up his mind to be, if possible, a model prisoner. He had in view the remission of his sentence, which was only to be gained by exemplary conduct.To a sanguine or irritable temperament the monotony of prison life is almost insupportable.Peace was nearly getting into trouble on the first Sunday he spent in prison for a very unintentional violation of the prison rules.In accordance with these rules, convicts are not allowed to turn their heads in any direction in the chapel; if they do so it is the duty of the attendant officer to take them before the governor, who, in all probability, will punish them for their disobedience.It is fair to assume that those who framed these rules had some good end in view in being stringent in the matter of posture in religious service.The difficulty with Peace was to discover whether the spiritual welfare of the prisoners or the preservation of a more than military discipline amongst them, even in matters of religion, had appeared to them to be of the greatest importance.It is probable, however, that neither of these considerations decided the question, but that the principal object of these regulations was to preserve in the convict mind, even in the act of worship, the idea of punishment in a perfectly lively and healthy condition.Be that as it may, on Peace’s first Sunday in chapel with his English Prayer-book before him he found himself quite unable to follow the chaplain in the services in which he was engaged.Turning over the leaves of the Prayer-book in the vain hope of finding the proper place, and happening to cast his eyes over the shoulder of a prisoner in front of him in order to find it, the movement caught the eye of the officer who sat watching every face. Peace saw from the stare and frown which followed, indeed, that he had committed some grave offence.He immediately resumed his proper attitude, and sat out the service as right as his neighbours, and so escaped the threatened punishment.“They are jolly particular in this establishment,” mused Peace. “Mustn’t even look, it appears.”Nothing, however, was said to him by the official, but he felt that he had narrowly escaped being reported.Every day the prisoners, male and female, old and young, were made to attend chapel, and twice on Sundays.The appearance of the sacred edifice quite upsets the idea of “freedom” in religious worship.The chaplain’s pulpit is perched high up against the wall at the end, so as to enable him to get a view of his entire congregation; otherwise this would be impossible, for while the larger number of adult male prisoners occupy the body of the chapel, the women and children are partitioned off on either side by a tall partition, which quite precludes the possibility of their seeing beyond.Before the great space where the men sit is a pair of tall iron gates, and they are ranged on seats rising one above another with warders in attendance, who are constantly on the watch.The men are expected to look steadfastly before them, regarding through the iron bars the preacher in his pulpit; they must raise or lower their prayer-books with elbows squared, and all at once, like soldiers in a drill.They must not scrape their feet against the floor without having afterwards to explain the reason of such a movement. They may scarcely wink an eye, cough, or make any noise without danger of rebuke or punishment.It is a terrible and humiliating state of servitude these miserably guilty creatures have to endure, but with all this it does not seem to deter them from the commission of crime, for many, as soon as they are released, have recourse to their old practices until they are again caught, and sentenced to another and longer term of imprisonment.Peace began to be weary of his monotonous life. One morning he said to the under turnkey.“I say, my friend, how long am I to be cooped up in this cheerful little abode—not the whole of the time, I hope?”“Prisoners are not permitted to talk out of hours,” said the turnkey, looking straight before him, but not at his questioner.“Ah! I beg your pardon, guv’nor; meant no offence.”The turnkey, whose name was Wilson, looked hard at the prisoner, and seemed lost in thought.Peace felt a little uncomfortable. Perhaps the man would report him to the governor.“I beg your pardon again; I hope I’ve not offended you.”The man shook his head and walked away.“I’m sorry I spoke,” muttered our hero to himself.The turnkey returned.“Now, then,No.34.”“Well,” cried Peace, “what’s up now?”“Prisoners shut their own doors,” returned the man. Peace closed the door of his cell.“Lively,” he ejaculated, “not to say encouraging. Well, I am blest, this is a place a cove’s got to lock himself in, it appears.”Peace had gone through the usual formula of prison life; one working day was just the same as another.He did his share of work, and his custodians had no reason to complain of him as far as industrious habits were concerned; he kept his cell scrupulously clean.The cell in which Peace was confined was small enough in all conscience. It was not much over seven feet in length, and four feet five inches in breadth; its height being a trifle over eight feet. By the side of the door was a small window of thick rough glass, and beneath this was a little flap table, which had to be let down when the hammock was slung.As may be readily imagined, there was nothing superfluous in this narrow prison house, only just enough to admit of a human being existing in the narrowest possible compass.Over the table was a small shelf. Below the shelf, and at the opposite end of the cell to the window and flap table, was the hammock, which was rolled up in the smallest possible compass, and strapped against the wall.There was a water spout, so ingeniously contrived that turned to the right it sent a small stream into a copper basin, and to the left into a bottomless close stool at some distance.There was also a small gas pipe tipped with polished brass.In one angle of the wall was a small commode or open cupboard, on whose shelves were ranged a bright pewter plate, a knife and fork, and a wooden spoon.There was a grating at the bottom of the door for the air to come in, and another for foul air to go out if it chose.An ordinary stable bucket with iron handle and hoops was on the floor alongside of a low wooden stool, a small hand broom, and in a corner under the table a scrubbing brush and flannel. Two tin tallies, with the number of the cell, prison, and hall, hanging behind the door, completed the furniture of this lively and cheerless apartment.The cellular system has, however, many advantages, and is a far better arrangement than that adopted in the earlier days of prison management.At one time English gaols were denounced by Howard and others “as schools for instruction in iniquity,” and there can be but little doubt that to an extent this was true.The poor dandy priest, Dr. Dodd, who was executed for forgery, spent six months in Newgate before he suffered death by hanging, and during part of his time he was forced to herd with the common rabble. The change from the caresses and luxuries lavished on him by the silly devotees of his green-room theology to the riot and ribaldry of the gaol sorely tried the unstrung nerves of the pet preacher. When at last he was accommodated with a separate apartment he wrote a poem, entitled “Thoughts in Prison,” in which he copiously lamented the evils of association and his own personal miseries.The case of the unfortunate divine-about-town made a great sensation. He really was hardly dealt with, for he had done all he could by confession and restitution to atone for his crime.Dr. Johnson fought for him nobly.Twenty thousand people signed a petition for his pardon. Consequently, when the ill-fated divine was hung and the poem published, hundreds of fine ladies and gentlemen read, and perhaps deplored, his watery blank verse, and thus most unexpectedly felt a transient interest in the question of prison discipline.But a change has come over us since the days of Dr. Dodd and Faudleroy; though it would appear that the sympathy evinced by a certain section of the community for murderers is still extanct.TheRev.John Clay, who was for many years chaplain of Preston Gaol, in discussing the question of prison discipline, says: “If we regard the prisoner as a moral patient, the paramount object is to render him as amenable as possible to the reformatory process. The tendency of separate confinement is to lower the bodily organs and weaken the faculties.“The discipline must be modified to correct this tendency. The prisoner probably lived a life of gross animal indulgence.“Accordingly his animal propensities must be first lulled to sleep; this is most effectually done by the repressing power of isolation.“Plenty of fresh air, therefore, brisk exercise, and suitable diet are necessary.“If the diet is too low, it will turn depression into despondency; if too high, it will produce excitement and irritability.“The god of criminals is their belly, and to baulk the belly god to the utmost extent is both wise and just.“In consequence of lowering the vital energies, the brain becomes more feeble, and therefore more susceptible.“That is to say, the man becomes more impressible, though this is not the invariable result.“The cell will sometimes only increase the reserve of the sullen, the stupidity of the dull, the idiotcy of the feeble, and the craft of the cunning.“Solitude is indeed a terrible solvent, but the main element in a man’s character will sometimes withstand its potency when all other characteristics are melted down.“But, as a general rule, a few months in a separate cell renders a prisoner strangely impressible.“The chaplain can then make a brawny navvy cry like a child—he can work on his feelings in almost any way he pleases. He can, so to speak, photograph his own thoughts, wishes, and opinions on his patient’s mind, and fill his mouth with his own phrases and language.”In common with most philanthropists, the Preston Gaol chaplain considered that almost all crime was traceable to three closely-linked causes, drunkenness, ignorance, and the habit of living in filthy, overcrowded dwellings.But he maintained that these, in their turn, were due in a great measure to the want of sympathy and intercourse between the upper and lower classes. This cause the late Justice Telford animadverted on while on the bench within a very short period of his death.Of course the effect produced by the solitary cell depends on many other things, such as temperament, previous habits,&c.The sluggish, lymphatic man, with small lungs and small brain, adapts himself easily to his solitude. Good food, light work, and a sufficient allowance of visits to break and cheer the monotony of his cell, reconcile him to his position; he becomes almost as passive as a vegetable.Uniformly submissive, he gives no trouble, and makes an excellent prisoner.On the other hand, the large-lunged, large-brained man of sanguine temperament is affected very differently. To him the cell is a severe punishment; he chafes and frets under restraint, and most likely grows irritable and sullen.Probably he breaks the prison rules.An ignorant, stupid gaoler would try by sharp punishment to coerce a man of this kind to submission, but to goad and madden him still more would be the only result of such an attempt.Not improbably a duel between prisoner and gaoler would be provoked, and perhaps some tragedy, like that enacted at Birmingham Gaol, be the issue. The details of this tragedy are treated in a masterly manner by Mr. Charles Reade in his “Never Too Late to Mend.”Those who are in the habit of having prisoners under their charge hear some extraordinary stories of crimes.While Peace was undergoing the probationary term of the sentence passed upon him, more than one member of a light-fingered family of some celebrity were inmates of the same prison.A brief sketch of this family, every member of which Peace knew perfectly well, is given in the gaol chaplain’s report, which, as it is reliable, may furnish the reader with some little insight into criminal life:—“Trained thieves and pickpockets,” says the chaplain, “differ from mere tramps, both as requiring a far greater amount of plunder to support them, and as more constantly and actively seeking it.“While the tramps are always pedestrian, and are content to herd in the most sordid lodging-houses, the professional thieves resort to ale-houses and taverns, travel by rail, and altogether maintain a style of living unattainable by meaner rogues.“They differ again from the ‘resident bad characters,’ inasmuch as they never work if they can help it, but live entirely upon the fruits of their daily villainy.“Though Preston is not yet of sufficient magnitude and importance to maintain a body of resident pickpockets, it seems to repay the trouble of frequent visits from members of the Manchester, Liverpool, and Sheffield corps. The great majority of cases tried at the sessions, in which it was thought necessary to inflict transportation, have been professional thieves whose head-quarters were at Manchester.“At certain periods of his life Peace made that town his head-quarters also.“I have had repeated conversations with many of these professionals, and I shall need no apology for entering into details.“The first case to which my special notice became attracted was that of three young men, two of them only boys, and a girl apprehended for a shop robbery at Preston—an offence seldom ventured upon by thieves of their class because considered “dangerous”—i.e., involving greater risk of detection than their ordinary practice, and a severe sentence in the event of a conviction.“The names of the culprits were John O’Neill, Richard Clarke, Thomas O’Gar, and Ellen O’Neill.“On committal their true characters were at once apparent.“On their trial numerous previous convictions at Manchester, Liverpool, and Wakefield,&c., were proved, and being once more found guilty, sentences were passed upon them to secure the public for some years from their depredations.“These unhappy convicts who, previous to their trial, were cautious and reserved, underwent a change afterwards.“Individual separation, and the consequent working of memory and reflection upon minds too young to be quite hardened, produced the usual result.“One after another, and each ignorant of what their associates had done or purposed, they gladly availed themselves of the opportunities to unburden their memories, if not their consciences.“The following is a sketch of the history now under notice, and I am too well assured that hundreds of similar sketches might be made by any one who has the opportunity of studying from the abundance of models supplied by the great towns of this country:—“An Irish soldier, named Clarke, on his discharge from the army, with a pension of a shilling a day, settled first at Stockport and then at Manchester with his family, consisting of his wife, three boys, and two girls.“The father occasionally worked at his trade as a shoemaker, and could have earned a comfortable living by it.“The two elder boys and the elder girl obtained employment at the factories; the girl, however, after a little time exchanged her occupation for domestic service, in which she continued a year or two.“The parents, as is too frequently the case, bestowed no moral or religious care upon their children, who in consequence soon picked up bad companions, and beginning with petty theft, like Laura Stanbridge, at such places at Knott Fair, gradually entered upon a course of systematic crime.“The second son, Richard, led the way, and all the rest of the children, with the exception of the youngest girl, followed in quick succession.“At first the parents remonstrated, scolded, and gave good advice, but never hesitated to accept all that was offered to them of their children’s ill-gotten gains.“In a short time the father became ‘a great drunkard,’ while the mother, it is evident, encouraged and assisted practices which provided her with the means of enabling her and her husband to live in idleness and luxury.“The man does not appear to have quitted Manchester, but the woman took a more active part in the proceedings of her children, frequently making long journeys to meet one or other of them on discharge from prison, and occasionally making herself useful in passing stolen bank notes.“One of the occasional associates of this family, named James O’Neill, attracted by the skill and success with which the girl exercised her vocation, after a short courtship married her.“‘The askings,’ said Ellen, ‘were put up at Leeds, and I filled up the three weeks by going to Sheffield and York. At the first-named place I fell in with an old friend of mine, named Charles Peace, who advised me to think twice before I threw myself away as he termed it. I got about £10 or £11 at both places together.’“After O’Neill’s marriage with Ellen Clarke he was supported almost entirely by his wife’s skill, living, like her father, in a constant state of drunkenness, and only making himself useful now and then byshading off—i.e., screening the operations of his more adroit and acute partner.“A great extent of country was traversed by this gang on their plundering expeditions, making Manchester the centre of their operations. They organised expeditions to all parts of the kingdom, or, to speak accurately, they started in a spirit of errantry, with no more plan than might be involved in the determination to remain a long time away, and to visit as many places as might hold out a good chance of booty. Now associated, now separated, forming temporary leagues with new comrades, occasionally caught and sentenced toshort imprisonments, they roamed the country, ‘working’ the fairs, markets, railway stations, steeple-chases,&c.,&c.“‘About, this time,’ said Richard Clarke, ‘I was fifteen, and my gains were between £9 and £10 a week.“‘It went in keeping my mother (to whom remittances were made by Post-office orders) and in public-houses.“‘I was dressed like a gentleman’s son, with a cap, a round jacket, and a turn-down collar.’“Though young Richard was cautious, ‘I never ran a chance,’ said he, ‘ofthrowing myself away—i.e., taking more than I wanted, and running unnecessary risks.’“Sometimes, indeed, he did not look for money because he had enough.“Ellen Clarke and the youngest boy, Edward, were the boldest and most successful of the family, and the girl as well as the mother was not wanting in a certain kind of family affection.“We find her starting from Manchester to Gloucester in order, if possible, to obtain a councillor for Richard, who had been put back for trial on the charge of picking pockets.“Unsuccessful in her object, however, and leaving Richard in Gloucester, she occupied some time in travelling about, chiefly in Yorkshire.“She went to Hull to meet her eldest brother John on his discharge from prison there.“‘I waited till he came out,’ said she, ‘and then he leathered me for being away from home.’“Ellen Clarke, indeed, possessed a natural disposition which, had she been blessed with Christian parents, might have contributed to their and her own credit and happiness.“Her narrative throughout betrays the wish to palliate their conduct, and at her interview with them after her conviction she appeared quite forgetful of herself, and only solicitous to assuage their anxiety about her, and to warn her brother Edward from his dangerous courses.“This determined and skilful girl-thief of seventeen, who at the latter period of her short run of crime was not satisfied with less than a weekly booty of £10 or £20, trembled very much when she made her first successful essay upon the pocket of a young woman, from which she abstracted eighteenpence.“‘I met,’ said she, ‘the young woman again in a short time, and she was crying; I heard her say the money was her mother’s. Icried too, and would have given her the money back, but I was afraid of being took up.’“What an affecting contrast between this girl’s character and fate as theywereand as theymight have been.“And how sad to think that our backward civilisation possesses as yet no means of saving from moral destruction thousands who, like this poor child, possess natural qualities which by God’s blessing would amply repay the labour of cultivation.“As I have said, after sentence was pronounced upon the gang, the reserve and hardihood which the different members of it had previously exhibited, gave way.“Richard Clarke was the first to yield; his sister, who seemed more attached to him than her husband, next softened.“O’Gar, whose demeanour had always been quiet and humble, after meeting with his mother, entirely threw off his obduracy.“It has been the long-established practice in this gaol to permit interviews between convicts newly sentenced to transportation and their near relations with more frequency than is usually allowed, partly from a feeling of compassion to all the parties, and partly from a hope that in such cases as the present one, warning may be taken by those who witness the convict’s misery should they be in any danger of treading in his steps.“I was present at two meetings between the Clarkes and their relatives.“The visitors on the first occasion were the father, the boy, Edward Clarke, and a young man introduced as a cousin.“They were all expensively dressed for their station; the father’s appearance was rather prepossessing, the boy, though good-looking and well clad, showed to an experienced eye the unmistakable and undisguisable physiognomy and manner of a bold and practical thief.“Creditable natural feelings were shown by all parties, and many tears were shed by all but the girl, who seemed most anxious to keep up the spirits of the others.“Old Clarke, habituated to the short imprisonments of his children, seemed unable to conceive that he saw them in a more serious predicament. Almost the first words he spoke were—“‘Don’t fret. Sure you’ll not be here more than five months. I’ve sent a letter to General W——, and he’ll soon get you off.’“The convicts themselves were well assured that such expectations were utterly vain, but the father could not be made to comprehend that GeneralW—— neithercould or would interfere with the course of justice.“After the interview Richard Clarke told me that the young man introduced as a cousin was no relative at all, but a former associate, then living with the old Clarke’s, and named M‘Giverin.“At the second visit there came both the old Clarkes, O’Neill’s mother, Edward Clarke, the younger sister—a fine-looking child of eleven—and a girl who lived with the Clarkes as Richard’s mistress.“Old Clarke, not content with bringing M‘Giverin again, also introduced another ‘cousin,’ a well-dressed man of thirty.“When Richard Clarke, the convict, was asked who these two men were, his father slipped forward and answered for him, repeating the falsehood he had already told, and persisting in it until his son plainly declared the real name and character of the two ‘cousins.’“When remonstrated with for practising such duplicity at such a time, all that could be obtained from the wretched man was—“‘Well, sir, I ax your pardon. Sure I did not know the rules of the place.’“At one moment he appeared oppressed with the bitterest feelings, and the next was chatting with an air of eager satisfaction.“When his relatives had gone Richard Clarke made the following statement—“‘My little brother told me this morning that last Saturday night he got £15 in sovereigns at the Bank Top Station, and that yesterday (Monday) he got £5 in Manchester. The two men that came to see me this morning are Thomas M‘Giverin and Henry Kelly. M‘Giverin has been a thief about five years, and has two brothers who are thieves. Kelly is about thirty years old; he has been a thiefin all waysabout twenty years. He is only just out of Liverpool Gaol, where he got six months for a watch. I think him and M‘Giverin came to see me out of curiosity—to see whether I washardor no.’“I have dwelt longer on the history of this family of pickpockets than may seem necessary, but I have done so from a desire to lay open as far as I can what is too little known, the character and proceedings of this portion ofla classe dangereuse, to impress upon the public the enormous loss it sustains by their depredations, and to suggest the necessity of resorting to more efficient means for the repression of the evil, which, I believe, to be greatly on the increase.“There are now many thousands of pickpockets robbing at the rate of £300 to £1000 a year, who boldly follow their trade under the idea—too much justified by past experience—that their particular line of practice involves but small risk of transportation, while its gains are certain and easily obtained.“Even when apprehended ‘legal assistance’ is generally forthcoming to aid the chances of escape.“A short time after the conviction of the Clarkes a boy named O’Brien, alias Johnson, aliasSlaver, was caught in the attempt to pick a lady’s pocket in Preston.“The boy’s accomplice, a man who had trained him, and who lived upon the produce of his robberies, escaped and reached Manchester in time to secure the professional services of a rather celebrated attorney, who came to Preston to appear for ‘Slaver,’ and extricate him from his dangerous position.“The boy’s skill as an apprentice pickpocket made it worth his master’s while to incur the expense of £10 for having the best ‘professional aid.’“‘Slaver’ was convicted, however, as a rogue and vagabond, and sentenced to three months’ imprisonment.”We must conclude this chapter on prisoner and prison life, and recur to this interesting subject in a future number, as we have to chronicle a much more heinous offence than robbery, this being the taking of human life.Peace had not been many weeks in gaol before another prisoner was lodged therein charged with a capital offence.
Charles Peace had not counted on receiving so heavy a sentence, and at first he was much borne down. He had been for a long time under the notice of the constabulary, who felt assured that he had perpetrated a series of robberies without being brought under the ban of the law. Had the authorities been oblivious to this fact, perhaps eighteen months, or at the most two years, would have been the maximum punishment awarded to him.
“Penal servitude,” says an authority on this subject, “is a thing many people hear and read of a great deal, but about which only a certain number know really anything.”
Mr. Charles Reade has touched the question in a masterly manner in his powerful romance of “Never Too Late to Mend,” but happily for the welfare of society at large, and criminals in particular, modifications have been made in the treatment of prisoners since the publication of Mr. Reade’s work.
Peace, as we have already seen, was selfish and unscrupulous.
He would have sacrificed his sister without the slightest compunction of conscience if he could thereby have saved himself.
It transpired, however, at the trial, that he was the principal, his sister and the woman James being but accomplices.
The bench took a righteous view of the question, and our hero simply got his deserts.
He, however, endeavoured to make out that he was an ill-used man.
After the sessions had come to a conclusion, he was taken in the prison van with a batch of convicts to the gaol where they were to undergo the first probationary term of their sentences.
With a heavy heart, Peace once more entered the “Black Maria,” which was to convey him to a convict establishment, with which he had never had any previous acquaintance.
When the prison van arrived at its destination the convicts were told to alight.
The first thing on entering the prison, each man was released from his handcuffs, and told to seat himself on a long bench in the passage.
Peace, during the progress of the van through the town, had been greatly annoyed at the shouting, screaming, and laughing of his fellow prisoners, who were, however, now much more quiet and comparatively well-behaved.
They were all subjected to a new and to Peace a most painful operation.
He was well aware that it would be next to useless, if not quite hypocritical, for one in his position to lay claim to any considerable delicacy of feeling, or to be over scrupulous in matters of common decency.
But there were occasionally, however, he found, even amongst convicts, those who will bear a pretty long period of imprisonment, during which they are subjected to a variety of contaminating influences, and yet not have their susceptibilities completely destroyed. Of these he was one, and he felt that the treatment he had to undergo was conceived in a barbarous spirit, and was fitted to destroy utterly any feelings of self-respect which his previous experiences had left in him.
Every part of his body was minutely inspected immediately on his arrival, in order that he might not take any money or tobacco into the prison.
Doubtless it is very desirable and even necessary that every precaution should be taken to prevent such articles finding their way into prisons—at least on the persons of prisoners; but the fact remains that, notwithstanding these inspections, both money and tobacco do find their way into prisons.
The trials of skill and invention which go on between the convict and the inspector, like those between artillery and iron plates, have as yet only proved that, given the power of resistance, the power of overcoming it will be found.
One of his fellow-prisoners verified the truth of this conclusion by taking five sovereigns into prison with him, notwithstanding all the care and experience exercised by the inspector.
Every prisoner on first entering the convict service has to undergo nine months of separate confinement in a cell by himself, working in that cell, and never leaving it except for exercise or to go to chapel.
Daring that nine months no remission is given; but for the remainder of his time, if he obtains the full quantum of eight marks a day, which, curiously, he earned by good conduct and the completion of his day’s work, whatever that may be, he is allowed a remission of equal to three months in each year, or one-fourth of his sentence, except the nine months.
The full amount of marks for a man to earn in a year is 2920.
If less than this number is earned, so much remission is lost.
It is seldom that a man goes through the whole of his service without losing some marks.
The day after the arrival of our hero and his fellow-prisoners they were all ordered to strip a second time for medical examination, and as a considerable time elapsed before Peace’s turn came he had to remain in that state rather longer than was good for him.
It was useless to complain, he had to submit to the humiliating process with the best grace he could.
When the inspection was concluded, he had his hair cut after the approved prison fashion, and was put into his cell to make mats.
His cell was white as the driven snow. His domestic duties were explained to him, and he was informed a heavy penalty would be inflicted if a speck of dirt was discovered on the wall or floor of his cell, or if his cocoa-bark mattress should not be neatly rolled up after use and the strap tight, and steel hook polished like glass, and his little brass gas-pipe glittering like gold.
He listened to all these injunctions with exemplary patience, having made up his mind to be, if possible, a model prisoner. He had in view the remission of his sentence, which was only to be gained by exemplary conduct.
To a sanguine or irritable temperament the monotony of prison life is almost insupportable.
Peace was nearly getting into trouble on the first Sunday he spent in prison for a very unintentional violation of the prison rules.
In accordance with these rules, convicts are not allowed to turn their heads in any direction in the chapel; if they do so it is the duty of the attendant officer to take them before the governor, who, in all probability, will punish them for their disobedience.
It is fair to assume that those who framed these rules had some good end in view in being stringent in the matter of posture in religious service.
The difficulty with Peace was to discover whether the spiritual welfare of the prisoners or the preservation of a more than military discipline amongst them, even in matters of religion, had appeared to them to be of the greatest importance.
It is probable, however, that neither of these considerations decided the question, but that the principal object of these regulations was to preserve in the convict mind, even in the act of worship, the idea of punishment in a perfectly lively and healthy condition.
Be that as it may, on Peace’s first Sunday in chapel with his English Prayer-book before him he found himself quite unable to follow the chaplain in the services in which he was engaged.
Turning over the leaves of the Prayer-book in the vain hope of finding the proper place, and happening to cast his eyes over the shoulder of a prisoner in front of him in order to find it, the movement caught the eye of the officer who sat watching every face. Peace saw from the stare and frown which followed, indeed, that he had committed some grave offence.
He immediately resumed his proper attitude, and sat out the service as right as his neighbours, and so escaped the threatened punishment.
“They are jolly particular in this establishment,” mused Peace. “Mustn’t even look, it appears.”
Nothing, however, was said to him by the official, but he felt that he had narrowly escaped being reported.
Every day the prisoners, male and female, old and young, were made to attend chapel, and twice on Sundays.
The appearance of the sacred edifice quite upsets the idea of “freedom” in religious worship.
The chaplain’s pulpit is perched high up against the wall at the end, so as to enable him to get a view of his entire congregation; otherwise this would be impossible, for while the larger number of adult male prisoners occupy the body of the chapel, the women and children are partitioned off on either side by a tall partition, which quite precludes the possibility of their seeing beyond.
Before the great space where the men sit is a pair of tall iron gates, and they are ranged on seats rising one above another with warders in attendance, who are constantly on the watch.
The men are expected to look steadfastly before them, regarding through the iron bars the preacher in his pulpit; they must raise or lower their prayer-books with elbows squared, and all at once, like soldiers in a drill.
They must not scrape their feet against the floor without having afterwards to explain the reason of such a movement. They may scarcely wink an eye, cough, or make any noise without danger of rebuke or punishment.
It is a terrible and humiliating state of servitude these miserably guilty creatures have to endure, but with all this it does not seem to deter them from the commission of crime, for many, as soon as they are released, have recourse to their old practices until they are again caught, and sentenced to another and longer term of imprisonment.
Peace began to be weary of his monotonous life. One morning he said to the under turnkey.
“I say, my friend, how long am I to be cooped up in this cheerful little abode—not the whole of the time, I hope?”
“Prisoners are not permitted to talk out of hours,” said the turnkey, looking straight before him, but not at his questioner.
“Ah! I beg your pardon, guv’nor; meant no offence.”
The turnkey, whose name was Wilson, looked hard at the prisoner, and seemed lost in thought.
Peace felt a little uncomfortable. Perhaps the man would report him to the governor.
“I beg your pardon again; I hope I’ve not offended you.”
The man shook his head and walked away.
“I’m sorry I spoke,” muttered our hero to himself.
The turnkey returned.
“Now, then,No.34.”
“Well,” cried Peace, “what’s up now?”
“Prisoners shut their own doors,” returned the man. Peace closed the door of his cell.
“Lively,” he ejaculated, “not to say encouraging. Well, I am blest, this is a place a cove’s got to lock himself in, it appears.”
Peace had gone through the usual formula of prison life; one working day was just the same as another.
He did his share of work, and his custodians had no reason to complain of him as far as industrious habits were concerned; he kept his cell scrupulously clean.
The cell in which Peace was confined was small enough in all conscience. It was not much over seven feet in length, and four feet five inches in breadth; its height being a trifle over eight feet. By the side of the door was a small window of thick rough glass, and beneath this was a little flap table, which had to be let down when the hammock was slung.
As may be readily imagined, there was nothing superfluous in this narrow prison house, only just enough to admit of a human being existing in the narrowest possible compass.
Over the table was a small shelf. Below the shelf, and at the opposite end of the cell to the window and flap table, was the hammock, which was rolled up in the smallest possible compass, and strapped against the wall.
There was a water spout, so ingeniously contrived that turned to the right it sent a small stream into a copper basin, and to the left into a bottomless close stool at some distance.
There was also a small gas pipe tipped with polished brass.
In one angle of the wall was a small commode or open cupboard, on whose shelves were ranged a bright pewter plate, a knife and fork, and a wooden spoon.
There was a grating at the bottom of the door for the air to come in, and another for foul air to go out if it chose.
An ordinary stable bucket with iron handle and hoops was on the floor alongside of a low wooden stool, a small hand broom, and in a corner under the table a scrubbing brush and flannel. Two tin tallies, with the number of the cell, prison, and hall, hanging behind the door, completed the furniture of this lively and cheerless apartment.
The cellular system has, however, many advantages, and is a far better arrangement than that adopted in the earlier days of prison management.
At one time English gaols were denounced by Howard and others “as schools for instruction in iniquity,” and there can be but little doubt that to an extent this was true.
The poor dandy priest, Dr. Dodd, who was executed for forgery, spent six months in Newgate before he suffered death by hanging, and during part of his time he was forced to herd with the common rabble. The change from the caresses and luxuries lavished on him by the silly devotees of his green-room theology to the riot and ribaldry of the gaol sorely tried the unstrung nerves of the pet preacher. When at last he was accommodated with a separate apartment he wrote a poem, entitled “Thoughts in Prison,” in which he copiously lamented the evils of association and his own personal miseries.
The case of the unfortunate divine-about-town made a great sensation. He really was hardly dealt with, for he had done all he could by confession and restitution to atone for his crime.
Dr. Johnson fought for him nobly.
Twenty thousand people signed a petition for his pardon. Consequently, when the ill-fated divine was hung and the poem published, hundreds of fine ladies and gentlemen read, and perhaps deplored, his watery blank verse, and thus most unexpectedly felt a transient interest in the question of prison discipline.
But a change has come over us since the days of Dr. Dodd and Faudleroy; though it would appear that the sympathy evinced by a certain section of the community for murderers is still extanct.
TheRev.John Clay, who was for many years chaplain of Preston Gaol, in discussing the question of prison discipline, says: “If we regard the prisoner as a moral patient, the paramount object is to render him as amenable as possible to the reformatory process. The tendency of separate confinement is to lower the bodily organs and weaken the faculties.
“The discipline must be modified to correct this tendency. The prisoner probably lived a life of gross animal indulgence.
“Accordingly his animal propensities must be first lulled to sleep; this is most effectually done by the repressing power of isolation.
“Plenty of fresh air, therefore, brisk exercise, and suitable diet are necessary.
“If the diet is too low, it will turn depression into despondency; if too high, it will produce excitement and irritability.
“The god of criminals is their belly, and to baulk the belly god to the utmost extent is both wise and just.
“In consequence of lowering the vital energies, the brain becomes more feeble, and therefore more susceptible.
“That is to say, the man becomes more impressible, though this is not the invariable result.
“The cell will sometimes only increase the reserve of the sullen, the stupidity of the dull, the idiotcy of the feeble, and the craft of the cunning.
“Solitude is indeed a terrible solvent, but the main element in a man’s character will sometimes withstand its potency when all other characteristics are melted down.
“But, as a general rule, a few months in a separate cell renders a prisoner strangely impressible.
“The chaplain can then make a brawny navvy cry like a child—he can work on his feelings in almost any way he pleases. He can, so to speak, photograph his own thoughts, wishes, and opinions on his patient’s mind, and fill his mouth with his own phrases and language.”
In common with most philanthropists, the Preston Gaol chaplain considered that almost all crime was traceable to three closely-linked causes, drunkenness, ignorance, and the habit of living in filthy, overcrowded dwellings.
But he maintained that these, in their turn, were due in a great measure to the want of sympathy and intercourse between the upper and lower classes. This cause the late Justice Telford animadverted on while on the bench within a very short period of his death.
Of course the effect produced by the solitary cell depends on many other things, such as temperament, previous habits,&c.
The sluggish, lymphatic man, with small lungs and small brain, adapts himself easily to his solitude. Good food, light work, and a sufficient allowance of visits to break and cheer the monotony of his cell, reconcile him to his position; he becomes almost as passive as a vegetable.
Uniformly submissive, he gives no trouble, and makes an excellent prisoner.
On the other hand, the large-lunged, large-brained man of sanguine temperament is affected very differently. To him the cell is a severe punishment; he chafes and frets under restraint, and most likely grows irritable and sullen.
Probably he breaks the prison rules.
An ignorant, stupid gaoler would try by sharp punishment to coerce a man of this kind to submission, but to goad and madden him still more would be the only result of such an attempt.
Not improbably a duel between prisoner and gaoler would be provoked, and perhaps some tragedy, like that enacted at Birmingham Gaol, be the issue. The details of this tragedy are treated in a masterly manner by Mr. Charles Reade in his “Never Too Late to Mend.”
Those who are in the habit of having prisoners under their charge hear some extraordinary stories of crimes.
While Peace was undergoing the probationary term of the sentence passed upon him, more than one member of a light-fingered family of some celebrity were inmates of the same prison.
A brief sketch of this family, every member of which Peace knew perfectly well, is given in the gaol chaplain’s report, which, as it is reliable, may furnish the reader with some little insight into criminal life:—
“Trained thieves and pickpockets,” says the chaplain, “differ from mere tramps, both as requiring a far greater amount of plunder to support them, and as more constantly and actively seeking it.
“While the tramps are always pedestrian, and are content to herd in the most sordid lodging-houses, the professional thieves resort to ale-houses and taverns, travel by rail, and altogether maintain a style of living unattainable by meaner rogues.
“They differ again from the ‘resident bad characters,’ inasmuch as they never work if they can help it, but live entirely upon the fruits of their daily villainy.
“Though Preston is not yet of sufficient magnitude and importance to maintain a body of resident pickpockets, it seems to repay the trouble of frequent visits from members of the Manchester, Liverpool, and Sheffield corps. The great majority of cases tried at the sessions, in which it was thought necessary to inflict transportation, have been professional thieves whose head-quarters were at Manchester.
“At certain periods of his life Peace made that town his head-quarters also.
“I have had repeated conversations with many of these professionals, and I shall need no apology for entering into details.
“The first case to which my special notice became attracted was that of three young men, two of them only boys, and a girl apprehended for a shop robbery at Preston—an offence seldom ventured upon by thieves of their class because considered “dangerous”—i.e., involving greater risk of detection than their ordinary practice, and a severe sentence in the event of a conviction.
“The names of the culprits were John O’Neill, Richard Clarke, Thomas O’Gar, and Ellen O’Neill.
“On committal their true characters were at once apparent.
“On their trial numerous previous convictions at Manchester, Liverpool, and Wakefield,&c., were proved, and being once more found guilty, sentences were passed upon them to secure the public for some years from their depredations.
“These unhappy convicts who, previous to their trial, were cautious and reserved, underwent a change afterwards.
“Individual separation, and the consequent working of memory and reflection upon minds too young to be quite hardened, produced the usual result.
“One after another, and each ignorant of what their associates had done or purposed, they gladly availed themselves of the opportunities to unburden their memories, if not their consciences.
“The following is a sketch of the history now under notice, and I am too well assured that hundreds of similar sketches might be made by any one who has the opportunity of studying from the abundance of models supplied by the great towns of this country:—
“An Irish soldier, named Clarke, on his discharge from the army, with a pension of a shilling a day, settled first at Stockport and then at Manchester with his family, consisting of his wife, three boys, and two girls.
“The father occasionally worked at his trade as a shoemaker, and could have earned a comfortable living by it.
“The two elder boys and the elder girl obtained employment at the factories; the girl, however, after a little time exchanged her occupation for domestic service, in which she continued a year or two.
“The parents, as is too frequently the case, bestowed no moral or religious care upon their children, who in consequence soon picked up bad companions, and beginning with petty theft, like Laura Stanbridge, at such places at Knott Fair, gradually entered upon a course of systematic crime.
“The second son, Richard, led the way, and all the rest of the children, with the exception of the youngest girl, followed in quick succession.
“At first the parents remonstrated, scolded, and gave good advice, but never hesitated to accept all that was offered to them of their children’s ill-gotten gains.
“In a short time the father became ‘a great drunkard,’ while the mother, it is evident, encouraged and assisted practices which provided her with the means of enabling her and her husband to live in idleness and luxury.
“The man does not appear to have quitted Manchester, but the woman took a more active part in the proceedings of her children, frequently making long journeys to meet one or other of them on discharge from prison, and occasionally making herself useful in passing stolen bank notes.
“One of the occasional associates of this family, named James O’Neill, attracted by the skill and success with which the girl exercised her vocation, after a short courtship married her.
“‘The askings,’ said Ellen, ‘were put up at Leeds, and I filled up the three weeks by going to Sheffield and York. At the first-named place I fell in with an old friend of mine, named Charles Peace, who advised me to think twice before I threw myself away as he termed it. I got about £10 or £11 at both places together.’
“After O’Neill’s marriage with Ellen Clarke he was supported almost entirely by his wife’s skill, living, like her father, in a constant state of drunkenness, and only making himself useful now and then byshading off—i.e., screening the operations of his more adroit and acute partner.
“A great extent of country was traversed by this gang on their plundering expeditions, making Manchester the centre of their operations. They organised expeditions to all parts of the kingdom, or, to speak accurately, they started in a spirit of errantry, with no more plan than might be involved in the determination to remain a long time away, and to visit as many places as might hold out a good chance of booty. Now associated, now separated, forming temporary leagues with new comrades, occasionally caught and sentenced toshort imprisonments, they roamed the country, ‘working’ the fairs, markets, railway stations, steeple-chases,&c.,&c.
“‘About, this time,’ said Richard Clarke, ‘I was fifteen, and my gains were between £9 and £10 a week.
“‘It went in keeping my mother (to whom remittances were made by Post-office orders) and in public-houses.
“‘I was dressed like a gentleman’s son, with a cap, a round jacket, and a turn-down collar.’
“Though young Richard was cautious, ‘I never ran a chance,’ said he, ‘ofthrowing myself away—i.e., taking more than I wanted, and running unnecessary risks.’
“Sometimes, indeed, he did not look for money because he had enough.
“Ellen Clarke and the youngest boy, Edward, were the boldest and most successful of the family, and the girl as well as the mother was not wanting in a certain kind of family affection.
“We find her starting from Manchester to Gloucester in order, if possible, to obtain a councillor for Richard, who had been put back for trial on the charge of picking pockets.
“Unsuccessful in her object, however, and leaving Richard in Gloucester, she occupied some time in travelling about, chiefly in Yorkshire.
“She went to Hull to meet her eldest brother John on his discharge from prison there.
“‘I waited till he came out,’ said she, ‘and then he leathered me for being away from home.’
“Ellen Clarke, indeed, possessed a natural disposition which, had she been blessed with Christian parents, might have contributed to their and her own credit and happiness.
“Her narrative throughout betrays the wish to palliate their conduct, and at her interview with them after her conviction she appeared quite forgetful of herself, and only solicitous to assuage their anxiety about her, and to warn her brother Edward from his dangerous courses.
“This determined and skilful girl-thief of seventeen, who at the latter period of her short run of crime was not satisfied with less than a weekly booty of £10 or £20, trembled very much when she made her first successful essay upon the pocket of a young woman, from which she abstracted eighteenpence.
“‘I met,’ said she, ‘the young woman again in a short time, and she was crying; I heard her say the money was her mother’s. Icried too, and would have given her the money back, but I was afraid of being took up.’
“What an affecting contrast between this girl’s character and fate as theywereand as theymight have been.
“And how sad to think that our backward civilisation possesses as yet no means of saving from moral destruction thousands who, like this poor child, possess natural qualities which by God’s blessing would amply repay the labour of cultivation.
“As I have said, after sentence was pronounced upon the gang, the reserve and hardihood which the different members of it had previously exhibited, gave way.
“Richard Clarke was the first to yield; his sister, who seemed more attached to him than her husband, next softened.
“O’Gar, whose demeanour had always been quiet and humble, after meeting with his mother, entirely threw off his obduracy.
“It has been the long-established practice in this gaol to permit interviews between convicts newly sentenced to transportation and their near relations with more frequency than is usually allowed, partly from a feeling of compassion to all the parties, and partly from a hope that in such cases as the present one, warning may be taken by those who witness the convict’s misery should they be in any danger of treading in his steps.
“I was present at two meetings between the Clarkes and their relatives.
“The visitors on the first occasion were the father, the boy, Edward Clarke, and a young man introduced as a cousin.
“They were all expensively dressed for their station; the father’s appearance was rather prepossessing, the boy, though good-looking and well clad, showed to an experienced eye the unmistakable and undisguisable physiognomy and manner of a bold and practical thief.
“Creditable natural feelings were shown by all parties, and many tears were shed by all but the girl, who seemed most anxious to keep up the spirits of the others.
“Old Clarke, habituated to the short imprisonments of his children, seemed unable to conceive that he saw them in a more serious predicament. Almost the first words he spoke were—
“‘Don’t fret. Sure you’ll not be here more than five months. I’ve sent a letter to General W——, and he’ll soon get you off.’
“The convicts themselves were well assured that such expectations were utterly vain, but the father could not be made to comprehend that GeneralW—— neithercould or would interfere with the course of justice.
“After the interview Richard Clarke told me that the young man introduced as a cousin was no relative at all, but a former associate, then living with the old Clarke’s, and named M‘Giverin.
“At the second visit there came both the old Clarkes, O’Neill’s mother, Edward Clarke, the younger sister—a fine-looking child of eleven—and a girl who lived with the Clarkes as Richard’s mistress.
“Old Clarke, not content with bringing M‘Giverin again, also introduced another ‘cousin,’ a well-dressed man of thirty.
“When Richard Clarke, the convict, was asked who these two men were, his father slipped forward and answered for him, repeating the falsehood he had already told, and persisting in it until his son plainly declared the real name and character of the two ‘cousins.’
“When remonstrated with for practising such duplicity at such a time, all that could be obtained from the wretched man was—
“‘Well, sir, I ax your pardon. Sure I did not know the rules of the place.’
“At one moment he appeared oppressed with the bitterest feelings, and the next was chatting with an air of eager satisfaction.
“When his relatives had gone Richard Clarke made the following statement—
“‘My little brother told me this morning that last Saturday night he got £15 in sovereigns at the Bank Top Station, and that yesterday (Monday) he got £5 in Manchester. The two men that came to see me this morning are Thomas M‘Giverin and Henry Kelly. M‘Giverin has been a thief about five years, and has two brothers who are thieves. Kelly is about thirty years old; he has been a thiefin all waysabout twenty years. He is only just out of Liverpool Gaol, where he got six months for a watch. I think him and M‘Giverin came to see me out of curiosity—to see whether I washardor no.’
“I have dwelt longer on the history of this family of pickpockets than may seem necessary, but I have done so from a desire to lay open as far as I can what is too little known, the character and proceedings of this portion ofla classe dangereuse, to impress upon the public the enormous loss it sustains by their depredations, and to suggest the necessity of resorting to more efficient means for the repression of the evil, which, I believe, to be greatly on the increase.
“There are now many thousands of pickpockets robbing at the rate of £300 to £1000 a year, who boldly follow their trade under the idea—too much justified by past experience—that their particular line of practice involves but small risk of transportation, while its gains are certain and easily obtained.
“Even when apprehended ‘legal assistance’ is generally forthcoming to aid the chances of escape.
“A short time after the conviction of the Clarkes a boy named O’Brien, alias Johnson, aliasSlaver, was caught in the attempt to pick a lady’s pocket in Preston.
“The boy’s accomplice, a man who had trained him, and who lived upon the produce of his robberies, escaped and reached Manchester in time to secure the professional services of a rather celebrated attorney, who came to Preston to appear for ‘Slaver,’ and extricate him from his dangerous position.
“The boy’s skill as an apprentice pickpocket made it worth his master’s while to incur the expense of £10 for having the best ‘professional aid.’
“‘Slaver’ was convicted, however, as a rogue and vagabond, and sentenced to three months’ imprisonment.”
We must conclude this chapter on prisoner and prison life, and recur to this interesting subject in a future number, as we have to chronicle a much more heinous offence than robbery, this being the taking of human life.
Peace had not been many weeks in gaol before another prisoner was lodged therein charged with a capital offence.