A NEW REGIME
Present system faulty everywhere—Reforms contemplated—Too great
intercourse among prisoners condemned—Labour for the spiritual
welfare of the prisoners becomes a leading idea—Unwearied zeal and
activity of the chaplain—Succeeded by Mr. Nihil who combines the
offices of chaplain and governor—Admonition and persuasion are the
leading principles of the new Penal Discipline—The chaplain-governor’s
difficulties and vexations.
WE now come to another stage in the onward career of the Penitentiary.
The committee, compelled to admit that the discipline was not
sufficiently severe, resolved to tighten the reins. In order to
understand this decision we must take into consideration certain
influences at work outside the walls.
There was, about this time, a sort of panic in the country at
the alarming prevalence of crime in England. Its continuous and
extraordinary growth was certainly enough to cause uneasiness. In the
years between December, 1817, and December, 1831, it had increased one
hundred and forty per cent. For this there was more than one reason, of
course. One, and no insignificant cause, was the comparative immunity
enjoyed by offenders. It came now to be understood that the lot of the
transgressor was far from hard. The system of secondary punishments in
force for their correction was felt to be inadequate, either to reform
criminals or deter from crime. Here was an explanation: evidently
a screw was loose in the way in which the sentence of the law was
executed. The judges and the juries did their duty, but the criminal
snapped his fingers at the ordeal to which they subjected him. This
discontent with the system of imprisonment grew and gained strength,
till at last the whole question of secondary punishments was referred
to a Select Committee of the House of Commons.
All prisoners found guilty of non-capital crimes were at that time
disposed of by committal for short periods to the county gaols and
houses of correction, or they were sentenced to transportation for
various terms of years. Those whose fate brought them within the latter
category were further disposed of, according to the will of the Home
Secretary, in one of three ways: either, by committal to Millbank
Penitentiary; or, by removal to the hulks; or, finally, by actual
deportation to the penal colonies beyond the seas. There were therefore
four outlets for the criminal. How he fared in each case, according as
his fate overtook him, I shall describe hereafter.
The county gaols were in these days still faulty. They made no attempt
to reform the morals of their inmates, nor could they be said to
diminish crime by the severity of their discipline. Indeed, they held
out scarcely any terrors to offenders. Of one of the largest, Coldbath
Fields, Mr. Chesterton, who was appointed its governor in 1829, speaks
in the plainest terms. “It was a sink of abomination and pollution.
The female side was only half fenced off from the male—evidently
with an infamous intention; its corrupt functionaries played into
each other’s hands to prevent an inquiry or exposure. None of the
authorities who ruled the prison had acquired any definite notion of
the wide-spread defilement that polluted every hole and corner of that
Augean stable. Shameless gains were promoted by the encouragement
of all that was lawless and execrable.” The same writer describes
Newgate, which he visited, as presenting “a hideous combination of
all that was revolting.” The thieves confined therein smoked short
pipes, gamed, swore, and fought through half the night: the place was
like a pandemonium. Again, when he saw them, “The prisons of Bury
St. Edmund’s, Salford, and Kirkdale created in my mind irrepressible
disgust. I wondered why such detestable haunts should be tolerated.”
Gaolers and criminals were on the best of terms with each other. At
Ilchester the governor was in the habit of playing whist with his
prisoners, and at Coldbath Fields the turnkeys shook hands with new
arrivals and promised to take “all possible care” of them. With all
this there was such a deficiency of control that unlimited intercourse
could not be prevented, and there followed naturally that corruption of
innocent prisoners by the more depraved which was a bugbear even in the
time of John Howard.
Indeed, it was a wonder that Howard did not rise from his grave. Half
a century had elapsed since his voice first was heard, and yet corrupt
practices, idleness, and wide-spread demoralization characterized the
greater part of the small prisons in the country. Herein were confined
the lesser lights of the great army of crime, and if they escaped thus
easily, it could not be said that the more advanced criminals endured
a lot that was much more severe. The reader has, perhaps, some notion
by this time of the kind of punishment to be met with in the walls of
the Penitentiary; the hulks, too, have already been mentioned. The
third method of coercion, by transportation, that is to say, beyond the
seas, remains to be described; but this I reserve for a later page,
recording only here the opinion of the committee of 1831, that as a
punishment transportation held out to the dangerous classes absolutely
no terrors at all. “Indeed, from accounts sent home, the situation
of the convict is so comfortable, his advancement, if he conducts
himself with prudence, so sure, as to produce a strong impression that
transportation may be considered rather an advantage than a punishment.”
After a long and careful investigation, the committee wound up their
report with the following pregnant words: “Your committee having now
passed in review the different modes of secondary punishment known to
the practice of this country, wish once more to direct the attention
of the House to their obvious tendency. If it is a principle of our
criminal jurisprudence, that the guilty should escape rather than the
innocent suffer, it appears equally a principle, in the infliction of
punishment, that every regulation connected with it, from the first
committal of a prisoner to gaol to the termination of his sentence of
transportation, should be characterized rather by an anxious care for
the health and convenience of the criminal than for anything which
might even by implication appear to bear on him with undue severity.”
The authorities at Millbank now wished to set their house in order.
With the publication of this parliamentary report, the managers of
Millbank awoke all at once to the true condition of the prison. On
account of the repeated “irregularities” laid before them, they now
considered it necessary to ascertain whether any, and what abuses
existed; and whether there were any and what defects in the system
upon which the prison was conducted. The whole subject was therefore
entrusted to a sub-committee, which, after some months of patient
investigation, was of opinion that all the irregularities arose
from “the too great intercourse which the present system permits
prisoners to hold with one another. The comparatively ignorant are
thus instructed in schemes and modes of vice by the hardened and the
depraved; and those upon whom good impressions have been made are
ridiculed and shamed out of their resolutions by associating with the
profligate.” We have here an admission that one of the old evils of
prison life—indiscriminate association—which was to have been abolished
by the Penitentiary system, was still in full vigour, and that in fact
it had never been interfered with.
The committee arrived therefore at the conviction “that the prosperity
and well-being of the establishment must depend upon effecting a more
strict seclusion of the prisoners, one from another.” At the same time
a new chaplain, Mr. Whitworth Russell, who became largely identified
with prisons and penal discipline, urgently recommended a greater
development of religious instruction. He proposed that in future the
open part of the Millbank chapel should be provided with benches, so
that he might assemble daily, large classes for religious instruction.
To these classes he was to devote three hours every morning, the
schoolmaster performing the same duty in the afternoon. During the
morning instruction by the chaplain this schoolmaster had to visit
the prisoners, cell by cell, either collecting information, as to the
previous habits and connections of the prisoners, or carrying on the
instruction commenced at school or the lectures in chapel. In this we
find the key-note of the new system that was from now on to prevail
with increasing strength, till by and by, as we shall see, it grew to
be altogether supreme.
Never since the opening of Millbank, in 1817, had the spiritual welfare
of the prisoners been forgotten, nor the hope abandoned of reforming
them by religious influences. But now, and for years to come, the
chaplain was to have the fullest scope. Whether much tangible benefit
followed from his increasing ministrations, will be best shown in
the later development of the narrative; but it cannot be denied that
the efforts of Mr. Whitworth Russell, and of his successor, Mr.
Nihil, who in himself combined the offices of governor and chaplain,
were praiseworthy in the extreme. Speaking, however, with all due
reverence, I cannot but think that their zeal was often misdirected;
that conversion, such as it is, obtained by force almost, could
never be either sincere or lasting; and in short, that the continued
parade of sacred things tended rather to drag them into the mire,
while the incessant religious exercises—the prayers, expositions, and
genuflexions, were more in keeping with a monastery of monks than a
gaol full of criminals.
There are numberless instances scattered up and down among the records
of the sort of spirit in which the prisoners received their sacred
instruction. It was the custom for a monitor, specially selected from
among the prisoners, to read aloud the morning and evening service
in each ward. He was frequently disturbed. Once when Balaam’s name
appeared in the lesson, it was twisted into “Ba—a—Lamb!” and as such
went echoing along with peals of laughter from cell to cell. The
monitor was frequently called upon for a song just before he gave out
the hymn; others mocked him as he sang, and sang ribald verses so loud
as to drown the voices of the rest; many said they couldn’t sing, and
nothing should compel them; often they would not join in the Lord’s
Prayer—there was no law, they said, to make them say their prayers
against their will. Then a certain Joseph Wells, an old offender, was
reported for writing on his pint cup these lines:—
“Yor order is but mine is
for me to go that I’ll go to
to chapel, Hell first”;
and when remonstrated with, he merely laughed in the governor’s face.
There was constant antagonism between the prisoners and their comrade
the monitor, generally over the church catechism, in which, as a
species of chaplain’s assistant, the latter had to instruct the others.
“What’s your name?” he asked one. “George Ward; and you know it as
well as I do,” replied the prisoner. Another read his answers out of
the book. The monitor suggested that by this time he ought to know the
catechism by heart. “Ah, every one hasn’t got the gift of the gab like
you have. And look here, don’t talk to me again like that, or you’ll be
sorry for it.” Again, as a proof of the glibness with which they could
quote scriptural language, I must insert here a strange rhapsody found
on a prisoner’s slate. He pretended to be dumb, and when spoken to, he
merely shook his head and pointed to the writing, which was as follows:
“MY KIND GOVERNOR,—I hope you will hearken unto me, as your best
friend; in truth I am no prophet, though I am sent to bear witness
as a prophet. For behold my God came walking on the water, and came
toward me where I stood, and said unto me, Fear not to speak, for I am
with you. Therefore I shall open my mouth in prophesies, and therefore
do not question me too much; but if you will ear my words, call your
nobles together, and _then_ I will speak unto you of all he has given
me in power, and the things I shall say unto you shall come to pass
within 12 months; therefore be on your guard, and mind what you say
unto me, for there be a tremor on all them that ear me speak, for I
shall make your ears to tingle. And the first parable I shall speak
is this: Behold, out of the mire shall come forth brightness against
thee.”
This man, when brought before the governor, continued obstinately
dumb. The surgeon consulted was satisfied he was shamming, but still
the prisoner persisted in keeping silence. “Is there any reason why he
should not go to ‘the dark?’” the surgeon was asked. “Certainly not;
on the contrary, I think it would be of service to him,” answered the
surgeon; and to the dark he was sent, remaining for six days, till he
voluntarily relinquished the imposture.
The energy and determination of the new chaplain, who was appointed
about the time the new system was established, were very remarkable.
He was a man of decided ability, and his influence could not fail to
be soon felt throughout the prison. Perhaps in manner he was somewhat
overbearing, and disposed to trench on the prerogative of the governor
as to the discipline of the establishment. He soon came into collision
with the prisoners. Many “tried it on,” as the saying was, with him,
but signally failed; and any who were guilty of even the slightest
disrespect were immediately punished. Mr. Russell constantly reported
cases of misconduct. Thus, having asked at school, whether any present
had been unable to write on coming into prison, a man named Fleming,
answered, “Yes! I could not.”
“You have every cause to be thankful, then, for the opportunities
afforded you here.”
“Not at all,” replied Fleming. “I have reason to curse the Penitentiary
and everybody belonging to it.”
“Be silent,” said the chaplain, “I shall not stand by and listen to
such reprehensible language.”
“I’ll not be gagged, I shall speak the truth,” persisted Fleming.
And for this without loss of time he was transferred to the dark.
All the chaplain’s professional feelings were also roused by another
incident that transpired not long after his arrival. It was discovered
that a prisoner, George Anderson, a man of colour, who had been
educated at a missionary college, had through the connivance of a
warder been endeavouring to sow the seeds of disbelief in the minds
of many of the prisoners. He had turned the chaplain and his sacred
office into ridicule, asserting that the services of the Church of
England were nonsense from beginning to end, that the prayers contained
false doctrine, that the Athanasian Creed was all rubbish, and that
the church “went with a lie in her right hand.” This man Anderson must
have been a thorn in the chaplain’s side, for they had more than once
a serious scuffle in the polemics of the church. Mr. Russell got warm
in the discussion of a certain passage in Scripture, and jumping up
suddenly to reach his Bible, struck his leg against the table. After
this Anderson had drawn a caricature of the scene, writing underneath,
“Oh, my leg!” and from henceforth the chaplain went by the name of “Oh,
my leg.” At another time there was a long dispute as to the date of the
translation of the Septuagint, and upon the service for “the Visitation
of the Sick.” Anderson, on returning to his cell from Mr. Russell’s
office, had been in the habit of taking off his coat, and shaking it,
saying always: “Peugh—— I smell of fire and brimstone.” One cannot
refrain from observing here how much better oakum picking would have
suited Anderson than theological controversy.
Fortunately among the prisoners were two—Johnson and Manister Worts—who
were more than a match for the unorthodox black man. Anderson asserted
that the Athanasian Creed was objected to by many able divines; he took
exception to the title, “religious” given to the king in the prayer
for the High Court of Parliament, whether he was religious or not;
he maintained that his animadversions upon the church were the very
words used by his former pastor, the Reverend Silas Fletcher, from the
pulpit. The knowledge and acquirements of Johnson and Worts however
enabled them “triumphantly to refute Anderson.”
Nor were the women behindhand in giving the chaplain annoyance. In the
middle of the service on one occasion a woman jumped up on to her seat,
crying out, “Mr. Russell, Mr. Russell, as this may be the last time I
shall be at church, I return you thanks for all favours.” The chaplain
replied gravely that the House of God was no place for her to address
him, but the attention of the male prisoners in the body of the chapel
below was attracted, and it was with some difficulty that a general
disturbance was prevented. At another time there was actually a row
in the church. Just as the sermon began, a loud scream or huzza was
heard among the females. At first it was supposed that some woman was
in a fit, but the next moment half a dozen prayer-books were flung at
the chaplain’s head in the pulpit. With some difficulty the culprits
were removed before the uproar became general; but as soon as the
chaplain had finished his sermon, and said “Let us pray,” a voice was
heard audibly through the building replying, “No, we have had praying
enough.” A year or two later a more serious affair was only prevented
with difficulty, when the women in the galleries above plotted to join
the men in the body of the church below in some desperate act.
Mr. Whitworth Russell, however, through it all continued to exhibit
the same unwearied activity and zeal. He never spared himself; and as
the years passed by, he became known as one experienced in all that
concerned prisons and their inmates. Therefore, when the cry for prison
reform echoed loudly through the land, he was at once named one of
Her Majesty’s inspectors of prisons. His colleague was Mr. Crawford,
who had made a lengthened visitation of the prisons in the United
States, and the two divided the whole of Great Britain between them and
vigorously applied themselves to their task.
Mr. Russell was succeeded as chaplain at Millbank by the Rev. Daniel
Nihil, a gentleman who soon gave satisfactory evidence that he was
worthy to wear his predecessor’s mantle. All that Mr. Russell did,
Mr. Nihil did also, and more. Ere long he found himself so firmly
established in the good graces of the committee, that he was soon
raised by them to wider, if not higher, functions, and in 1837 it
was decided that he should hold the appointment of both governor and
chaplain combined.
On the 15th of April in that year, the governor, Captain Chapman, wrote
to tender his resignation for various reasons. “The changes that have
taken place, those about to be introduced by the new Bill, his advanced
age and indifferent health, induced him to consider it due to the
public service to retire, for the purpose of enabling the committee to
supply his place by the appointment of an officer who might begin the
new system at its commencement.” In reply came a gracious message from
the committee, to the effect that they were aware of the “unwearied
assiduity, zeal, and ability” with which he had discharged his arduous
duties for fourteen years, and they recommended him “for the most
liberal and favourable consideration of the Secretary of State, on
account of his long and faithful services.” At the same meeting it was
at once mooted that Mr. Nihil should succeed to the vacancy.
Some account may here be given of the chaplain’s reign in the
Penitentiary. It will be seen at once that his appointment as head
of the establishment sufficiently shows the influences that were in
ascendancy with the committee of the Penitentiary. This body was not
alone and peculiar in its views; the general tone of public opinion at
that time turned towards entrusting the ministers of religion with
full powers to preach prisoners out of their evil courses into honesty
and the right path. Far be it from me to detract from the efforts made
in such a cause; but they are liable to be misconstrued. The objects
of so much tender solicitude are apt to take the kindness that is well
meant, for weakness, and wax in consequence insolent and unmanageable.
The Millbank committee were sanguine still, in 1838, when Mr. Nihil
came into power under them. We shall see now how far their agent,
having _carte blanche_ and every facility, prospered in this difficult
mission. His real earnestness of purpose, and the thoroughness of his
convictions, were incontestable.
Immediately on assuming the reins Mr. Nihil applied himself with all
the energy of his evidently vigorous mind to the task before him,
seeking at once to imbue his subordinates with something of his own
spirit, and proclaiming in plain terms, to both officers and prisoners,
his conception of the proper character of the institution he was called
upon to rule. He considered it “a penal establishment, constituted with
a view to the real reformation of convicts through the instrumentality
of moral and religious means;” and in the official records made the
following entry, wherein he intimated his views, and appealed to those
under him for co-operation and support.
“Having, in my capacity of chaplain, observed the injurious effects
arising from a habit which appears prevalent among the inferior
officers, of regarding our religious rules as empty forms, got up for
the sole purpose of prison discipline, and conceiving it right to let
them understand the principles on which I propose to administer the
prison, I drew up, and have since circulated, the following intimation:
“Having been appointed governor of this institution, I desire to
express to the inferior officers my earnest and sincere hope that
they will one and all bear in mind the objects of a penitentiary. The
reformation of persons who have been engaged in criminal acts and
habits is the most difficult work in the world. God alone, who rules
the heart, can accomplish it; but God requires means to be used by
man, and amongst the means used here, none are more important than
the treatment of prisoners by the officers in charge of them. That
treatment should always be regulated by religious principle. It should
be mild, yet firm, just, impartial, and steady. In delivering orders
to prisoners, care should be taken to avoid unnecessary offence and
irritation, at the same time that those orders are marked by authority.
Command of temper should be particularly cultivated. The rules require
certain religious observances. It is of the greatest importance that
the officers should always remember the reverence which belongs to
sacred things, otherwise the prisoners will be apt to regard them not
as religious services, but as matters of prison discipline. It should
appear that officers themselves have a concern in religion and love
and venerate it for its own sake. I do not by any means wish them to
put on an appearance of religion which they do not feel—that would be
hypocrisy,—but I wish them, as members of a religious institution, to
cultivate the feeling and demeanour of true Christians—not only for the
sake of the prisoners under their charge, but for their own.”
That the intention of this order was of the best no one who reads
it can deny; but its provisions were fraught with mischievous
consequences, as will soon appear. It struck at the root of all
discipline. The prisoners were insubordinate and insolent, and needed
peremptory measures to keep them in check; they were already only too
much disposed to give themselves airs, and quite absurdly puffed up
with an idea of their own importance. In all this they were now to be
directly encouraged; for although the order in question was not made
known to them in so many words, they were quick witted enough, as they
always are, to detect the altered attitude of their masters. These
masters were such, however, only in name; and one of them within a
month complains rather bitterly that he is worse off than a prisoner.
The latter, if charged with an offence, need only deny it and it fell
to the ground, while a prisoner might say what he liked against an
officer and it could not be refuted. The governor did not at first see
how injudicious it was to weaken the authority of his subordinates,
and continued to inculcate mildness of demeanour. In a serious case
of disturbance, where several prisoners were most turbulent and
needed summary repression, he took a very old warder to task for his
unnecessary severity. One of these mutineers, whom they had been
obliged to remove by force, cried, “You have almost killed me,” though
nothing of the kind had occurred. This officer was injudicious enough
to reply, “You deserve killing.” Upon this Mr. Nihil, as I find it
recorded, states, “I thought it necessary to reprove the warder for
such language. If the prisoners are to be properly managed, it is by
authority administered with firmness, and guided, not by passion, but
by reason and principle.”
Later he issued the following order: “In consequence of what the
governor has sometimes observed, he wishes to impress on the inferior
officers the importance of coolness and command of temper in the
management of prisoners.... Cases will, of course, arise when
prisoners by their violence give much provocation. At such times it is
particularly necessary that the officers should endeavour to maintain
calmness and self-possession. The best way is to use as few words as
possible, taking care at the same time to adopt the necessary means of
securing a refractory prisoner; but to fall into a passion, or to enter
into a war of words, only lowers the authority of the officer, and adds
to the irritation it is intended to allay.” Excellent advice, but not
always easily followed.
Indeed, the condition of his officers was hardly to be envied. They
were mostly men of the camp, soldiers who had served their time in the
army, little fitted either by previous training or the habits of their
mind for the task required of them now. Mr. Nihil, to be fully served
and seconded in his conscientious efforts to effect reformation, should
have been provided with a staff of missionaries; though these were
hardly to be got for the money, nor would they have been found of much
assistance in carrying out the discipline of the prison. As it was,
the warders had to choose between becoming hypocrites, or running the
risk of daily charges of irreligious impropriety, and of losing their
situations altogether. Placed thus from the first in a false position,
there was some excuse for them in their shortcomings. It is not
strange that many went with the stream, and sought to obtain credit by
professing piety whether they felt it or not, using scripture phrases,
and parading in the pentagons and ward passages with Bibles carried
ostentatiously under their arms, though it could be proved, and was,
that many of the same men when safe beyond the walls were notorious for
debauchery and looseness of life. It was in these days that a curious
epithet came to distinguish all who were known as the chaplain’s men.
They were called in the thieves’ _argot_ “Pantilers,” and the title
sticks to them still. The “pantile,” according to the slang dictionary,
from which I must perforce quote, was the broad-brimmed hat worn by
the puritans of old. From this strange origin is derived a word which,
with the lower orders, is synonymous still with cant and a hypocritical
profession of religion to serve base ends. Millbank was long known as
the headquarters of the “Pantilers.”
On the other hand, officers in whom the old mammon was too strong
to be stifled altogether, occasionally forgot themselves, and when
accused or suspected of unorthodoxy or unbelief they naturally went
to the wall. Thus it was not likely that one who was reported to be
a confirmed infidel would escape instant dismissal; though in one
instance the information was given by a prisoner, and should at least
have been received with caution. The substance of the complaint made
by the prisoner was that the officer had asserted that the nature of
man was sinful, but that the worst man that ever lived was no worse
than God had made him, with other remarks of a carping and irreverent
character. Mr. Nihil immediately sent for both officer and prisoner,
and confronted them together, questioning the former as follows:—
“Mr. Mann, are you a member of the Church of England?”
“No, sir.”
“To what church, then, do you belong?”
“I was brought up a Baptist, sir; but I am not a member of any society
at present.”
“Are you a believer in the Scriptures?”
“I would rather not enter into that subject.”
“Did you not represent yourself a member of the Church of England when
first employed?”
“I did not. I was never asked the question.”
He was then asked if he had ever tried to controvert the religion of
the Penitentiary, but he distinctly denied having done so.
Then came the prisoner’s turn.
“I assure you, sir,” he told Mr. Nihil, “that this officer on one
occasion remarked to me that St. Paul took up several chapters in
telling women what sort of ribbons they wore in their bonnets.” And on
this evidence Mr. Mann lost his situation; for, says the Governor, “I
considered his answers evasive throughout; while the prisoner being an
exceedingly well-conducted man, I have no doubt, from the tenour of the
whole proceedings, that he spoke the truth.” Hard measure this, and
scarcely calculated to maintain the discipline of the establishment.
Still harder, perhaps, was the dismissal of another officer, who
was found using what was characterized as a species of low slang in
speaking of prisoners. “It came out very artlessly,” says Mr. Nihil,
“as he was telling me of some boyish irregularity of a prisoner, whom
he styled a ‘rascal.’ This, coupled with other appearances, determined
me that the man may have meant no great harm, but that he was quite
unfit for the moral charge here entrusted to him; and I thought it
necessary, not only in regard to this offence, but that others might
take a lesson from it, to mark my sense of the unfitness of one in the
habit of familiarly using such language for the situation of warder.”
When a fate so severe overtook these two for the offences recorded,
a third was not likely to escape who was proved to have occasionally
sworn, and who admitted that he considered it was all humbug taking
the prisoners to chapel. Although this culprit held the grade of
taskmaster, and had completed a service of many years, he too was
forthwith sent about his business. But then it was brought home to
him that he had once been heard to say, “The governor thinks himself
a sharp fellow—I think him the—— fool I ever knew.” It also appeared
that this officer’s familiar language among other officers was very
profane. He sometimes ridiculed religion; and at one time scoffed at
the miracle of the sun standing still. On one occasion he spoke of the
chaplain’s lectures as humbug. “My own impressions of T.,” says the
governor-chaplain, “were that though he was an efficient officer, he
was a conceited self-sufficient man, and of his moral principles I had
no good opinion. Everything led to the conviction that he was a very
dangerous character in an institution of this kind; his general bearing
giving him influence over the inferior officers, and his principles
and habits being such as to turn that influence to pernicious account.”
He was accordingly dismissed by the committee “with the strongest
reprobation of his abominable hypocrisy.”
Although thus studiously bent upon raising the moral tone of his
officers, in many other respects, hardly of inferior importance, the
utmost laxity prevailed. The rules by which the Penitentiary was
governed, and by which all undue familiarity between officers and
prisoners was strictly prohibited; which forbade certain luxuries,
such as tobacco, ardent spirits, and the morning papers; and which
insisted upon certain principles to insure the safe custody of those
confined—all these were often contravened or neglected. Upon no one
point are gaolers bound to be more vigilant and circumspect than in
the security of their keys. In all well-ordered prisons now the most
stringent rules prevail on this head. To lose a key entails exemplary
punishment, heavy fines, or immediate dismissal. Yet in these old
Millbank days we find an officer coolly lending his keys to a prisoner
to let himself in and out of his ward; and another who wakes up in the
morning without them, asserts at once that they have been stolen from
him in the night. In this latter case instant search was made, and
after a long delay one key was found in the ventilator of a prisoner’s
cell, and below his window, outside, the remaining three. This man was
of course accused of the theft; and a circumstantial story at once
invented, of his escaping after school, repairing to the tower, and
possessing himself of the keys. He would infallibly have suffered for
the offence, had it not been accidentally discovered that the officer
who had lost them was drunk and incapable on the night in question,
and had himself dropped them from his pocket. There was more than
one escape, which though ingeniously conceived and carried out could
never have succeeded but for a want of watchfulness and supervision
on the part of the officer. Of the improper intimacy there could be
little doubt, when it was proved that officers and old prisoners
were seen in company at public houses—the latter standing treat, and
supplying bribes freely, to compass the conveyance to their friends,
still inside, of the luxuries prohibited by the rules. All this came
out one fine day, when it was discovered that, through the connivance
of certain dishonest warders, several prisoners had been regularly
supplied with magazines and morning newspapers. Wine, spirits, and
eatables more toothsome than the prison fare, and the much-loved weed,
found their way into the prison by the same reprehensible means. It is
but fair to add here, that in this and in every other case, as soon
as the irregularities referred to were brought to light, they were
invariably visited with the condemnation they deserved.
Even a man of shrewd intelligence like Mr. Nihil could not fail to
be occasionally taken in. On one or two points he was especially
vulnerable. Signs of repentance, real or feigned, won from him at once
an earnest sympathy which not seldom proved to be cruelly misplaced.
There was also a certain simplicity about him, and want of experience,
that sometimes made him the dupe of his subordinates when they tried to
curry favour by exaggerating the sufferings of the prisoners. One day
when he was _en route_ to the dark cells, intending to pardon a culprit
therein confined, the taskmaster who accompanied him voluntarily
observed, “You are quite right to release him, sir. His legs would get
affected, I am afraid, if he were left there any time, like all the
rest.”
“What do you mean by that?” asked the governor at once. “Explain.”
“I mean, sir, that whenever a prisoner is kept any length of time in
the dark, his loins are always affected. It may be seen in their walk.
Take the case of Welsh. Welsh is quite crippled from being so much in
the dark.”
“Do they never recover it?”
“Never.”
Mr. Nihil was naturally much struck with this observation, and gave it
credence, thinking the officer’s opinion worth attention, as he was
particularly shrewd and intelligent. But on consulting the medical man
of the establishment, he found the statement quite without foundation.
Nothing of the kind ever happened; there was nothing the matter with
Welsh, and never had been. It was all pure nonsense.
Then there was the case of Stokes, a boy continually in mischief, an
arrant young villain, who coolly tells the governor that it is no use
sending him to the dark—the dark only makes him worse. The governor
reminded him that he had often tried kind and gentle methods in vain,
and asked what would make him better. Stokes replied that the only
thing to cure him would be a good sound flogging—knowing full well that
this it was not possible to inflict except for certain offences, all
of which he studiously avoided. Three days later when liberated from
the dark, to which he had been sent in default of corporal punishment,
he tried a fresh tack with Mr. Nihil, who observes, “This boy sent
for me, and spoke as from the very abyss of conscious depravity. He
complains of the hardness and wickedness of his heart. He thinks there
is something wrong about him. He cried much. I urged him to pray, but
he said his heart was too full—too full of wickedness to pray. I have
promised to visit him in his cell, when I shall endeavour to soften
and raise the tone of his mind, and pray with him.” Of course his new
attitude is all hypocritical deceit. Almost the next day he breaks out
in conduct more disorderly than ever, and after smashing his window,
spends his time in shouting to the prisoners below. The governor, now
alive to his real character, declares “that the injury done to the
discipline of the prison by the perpetual insubordination of this boy
has become so serious, that I think he must be sent up to the committee
as incorrigible.” Again he wavers, and again he changes his mind. “John
Stokes applied to me yesterday evening, and spoke so sensibly, with
such an appearance of a sincere desire for reformation, that I must beg
to suspend my recommendation for his removal to the hulks. The result
of such removal would probably be to consign him to the destroying
influences of the worst companions.” Stokes did not remain long in this
way of thinking, and continued still to be a thorn in the governor’s
side for many a month to come.
But we have in this an instance of the extreme pains Mr. Nihil was at
to do his duty conscientiously by all. And if he had sometimes to deal
with designing hypocrites, he was not always wrong—at least, in cases
like the following, the imposture, if any, was well concealed.
A woman came forward of her own accord to confess that she had made a
false charge against another prisoner.
“What led you to make the charge?” (She had accused the other of
calling her names.)
“Spite.”
“And what leads you now to confess?”
“I was so much impressed by the sermon I heard yesterday from the
strange gentleman.”
The governor admitted that it was a most impressive discourse, well
calculated to awaken the guilty conscience. “Being anxious,” he says,
“to foster every symptom of repentance, I did not punish this woman.
She freely acknowledged she deserved to be punished, but I thought it
might tend to repress good feeling were I, under the circumstances, to
act with rigour.”
Another woman, named Alice Bradley, sent for the governor, and told him
that she had put down her name for the sacrament, but that she could
not feel happy till she had told him all the truth. “I encouraged her
to make the communication,” says the governor, “whereupon,” with a
subdued voice and many tears, she said, “I was guilty of what I was
sent here for.”
“This girl had invariably,” goes on Mr. Nihil, “with much appearance
of a tender conscience, and a spirit wounded by injustice, protested
her innocence. This perseverance in her protestations had now lasted
six months, and it appeared that the girl had imposed a persuasion of
her innocence on her nearest relations. I was much gratified with the
contrition that was now developed under the system of this place, so
consolatory amidst the numerous instances of a contrary description
which we daily witness; and I endeavoured to trace the prisoner’s
impression to some distinct instrumentality, which might be improved
to further usefulness. She could only attribute her recent feelings to
prayer.”
Again, he states the case of George Cubitt, who had been extremely
well-conducted since he came to the Penitentiary. “He looks ill,
and much altered within a short time, and seems much distressed. He
told me he had of late been affected with the most dreadfully wicked
thoughts, that he had a strong temptation to sell himself to the devil,
and feared he had done so. That, on Friday week, when in bed, he was
much oppressed with these thoughts, which he long resisted, but at
last gave way, and made an oath to himself to sell himself. He got up
immediately, and felt a chill all over him, as if his nature was quite
changed. Ever since he has been subject to the most shocking thoughts
and fears. He attributed the calamity to his having been alone, and
seemed to dread the idea of returning to a cell by himself. I see no
signs of pretence about this boy, and greatly pity him. His nerves have
evidently been shaken by confinement. I prayed with him, and said what
I could to dissipate his terrors, and bade him make the goodness of God
his protection. I could wish that in a case of this kind the discipline
of the prison admitted of a little labour in the garden; but I see
great practical difficulties in making practical arrangements for the
purpose.”
Of course Mr. Nihil was in his element in dealing with a case of this
kind; just as the following claimed at once the whole of his sympathy
and attention.
A prisoner was seized suddenly with an attack of hydrophobia. The only
cause known was that he had been badly bitten by a dog six or seven
years before. “The poor patient was in a most distressing state, being
a fine intelligent youth, and in an admirable spirit of Christian
resignation. He observed to me repeatedly that he was a poor friendless
boy, and that this was a wise and merciful providence, for if he lived
to get his liberty he might get into trouble and come to a bad end.
When I saw him next morning, most edifying was the whole tenour of
his observations and his prayers. That night he grew to be in a state
of high excitement, continually imploring me and every one for tea,
while unable to taste a drop out of a basin which he held in his hand.
About midnight he took a turn—no longer expressed any bodily want,
but, as from a mind stored with scriptural truths, poured out the most
appropriate ideas and expressions, though in a raving and delirious
manner. It was most gratifying to observe the just views he exhibited,
and the expressions of his deep repentance and humility. But dreadful
to our feelings was the succeeding phasis which his disorder assumed.
He seemed to struggle with a deadly foe, beating about his arms, and
striving with incessant violence, while he uttered the language of
abhorrence towards his enemy. Then, after a while, he began to give
utterance to the most senselessly obscene and filthy language and
ideas, nor were we able to repress them; but with these were mixed
pleasing expressions of a pious, confiding tendency. This mixed and
incongruous exhibition continued till about 3 A.M., when he sunk into
death.”
Even if it could have been proved against Mr. Nihil that he was lacking
in the resolute peremptoriness of persons bred to command, this
chaplain-governor was, however, not wanting in many of the qualities of
a good administrator. It must be recorded to his credit that he brought
in many reforms, of which time has since proved the wisdom. There was
for instance the change he instituted in the system of hearing and
adjudicating upon charges of misconduct. It had been the custom for
the governor to rush off post-haste to the scene of action, and then
and there administer justice. Now, Mr. Nihil resolved to take “the
reports” the same hour every morning, “thereby economizing time, and
having the advantage of previous calm consideration. Besides,” he says,
“officers and prisoners are both much irritated when the offence is
still fresh, and the frequent interruptions took the governor often
away from other subjects which at the time had full possession of his
mind.” Again, after a daring and successful escape, he recommends
that every prisoner at night should be obliged to put outside his
cell gate all the tools, etc., with which he has been at work during
the day. An obvious precaution, perhaps, which is the invariable rule
now with all men, especially “prison breakers,” but the necessity of
it was not recognized till Mr. Nihil found it out. Although in his
management of his officers he erred somewhat in being too anxious
to obtain a standard of impossible morality, still he knew that more
than mere admonition was needed to maintain order and obedience to
the regulations. With this in view he instituted a system of fines,
as the best method of insuring punctuality and exact discharge of
duties. It is really a marvel how the Penitentiary had been governed
for so long without it. Nor did his tenderness and solicitude for the
spiritual welfare of the prisoners prevent his entering a sound protest
against over-much pampering them in food. “I have frequent occasion
to observe,” he remarks in one part of his journal, “the extreme
sauciness of prisoners with regard to their victuals. It appears
from Mr. Chadwick’s report, and the evidence that he collected, that
the industrious labourers are the worst fed; the next best are the
poor-house paupers; the next, convicts for petty thefts; the best are
felons, with the exception of transports, who are still more abundantly
supplied abroad. The idle and the profligate act upon the knowledge
of these facts, and we have in the Penitentiary several of that
description. Their fastidiousness and impertinence strangely illustrate
the fact that our diet is much too high for the purposes of a prison.”
Certainly the calls upon his time were many and various. Now for
the first time, in consequence of the great complaints made against
the county gaols, arising chiefly from the want of separate cells,
the Penitentiary became the receptacle for soldiers sentenced to
imprisonment by court-martial. And with the introduction of this
new element he brought about his ears a crowd of new questions and
new difficulties—a different dietary scale, different labour, and a
great accession of misconduct of a new description; above all, new
officials to deal with, and plenty of punctilious red-tapism, to which,
as a civilian, he was altogether unaccustomed. Then, through strong
representations made to the Government of the scandalous manner in
which female transports were shipped to the penal colonies, it was
decided that most of those who came from a distance should be lodged
in Millbank to await embarkation. All these women were the scum of
the earth, and added greatly to the governor’s trials. They came
to the Penitentiary in a miserable state of rags and wretchedness,
shoeless, shiftless, and filthy. They were often accompanied by their
children of all ages, from infancy to fourteen or fifteen years; and
in nearly every case the conduct of all was violent and outrageous
beyond description. Knowing they had nothing to gain by a conformity to
the rules of the establishment, and that by no possibility could they
escape transportation, they gave vent to their evil passions and set
all authority at defiance.
Another vexation, which pressed perhaps more sorely on him than any I
have described, was the invasion of his territory by a Roman Catholic
clergyman, appointed under a recent Act of Parliament to visit Roman
Catholic prisoners. I do not suppose that Mr. Nihil was more intolerant
than were others of his cloth in those days, when antagonism between
churches ran unusually high, and there is much excuse for the remarks
he makes on the subject. By the Act provision was made for the payment
of the priest from the prison fund. This Mr. Nihil characterizes as
tantamount to “establishment.” He does not see the necessity for
anything of the kind, especially as the scruples of all the Roman
Catholic prisoners have hitherto been most punctiliously respected. He
foresees trouble and difficulty: Where was the line to be drawn with
respect to discipline? Would not friction and difficulty arise from
the Roman Catholic prisoners placing themselves under the patronage
of the Roman Catholic priest in opposition to the governing authority
of the prison? Happily, these anticipations proved almost groundless,
and, except in one or two trivial instances, which are hardly worth
recording, no evil results followed the occasional admission of the
priest to the Penitentiary.