Six Years in the Prisons of England

In the beginning of the year 1856 I commenced business on my own account, as a merchant in a Northern City. Previous to that time I had been engaged in an unsuccessful partnersh...

It is impossible to give the faintest idea of my state of mind on finding myself a prisoner. The circumstances of my arrest, while in the midst of my arrangements for a long nig...

THREE MONTHS IN A SCOTTISH PRISON--BEGIN MY STUDY OF THE CONVICT AND HIS SURROUNDINGS--AN OLD JAIL BIRD--A SOLDIER--AN INNOCENT CONVICT--MY FIRST CRACKSMAN ACQUAINTANCE--CONSPIR...

On my arrival at the Yorkshire prison I and my companions were subjected to a new, and to me most painful operation. I am quite well aware that it would be next to useless, if n...

The Surrey prison in which I was doomed to spend nearly five years of my life is a somewhat spacious looking building, situated in a healthy locality, and fitted up for the acco...

About two months after the amputation of my leg, feeling and believing that my health would never be restored in confinement I wrote a petition to the Home Secretary, in the exp...

As a means of beguiling the time while in the hospital, I used to enter into long conversations with those of my fellow prisoners who were willing to gratify my curiosity, with...

"I was about fifteen years of age before I stole any money, or got into any trouble; but I used to 'nick' little things, such as fruit, &c., when I was a kid. My father kept a s...

ANOTHER PRISONER--"HAPPY AS A KING"--CURE OF A DOCTOR--THE TOBACCO AND FOOD EXCHANGE--ANOTHER JAIL-BIRD--CIVIL AND LAZY--UNDESERVED REMISSION--PRISON DIRECTORS, AND HOW THEY DIS...

My readers must now descend with me from the hospital, to what the convicts termed the twenty-four bedded room in the prison. In the cells and in the hospital, quietness reigned...

As I have already said in a previous chapter, one of the most glaring defects in our present system of penal servitude, viewed as a means of reformation as well as of punishment...

A certain class of criminals--it would be very wrong to say all--may be looked upon as rebels against society, and assuming that they are so, it would be difficult to conceive a...

The year 1864 was a marked epoch in convict life. A new Act was then passed and fresh prison regulations were brought into force. This Act contained one good clause, viz., the a...

Shortly after the new regulations were made known to the prisoners, I wrote a letter to my brother, and in this solitary instance I confess in a somewhat ironical strain, and as...

On one occasion during my second sojourn in hospital, my attention was accidentally directed to a pale, sickly-looking young man, who had just arrived with a number of other pri...

I have already said in a previous chapter that our prison authorities regard the convicts as mere human machines, all made after the same model, and that the machinery, by some...

During my second stay in hospital the governor from another prison came to rule over our establishment. He was known to most of the prisoners as "Bread and Water Jack," some cal...

Having recruited my strength in hospital, I was again discharged to resume my work in prison. Shortly after my return to my old quarters, I thought I would inform my friends tha...

PRISONERS' CONVERSATIONS--LARRY AND TIM GET INTO CHOKEY--BIG CROPPY--WHAT PAT GETS "IN FOR"--MALICIOUS GAMBLING--PAT'S PATENT FOR GETTING A NEW COAT--DICK'S EXPLOITS--NED'S ADVE...

During the last year of my imprisonment a bill relating to the crimes of murder and manslaughter was brought before Parliament, and the discussion in the House of Commons which...