Part 10 (2/2)
Great sensitiveness pervades too many minds on the idea of attempting to show benevolence to a released prisoner, they holding it as a wrong to society. These will not hear on the subject understandingly, but with prejudice and a proclivity to misrepresent. Though the cla.s.s does not embrace, in its numbers, the more intelligent, worthy citizens, yet it contains more or less who possess the power of casting mists of blindness before the well-disposed and honest seekers for the right.
In this cla.s.s, we find the ideas of the brutal and vindictive freely cropping out in their utterances. ”Those fellows ought to suffer. They were put in prison for punishment, now let them have enough of it, so that they may thus learn to do better, no matter if it were ten times worse.” These persons seem to think that the correct way of prison management would be to select the most hard-hearted, cruel men of the State for officers, and deliver the convicts into their hands, for them to exercise their brutal feelings upon as fully and freely as they may choose. These points, then, evidently need to be agitated in the State, by lecturers and through the press, but it were better that this work be done by others than by the prison chaplain.
The loss of my occasional writing was severely felt, especially by outside friends. Thus, on Fast day of '71, a prisoner wrote a letter to a sister in the West, and asked for an envelope and stamp that he might send it, but weeks and months pa.s.sed and none were forthcoming. There was the idea, ”You must not ask a second time.” The sister became deeply troubled at not hearing from or about the brother, not knowing whether he were dead or alive, and wrote to me, earnestly beseeching to be informed. But as I was now under the ban, I did not answer her. She also wrote to the ex-warden, but he was away and did not answer. In the fall, when that gentleman of Concord was chosen warden, she wrote to him, but, as he was sick and knew nothing of the matter, he did not respond. And no doubt she also wrote to the warden himself; but probably has not heard to this day.
Formerly, I should have written her something like this: ”Your brother is alive, in usual health, and progressing well. Don't be over-anxious till he may write you.” In this way I could have satisfied her, measurably, at least with no reflection, in any way, on prison management.
This neglect of the deputy seemed the more cruel from the fact that the man was a most faithful, obedient prisoner, and that this sister had previously furnished him with ample writing materials, that he might write frequently with no expense to the State, which materials the warden had confiscated on coming into office.
In connection with this matter, the important question comes up, In whose hands, really, should the prison correspondence be placed?--in those of the warden or chaplain? The correspondence, to be well managed, requires no little labor, especially if the inmates are permitted to write as they should and receive answers in return. If, in the warden's hands, it would tend to crowd other business too much, or itself be too much neglected, the latter having been the fact.
To avoid all this, in various places, they put the management in the hands of the chaplain. This would seem the more appropriate, being rather in his line of duty, and more easily performed by him. A schedule of the points of information, which should be allowed to pa.s.s, could be marked out by the competent authority and laid before him for his guidance, that matters might be correct in that respect.
This question ought to receive the careful attention of our law-makers, for proper letter writing should not be restricted in any degree in the prison. Good letters from home and friends will bring with them no little reformatory power and influence to quietness and order. Indeed, the privilege, by proper management, can be made a great force in disciplinary efforts among the prisoners.
32. _Change, for a time, in the warden's management._ Shortly after the death of Sylver, a man, occupying a cell near by, was taken sick, but could sit up the most of the time. As he said, the warden went to him and remarked, ”I am warden here. Be free, and ask for whatever you need, and you shall have it.” He permitted this man to sit with his cell door unlocked, and to go to the stove when he chose, and, to all appearance, properly cared for him, giving reason for much commendation. True, he was shortly to leave prison, and his statement would go towards counteracting the reports of prison cruelty circulating outside, and some were uncharitable enough to contend that this was the object of the better treatment.
One evening, about this time, I found a prisoner in his cell appearing as though he could live but a few hours, and perhaps minutes, unless immediately attended to. He had been in the hospital a number of weeks with a lung difficulty and, though he had not recovered, was transferred sometime that day, I think, to his cell,--to a colder atmosphere. Here, he found it difficult to speak or breathe. I hastened to the warden for him to attend to the matter. He hurried for the physician, who soon arrived, and had the sufferer returned to the hospital, where he died some weeks after. This was one of my only three requests or suggestions that were granted or favorably attended to by the warden while I was under him. True, I was not denied many times, for I early learned not to propose anything or make any request, except when absolutely needed.
This changed course in the warden, however, did not continue many weeks.
That hearing and its acquittal had pa.s.sed, and the Sylver affair was dying away, when, at length, I thus found him returned to his former spirit. Though early in the season, on a warm day, he had divested the sick of their flannels, and I suppose all other prisoners. Soon the weather became cooler, and I found a sick man in the hospital suffering greatly for want of his flannels, which articles, as he a.s.serted, he had not previously been without, summer or winter, for twenty years. He was trembling with the cold, which much enhanced his distress. Going to the warden, I presented the case, and received the reply, ”If he wants his flannels, let him ask the doctor.” He could meddle in the matter enough to divest the man of the needed articles, but would not move to put them on, and thus mitigate his sufferings. It was then early in the afternoon, and the man would have to suffer till the next forenoon, the usual time for the doctor to make his visit. When he came, as I was informed, he lectured them severely for removing the flannels at all.
33. _The fate of Henry Stewart and others._ Henry was said to have been exceedingly unfortunate in his parents, they having been largely chargeable with his proclivities to evil. He was highly excitable, easily thrown into a perfect phrensy of pa.s.sion, insane at times, and, on the whole, very difficult to manage, requiring a large amount of patience and skill in those over him. They needed to study his peculiarities and accommodate their treatment to his particular case, much the same as would the driver of a vicious, balky horse. The former managers had so treated him, that he had really improved, and his condition was appearing more and more hopeful. But in the new order, where officers were not expected to bother themselves over peculiarities, it was different with Henry. Though laboring with faithfulness generally, what was bred within would appear in outward acts. When a spell came on, they would ”shake him up,” as the deputy said (the import of which I did not fully understand), and put him in the solitary. At length his insanity, or whatever had impelled him, would pa.s.s off, and he come out in his right mind. Confinement to his cell would probably have been just as effective in securing his good deportment and less injurious to his health. Whenever I visited him, he would appear hopeful, tell what a good boy he proposed to be, how he meant to live, and not get into any more trouble; that he should soon be out, and would then strive to be a good man. Many air castles the poor fellow thus built, but to see them fall. The prison fare and general management was now highly unfavorable to his proclivities, tending constantly to make them worse. Men repeatedly told me that the officers would severely beat him, and that he was sadly abused. One day, in a freak of insanity or anger, he struck his overseer to the floor with a bed-post, coming within a hair's breadth of ending his life, and was aiming a second blow, which a fellow prisoner arrested, and thus saved the overseer. Henry was put in the solitary, and I know not how long kept there, nor how used; but when, at length, I found him in his cell, he was greatly changed. I was perfectly astonished! He was not only insane, but changed in physical appearance; shrunken in flesh and with a strange expression of countenance. For a time, I could hardly believe it was Henry, but finally had to admit that it was really he. I have seldom seen one with a fever change more for the time. Soon his insanity took a boisterous turn by night, keeping the other prisoners all awake, which induced them for a time to confine him to the solitary during these hours, and keep him in his cell by day. But his howls so disturbed the prison family, that they next resorted to keeping him in the shop by night, lying upon his back, his feet chained together, with a post between them.
Thus, they continued for a season, but finally, the governor sent him to the insane asylum. Shortly after, I was speaking to one of Henry, in hearing of the warden, as being insane, to which he replied, ”No, he is not insane. He is ugly, of which I could have cured him, had his time not been so near out.” I thought, ”You _would_ have cured him by death, and were very near it.”
As he was taken to the asylum, the warden said to me, ”Chaplain, I wish it understood that he is taken out to be tried for attempting to kill his overseer,” thereby expressing the desire, as I understood it, for me to give that version of the matter to the prisoners. ”What an idea!” I answered in my mind, ”the chaplain going about lying for the warden!”
Fisher was naturally of a low order of mind, but still possessed knowledge enough to work well at many things under the direction of another, was to come out the early part of March, but whom I missed from his cell a while previous, and, from his long absence, began to suppose they had sent him off unbeknown to me. But the day previous to the expiration of his sentence, I found him again in his cell, completely demented. I was told by more than one, that his overseer, attempting to direct him in a certain way about his work and not succeeding, seized him by the collar, plunged him head foremost to the floor, and then jerked him about, he probably now uttering some disrespectful words; then the deputy was called and took him to the solitary, I was also informed, and plunged him against the outer prison door, on the way, with such force as to push it open.
When first finding him in his cell, as stated, I asked where his father lived, and he answered, ”Enfield,” as I understood it. But after that, I could not obtain even a sound from his lips. He kept almost constantly spitting, would frequently laugh to himself, but I could learn nothing about his legal residence. I was expected to care for him, and would not turn him loose to suffer and perhaps perish; but I found that I should be liable for damage, should I send him to another town. True, the State, by her prison management, had reduced him to this wretched condition, and ought to bear the expense of maintaining him, but there was no law or provision for that. Hence, finding it my only safe and legitimate course, I obtained a decree from the probate judge, took him to the insane asylum, and notified the commissioners of that county, of the same.
No doubt, with proper prison fare and treatment, both of these men might have come out able to earn their living, under proper guardians, which they would have needed; and that the fate of both was directly chargeable to the prison treatment.
There was one, also, who left after my departure from prison, belonging to another State, who had become nearly as demented as Fisher. Hence, they obtained for him a railroad pa.s.s, and put him on board the cars with a label fastened upon his arm, directing him to be transferred to such a State and town, where his friends were supposed to live. He, too, I doubt not, was reduced to that demented condition by the prison treatment for he was far from such a state at the beginning of the year.
34. _Warden's want of courtesy to prisoners' visitors._ By rule, no friend is allowed to see a prisoner except in presence of the warden or a subordinate that he may hear whatever is said. The time allowed for a visit is usually short, and the parties, of course, wish to make the most of every moment. But no little complaint was made, that, when the interview was in the warden's presence, he would engross much of the time in recounting his exploits in prison management, the disorders he found, the corrections he had made, how they would deceive his predecessor, but could not deceive him, and the like. No matter how far one had come, or at what expense, he would, perhaps, be treated thus.
Some, on going away, having had an opportunity of saying but few words to the prisoner whom they visited, would utter remarks which were anything but complimentary to the man thus imposing upon them, as they regarded it, and to the State for allowing such things to occur.
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