I have introduced the name of this amiable and lamented young man, to
illustrate some other parts of that deformed and dreadful character in
which so many of the keepers glory. Having experienced the hardening
effect of that awful place on their moral feelings, they take an
infamous delight in accelerating the same effect on all who enter into
the service of the prison. To accomplish this, they give them to
understand that the prisoners are a malicious, bloodthirsty, and
hellish pack, whom they must treat with perfect hatred and the most
jealous and wakeful suspicion. They are taught to keep their swords
always sharp as a scythe, and fastened to their wrists by a strong
leather strap. It is impressed on their minds that they are as
insecure when with the prisoners, as if they were among a clan of
Arabs or a gang of pirates. To make these instructions the more
efficacious, the keepers try all schemes which they can think of, to
find their pupils off their guard, and to make them believe that the
prisoners are on the eve of some dreadful plot. Under such masters,
and such a course of education, the new servants enter upon their
duty; and who can wonder to find them becoming in a short time as
hateful as their teachers.
Mr. Stricklin was engaged as a guard. As soon as he entered on his
duty, his ears were made to tingle with the lectures of his new
associates. He was a young man of amiable disposition, and having but
little acquaintance with mankind, he presumed that what the keepers
told him was true. His conduct under such impressions was such as
might have been expected. One day as he was in a shop to relieve the
keeper, he gave some indications of the study in which he had been
engaged, and also of the effect which his lessons had produced on his
mind. As he was walking through the shop, he stopped suddenly, and
demanded attention. When all was silent, and every ear open to what he
might say, he observed that he had been employed as guard, and might
stay longer or not so long, just as he might feel disposed; but while
he did stay, he said, if the prisoners would treat him well, he would
be kind to them. There was some singularity in this, as also in his
manner, which no one failed to notice.
At night he went on guard, and his duty was to see that no prisoner
made his escape. This required that he should be attentive to every
noise, and be furnished with means of defence. The place for the guard
at night is a small apartment in which he is locked up, and must stay
till released. This room is in the prison, and adjoining the cells of
the prisoners. The means of defence are a gun and a sword. With these
arms, and in this place, Mr. Stricklin was posted when the events of
which I am now going to write, occurred.
Scarcely had he entered on his post, before some of the keepers placed
themselves at a grated window, exactly over his head, and began to
make a noise on the grates like the sound of a file. Their object was
to make him think that the prisoners were breaking out. He heard the
noise, and began to call on the prisoners to be still, supposing they
were filing the grates. The noise was kept up, and some chips and an
old shoe were thrown down at him, by the keepers at the window. For
nearly an hour they continued their cruel and unmanly sport, until he
became frantic, and began to exhibit unequivocal evidences of a
terrified and shattered intellect. He had before this time ascertained
that the keepers were the authors of the noise he had attributed to
the prisoners, and the effect of such mean and hypocritical conduct on
him was most painfully developed. He became as furious as a hungry
lion. He ascended and descended the stairs with a rapidity of step
never equalled, and with shrieks that pierced the very heavens. He
stamped on the stairs as if a mountain had fallen, and the sound made
the iron doors tremble on their hinges. He kept every guard and keeper
at bay till his time expired; and at the very minute for him to be
relieved, he screamed like a panther that his time was out, and was
let out of his room. He went immediately to bed, and by morning became
rational. After breakfast the Warden told him he had no more for him
to do, and kicked him out headlong on the brick pavement before the
door. At least, the undisputed report says so; I did not see it
myself. This threw him back again into the most wild and frantic
ravings, and he returned home and died in a few weeks. His mind was a
perfect ruin, and he left the world a poor distracted youth.
Now, my dear reader, pause and contemplate this melancholy sketch. Who
were the criminal cause of this young man's death? I know some of the
men who stood at that grated window, and frightened him to madness;
and I say to them, if they should ever read this page, that the blood
of a promising youth, of good character and amiable connexions, has
stained their doings, and it is high time for them to repent. The
voice of Mr. Stricklin's death cries to heaven against them, and the
voice of _such_ a death, can never cry in vain.
But if it be true, as is reported, that the Warden treated him with
such cruel and shameful indignity, what shall be said of _him_? He
had sons of the same age, but none more likely or promising; and how
did he know that it was not through the means of some of _them_, that
this youth was ruined? Every body knows that Wardens of prisons are
tyrants, and few will question the perfect right of _this_ one, to a
very liberal share of this character. Certainly, if he abused that
ruined young man as it is said he did, he richly merits the title of
Nero the Second. At any rate, I know enough of him never to call him a
_merciful_ man, and I would ask all men, all angels, and all
creatures, to look at his conduct just as it is, and decide on his
fitness or _un_fitness for the office of Warden of a penitentiary. He
never found any fault with those who drove the victim of his anger to
distraction; I know not but he applauded them. I know, however, that
Mr. Stricklin came to the prison in health; that he was frighted to
distraction one night while on duty, by some of the keepers and guard;
that he was turned away in the morning; and that he died in a few
weeks perfectly deranged.
It is reported that he plead with the Warden to stay, remarking that
it would injure his character to be turned out so. He was well
reported of by all men, was an officer in the militia, and the pride
of his family. No one can reflect on his untimely and unhappy death
without the most painful emotions of soul. And in concluding this
article I feel it to be a duty which I owe to the young men of our
country, to exhort them never to become prison keepers, but to shun
those places which have a tendency to blunt the finer feelings of the
heart, and stupify their moral sensibilities.
And I would be equally friendly to such as are already engaged in
prisons. Let them try to act like merciful beings, and forget not that
cruelty is no part of their office. Let them redeem the character of
gaolers, and shew by their conduct that humanity and justice can dwell
in their hearts. It is important that they should heed this counsel,
for it will be a sad vicissitude after having been _keepers_ on earth,
to become _prisoners_ in eternity.