It was certainly lucky that I did not marry that sweet girl, for a month after I had split with her, I fell for a long term in state's prison. It was for a breech-kick, which I could not square. I had gone out of my hotel one morning for a bottle of whiskey when I met two grafters, Johnny and Alec, who were towing a "sucker" along with them. They gave me the tip that it was worth trying. Indeed, I gathered that the man must have his bank with him, and I nicked him in a car for his breech-leather. A spectator saw the deed and tipped off a copper. I was nailed, but had nothing on me, for I had passed the leather to Alec. I was not in the mood for the police station, and with Alec's help I "licked" the copper, who pulled his gun and fired at us as we ran up a side street. Alec blazed back, and escaped, but I was arrested. I could not square it, as I have said, for I had been wanted at Headquarters for some time past, because I did not like to give up, and was no stool-pigeon. I notified Mr. R——, who was told to keep his hands off. I had been tearing the cars open for so long thatthe company wanted to "do" me. They got brassy-mouthed and yelled murder. I saw I had a corporation against me and hadn't a living chance to beat it. So I pleaded guilty and received five years and seven months at Sing Sing.
A boy of twenty-one, I was hand-cuffed with two old jail-birds, and as we rode up on a Fourth Avenue car to the Grand Central Station, I felt deeply humiliated for the first time in my life. When the passengers stared at me I hung my head with shame.
I hung my head with shame, but not because of contrition. I was ashamed of being caught and made a spectacle of. All the way to Sing Sing station people stared at us as if we were wild animals. We walked from the town to the prison, in close company with two deputy sheriffs. I observed considerably, knowing that I should not see the outside world again for a number of years. I looked with envy at the people we passed who seemed honest, and thought of home and the chances I had thrown away.
When I reached the stir I was put through the usual ceremonies. My pedigree was taken, but I told the examiners nothing. I gave them a false name and a false pedigree. Then a bath was given to my clothes and I was taken to the tailor shop. When my hair had been cropped close and a suit of stripes given me I felt what it was to be the convicted criminal. It was not a pleasant feeling, I cantell you, and when I was taken to my cell my heart sank indeed. A narrow room, seven feet, four inches long; dark, damp, with moisture on the walls, and an old iron cot with plenty of company, as I afterwards discovered—this was to be my home for years. And I as full of life as a young goat! How could I bear it?
After I had been examined by the doctor and questioned about my religion by the chaplain, I was left to reflect in my cell. I was interrupted in my melancholy train of thought by two convicts who were at work in the hall just outside my cell. I had known them on the outside, and they, taking good care not to be seen by the screws (keepers) tipped me off through my prison door to everything in stir which was necessary for a first timer to know. They told me to keep my mouth shut, to take everything from the screws in silence, and if assigned to a shop to do my work. They told me who the stool-pigeons were, that is to say, the convicts who, in order to curry favor and have an easy time, put the keepers next to what other convicts are doing, and so help to prevent escapes. They tipped me off to those keepers who were hard to get alongwith, and put me next to the Underground Tunnel, and who were running it. Sing Sing, they said, is the best of the three New York penitentiaries: for the grub is better than at the others, there are more privileges, and, above all, it is nearer New York, so that your friends can visit you more frequently. They gave me a good deal of prison gossip, and told me who among my friends were there, and what their condition of health was. So and so had died or gone home, they said, such and such had been drafted to Auburn or Clinton prisons. If I wanted to communicate with my friends in stir all that was necessary for me to do was to write a few stiffs (letters) and they would be sent by the Underground Tunnel. They asked me about their old pals, hang-outs and girls in New York, and I, in turn gave them a lot of New York gossip. Like all convicts they shed a part of the things they had received from home, gave me canned goods, tobacco and a pipe. It did not take me long to get on to the workings of the prison.
I was particularly interested in the Underground Tunnel, for I saw at once its great usefulness. This is the secret system bywhich contraband articles, such as whiskey, opium and morphine are brought into the prison. When a rogue is persuasive with the coin of the realm he can always find a keeper or two to bring him what he considers the necessaries of life, among which are opium, whiskey and tobacco. If you have a screw "right," you can be well supplied with these little things. To get him "right" it is often necessary to give him a share—about twenty per cent—of the money sent you from home. This system is worked in all the State prisons in New York, and during my first term, or any of the other terms for that matter, I had no difficulty in supplying my growing need for opium.
I do not want people to get the idea that it is always necessary to bribe a keeper, in order to obtain these little luxuries; for many a screw has brought me whiskey and hop, and contraband letters from other inmates, without demanding a penny. A keeper is a human being like the rest of us, and he is sometimes moved by considerations other than of pelf. No matter how good and conscientious he may be, a keeper is but a man after all, and, having very little to do, especially if he is incharge of an idle gang of "cons" he is apt to enter into conversation with them, particularly if they are better educated or more interesting than he, which often is the case. They tell him about their escapades on the outside and often get his sympathy and friendship. It is only natural that those keepers who are good fellows should do small favors for certain convicts. They may begin by bringing the convicts newspapers to read, but they will end by providing them with almost everything. Some of them, however, are so lacking in human sympathy, that their kindness is aroused only by a glimpse of the coin of the realm; or by the prospect of getting some convict to do their dirty work for them, that is, to spy upon their fellow prisoners.
At Auburn penitentiary, whither I was drafted after nine months at Sing Sing, a few of the convicts peddled opium and whiskey, with, of course, the connivance of the keepers. There are always some persons in prison as well as out who want to make capital out of the misfortunes of others. These peddlars, were despised by the rest of the convicts, for they were invariably stool-pigeons; and young convicts who never before knew the power ofthe drug became opium fiends, all on account of the business propensities of these detestable rats (stool-pigeons) who, because they had money and kept the screws next to those cons who tried to escape, lived in Easy Street while in stir.
While on this subject, I will tell about a certain famous "fence" (at one of these prisons) although he did not operate until my second term. At that time things were booming on the outside. The graft was so good that certain convicts in my clique were getting good dough sent them by their pals who were at liberty; and many luxuries came in, therefore, by the Underground Tunnel. Now those keepers who are next to the Underground develop, through their association with convicts, a propensity to graft, but usually have not the nerve to hustle for the goods. So they are willing to accept stolen property, not having the courage and skill to steal, from the inhabitants of the under world. A convict, whom I knew when at liberty, named Mike, thought he saw an opportunity to do a good "fencing" business in prison. He gave a "red-front" (gold watch and chain), which he had stolen in his good days, to acertain keeper who was running the Underground, and thus got him "right." Then Mike made arrangements with two grafters on the outside to supply the keeper and his friends with what they wanted. If the keeper said his girl wanted a stone, Mike would send word to one of the thieves on the outside to supply a good diamond as quickly as possible. The keeper would give Mike a fair price for these valuable articles and then sell the stones or watches, or make his girl a present.
Other keepers followed suit, for they couldn't see how there was any "come-back" possible, and soon Mike was doing a thriving business. It lasted for five or six months, when Mike stopped it as a regular graft because of the growing cupidity of the keepers. One of them ordered a woman's watch and chain and a pair of diamond ear-rings through the Underground Tunnel. Mike obtained the required articles, but the keeper paid only half of what he promised, and Mike thereupon shut up shop. Occasionally, however, he continued to sell goods stolen by his pals who were at liberty, but only for cash on the spot, and refused all credit. The keepers gradually got a great feeling of respect for this convict"fence" who was so clever and who stood up for his rights; and the business went on smoothly again, for a while.
But finally it was broken up for good. A grafter on the outside, Tommy, sent through the Underground a pawn ticket for some valuable goods, among them a sealskin sacque worth three hundred dollars, which he had stolen and hocked in Philadelphia. Mike sold the pawn-ticket to a screw. Soon after that Tommy, or one of his pals, got a fall and "squealed". The police got "next" to where the goods were, and when the keeper sent the ticket and the money to redeem the articles they allowed them to be forwarded to the prison, but arrested the keeper for receiving stolen goods. He was convicted and sentenced to ten years, but got off through influence. That, however, finished the "fence" at the institution.
To resume the thread of my narrative, the day after I reached Sing Sing I was put through the routine that lasted all the time I was there. At six-thirty in the morning we were awakened by the bell and marched in lock-step (from which many of us were to acquire a peculiar gait that was to mark us through life and helpprevent us from leading decent lives) to the bucket-shop, where we washed, marched to the mess for breakfast at seven-thirty, then to the various shops to work until eleven-thirty, when at the whistle we would form again into squads and march, again in the lock-step, fraternally but silently, to our solemn dinner, which we ate in dead silence. Silence, indeed, except on the sly, was the general rule of our day, until work was over, when we could whisper together until five o'clock, the hour to return to our cells, into which we would carry bread for supper, coffee being conveyed to us through a spout in the wall. The food at Sing Sing was pretty good. Breakfast consisted of hash or molasses, black coffee and bread; and at dinner we had pork and beans, potatoes, hot coffee and bread. Pork and beans gave place to four eggs on Friday, and sometimes stews were given us. It was true what I'd heard, that Sing Sing has the best food of any institution I have known. After five o'clock I would read in my cell by an oil lamp (since my time electricity has been put in the prison) until nine o'clock, when I had to put out my light and go to bed.
I had a great deal more time for readingand meditation in my lonely cell than one would think by the above routine. I was put to work in the shop making chairs. It was the first time I had ever worked in my life, and I took my time about it. I felt no strong desire to work for the State. I was expected to cane a hundred chairs a day, but I usually caned about two. I did not believe in work. I felt at that time that New York State owed me a living. I was getting a living all right, but I was ungrateful. I did not thank them a wee bit. I must have been a bad example to other "cons," for they began to get as tired as myself. At any rate, I lost my job, and was sent back to my cell, where I stayed most of the time while at Sing Sing.
I worked, indeed, very little at any time during my three bits in the penitentiary. The prison at Sing Sing, during the nine months I was there on my first term, was very crowded, and there was not enough work to go round; and I was absolutely idle most of the time. When I had been drafted to Auburn I found more work to do, but still very little, for it was just then that the legislature had shut down on contract labor in the prisons. The outside merchants squealed because they couldnot compete with unpaid convict labor; and so the prison authorities had to shut down many of their shops, running only enough to supply the inside demand, which was slight. For eighteen months at Auburn I did not work a day. I think it was a very bad thing for the health of convicts when this law was passed; for certainly idleness is a very bad thing for most of them; and to be shut up nearly all the time in damp, unhealthy cells like those at Sing Sing, is a terrible strain on the human system.
Personally, however, I liked to be in my cell, especially during my first year of solitary confinement, before my health began to give way; for I had my books from the good prison libraries, my pipe or cigarettes, and last, but not least, I had a certain portion of opium that I used every day.
For me, prison life had one great advantage. It broke down my health and confirmed me for many years in the opium habit, as we shall see; but I educated myself while in stir. Previous to going to Sing Sing my education had been almost entirely in the line of graft; but in stir, I read the English classics and became familiar with philosophy and the science ofmedicine and learned something about chemistry.
One of my favorite authors was Voltaire, whom I read, of course, in a translation. His "Dictionary" was contraband in prison but I read it with profit. Voltaire was certainly one of the shrewdest of men, and as up to snuff as any cynical grafter I know, and yet he had a great love for humanity. He was the philosopher of humanity. Goethe said that Luther threw the world back two hundred years, but I deny it; for Luther, like Voltaire, pointed out the ignorance and wickedness of the priests of their day. These churchmen did not understand the teachings of Christ. Was Voltaire delusional? The priests must have thought so, but they were no judges, for they were far worse and less humane than the French revolutionists. The latter killed outright, but the priests tortured in the name of the Most Humane. I never approved of the methods of the French revolutionists, but certainly they were gentle in comparison with the priests of the Spanish Inquisition.
I think that, in variety of subjects, Voltaire has no equal among writers. Shrewd as he was, he had a soul, and his moral courage wasgrand. His defense of young Barry, who was arrested for using language against the church, showed his kindness and breadth of mind. On his arrival in Paris, when he was only a stripling, he denounced the cowardly, fawning sycophants who surrounded Louis XIV,[B]and wrote a sarcastic poem on His Nibs, and was confined in the Bastille for two years. His courage, his wit, his sarcasms, his hatred of his persecutors, and his love and kindness, stamp him as one of the great, healthy intellects of mankind. What a clever book isCandide! What satire! What wit! As I lay on my cot how often I laughed at his caustic comments on humanity! And how he could hate! I never yet met a man of any account who was not a good hater. I own that Voltaire was ungallant toward the fair sex. But that was his only fault.
I enjoyed Victor Hugo because he could create a great character, and was capable of writing a story with a plot. I rank him as a master of fiction, although I preferred his experience as a traveller, to his novels, which are not real enough. Ernest Renan was a bracing and clever writer, but I was sadly disappointedin reading hisLife of Jesus. I expected to get a true outline of Christ's time and a character sketch of the man himself, but I didn't. I went to the fountain for a glass of good wine, but got only red lemonade.
I liked Dumas, and revelled in the series beginning withThe Three Musketeers. I could not read Dumas now, however. I also enjoyed Gaboriau and Du Boisgobey, for they are very sensational; but that was during my first term in stir. I could not turn a page of their books now, for they would seem idiotic to me. Balzac is a bird of another feather. In my opinion he was one of the best dissectors of human nature that the world ever produced. Not even Shakespeare was his equal. His depth in searching for motives, his discernment in detecting a hypocrite, his skill in showing up women, with their follies, their loves, their little hypocrisies, their endearments, their malice and their envy is unrivalled. It is right that Balzac should show woman with all her faults and follies and virtues, for if she did not possess all these characteristics, how could man adore her?
In his line I think Thackeray is as great as Balzac. When I had readVanity Fair,Pendennis,The NewcomesandBarry Lyndon, I was so much interested that I read anything of his I could lay my hands on, over and over again. With a novel of Thackeray's in my hand I would become oblivious to my surroundings, and long to know something of this writers personality. I think I formed his mental make-up correctly, for I imagined him to be gentle and humane. Any man with ability and brains equal to his could not be otherwise. What a character is Becky Sharp! In her way she was as clever a grafter as Sheenie Annie. She did not love Rawdon as a good wife should. If she had she would not be the interesting Becky that she is. She was grateful to Rawdon for three reasons; first, he married her; second, he gave her a glimpse into a station in life her soul longed for; third, he came from a good family, and was a soldier and tall, and it is well-known that little women like big men. Then Rawdon amused Becky. She often grinned at his lack of brains. She grinned at everything, and when we learn that Becky got religion at the end of the book, instead of saying, God bless her, we only grin, too.
Pendennisis a healthy book. I alwayssympathize with Pen and Laura in their struggles to get on, and when the baby was born I was willing to become Godpapa, just for its Mamma's sake.The NewcomesI call Thackeray's masterpiece. It is truer to life than any other book I ever read. Take the scene where young Clive throws the glass of wine in his cousin's face. The honest horror of the father, his indignation when old Captain Costigan uses bad language, his exit when he hears a song in the Music Hall—all this is true realism. But the scene that makes this book Thackeray's masterpiece is that where the old Colonel is dying. The touching devotion of Madam and Ethel, the love for old Tom, his last word "adsum" the quiet weeping of his nurse, and the last duties to the dead; the beautiful tenderness of the two women, of a kind that makes the fair sex respected by all men—I can never forget this scene till my dying day.
When I was sick in stir a better tonic than the quack could prescribe was Thackeray'sBook of Snobs. Many is the night I could not sleep until I had read this book with a relish. It acted on me like a bottle of good wine, leaving me peaceful after a time ofpleasure. In this book are shown up the little egotisms of the goslings and the foibles of the sucklings in a masterly manner.
I read every word Dickens ever wrote; and I often ruminated in my mind as to which of his works is the masterpiece.Our Mutual Friendis weak in the love scenes, but the book is made readable by two characters, Noddy Boffin and Silas Wegg. Where Wegg reads, as he thinks,The Last of the Russians, when the book wasThe Decline and Fall Of the Roman Empire, there is the quintessence of humor. Silas's wooden leg and his occupation of selling eggs would make anybody smile, even a dip who had fallen and had no money to square it.
The greatest character inDavid Copperfieldis Uriah Heep. The prison scene where this humble hypocrite showed he knew his Bible thoroughly, and knew the advantage of having some holy quotations pat, reminded me often of men I have known in Auburn and Sing Sing prisons. Some hypocritical jail-bird would dream that he could succeed on the outside by becoming a Sunday School superintendent; and four of the meanest thieves I ever knew got their start in thatway. Who has not enjoyed Micawber, with his frothy personality and straitened circumstances, and the unctuous Barkis.—Poor Emily! Who could blame her? What woman could help liking Steerforth? It is strange and true that good women are won by men they know to be rascals. Is it the contrast between Good and Evil, or is it because the ne'er-do-well has a stronger character and more magnetic force? Agnes was one of the best women in the world. Contrast her with David's first wife. Agnes was like a fine violin, while Dora was like a wailing hurdy-gurdy.
Oliver Twistis Dickens's strongest book. He goes deeper into human nature there than in any other of his writings. Fagin, the Jew, is a very strong character, but overdrawn. The picture of Fagin's dens and of the people in them, is true to life. I have seen similar gatherings many a time. The ramblings of the Artful Dodger are drawn from the real thing, but I never met in real life such a brutal character as Bill Sykes; and I have met some tough grafters, as the course of this book will show. Nancy Sykes, however, is true to life. In her degradation she was stilla woman. I contend that a woman is never so low but a man was the cause. One passage in the book has often touched me, as it showed that Nancy had not lost her sex. When she and Bill were passing the prison, she turned towards it and said: "Bill, they were fine fellows that died to-day." "Shut your mouth," said Bill. Now I don't think there is a thief in the United States who would have answered Nancy's remark that way. Strong arm workers who would beat your brains out for a few dollars would be moved by that touch of pity in Nancy's voice.
But Oliver himself is the great character, and his story reminds me of my own. The touching incident in the work-house where his poor stomach is not full, and he asks for a second platter of mush to the horror of the teachers, is not overdrawn. When I was in one of our penal institutions, at a later time of my life, I was ill, and asked for extra food; but my request was looked upon as the audacity of a hardened villain. I had many such opportunities to think of Oliver.
I always liked those authors who wrote as near life as decency would permit. Sterne'sTristram Shandyhas often amused me, andTom Jones,Roderick RandomandPeregrine PickleI have read over and over again. I don't see why good people object to such books. Some people are forever looking after the affairs of others and neglecting their own; especially a man whom I will call Common Socks who has put himself up as a mentor for over seventy millions of people. Let me tell the busy ladies who are afraid that such books will harm the morals of young persons that the more they are cried down the more they will be read. For that matter they ought to be read. Why object to the girl of sixteen reading such books and not to the woman of thirty-five? I think their mental strength is about equal. Both are romantic and the woman of thirty-five will fall in love as quickly as the girl of sixteen. I think a woman is always a girl; at least, it has been so in my experience. One day I was grafting in Philadelphia. It was raining, and a woman was walking along on Walnut Street. She slipped on the wet sidewalk and fell. I ran to her assistance, and saw that her figure was slim and girlish and that she had a round, rosy face, but that her hair was pure white. When I asked her if she was hurt, she said "yes," butwhen I said "Let me be your grandson and support you on my way," I put my foot into it, for, horrors! the look she gave me, as she said in an icy voice, "I was never married!" I wondered what manner of men there were in Philadelphia, and, to square myself, I said: "Never married! and with a pair of such pretty ankles!" Then she gave me a look, thanked me, and walked away as jauntily as she ever did in her life, though she must have been suffering agonies from her sprained ankle. Since that time I have been convinced that they of the gentle sex are girls from fifteen to eighty.
I read much of Lever, too, while I was in stir. His pictures of Ireland and of the noisy strife in Parliament, the description of Dublin with its spendthrifts and excited populace, the gamblers and the ruined but gay young gentlemen, all mixed up with the grandeur of Ireland, are the work of a master. I could only compare this epoch of worn-out regalia with a St. Patrick's day parade twenty years ago in the fourth ward of Manhattan.
Other books I read in stir were Gibbon'sRoman Empire, Carlyle'sFrederick the Great, and many of the English poets. I readWordsworth, Gray and Goldsmith, but I liked Tom Moore and Robert Burns better. The greatest of all the poets, however, in my estimation, is Byron. His loves were many, his adventures daring, and his language was as broad and independent as his mind.
Sing Sing was overflowing with convicts, and after I had been there nine months, I and a number of others were transferred to Auburn penitentiary. There I found the cells drier, and better than at Sing Sing, but the food not so good. The warden was not liked by the majority of the men, but I admired him for two things. He believed in giving us good bread; and he did not give a continental what came into the prison, whether it was a needle or a cannister, as long as it was kept in the cell and not used.
It was in Auburn stir that opium grew to be a habit with me. I used to give the keepers who were running the Underground one dollar of every five that were sent me, and they appreciated my kindness and kept me supplied with the drug. What part the hop began to play in my life may be seen from the routine of my days at Auburn; particularly at those periods when there was no work to be done.After rising in the morning I would clean out my cell, and turn up my bed and blankets; then I went to breakfast, then if there was no work to do, back to my cell, where I ate a small portion of opium, and sometimes read the daily paper, which was also contraband. It is only the stool-pigeons, those convicts who have money, or the cleverest among the rascals, who get many of these privileges. After I had had my opium and the newspaper I would exercise with dumb-bells and think or read in my cell. Then I would have a plunge bath and a nap, which would take me up to dinner time. After dinner I would read in my cell again until three o'clock, when I would go to the bucket-shop or exercise for half an hour in the yard, in lock step, with the others; then back to the cell, taking with me bread and a cup of coffee made out of burnt bread crust, for my supper. In the evening I would read and smoke until my light went out, and would wind up the day with a large piece of opium, which grew larger, as time passed.
For a long time I was fairly content with what was practically solitary confinement. I had my books, my pipe, cigarettes and my regular supply of hop. Whether I worked inthe daytime or not I would usually spend my evenings in the same way. I would lie on my cot and sometimes a thought like the following would come to me: "Yes, I have stripes on. When I am released perhaps some one will pity me, particularly the women. They may despise and avoid me, most likely they will. But I don't care. All I want is to get their wad of money. In the meantime I have my opium and my thoughts and am just as happy as the millionaire, unless he has a narcotic."
After the drug had begun to work I would frequently fall into a deep sleep and not wake until one or two o'clock the following morning; then I would turn on my light, peer through my cell door, and try to see through the little window out in the corridor. A peculiar nervousness often came over me at this hour, particularly if the weather had been rainy, and my imagination would run on a ship-wreck very often, or on some other painful subject; and I might tell the story to myself in jingles, or jot it down on a piece of paper. Then my whole being would be quiet. A gentle, soothing melancholy would steal upon me. Often my imagination was so powerfullyaffected that I could really see the events of my dream. I could see the ship tossing about on waves mountain high. Then and only then I was positive I had a soul. I was in such a state of peace that I could not bear that any human being should suffer. At first the scenes before my imagination would be most harrowing, with great loss of life, but when one of the gentle sex appeared vividly before me a shudder passed over me, and I would seek consolation in jingles such as the following:
A gallant bark set sail one dayFor a port beyond the sea,The Captain had taken his fair young brideTo bear him company.This little brown lassWas of Puritan stock.Her eyes were the brightest e'er seen.They never came back;The ship it was wreckedIn a storm in the old Gulf Stream.Two years had passed, then a letter cameTo a maid in a New England town.It began Darling Kate, it ended Your Jack,I am alive in a foreign land.The Captain, his gentle young wife and your ownWere saved by that hand unseen,But the rest——they went downIn that terrible stormThat night in the old Gulf Stream.
A gallant bark set sail one dayFor a port beyond the sea,The Captain had taken his fair young brideTo bear him company.This little brown lassWas of Puritan stock.Her eyes were the brightest e'er seen.They never came back;The ship it was wreckedIn a storm in the old Gulf Stream.Two years had passed, then a letter cameTo a maid in a New England town.It began Darling Kate, it ended Your Jack,I am alive in a foreign land.The Captain, his gentle young wife and your ownWere saved by that hand unseen,But the rest——they went downIn that terrible stormThat night in the old Gulf Stream.
A gallant bark set sail one dayFor a port beyond the sea,The Captain had taken his fair young brideTo bear him company.This little brown lassWas of Puritan stock.Her eyes were the brightest e'er seen.They never came back;The ship it was wreckedIn a storm in the old Gulf Stream.
A gallant bark set sail one day
For a port beyond the sea,
The Captain had taken his fair young bride
To bear him company.
This little brown lass
Was of Puritan stock.
Her eyes were the brightest e'er seen.
They never came back;
The ship it was wrecked
In a storm in the old Gulf Stream.
Two years had passed, then a letter cameTo a maid in a New England town.It began Darling Kate, it ended Your Jack,I am alive in a foreign land.The Captain, his gentle young wife and your ownWere saved by that hand unseen,But the rest——they went downIn that terrible stormThat night in the old Gulf Stream.
Two years had passed, then a letter came
To a maid in a New England town.
It began Darling Kate, it ended Your Jack,
I am alive in a foreign land.
The Captain, his gentle young wife and your own
Were saved by that hand unseen,
But the rest——they went down
In that terrible storm
That night in the old Gulf Stream.
But these pleasures would soon leave me, and I would grow very restless. My only resource was another piece of opium. Sometimes I awoke much excited, paced my cell rapidly and felt like tearing down the door. Sometimes a book would quiet me. The best soother I had was the most beautiful poem in the English language—Walt Whitman'sOde To Death. When I read this poem, I often imagined I was at the North Pole, and that strange shapes in the clouds beckoned me to come to them. I used to forget myself, and read aloud and was entirely oblivious to my surroundings, until I was brought to myself by the night guard shouting, "What in —— is the matter with you?"
After getting excited in this way I usually needed another dose of hop. I have noticed that the difference between opium and alcohol is that the latter is a disintegrator and tears apart, while the opium is a subtle underminer. Opium, for a long time anyway, stimulates the intelligence; while the reverse is true of alcohol. It was under the influence of opiumthat I began to read philosophy. I read Hume and Locke, and partly understood them, I think, though I did not know that Locke is pronounced in only one syllable till many years after I had read and re-read parts ofThe Human Understanding. It was not only the opium, but my experience on the outside, that made me eager for philosophy and the deeper poetry; for a grafters wits, if they don't get away from him altogether, become keen through his business, since he lives by them. It was philosophy, and the spectacle of men going suddenly and violently insane all about me, that led me first to think of self-control, though I did not muster enough to throw off the opium habit till many years afterwards. I began to think of will-power about this time, and I knew it was an acquired virtue, like truth and honesty. I think, from a moral standpoint, that I lived as good a life in prison as anybody on the outside, for at least I tried to overcome myself. It was life or death, or, a thousand times worse, an insane asylum. Opium led me to books besides those on philosophy, which eventually helped to cure me. At this time I was reading Balzac, Shakespeare, Huxley, Tyndall and Lavater.One poem of Shakespeare's touched me more than any other poem I ever read—The Rape of Lucrece. It was reading such as this that gave me a broader view, and I began to think that this was a terrible life I was leading. But, as the reader will see, I did not know what hell was until several years later.
I had been in stir about four years on my first bit when I began to appreciate how terrible a master I had come under. Of course, to a certain extent, the habit had been forced upon me. After a man has had for several years bad food, little air and exercise, no natural companionship, particularly with the other sex, from whom he is entirely cut off, he really needs a stimulant. Many men fall into the vilest of habits. I found, for my part, that only opium would calm me. It takes only a certain length of time for almost all convicts to become broken in health, addicted to one form or another of stimulant which in the long run pulls them down completely. Diseases of various kinds, insanity and death, are the result. But before the criminal is thus released, he grows desperate in the extreme; particularly if he resorts to opium, for that drug makes one reckless. The hop fiend nevertakes consequences into consideration. Under its influence I became very irritable and unruly, and would take no back talk from the keepers. They and the stool-pigeons began to be afraid of me. I would not let them pound me in any way, and I often got into a violent fight.
As long as I had my regular allowance of opium, which in the fourth year of my term was about twenty grains a day, I was peaceable enough. It was when I began to lessen the amount, with the desire to give it up, that I became so irritable and violent. The strain of reform, even in this early and unsuccessful attempt, was terrible. At times I used to go without the full amount for several days; but then I would relapse and go on a debauch until I was almost unconscious. After recovery, I would make another resolution, only to fall again.
But my life in stir was not all that of the solitary; there were means, even when I was in the shop, of communicating with my fellow convicts; generally by notes, as talking was forbidden. Notes, too, were contraband, but we found means of sending them through cons working in the hall. Sometimes good-naturedor avaricious keepers would carry them; but as a rule a convict did not like to trust a note to a keeper. He was afraid that the screw would read it, whereas it was a point of honor with a convict to deliver the note unread. The contents of these notes were usually news about our girls or pals, which we had received through visitors—rare, indeed!—or letters. By the same means there was much betting done on the races, baseball games and prize fights. We could send money, too, or opium, in the same way, to a friend in need; and we never required an I. O. U.
We were allowed to receive visitors from the outside once every two months; also a box could be delivered to us at the same intervals of time. My friends, especially my mother and Ethel, sent me things regularly, and came to see me. They used to send me soap, tooth brushes and many other delicacies, for even a tooth brush is a delicacy in prison. Ethel stuck to me for three years and visited me regularly during that period. Then her visits ceased, and I heard that she had married. I couldn't blame her, but I felt bad about it all the same.
But my mother came as often as the twomonths rolled by; not only during this first term, but during all my bits in stir. Certainly she has stuck to me through thick and thin. She has been my only true friend. If she had fallen away from me, I couldn't have blamed her; she would only have gone with the rest of the world; but she didn't. She was good not only to me, but to my friends, and she had pity for everybody in stir. I remember how she used to talk about the rut worn in the stone pavement at Sing Sing, where the men paced up and down. "Talk about the Bridge of Sighs!" she used to say.
When a man is in stir he begins to see what an ungrateful brute he has been; and he begins to separate true friends from false ones. He thinks of the mother he neglected for supposed friends of both sexes, who are perhaps friendly at the beginning of his sentence, but soon desert him if he have a number of years to serve. Long after all others have ceased coming to see him, his old mother, bowed and sad, will trudge up the walk from the station to visit her thoughtless and erring son! She carries on her arm a heavy basket of delicacies for the son who is detested by all good citizens, and in her heart there is stillhope for her boy. She has waited many years and she will continue to wait. What memories come to the mother as she sees the mansion of woes on the Hudson looming up before her! Her son is again a baby in her imagination; or a young fellow, before he began to tread the rocky path!—They soon part, for half an hour is all that is given, but they will remember forever the mothers kiss, the son's good-bye, the last choking words of love and familiar advice, as she says: "Trust in God, my lad."
After one of my mothers visits I used to have more sympathy for my fellow convicts. I was always a keen observer, and in the shops or at mess time, and when we were exercising together in lock step, or working about the yard or in the halls, I used to "feel out" my brother "cons," often with a kindly motive. I grew very expert in telling when a friend was becoming insane; for imprisonment leads to insanity, as everybody knows. Many a time a man I knew in stir would grow nervous or absent-minded, then suspicious, and finally would be sent to the madhouse at Dannemora or Matteawan.
For instance, take a friend of mine namedBilly. He was doing a bit of ten years. In the fifth year of his sentence I noticed that he was brooding, and I asked him what was the matter.
"I am afraid," he said, "that my wife is going outside of me."
"You are not positive, are you?" I asked.
"Well," he answered, "she visited me the other day, and she was looking good (prosperous). My son was with her, and he looked good, too. She gave me five dollars and some delicacies. But she never had five dollars when I was on the outside."
"She's working," said I, trying to calm him.
"No; she has got a father and mother," he replied, "and she is living with them."
"Billy," I continued, "how long have you been in stir?"
"Growing on six years," he said.
"Billy," I proceeded, "what would you do if you were on the outside and she was in prison for six years?"
"Well," he replied, "I'd have to give myself some rope."
"Philosophers claim that it is just as hard for a woman to live alone as for a man," Isaid. "You're unreasonable, Billy. Surely you can't blame her."
Billy's case is an instance of how, when a convict has had bad food, bad air and an unnatural routine for some time, he begins to borrow trouble. He grows anæmic and then is on the road to insanity. If he has a wife he almost always grows suspicious of her, though he does not speak about it until he has been a certain number of years in prison. It was not long after the above conversation took place that Billy was sent to the insane asylum at Matteawan.
Sometimes, after a man has begun to grow insane, he will show it by reticence, rather than by talkativeness, according to his disposition. One of my intimate friends, in stir much longer than I, was like a ray of sunshine, witty and a good story teller. His laugh was contagious and we all liked to see him. He was one of the best night prowlers (burglars) in the profession, and had many other gifts. After he had been in stir, however, for a few years, he grew reticent and suspicious, thought that everybody was a stool-pigeon, and died a raving maniac a few years later at Matteawan.
Sometimes a convict will grow so nervous that he will attempt to escape, even when there is no chance, or will sham insanity. An acquaintance of mine, Louis, who had often grafted with me when we were on the outside, told me one day he did not expect to live his bit out. When confined a man generally thinks a lot about his condition, reads a book on medicine and imagines he has every disease the book describes. Louis was in this state, and he consulted me and two others as to whether he ought not to "shoot a bug" (sham insanity); and so get transferred to the hospital. One advised him to attack a keeper and demand his baby back. But as Billy had big, black eyes and a cadaverous face, I told him he'd better shoot the melancholy bug; for he could do that better. Accordingly in the morning when the men were to go to work in the stone yard, Billy appeared in the natural (naked). He had been stalled off by two friends until he had reached the yard. There the keepers saw him, and as they liked him, they gently took him to the hospital. He was pronounced incurably insane by two experts, and transferred to the madhouse. The change of air was so beneficial that Louis speedily recoveredhis senses. At least, the doctors thought so when he was discovered trying to make his elegant (escape); and he was sent back to stir.
As a rule, however, those who attempted to sham insanity failed. They were usually lacking in originality. At any hour of the day or night the whole prison might be aroused by some convict breaking up house, as it was called when a man tried to shoot the bug. He might break everything in his cell, and yell so loud that the other convicts in the cells near by would join in and make a horrible din. Some would curse, and some laugh or howl. If it was at night and they had been awakened out of an opium sleep, they would damn him a thousand miles deep. His friends, however, who knew that he was acting, would plug his game along by talking about his insanity in the presence of stool-pigeons. These latter would tell the keepers that he was buggy (insane), and, if there was not a blow, he might be sent to the hospital. Before that happened, however, he had generally demolished all his furniture. The guards would go to his cell, and chain him up in the Catholic chapel until he could be examined by the doctor. WardenSage was a humane man, and used to go to the chapel himself and try to quiet the fake lunatic, and give him dainties from his own table. During the night the fake had historic company, for painted on the walls were, on one side of him, Jesus, and on the other, Judas and Mary Magdalene.
A favorite method of shooting the bug, and a rather difficult one for the doctors to detect, was that of hearing voices in one's cell. This is more dangerous for the convict than for anybody else, for when a fake tries to imagine he hears voices, he usually begins to really believe he does, and then from a fake he becomes a genuine freak. Another common fake is to tell the keeper that you have a snake in your arm, and then take a knife and try to cut it out; but it requires nerve to carry this fake through. Sometimes the man who wants to make the prison hospital merely fakes ordinary illness. If he has a screw or a doctor "right" he may stay for months in the comparatively healthy hospital at Sing Sing, where he can loaf all day, and get better food than at the public mess. It is as a rule only the experienced guns who are clever enough to work these little games.
For faking, conversing, loafing in the shop, and for many other forbidden things, we were often punished, though the screws as often winked at small misdemeanors. At Sing Sing they used to hang us up by the wrists sometimes until we fainted. Auburn had a jail, now used as the condemned cells, where there was no bed and no light. In this place the man to be punished would remain from four to ten days and live on ten ounces of bread and half a jug of water a day. In addition, the jail was very damp, worse even than the cells at Sing Sing, where I knew many convicts who contracted consumption of the lungs and various kidney complaints.
Indeed, a great deal of dying goes on in State's prison. During my first term it seemed as if three niggers died to every white man. A dozen of us working around the front would comment on the "stiffs" when they were carried out. One would ask, "Who's dead?" The reply might be, "Only a nigger." One day I was talking in the front with a hall-room man when a stiff was put in the wagon. "Who's dead?" I asked. The hall-man wanted to bet it was a nigger. I bet him a dollar it was a white man, and then asked the hospitalnurse, who said it was not a nigger, but an old pal of mine, named Jerry Donovan. I felt sore and would not accept the money I had won. Poor Jerry and I did house-work together for three months, some of which I have told of, and he was a good fellow, and a sure and reliable grafter. And now he had "gone up the escape," and was being carried to the little graveyard on the side of the hill where only an iron tag would mark his place of repose.
My intelligence was naturally good, and when I began to get some education I felt myself superior to many of my companions in stir. I was not alone in this feeling, for in prison there are many social cliques; though fewer than on the outside. Men who have been high up and have held responsible positions when at liberty make friends in stir with men they formerly would not have trusted as their boot-blacks. The professional thieves usually keep together as much as possible in prison, or communicate together by means of notes; though sometimes they associate with men who, not professional grafters, have been sent up for committing some big forgery, or other big swindle. The reason for this isbusiness; for the gun generally has friends among the politicians, and he wants to associate while in stir only with others who have influence. It is the guns who are usually trusted by the screws in charge of the Underground Tunnel, for the professional thief is less likely to squeal than the novice. Therefore, the big forger who has stolen thousands, and may be a man of ability and education appreciates the friendship of the professional pickpocket who can do him little favors, such as railroading his mail through the Underground, and providing him with newspapers, or a bottle of booze.
The pull of the professional thief with outside politicians often procures him the respect and consideration of the keepers. One day a convict, named Ed White, was chinning with an Irish screw, an old man who had a family to support. Jokes in stir lead to friendship, and when the keeper told Ed that he was looking for a job for his daughter, who was a stenographer, Ed said he thought he could place her in a good position. The old screw laughed and said; "You loafer, if you were made to carry a hod you wouldn't be a splitting matches in stir." But Ed meant what hehad said, and wrote to the famous Tammany politician, Mr. Wet Coin, who gave the girl a position as stenographer at a salary of fourteen dollars a week. The old screw took his daughter to New York, and when he returned to Auburn he began to "Mister" Ed. "I 'clare to God," he said, "I don't know what to make out of you. Here you are eating rotten hash, cooped up like a wild animal, with stripes, when you might be making twelve to fifteen dollars a week." Ed replied, sarcastically, "That would about keep me in cigar money."
One of the biggest men I knew in stir was Jim A. McBlank, at one time chief of police and Mayor of Coney Island. He was sent to Sing Sing for his repeating methods at election, at which game he was A No. 1. He got so many repeaters down to the island that they were compelled to register as living under fences, in dog kennels, tents, or any old place. There was much excitement in the prison when the Lord of Coney Island was shown around the stir by Principal Keeper Connoughton. He was a good mechanic, and soon had a gang of men working under him; though he was the hardest worker of them all.After he had been there awhile the riff-raff of of the prison, though they had never heard the saying that familiarity breeds contempt, dropped calling him Mr. McBlank, and saluted him as plain Jimmy. He was never in touch, however, with the majority of the convicts, for he was too close to the authorities; and the men believe that convicts can not be on friendly terms with the powers that be unless they are stool-pigeons. Another thing that made the "cons" dislike the Mayor was the fact, that, when he was chief of police, he had settled a popular dip named Feeley for ten years and a half. The very worst thing against him, however, was his private refrigerator in which he kept butter, condensed milk and other luxuries, which he did not share with the other convicts. One day a young convict named Sammy, tried to beat Sing Sing. He bricked himself up in the wall, leaving a movable opening at the bottom. While waiting a chance to escape Sammy used to sally forth from his hiding-place and steal something good from McBlank's box. One night, while helping himself to the Mayor's delicacies, he thought he heard a keeper, and hastily plunging his arm into the refrigeratorhe made away with a large piece of butter. What did the ex-Chief of police do but report the loss of his butter to the screws which put them next to the fact that the convict they had been looking for for nine nights was still in the stir. The next night they would have rung the "all-right" bell, and given up the search, and indeed, they rang the bell, but watched; and when Sammy, thinking he could now go to New York, came out of his hiding place, he was caught. When the story circulated in the prison all kinds of vengeance were vowed against McBlank, who was much frightened. I heard him say that he would rather have lost his right arm than see the boy caught. What a come-down for a man who could throw his whole city for any state or national candidate at election time, to be compelled to apologize as McBlank was, to the lowest element in prison. Here indeed was the truth of that old saying: pride goeth before a fall.
One of the best liked of the convicts I met during my first bit was Ferdinand Ward, who got two years for wrecking the firm in which General Grant and his son were partners. He did many a kindness in stir to those whowere tough and had few friends. Another great favorite was Johnny Hope, son of Jimmy Hope, who stole three millions from the Manhattan Bank. The father got away, and Johnny, who was innocent, was nailed by a copper looking for a reputation, and settled for twenty years in Sing Sing, because he was his father's son and had the misfortune to meet an ambitious copper. When Johnny had been in prison about ten years, the inspector, who was the former copper, went to the Governor, and said he was convinced that the boy was innocent. But how about young Hope's wrecked life? Johnny's father, indeed, was a well-known grafter whom I met in Auburn, where we worked together for a while in the broom-shop. He was much older than I, and used to give me advice.
"Don't ever do a day's work in your life, my boy," he would say, "unless you can't help it. You are too intelligent to be a drudge."
Another common remark of his was: "Trust no convict," and a third was: "It is as easy to steal five thousand dollars as it is to steal five dollars."
Old man Hope had stolen millions andought to know what he was talking about. In personal appearance he was below the medium height, had light gray hair and as mild a pair of eyes as I ever saw in man or woman. I ranked him as a manly old fellow, and he was an idol among the small crooks, though he did not have much to do with them. He seemed to like to talk to me, partly because I never talked graft, and he detested such talk particularly among prison acquaintances. He referred one day to a pick pocket in stir who was always airing what he knew about the graft. "He's tiresome," said old Hope. "He is always talking shop."
One of the worst hated men at Auburn was Weeks, a well-known club man and banker, who once stole over a million dollars. He was despised by the other convicts, for he was a "squealer." One of the screws in charge of the Underground Tunnel was doing things for Weeks, who had a snap,—the position of book-keeper, in the clothing department. In his desk he kept whiskey, beer and cigars, and lived well. One day a big bug paid him a visit, and Weeks belched how he had to give up his watch and chain in order to secure luxuries. His friend, the big bug, reported tothe prison authorities, and the principal keeper went to Weeks and made the coward squeal on the keeper who had his "front." The screw lost his job, and when the convicts heard of it, they made Weeks' life miserable for years.
But the man who was hated worst of all those in prison was Biff Ellerson. I never understood why the other cons hated him, unless it was that he always wore a necktie; this is not etiquette in stir, which in the convicts' opinion ought to be a place of mourning. He had been a broker and a clubman, and was high up in the world. Ellerson was a conscientious man, and once, when a mere boy, who had stolen a ten dollar watch, was given fifteen years, had publicly criticized the judge and raised a storm in the newspapers. Ellerson compared this lad's punishment with that of a man like Weeks, who had robbed orphans out of their all and only received ten years for it. Many is the time that this man, Biff Ellerson, has been kind to men in stir who hated him. He had charge of the dungeon at Auburn where convicts who had broken the rules were confined. I have known him to open my door and give me water on the quiet, many a time,and he did it for others who were ungrateful, and at the risk, too, of never being trusted again by the screws and of getting a dose of the cuddy-hole himself.
By far the greater number of these swell grafters who steal millions die poor, for it is not what a man steals, but what he saves, that counts. I have often noticed that the bank burglar who is high up in his profession is not the one who has the most money when he gets to be forty-five or fifty years of age. The second or third class gun is more likely to lay by something. His general expenses are not so large and he does not need so much fall-money; and in a few years he can usually show more money than the big gun who has a dozen living on him. I knew a Big One who told me that every time he met a certain police official, his watch, a piece of jewelry, a diamond stud or even his cuff buttons were much admired. The policeman always had some relative or friend who desired just the kind of ornament the Big One happened to be wearing at the time.
I cannot help comparing those swell guys whom I knew at Sing Sing with a third class pickpocket I met on the same bit. The big onesare dead or worse, but the other day I met, in New York, my old pickpocket friend in stir, Mr. Aut. I am positive that the hand-shake he gave me was only a muscular action, for Mr. Aut has "squared it", and the gun who has reformed and has become prosperous does not like to meet an old acquaintance, who knows too much about his past life. When I ran across him in the city I started in to talk about old times in stir and of pals we knew in the long ago, but he answered me by saying, "Nix", which meant "Drop It". To get him to talk I was forced to throw a few "Larrys" into him, such as: "Well, old man, only for your few mistakes of the past, you might be leader of Tammany Hall." Gradually he expanded and told me how much he had gained in weight since he left stir and what he had done for certain ungrateful grafters. He boasted that he could get bail for anyone to the sum of fifty thousand dollars, and he told the truth, for this man, who had been a third class dip, owns at the present time, three gin-mills and is something of a politician. He has three beautiful children and is well up in the world. His daughter was educated at a convent, and his son is at a well-known college.
Yet I remember the time when this ex gun,Mr. Aut, and I, locked near one another in Sing Sing and consoled one another with what little luxuries we could get together. Our letters, booze and troubles were shared between us, and many is the time I have felt for him; for he had married a little shop girl and had two children at that time. When he got out of stir he started in to square it, that is, not to go to prison any more. He was wise and no one can blame him. He is a good father and a successful man. If he had been a better grafter it would not have been so easy for him to reform. I wish him all kinds of prosperity, but I don't like him as well as I did when we wore the striped garb and whispered good luck to one another in that mansion of woes on the Hudson.
One of Mr. Aut's possessions makes me smile whenever I think of it. In his swell parlor, over a brand new piano, hangs an oil painting of himself, in which he takes great pride. I could not help thinking that that picture showed a far more prosperous man and one in better surroundings than a certain photograph of his which is quite as highly treasured as the more costly painting; although it is only a tintype, numbered two thousand and odd, in the Rogues' Gallery.
Some of the most disagreeable days I ever spent in prison were the holidays, only three of which during the year, however, were kept—Fourth of July, Thanksgiving and Christmas. In Sing Sing there was no work on those days, and we could lie abed longer in the morning. The food was somewhat better than usual. Breakfast consisted of boiled ham, mashed potatoes and gravy, and a cup of coffee with milk. After mess we went, as usual, to chapel, and then gave a kind of vaudeville show, all with local talent. We sang rag-time and sentimental songs, some of us played on an instrument, such as the violin, mandolin, or cornet, and the band gave the latest pieces from comic opera. After the show was over we went to the mess-room again where we received a pan containing a piece of pie, some cheese, a few apples, as much bread as we desired and—a real luxury in stir—two cigars. With our booty we thenreturned to our cells, at about eleven o'clock in the morning, and after the guards had made the rounds to see that none of the birds had gone astray, we were locked up until the next morning, without anything more to eat. We were permitted to talk to one another from our cells until five o'clock, when the night guards went on duty. Such is—just imagine it—a great day in Sing Sing! The gun, no matter how big a guy he is, even if he has robbed a bank and stolen millions, is far worse off than the meanest laborer, be he ever so poor. He may have only a crust, but he has that priceless boon, his liberty.
At Auburn the routine on holidays is much the same as that of Sing Sing; but one is not compelled to go to chapel, which is a real kindness. I don't think a man ought to be forced to go to church, even in stir, against his will. On holidays in Auburn a man may stay in his cell instead of attending divine service, if he so desires, and not be punished for it. Many a con prefers not to go even to the vaudeville show, which at Auburn is given by outside talent, but remains quietly all day in his cell. There is one other great holiday privilege at Auburn, which some of the convictsappreciate more than I did. When the clock strikes twelve o'clock the convicts, locked in their cells, start in to make the rest of the night hideous, by pounding on the doors, playing all sorts of instruments, blowing whistles, and doing everything else that would make a noise. There is no more sleep that night, for everything is given over to Bedlam, until five thirty in the morning, when discipline again reigns, and the nervous man who detests these holidays sighs with pleasure, and says to himself: "I am so glad that at last everything is quiet in this cursed stir."
What with poor food, little air and exercise, no female society, bad habits and holidays, it is no wonder that there are many attempts, in spite of the danger, to escape from stir. Most of these attempts are unsuccessful, but a few succeed. One of the cleverest escapes I know of happened during my term at Auburn. B—— was the most feared convict in the prison. He was so intelligent, so reckless and so good a mechanic that the guards were afraid he would make his elegant any day. Indeed, if ever a man threw away gifts for not even the proverbial mess of pottage, it was this man B——. He was the cleverest man Iever met in stir or out. It was after one of the delightful holidays in Auburn that B——, who was a nervous man, decided to make his gets. He picked a quarrel with another convict and was so rough that the principal keeper almost decided to let him off; but when B—— spat in his face he changed his mind and put him in the dungeon. I have already mentioned this ram-shackle building at Auburn. It was the worst yet. All B——'s clothing was taken off and an old coat, shirt, and trousers without buttons were given him. An old piece of bay rope was handed him to tie around his waist, and he was left in darkness. This was what he wanted, for, although they had stripped him naked and searched him, he managed to conceal a saw, which he used to such good purpose that on the second night he had sawed himself into the yard. Instead of trying to go over the wall, as most cons would have done, B—— placed a ladder, which he found in the repair shop, against the wall, and when the guards discovered next morning that B—— was not in the dungeon, and saw the ladder on the wall, they thought he had escaped, and did not search the stir but notified the towns to look after him. Hewas not found, of course, for he was hiding in the cellar of the prison. A night or two afterwards he went to the tailor shop, selected the best suit of clothes in the place, opened the safe which contained the valuables of the convicts, with a piece of steel and a hammer, thus robbing his fellow sufferers, and escaped by the ladder. After several months of freedom he was caught, sent back to stir, and forfeited half of his commutation time.
A more tragic attempt was made by the convicts, Big Benson and Little Kick. They got tools from friends in the machine shop and started in to saw around the locks of their doors. They worked quietly, and were not discovered. The reason is that there is sometimes honor among thieves. Two of their friends in their own gallery, two on the gallery above and two on that underneath, tipped them off, by a cough or some other noise, whenever the night guard was coming; and they would cease their work with the saws. Convicts grow very keen in detecting the screw by the creaking of his boots on the wooden gallery floor; if they are not quite sure it is he, they often put a small piece of looking-glass underneath the door, and canthus see down the gallery in either direction a certain distance. Whenever Benson and Kick were at work, they would accompany the noise of the saw with some other noise, so as to drown the former, for they knew that, although they had some friends among the convicts, there were others who, if they got next, would tip off the keepers that an escape was to be made. In the morning they would putty up the cuts made in the door during the night. One night when everything was ready, they slipped from their cells, put the mug on the guard, took away his cannister, and tied him to the bottom of one of their cells. They did the same to another guard, who was on the watch in the gallery below, went to the outside window on the Hudson side of Sing Sing, and putting a Jack, which they had concealed in the cell, between the bars of the window, spread them far apart, so that they could make their exit. At this point however they were discovered by a third guard, who fired at them, hitting Little Kick in the leg. The shot aroused the sergeant of the guards and he gave the alarm. Big Benson was just getting through the window when the whole pack of guards fired at him, killing him as dead asa door-nail. Little Kick lost his nerve and surrendered, and was taken to the dungeon. Big Benson, who had been serving a term for highway robbery, was one of the best liked men in stir, and when rumors reached the convicts that he had been shot, pandemonium broke loose in the cells. They yelled and beat their coffee cups against the iron doors, and the officials were powerless to quiet them. There was more noise even than on a holiday at Auburn.
Soon after I was transferred from Sing Sing to Auburn, a friend came to me and said: "Jimmy, are you on either of the shoe-shop galleries? No? Well, if you can get on Keeper Riley's gallery I think you can spring (escape)."
Then he let me in on one of the cleverest beats I ever knew; if I could have succeeded in being put on that gallery I should not have finished my first term in State's prison. At that time work was slack and the men were locked in their cells most of the time. Leahy started in to dig out the bricks from the ceiling of his cell. Each day, when taking his turn for an hour in the yard, he would give the cement, which he had done up in smallpackages, to friends, who would dump it in their buckets, the contents of which they would then throw into the large cesspool. While exercising in the yard, the cons would throw the bricks Leahy had removed on an old brick pile under the archway. After he had removed sufficient stuff to make a hole big enough to crawl through, all he had left to do was to saw a few boards, and remove a few tiles, and then he was on the roof. It is the habit of the guard, when he goes the rounds, to rap the ceiling of every cell with his stick, to see if there is an excavation. Leahy had guarded against this by filling a small box with sand and placing it in the opening. Then he pasted a piece of linen over the box and whitewashed it. Even when the screw came around to glance in his cell Leahy would continue to work, for he had rigged up a dummy of himself in bed. When he reached the roof, he dropped to a lower building, reached the wall which surrounds the prison, and with a rope lowered himself to the ground. With a brand new suit of clothes which a friend had stolen from the shop, Leahy went forth into the open, and was never caught.
At Sing Sing an old chum of mine namedTom escaped, and would never have been caught if he had not been so sentimental. Indeed, he was improvident in every way. He had been a well-known house-worker, and made lots of money at this graft, but he lived well and blew what he stole, and consequently did many years in prison. He was nailed for a house that was touched of "éclat" worth thousands, and convicted, though of this particular crime he was, I am convinced, innocent; of course, he howled like a stuck pig about the injustice of it, all his life. While he was in Raymond Street jail he got wind of the men who really did the job. They were pals and he asked them to try to turn him out. His girl, Tessie, heard of it and wanted to go to Police Headquarters and squeal on the others, to save her sweetheart. But Tom was frantic, for there was no squeal in him. You find grafters like that sometimes, and Tom was always sentimental. He certainly preferred to go to stir rather than have the name of being a belcher. So he went to Sing Sing for seven and a half years. He was a good mechanic and was assigned to a brick-laying job on the wall. He had an easy time in stir, for he had a screw right, and got manyluxuries through the Underground; and was not watched very closely. One day he put a suit of clothes under his stripes, vamoosed into a wood near by, and removed his stripes. He kept on walking till he reached Connecticut, which, as I have said, is the softest state in the Union.
Tom would never have finished that bit in stir, if, as I have also said, he had not been so sentimental. When in prison a grafter continually thinks about his old pals and hang-outs, and the last scenes familiar to him before he went to stir. Tom was a well-known gun, with his picture in the Hall of Fame, and yet, after beating prison, and leaving years behind, and knowing that if caught he would have to do additional time, would have the authorities sore against him and be confined in the dark cell, he yet, in spite of all that, after a short time, made for his old haunts on the Bowery, where he was nailed by a fly-cop and sent back to Sing Sing. So much for the force of habit and of environment, especially when a grafter is a good fellow and loves his old pals.
On one occasion Tom was well paid for being a good fellow. Jack was a well-knownpugilist who had become a grafter. His wife's sister had married a millionaire, and Jack stole the millions, which amounted, in this case, to only one hundred thousand dollars. For this he was put in prison for four years. While in stir, Tom, who had a screw right, did him many favors, which Jack remembered. Years afterwards they were both on the outside again. Tom was still a grafter, but Jack had gone to work for a police official as general utility man, and gained the confidence of his employer, who was chief of the detective force. The latter got Jack a position as private detective in one of the swellest hotels in Florida. Now, Tom happened to be grafting in that State, and met his old friend Jack at the hotel. Instead of tipping off the chief that Tom was a grafter, Jack staked his old pal, for he remembered the favors he had received in stir. Tom was at liberty for four years, and then was brought to police headquarters where the chief said to him: "I know that you met Jack in Florida, and I am sore because he did not tip me off." Tom replied indignantly: "He is not a hyena like your ilk. He is not capable of the basest of all crimes, ingratitude. I can forgive a manwho puts his hand in my pocket and steals my money. I can forgive him, for it may do him good. He may invest the money and become an honored member of the community. But the crime no man can forgive is ingratitude. It is the most inhuman of crimes and only your ilk is capable of it."