DISCIPLINE
Punishments for escaping were usually severe. I was put in what was
called the lockup. Each cottage possessed one. It was a narrow closet
of a room about five by seven feet. There wasn’t a sign of a window in
it, the door was made of several thicknesses of wood, reenforced by
numerous steel plates. A narrow slit in the wall acted as a ventilator.
There were no toilet facilities. There was no bed but a board, and
there was no covering. My outer clothes were taken from me before
entering. Can you imagine the feelings of one confined in such a place?
Each morning, about eight o’clock, the officer of the family unlocked
the door, a boy placed a piece of bread about the size of a half a
loaf and a cup of water inside the door, emptied the excretion of the
night, and another day began. In this place I spent the next eighteen
days. In all that time I was denied the privilege of exercising, of
seeing the sun, of even washing myself.
On the morning of the eighteenth day I was taken to the punishment
room. I was stripped naked and whipped with forty lashes. A devilish
mind invented this implement of torture. A strap about fourteen inches
long and about fifteen inches at its widest part was affixed to a
wooden handle, to give, as I once heard an officer say, more swing to
it. To give it pliability it is kept in an oil solution; this is to
keep the leather soft and prevent its breaking.
I had a dumb notion in my head that my punishment was about over
with, but I was sadly mistaken. That noon I was ordered “on line” for
thirty days. This “on line” punishment must have been devised by one
inordinately brutal. There were certain hours at the school which were
regarded as recreation time. If one were “on line,” he walked in a
circle about thirty feet in circumference during all that period of
play. He was supposed to let his hands fall at his side, face square
to the front, and in absolute silence. Of course this galled bitterly.
The boy being punished by this method was in full view of the others
and they of him; he saw them at their games, but could take no part in
their pleasures. For myself I preferred the lockup to this.
In my later days at the school, when experience had toughened and
much punishment hardened me, I refused to walk, and took the licking
instead. There came a day when they even stopped licking me.
That experience, following the escape, pulled me down a little lower.
I began to hate the society which maintained such an institution. I
scoffed at the name “reform” and resolved to escape again. I soon did
so, but the law reached out for me and brought me back. I tried again
and again, but each time I was returned. The fourth time I managed to
stay away for three long months. I had a unique experience after being
returned this fourth time. All the other times on my return to the
institution after escaping, I was subjected to the usual punishment. On
my return this time, however, I was brought immediately before the head
of the institution. He spoke to me kindly of the uselessness of such
escapes, and asked me to promise him that I would not attempt to escape
again. Of course I promised him; I would have promised anything that he
asked; but the promise was worth nothing. My nature had commenced to
acquire the quality of hypocrisy and I had been punished enough to lead
me to promise him anything.
He sent me back to my cottage with no words of reproof or smart of
punishment. He thought to teach me the right road by kindness, to
bring me to my senses by a little sympathy. But those virtues were
too late coming into my life at the School. My nature had fallen too
low to appreciate to the full such acts on the part of this official.
That they made some impression on me is shown by the fact that for the
following six months I surprised the boys and officials alike by my
becoming deportment. It didn’t last: I was soon deep in a plot that
seemed to make my freedom assured. The fear of physical suffering had
no terrors for me. The day of the final attempt for liberty came, and
that midnight saw a pal and me trudging a lonely country path on our
way to a railroad station and the outside world.
Five miles from the school is situated a small village. Its inhabitants
number about three hundred, devoted almost exclusively to the
manufacture of tobacco sundries. We reached this village with hearts
aglow and a song on our lips. Here was the railroad, and the railroad
was to carry us over the line to the joys of the outside world.
Suddenly from the side of the road came an avalanche of rushing forms.
We tried to run, but were swept to the ground by the onslaught. We
struggled and kicked and tore in an endeavor to throw our captors off.
We were husky specimens of manhood, this pal and I, and we put up a
fight, the memory of which will remain in that village for some few
years. They finally mastered us, and with pieces of hemp proceeded
to tie us up, awaiting the arrival of school officials and monetary
reward. You see, for the return of every escaped boy the State allows
the captor the sum of five dollars. In the struggle between our captors
and ourselves one of the former received a severe cut on the right arm,
presumably done by some sharp instrument. After lying twenty-two days
in the lockup for this last escapade I was arrested by the sheriff of
the county for this alleged atrocious assault, as the warrant read. I
can honestly say that that arrest was welcomed. I didn’t know who had
cut the man, my pal or I, or whether in the scrimmage he had been cut
by one of his own friends, but, anyway, it was an opportunity to get
away from the school, and this certainly was welcome.