This is the dreaded place of all prisons and in many places resorted to
oftener than necessary. Many prisoners who work in the mines have had
to go to the dungeon without their supper after laboring hard all day,
because ungodly and wicked guards reported a shortage in the proper
amount of coal mined, when the facts of the case were that the guards
had stolen or removed a portion of the coal from the car after it left
the prisoner, because of their dislike for the prisoner and by so doing
could have him punished. It also too often happens that prisoners
refuse to work as they should, and deserve the punishment. It is not
necessary to here describe the filthy, stifling, odorous dungeons
of war times or of some of the worst prisons of the day, but a
description of the dungeon of one of the best prisons in our land will
be sufficient. The following is a description given by one who served a
term in prison. In describing the punishment to secure good discipline,
he said:
“To me these contingency dungeons are, as their name implies, dark,
with similarity to an ordinary cell with the exception of a door which
in the common cell contains open spaces for the admission of light, but
the dark cell admits no light, and not a sufficient quantity of air.
There is no furniture in this dark cell. While undergoing punishment
if a prisoner desires to rest he can do so by reclining on the stone
floor. No refractory prisoner ever grows corpulent while confined in
these dark cells, as he receives only one meal of bread and water in
twenty-four hours. The prisoner is often kept in one of these cells
from eight to ten days. Sleep is almost impossible. When a prisoner
enters the dungeon he is required to leave behind him his coat, cap,
and shoes. During the winter months it is often very cold in these
cells, requiring the prisoner to walk up and down the dungeon in his
stocking feet to prevent his freezing, and this for a period of ten
days in nearly every instance compels submission. After the dark cells
thaw out in the summer months they are excessively hot. Sometimes in
winter the temperature is below zero, and in summer it often rises
to 100 degrees. They are then veritable furnaces. Generally after
the prisoner undergoes a freezing or baking process for eight or
ten days, he is willing to behave himself in the future. They are
sometimes so reduced and weakened that when brought out of the dark
cell they can scarcely walk without aid. I have seen them reel to and
fro like drunken men. They are often as pale as death. In many cases
the prisoner contracts cold which later on terminates fatally, and this
is one of the principal objections to this mode of punishment. If the
prisoner in the mine does not get out his regular weekly task of coal,
on Saturday he is reported to the deputy sheriff by the officer in
charge and is sent to the blind cell before supper and kept there until
the following Monday morning, when he is taken out and sent to his
work in the mines. While in there he gets only bread and water once in
twenty-four hours. This is a great inducement to work, which certainly
prevents criminals from shirking their labor, and soon converts the
lazy tramp into a hustling coal miner. If being in this dark cell
ten days and nights is insufficient to subdue a rebellious spirit of
the convict he is taken out and placed in the solitary cell. This is
similar to the ordinary cell with the exception that it contains no
furniture. Here the convict remains on bread and water until he is
starved almost to death or until he is willing to submit and do his
work as ordered.”
[Illustration: The Cat-o’nine-tails]