A brief history of time (in prison)

A school of crime?

Introduction to prisons

• In early years Britain had little need, if any, for prisons. The normal sentence for those found guilty was death while those found innocent were simply set free. Dungeons were certainly used as prisons for ordinary soldiers in the middle ages.

• As an alternative to death and execution in 1615, Thomas More's Utopia suggested a proposal for imprisonment as punishment. The suggestion was that thieves be locked away and reduced in status as slaves for a number of years, but as state prisons at the time did not exist there was no place to send them.

The prison population grew by seventy per cent to 77,000 between 1993 and 2005.

The New Prison• The new prison was founded with £2000 paid by Bishop Barrington

Shute of Durham who wanted to be rid of the existing gaol which he felt was a traffic hazard.

• In 1808 Sir George Wood had commented on the poor state of the House of Correction and County Gaol and so moves were made to build a new prison to replace these.

• The new prison had 600 cells and was able to replace both the old House of Correction and the County Gaol.

• Some prisoners have claimed that the new prison is haunted - saying they have seen something in a cell where one inmate was allegedly stabbed to death by another.

The new prison needed new rules which reflected the changes in attitude to punishment and criminals. After 1819 male and female prisoners were kept apart, as were debtors and felons. Rules forbade drinking, bad language, disobedience, quarrelling and indecency. All prisoners were to be put to work with some being paid for their work when they were discharged. The prisoners were classified and separated according to the crimes they had committed and work was expected to help in reforming the character of these people. Short term offenders had to take away rubbish, level ground, extend gardens whilst longer term prisoners had to pick oakum, work in the workshops etc. Considerable efforts were made to find suitable work for every prisoner but bad weather sometimes made this difficult.

Punishments in prisonThe prison operated a series of punishments for various misdemeanours. This included fettering in irons, flogging, birching, the treadmill and close confinement. The treadmill was introduced as a punishment when a prisoner had severely broken the prison rules. They were expected to turn the treadmill by walking on it. Each turn was counted and 500 turns was considered a good day's effort. However, as the prisoner became accustomed to the treadmill it became easier for the prisoner to turn so a special screw was introduced which the prison turnkeys could use to adjust the pressure and make it more difficult to turn. This is why prison officers are still known to this day as 'screws'.

Newgate Prisons• Back in the 1800’s crime was treated more harshly and most

people were accused and just thrown in cells. There was a variety of types of cells, ranging from the pits to normal cells, there was also inequality between men and women, as women cells had beds in them (even though there were about 6 woman allocated to one cell) and were just better than what the males got. If the males wanted to be transferred to a better cell they would have to pay, however the cell they would have gotten would have been packed it 12 other people who slept and did their business. This wouldn’t have been much better as there was a much higher rate of illness. The people that didn’t pay were automatically thrown into the pits.Once the prisoners were convicted of a crime, most were sentenced to death, in specific the gallows, on the way to gallows the carriage taking the prisoner would stop and every pub and the landlord would give them a free pint, this is so that the prisoner would be totally drunk before he was killed and so that he wouldn’t notice. However at the last pub, the prisoner was taken through an underground passage to the gallows to avoid the public.

Types of cells. The pits. This is one of the worst cells to be put in, there was no light, it was underground and as many people couldn’t afford to be put in better cells this cell would be more likely to be packed with more people.

Woman cells. These cells had beds and a chamber pot. Outside this cell was a small room where they could roam about during the day time, and usually there would be 6 women allocated to one room.

Another type of cell would have been a dark room with a bench, people would have been shackled up and left in there until there time with the jury would have come.In one certain prison, all the cells went underground and at the lowest level there was a chapel where the prisoners could have there last prayer.

This type of cell would have had one person allocated to one of the slots. They would have to stay there during the day. And the conditions would have been really bad.

This is the last pub the criminal would have seen before the gallows. The picture above is also inside this building. This would have been the last pub from Newgate Prison.

The chapel is on the lowest level of the prisons and would have been the last place for the criminals to pray.

These are pictures of recent/today’s prisons. As you can see, there have been various changes. The major change would be the living conditions; now, the criminals would be living in a clean environment and would have extra facilities such as a TV for entertainment and more comfortable beds. In the old cells, they would have to sleep on the floor or beds with no mattresses or in their own excrete.