In the Sixteenth Report on the state of the Prisons, by Mr Frederic
Hill, lately laid before parliament, will be found some passages
worthy of general attention. While speaking favourably of the system
of discipline now ordinarily pursued towards prisoners, Mr Hill is
obliged to admit that certain prisons are rendered much too
attractive; in fact, that they create crime. It is important that
this condition of affairs should be known. Good food and medical
attendance are, it seems, the attractions. The following are Mr
Hill's words, with the quotations he makes from the statements of
prison officials:--
'Several of the prisons continue to be attractive, to certain
classes of persons, instead of repulsive; owing, apparently in some
instances, to the better dietary of the prison as compared with that
of the workhouse; in others, to the good medical treatment generally
provided in prisons; and in others, to a practice of giving
prisoners clothing on their liberation, a practice which, did the
law permit, might be replaced by a rule enabling prisoners to earn
clothing by extra labour.
'The governor of the borough prison at Cambridge stated that many
persons were reckless about committing offences, because they
preferred being sent to the prison to going to the workhouse, owing
chiefly (according to their statements) to their getting better food
at the prison.
'The chaplain of the prison at Spilsby stated as follows:--"I am
sorry to observe that the present system of discipline here does not
deter people from the commission of crime. Several have said that
they would rather come here than go to the Union workhouse." ...
'Mr Dunn, one of the surgeons of the prison at Wakefield, states--"I
am convinced that many persons, especially females, get committed to
the prison on purpose to be cured of attacks of disease. Many of
them have admitted to me that it was so. A man from Bradford, who
went out last week, told me that he had been here before, and that
he had got committed again in consequence of his having a return of
his disease, and that he came to be cured.... One man who was here
for a month last autumn, and who came in a very diseased state, but
who left cured, required, during nearly the whole time, a pint of
wine per day, besides malt liquor. It was a case in which a very
liberal diet is necessary to preserve life; and it was requisite to
have a prisoner, acting as nurse, to sit up with him through the
night. The cost to the West Riding of this single case, counting
expenses of all kinds, could not have been less than L.6."
'The governor of the city prison at York said--"By the
acknowledgments of the prisoners themselves, I know that the
practice still continues of committing offences on purpose to get
committed to this prison. Four prisoners were liberated this morning
who had broken a street-lamp with the evident intention of being
sent to this prison. They were sentenced to seven days'
imprisonment, and on their liberation each prisoner was supplied
with a coat, waistcoat, pair of trousers, and a pair of shoes, and
one of them had a shirt also! Many times last winter gas-lamps and
the windows of the police-office and vagrant-office were broken, in
order to get admission to the prison. Out of eighteen male prisoners
who were brought to trial at the last Quarter-Sessions, twelve in my
opinion committed their offences for the direct purpose of being
sent to prison. Most of the vagrants committed to the prison still
pass their time in idleness; no prisoners except those sentenced to
hard labour being set to work."
'The following is an extract from the visiting justices' minute-book
at the same prison:--
"_Dec. 12th, 1849._--The number of prisoners who commit offences
with the object of being maintained during the winter increases
yearly, and is deserving of serious consideration, as a serious
expense is entailed thereby on the city. The imprisonment inflicted
is not looked on as a punishment, but a reward."'
If such really be the case, it is evident that a wrong course has
been pursued in making the prisons so comfortable. Some years ago,
when society was seized with a paroxysm of humanity, prisons were
got up in a style of palatial splendour, and criminals, the most
worthless of the population, were treated with a degree of
tenderness which was opposed to every principle of justice. Possibly
the method of reclaiming by kindness was not bad in the abstract,
and in numerous instances it was perhaps effective; but in the main
it was unsuitable to a complicated condition of ignorance, poverty,
vice, and wretchedness. It should have been borne in mind that there
is a distinct class of persons to whom any kind of provision is
desirable, and who, being sunk below all sentiments of self-respect,
shame, and regret, would very willingly sell themselves into slavery
for the sake of a momentary gratification. To think of a warm,
comfortable prison being an object of dread to this
utterly-abandoned class!
Another philosophical crotchet did no small mischief. It was alleged
that hard labour on the tread-mill would do harm: knowing that the
labour tended to no useful purpose but merely the turning of a
wheel, prisoners would feel degraded, and this feeling would prevent
their reclamation! The error here consisted in imagining that the
criminal class possessed the feelings of gentlemen; whereas the real
thing to be thought of, was to give them labour so excessively
toilsome and irksome as to be remembered with salutary horror all
the days of their life. For example, no kind of punishment, we
believe, has proved so sure a terror as that of the shot-drill in
the military prisons. This consists in lifting a cannon-ball of
perhaps twenty pounds' weight; marching with it for a dozen yards;
then laying it down; and so on, repeating the same thing for an
hour. Now this is clearly a useless and most degrading species of
labour; yet it is a terrible infliction, and we are told seldom
fails in its effect--that is to say, it deters from the commission
of crime.
The experience of the last few years would shew that much is still
to be learned in the art of criminal discipline; and indeed the
whole question of what is to be done with our criminal population is
becoming daily more perplexing. Mere confinement is found to be of
small avail. Transportation is exploded; for it improves the
circumstances of criminals instead of making them worse. Capital
punishment has also had its day, and, excepting for a very few
offences, is abandoned as useless, independently of being revolting
to humanity. One writer proposes to work convicts in gangs at
out-door labour, such as mining, and making railways; but the public
would never tolerate the spectacle of this worst species of
slave-labour; and besides, the employment of honest workers would be
ruined. We are inclined to think that imprisonment, in a severe
form, is after all the only practicable means of dealing with
criminals. If anything be urgently wanted, it is a plan for
preventing the growth of the criminal class; and this probably is
not so difficult as it may appear. Of course, till there be a far
broader system of public education than now prevails, the criminal
population will never want recruits. Nevertheless, even with our
present imperfect educational arrangements, something might be done.
The criminal class is discovered to be on the whole a narrow class.
The practice of living by depredation runs in families, and clings
to individuals. The police of any given town could put their hand on
almost every person who lives by fraud, theft, and robbery. They
could at a day's notice secure nearly every one of them. A knowledge
of this fact has suggested to Mr Matthew Hill a plan for capturing
the whole criminal class, and obliging them to give security for
their good behaviour; failing which, they should suffer
incarceration as notoriously dangerous and troublesome to society. A
fear of trenching on the liberty of the subject may prevent this
ingenious scheme of the Recorder of Birmingham from being carried
into effect; but to something or other of the kind he proposes,
society must come at last, if it wish to save itself from being
everlastingly worried and plundered by a habitually predatory class.
In the Prison Report to which we have above referred, mention is
made of a single family of thieves, consisting of fifteen
individuals, who cost the country L.26,000 before they were got rid
of. Is not such a fact quite monstrous!