The Utter Desolation of a Sick Prisoner
When a prisoner is admitted she is first weighed and then allotted a bed. Her food and medicine are given her by an officer, who places it on a chair at her bedside if she is too ill to sit at the table. The doctor makes his rounds in the morning and evening, and if the patient is seriously ill he may make a visit in the night also. The matron in charge goes through the wards at stated times to see that all is going well, but there is no nursing. The prisoner must attend to her own wants, and if too weak to do so, she must depend upon some other patient less ill than herself to assist her. To be sick in prison is a terrible experience. I felt acutely the contrast between former illnesses at home and the desolation and the indifference of the treatment under conditions afforded by a prison infirmary. To lie all day and night, perhaps day after day, and week after week, alone and in silence, without the touch of a friendly hand, the sound of a friendly voice, or a single expression of sympathy or interest! The misery and desolation of it all can not be described. It must be experienced. I arrived at Woking ill, and I left Woking ill.